The Role of the Church

It's my privilege tonight to introduce to you Paul Craig. Paul is one of the pastors at Grace Covenant in Beaver Creek. We've had a long association with that church. And Paul and Jill and their family have been there since 2007. Now before that, they're missionaries in Kenya. And Paul, for the life of me, I'm trying to remember when the first time I met you was.

Do you remember? Was it at Masters? Okay. All right. But I remember Paul moving up here, getting to know him through the church at Beaver Creek. And I always called him the coolest missionary ever.

See, he really was the coolest missionary ever. So that's how I knew him. That's how I knew him. And we got to know one another. We did things together. It has been a real privilege to get to know Paul and Jill and their family.

And so I asked Paul to come and minister to us from the word of God about missions. Because I respect Paul and his studies in the word. and the fact that, as we all talk about here, about the sufficiency of the word of God, that extends to missions too. The Bible ought to be able to tell us how to do that, right? And Paul has done a great job, in my estimation, of seeing what scripture has to say about that.

So, Paul, come and minister the word tonight, and we anticipate God's blessings as you minister to us in the next couple of days. Tim's the coolest pastor. But you know that, right? Well, it's great. I'm very thankful that you guys invited me here. I don't know how much the rest of you had anything to do with it, but we'll hold off till Sunday to see if you're happy with the decision.

So we're going to talk about missions, right? I hope so. That's what I'm ready to talk about. So I'm sure the Lord is going to bless our time together. Let's open up with a word of prayer. Father in heaven we thank you for who you are We are so grateful that you took it upon yourself to draw us to yourself We thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ for the love that we just sang about and for your sovereign choice in our lives.

We don't deserve, Lord, even the least of the blessings, and yet you lavish your love upon us. We are thankful. Father, as we come together tonight, Lord, our hearts are full, our minds are full. There are distractions. There are many things, Lord, that would keep us from thinking hard on these things from your word. But we pray that you would set those aside and that you would allow us to focus on your truth.

We pray that your spirit one more time would have his way. Lord, that you would be exalted in our midst, exalted among the nations, Lord, and that your glory would fill the earth. We pray in Christ's name. Amen. So the final words of Jesus before ascending to heaven was to instruct believers to go and make disciples, baptizing them, teaching them all that he had commanded them.

I think we're familiar with that passage at the end of Matthew. We're going to look at that here briefly. Now, and I'm not assuming that you all know everything about the Bible, right? Okay, yeah. Well, maybe you do. I mean, Tim Pasma is your pastor, right?

So, yeah. But I wasn't invited up here to gush about Tim. Yeah. Now, we're here to look into the word of God concerning this issue of missions. So we can turn to the end of the Gospel of Matthew, the final verses there, if you have your copy of the scriptures. It's a familiar passage.

We'll just read together starting at 28.16. This is the word of the Lord Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them And when they saw him they worshipped him but some doubted And Jesus came and said to them All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. Now much has been said about this commission. Much can be said about it. But I want to just point out as we sort of introduce some of the things that we're going to talk about when we're together, two fundamental aspects of what Jesus told his disciples on that mountain on that day when he went back to heaven to take his seat at the right hand of the Father.

The first thing is that simply going, simply going, does not fulfill the command. Despite what many songwriters have said over the years, right? Keith Green, how many of you are familiar with Keith Green? So he had several songs that, it's like, if you didn't go, you were in sin. and it seemed to be that was the message, right? But while that's part of the command, it's not the focus of the command.

The going is connected to the sending for sure and we'll talk a little bit more about that later but the imperative here is making disciples. Making disciples. And so it might be translated this way, in your going, make disciples. The going part is just assumed. that you go and make disciples. We tack that on to a lot of things we tell our kids especially, right?

Go and take out the trash, right? So the going is just sort of understood to be part of that. And so it is with the Great Commission. As we go, as we move through our lives, and however God has sovereignly brought our lives about and the things that we're doing, we need to be making disciples. And the second thing this task of making disciples is divided equally notice divided equally between two endeavors Baptizing with all authority especially with all the authority of the Trinity We don want to overlook that That's an under-emphasized aspect of the Great Commission.

That is that we were sent in the name. We're baptizing in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. So for us, it's an authority issue. It's not like Piglet, you know, wringing his hands. It's just, oh, dear, dear, dear, right? You don't want to hear about this?

That's okay, right? It's not like that. We are to evangelize with authority. We are sent with authority. And I think we forget that sometimes, that God has sent us with that authority. The Lord Jesus has sent us with that authority.

And with that authority comes a measure of confidence. Not confidence in the flesh, right? Not confidence that I can do this. I got this, right? gird up our loins and I can overcome my fears and all that stuff. It's confidence that we're going with the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ himself. And that makes all the difference.

It really does. And we're going to talk some more about that. So we're evangelizing and we're teaching all that Jesus commanded. Teaching all that Jesus commanded. Say that. teaching all that Jesus commanded. We're going to be very interactive here.

Say it with me. All that Jesus commanded. We don't want to miss that. The alls of scripture are very important, and this is one of those very important alls. This is also, I think, under-emphasized because we don't pick and choose what we teach. That's already been chosen for us, and we teach everything, everything that Jesus commanded.

So here's a question to consider. And we're going to be considering over the next couple of days, I think, many important questions. Right? But here's one. Is the church sending missionaries skilled in expository preaching? Is the church sending missionaries skilled in expository preaching?

And you might answer that, well, I don't know. Or you might answer that, well, I hope so. Right? but we need an answer because we're commanded in the Great Commission to teach all that Jesus commanded and I don't know how to do that other than expository preaching If there is another way, I'm happy to look at it, but I don't think there is. And if we are sending missionaries skilled in expository preaching, great, that's good.

If we're not, shame on us, and we better make whatever changes we need to make. At whatever level we need to make them, by the grace of God, so that we are. Now scripture, as Pastor Tim said, gives us much needed guidance as to the role of the church in fulfilling this commission from the Lord. Who sends? Who goes? We live in the age, they call this age modern missions.

It started a couple hundred, 150, 200 years ago. Modern missions. Who sends? Who goes? and we have not been left to guess the answers to those questions. And it might be a startling revelation to you, but LaRue Baptist Church, is it LaRue or LaRue? I need to put this to rest.

See, this is why, this is right. Oregon or Oregon? I mean, all right. So let's just say this Baptist church. Is that safe? This church, literally, this local church has everything it needs, everything it needs to step up and be the sending church.

God has already decided it should be. Okay? You have everything you need. You lack no good thing to do this. At the risk of heresy, let me say this. Sanctification happens in us, as the church, mostly when we simply remember what God has already established as reality.

Right? That's sanctification. It's just lining up with what God has already done. Nothing new here. in case that is heretical you can ask me more after lunch on Sunday I guess there a question and answer time then right Until then just let me be heretical This local church, I think, may be farther along the missions path than you think. And so the conference title, this conference title, do we have, was there a PowerPoint slide or anything with that conference title on it?

That's okay if there's not. So I send it ahead of time. So you'll have to listen closely since it's not on a slide. I'm really not a PowerPoint person anyway. So the conference title that I put to it, Who Sends Who? Ecclesiology and the Great Commission.

Who Sends Who? Ecclesiology and the Great Commission. So tonight we're going to talk about the role of the church in this session. And we're going to talk about different aspects. We're going to talk about leadership, elders as missionaries, church planting, carrying the word of Christ to the lost. But since I put the word ecclesiology in the title, we should probably talk about the church.

So why are we talking about ecclesiology first in this anyway, the role of the church? Well, let me ask you this question. You're going to get a lot of questions. And this is interactive, so answer the questions when I ask them. So let me ask you this. If we're not doing it right at home, what makes us think we'll do it right anywhere else?

If we don't understand the role of the church as the scriptures open it up to us, What makes us think we're going to do that somewhere else when we plant a church? Okay, so the title, again, of the conference is Who Sends Who? That's the first part of it. What's wrong with that title? Who Sends Who? What's wrong with that title?

There is something wrong with it. What? What's that? Right. Who sends whom? Who sends whom Now is it a big deal that it wrong If you a grammarian or a grammar head right I not so I don have a problem with who sends who right But if that's an issue for you, yeah, you're going to have a problem with that.

I mean, you know, they have grammar rules for a reason, right? Yeah, the grammar heads are going, yeah, there's a reason. But while there might be certain repercussions for poor grammar, some more painful than others, the fallout of an unbiblical or extra-biblical or even a-biblical approach to fulfilling the Great Commission can be significant, to say the least.

To make it more clear, I'd like us to do a bit of role-playing to help us understand what I'm talking about. But before we get into that, we need to lay a solid scriptural foundation for why I'm calling our time together, Who Sends Whom, Ecclesiology and the Great Commission. So just back up, if you will, in Matthew to Matthew chapter 16. Matthew 16, and let's start reading together in verse 13.

This is the Lord Jesus Christ talking to his disciples. and he wants them to verbalize and articulate back to him who he is. So verse 13, Matthew 16, 13 says this. Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, who do people say that the Son of Man is? And they said, some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.

He said to them, but who do you say that I am? Simon Peter replied, you are the Christ, the son of the living God. And Jesus answered him, blessed are you, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ That would change but for now they were to keep quiet So what was the confession Well the confession was the identification of who Jesus really is The Christ, the Son of the living God, or as we read in Isaiah, the suffering servant. But it is an amazing thing that Jesus told and declared in verse 18 there.

He said, I tell you, you are Peter on this rock. I will build my church. I will build my church. What do you think about the church when you hear this declaration from God? I will build my church. A couple things, there's several, but number one, God does it.

I will build my church. Nobody else builds the church. Now we have a part to play, we're going to talk about that, but God is the one who said, I will build my church. And when God declares that he's going to do something, who can thwart that? Who could stop that? not hell according to this according to his words the gates of hell shall not prevail against it so God does it and secondly there's a process there's a structure to it turn real quick you can keep your finger there but turn to Acts turn forward to Acts chapter 9 in Acts chapter 9 we're going to spend some time in the book of Acts.

Acts chapter 9, in verse 31. Let's start there. There's been a lot happening. Chapter 9 records for us Saul's conversion. And several things happened. We see several things happening in Saul's life in the early days.

There he's moving about. and he's proclaiming, verse 20, Jesus in the synagogue saying he is the son of God. So there's the identification thing happening again. But then after some other events and Saul arriving in Jerusalem, Verse 31 says, so the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was being built up. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it multiplied.

So there's the same word used, and the idea here is it's passive for us, right? It's being built up, and this is the fulfillment of what Jesus told Peter, that he was going to build his church. And so in the book of Acts, we see the church being built. And it's being built up. And what does it look like? Well, that second part of that verse.

There's walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit. When those things are taking place, the church multiplies. That's what happens. And God is using means, notice. He's using his people walking in the fear of the Lord, conducting their lives in the fear of the Lord. This is the going of Matthew 28.

In our lives, as we move about, in lives that show forth the fear of the Lord and the comfort of the Holy Spirit, when that's happening, the church multiplies. Now this kind of makes us wonder why we need to have all these books on missiology, right? And all this stuff written and there's countless books and countless programs and schemes. You know, every so often we'll hear of the next kind of missions scheme.

You guys remember when the whole 1040 window thing came out? That was pretty cool, wasn't it? 1040. The rest of you people outside 1040, sorry. Right. It's like and so there's these schemes, these plans that come come about from time to time.

But this the scriptures just say the church is being built up because God said he's going to do it and he can be trusted that he's going to do it. And he's going to use the lives of his people walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit. And when we're doing that, the church is going to multiply. and he's going to use us but he's doing it he's the builder right Hebrews 11 10 right there's a city there it's talked about the city the kingdom of God whose architect and builder is God All right So God's going to do that.

But now, turn to Ephesians. We'll get back to Matthew, I think, eventually. But let's turn to Ephesians chapter 2. Because Ephesians, as a letter, have you guys gone through the book of Ephesians? Yeah? Okay.

Put that on your list of books to exposit. Ephesians. We did it not too long ago in conjunction with a study in the book of Acts as well. But here in Ephesians chapter 2, this letter Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus really to tell them and to explain to them, to teach them, to instruct them on ecclesiology. It's like when you go to seminary, you go to Bible school, and you're in Ecclesiology 101, you're looking at Ephesians.

You're spending a lot of time in Ephesians because it has a lot to say about the church. But in chapter 2, beginning in verse 19, there's this description of the church. Paul says this, so then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. And here he goes, verse 20, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord.

In him, you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the spirit. So we see that God, again, this is passive built. It's being built. God is the one doing the building, and he's putting that building on a strong foundation. Now, when we went to the Master's Mission, one of the things that they told us in the early days is spend all of your money, if you know anything about construction, put all of your money in the foundation.

Right? Because if you don't put a solid foundation in the ground, you can put this wonderfully elaborate thing on top of it, and what's going to happen? It's going to fall down. It's going to fall down. and I remember putting up a building once on the church plot it was an educational building that we were going to and so I was doing the master mission thing I was putting all of my money in the foundation I think I put a little too much money in the foundation But you know and some of the local builder guys would come up and they would watch what we were doing, right?

They'd come up and they'd say, you know, and they'd say, goodness gracious, what, they didn't say that because they didn't have the equivalent in Swahili, but they did, I mean, they did have the equivalent. And they'd say, what are you doing? And, you know, my answer to them, I didn't actually explain what I was doing. I just turned their attention across the street to a bunch of buildings that were built on the police compound by some contractor, quote, unquote, who didn't put strong foundations in the ground.

And every one of those houses had these massive cracks. And they were so big that you could see them from way up on top of the hill where we were. You could see these buildings literally cracking and falling down. So when they said, so why are you doing this? I'd say, that's it. That's why I'm doing it right there.

I don't want that to happen. So we're going to build a strong foundation. The church is on a strong foundation. It's a foundation rooted in even the Old Testament, the prophets and the apostles. Christ Jesus himself is our cornerstone. And it is in him. and there's the proper grammar right in whom in whom the whole structure that is the whole church being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord and we are the parts we could go to Peter and we could see the same picture and it talks about us as living stones being built together and God is doing this God is doing the building and he's doing this building upon a foundation that he laid.

And we are involved in the building process. God uses means, but he's the initiator, he's the impetus for that process. So any understanding, any starting point for missions is going to be here, that the church is being built up by God on a strong foundation. now now turn to Jude where we're going to see not the passive but the active Jude and we look at verse 20 we start there Jude well let let let start in 17 but you must remember beloved the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ that said to you, in the last time there will be scoffers following their own ungodly passions.

It is those who cause divisions, worldly people devoid of the Spirit. But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life and have mercy on those who doubt. Save others by snatching them out of the fire.

To others, show mercy with fear, hating even the garment stained by the flesh. This is what we ought to look like now. This is what the church ought to look like now. Now, God is still doing the building, but notice verse 20 changes it to the active and it says, but you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith. So God uses means. He uses our lives and he uses the gifts that he has bestowed upon the church to cause that building to happen.

And he commands us to do that. Now the command here is actually, again, not the building and the praying. The command is in verse 21, keep yourselves in the love of God. But that too is an example of how God is accomplishing it, but he's giving us our part in that. He is sovereign. He bestowed his love upon us before the foundation of the world.

We don't have a problem there. But we understand that he also tells us that we are to keep ourselves in the love of God. But Romans 8.28, we just read the passage today at a memorial service for a child passed away in the womb, four months. And we read Romans 8.28. Right? And the end of that whole chapter 8 is that nothing can separate us from the love of God.

Why? Because God placed his love on us. And that's where it stays. But we keep ourselves in the love of God too. we have a God given grace operating responsibility to keep ourselves in the love of God when we're doing that when we're understanding that when we're walking in the fear of the Lord Then the church is built up, and we are in a position to fulfill the Great Commission.

God uses means to build his church. He uses the church to build the church. That's kind of wild, huh? He uses the church to build the church. So, and I've already pointed out that you as a local church have everything that you need to accomplish the fulfilling of this great commission. So woe to LaRue Baptist if it doesn't step up and do that.

Something God has already decided and designed that you should do. Maybe woe to you is a bit strong. At the very least, we should be praying that God would make our desires his desires. That's really what we need, isn't it? We just need to see our desires become his desires in this. Psalm 37 promises that he will grant us the desires of our heart.

It's a promise that I cling to often, but I know, I know that that will only happen when those desires are his desires. Now you might want to take notes at this point. Some of you are, but... Because I'm going to give you a scenario. We're going to do a little bit of role-playing. I told you this was going to be interactive.

So we're going to do a role-play here. So I'll be giving you some information, and you are a missions team. I'm going to use the word team because we don't use the C word. I'm not even going to say it. All right, so you're a missions team. In this church.

So, Jack and Polly Martin. Is there any Jacks here? Any Polly's? Okay, good. Jack and Polly Martin. Jack and Polly are planning to go to Zambia.

How many of us know where Zambia is? Some of you, good. Good thing we don't have a country quiz here at this missions conference, huh? Zambia it in Africa ok yeah that it so Jack and Polly Martin are planning to go to Zambia as medical missionaries okay And Jack is a family practice doctor and Polly is a maternity nurse. And they're hoping to join a medical missions ministry that establishes hospitals in rural areas where there are no such services.

You don't have any hospitals, no clinics, maybe a few sporadic dispensaries, but that's it. So they want to join that ministry. And that ministry starts new works. You know, they go around in the different countries where they're working. And they start up these ministries by setting up these mobile clinics. and in these mobile clinics they show the Jesus film to people while they're sitting there waiting to see the doctor or see whoever it is they're going to see and they show them the Jesus film and it's in their local language and they hand out tracks also in the local language.

And they communicate with the folks that come into the clinic through interpreters who are chosen and trained from a nearby village and those interpreters help them to communicate with the people. So there have been a number of large donations to the organization that they want to go out with that makes this ministry possible. The purchase of all of the supplies necessary, the medicines, the building materials, everything has been covered for this medical work because we all know that doctors are rich.

And so Jack has a lot of friends. And the organization has a lot of friends. But Jack and Polly, even though they have all of this money for the organization to do all this work, Jack and Polly, they need to raise $65,000 a year for a salary. And they need $125,000 in outgoing costs to get out there. Now these are accurate figures, even though we're role-playing here.

Those are accurate figures. from a real situation. So Jack and Polly are currently crisscrossing the USA on deputation. Right? That's a fancy word for asking for money Now Jack is right out of medical school and there an organization that has pledged to begin paying back his school loan And if you're familiar with medical school, you know how large that school loan is.

And they're going to pay back Jack's school loan as long as he will remain in full-time missions ministry. So they'll continue paying his loan as long as he remains in full-time missions ministry. So Jack and Polly have contacted your church. Somehow they got onto the FIRE website or something, and they found you guys here, and they decided that they were going to come and visit you, and somehow they managed to make that happen.

So you're on the missions team, and you're tasked with gathering all the information you can from them in order to determine if your church will get behind them in their ministry. So, with that, what are some of the things that you want to know beyond what I've just told you? What are some questions that you would ask? Now, I'm Jack and Polly, so you could ask me as if, you know.

What are the questions? And then I want you to begin thinking about what are some of the questions that you would ask them that you would want to know. And then I also want you to begin thinking what you would want to hear as an answer from them. Okay? Keeping in mind some of the things that we've talked about already. So, what would you ask them?

What would you ask Jack and Polly? They're here. You're having a question and answer time with them. You know, they're sitting with your missions team. let's say there's six of you on that team but every one of you here tonight are one of them one of the six I don't know how that'll work but it'll work so what are you asking them Greg what are you asking them Jack how have you served in the church as you've been a medical student what's your experience All right, what's your past experience in ministry?

Okay, even tack on to that, what's your current one? Together with that, right? What have you done in ministry? And what are you doing now in ministry? I think both of those are important right Okay Pat I want to be next after they have these discussions how they connect with the local body How to? How to connect these individuals with the coming here to the tracks and stuff, how you connect them with the local church.

With a local church? I mean, my church. So are you asking if they're connected to a local church? No, how they would get these people if they're still making the tracks but they don't know that. Oh, so over in Zambia, you're asking what's going on, how is that work connected to a church? Yeah.

My question is, is there a local church? Right. Or is it you? Okay. There's not a local church. Right.

Okay. And they would say, I think so. this meeting is adjourned okay Okay, so this kind of would be connected to Greg too. What current ministries are you involved in? And who is your sending church would be the question more specifically I think that we would ask. I would want to ask not just who is your sending church, but how they determine to send you.

Right. So we want to know some information. we'd like to know some information about the process involved in sending you. In other words, why are you here today? And how did you get here? And hopefully we're asking all those questions in the right spirit, right? We're not the mission's Gestapo, right?

Don't mind us, we're just the SS, right? No. No, but it is amazing. how many churches start cutting checks to people and they don't ask any of these questions. Jack and Polly show up and they say, mission, medical ministry? I want all over the place. that, right? Showing them the Jesus film?

Wow. In their language. How cool is that? You want to talk about cool missionaries, right? There's an incredible lack of discernment on the part of many local churches, which is why we're thinking through this. All right.

What other questions? These were good. Emma? How do you plan to assimilate to the culture without becoming necessarily part of it? Right. Now, what led you to ask that question?

Because I'm saying that they have a good idea of taxonomy, and they're using interpreters, and so there's that break in a relationship. Good girl. See, Emma lived with us for a while, so she doesn't count. She doesn't count. Right. Yeah, yeah.

You know, the Jesus film, you know, that's an okay thing. How many of you have seen the Jesus film? Wow. Okay, good. no don't get me wrong it's yeah it's called the Jesus film and it's it's a tool used all over the place I mean it's amazing I've lost track of how many I bet we can find out how many languages it's been translated into but you know what's that Is it a good tool?

You know, I'm not going to bash it anymore. It's a tool. It's a tool. I think the problem is not in the tool. It's that sometimes we use the wrong tool for a certain job, right? You pick up a tool, you know, and my wife has a story for that.

You can ask her about that later. You want to use the right tool for the right job, what you want to do. Sometimes I think people think the Jesus film is going to accomplish things that it can't, right? Because it's just a film. And if you just kind of park somebody in front of a film and hope that by osmosis something happens, well, it might. But there a little bit more to ministry than simply showing somebody the Jesus film So it a tool But actually Emma right You have a situation where you have the Jesus film in their language and you have these tracks in their language and you might even have a copy of the scripture.

Maybe it's not in their language, but it's in a close language that has a percentage of similarity to their language, right? But if you, the missionary, don't know the language and you have to rely on interpreters, right, what's the challenge there? They're actually saying what you're saying. Oh. And I'm not saying we have to automatically distrust people.

We shouldn't do that. But we really don't know what they're saying. Have you ever been translated? Has anybody ever been translated? Okay. So you guys know.

It can be really fun or it can be a natural disaster. Right? It can just be this thing that's just like, whoa, what just happened? Right? And a lot of times you'll be talking and you're waxing eloquent, right, in your language. And you're getting things, you know.

And then you get to that point where you say this one phrase. And it's your humdinger. Right? And you say it in your language. You're preaching in English, right? And in your language it's four words.

Right? And then your interpreter launches into it and he starts talking for 15 minutes. Right? On something that you said in four words, right? Because your four words aren't translatable. So he's got to do a whole lot of back story.

He's got to do a whole lot of stuff to get the folks who are listening, right? And invariably, not in every case, but invariably, something gets lost in the translation. And when it comes to doctrine, when it comes to biblical truth, we can't afford that. I was deathly afraid of preaching in the early years out on the mission field for that reason. And we eventually learned Swahili and I eventually could, by God's grace, preach in Swahili.

But the early days were kind of crazy. And I tried all kinds of things. But my main concern was the truth itself. Because preaching the word of God is a life and death matter. And I just was fearful of that. So eventually we made it And so I was translated And I think I was translated pretty good most of the time the guys that were translating But if we going to send out missionaries into a situation and they have no plan this is what Emma's question was, they have no plan of getting into the culture so that they can learn the language and by learning the language understand the culture, then I don't know that we would want to support them at all, really, because what ultimately are they going to accomplish?

Well, we'll never know, really. We'll never be able to know. So that's a question, too. Very good. Anybody else? So I was thinking a couple different things.

The fact that what they've done in the church, but what training do they have in the first place? Do you know if they have foundational, if they're going to understand it, first of all? Right. And then second, what is the object? How does it apply to what they're going to be doing, I guess, that haven't been there in the first place? If you haven't been there and you don't know enough people, why are you going?

I see the logic of the foundation of things. Well, that question right there, why are you going? That's a great question. Sometimes the most simple questions are the most telling in the answers. Yeah? That's where my question was going to.

You have a grade that shows you're proficient at half of your intended purpose. Where do you have to show your proficiency in the other half of your purpose? Right. That's assuming that the other half of their purpose is to make disciples. That's assuming that they have an accurate grasp of the Great Commission and that their ecclesiology is in place, and that's where we're going with this.

I mean, how many of these questions have to do with a sound ecclesiology? Almost every one of them. So what is the church? What time do you want me to finish? No, you don't say that. No, you don't say that.

Okay. Okay. Right. That's what the broadcast is. Okay. So what is the church?

What's your definition of the church? Give me your best succinct biblical definition of the church Succinct The Bride of Christ. The Bride of Christ? That's a good, succinct one. Very biblical. Very biblical.

Was that the Jetsons? That was a flashback. How about this? All the people of God in all ages. That's the church. All the people of God in all ages.

Where is the church found? Well, we're going to move through this next section. We want to understand when we talk about the church, when we talk about ecclesiology, what are we talking about? Well, there's manifestations of the church. There's the local manifestation. In Romans 16.5, we read about the house churches. greet also this is paul and his greetings at the end of that letter greet also the church in their house this is this is verse three prisca and aquila who risk their necks for my life he says but greet also the church in their house that's a pretty local church that's in a house in a in a particular place we could look up colossians 4 15 see that the same thing the church that was in a house.

This was a local church. But Paul writes letters to regional churches as well. First Corinthians chapter 1 verse 2, you can look that up in Philippians 1.1 where he addresses the church in a larger metropolis, a larger urban area. And it's not difficult to imagine smaller local manifestations within that regional area. But he writes, when he writes his letters to places that had fairly significant populations at the time that he wrote, Corinth being one of them.

And then as we read in Matthew 16, 18, there is the church universal, or some people call it the church invisible, which is the entire church. the all the people of God in all ages. So you have these local manifestations, which we can see, and the regional manifestations, larger sections of that, and that would be comparable today to possibly coalition of churches, maybe denominations or fellowships of churches, the fire fellowships kind of thing that are in an area, in a region. so that's that's how the scriptures portrayed the the actual entities of them but our question tonight is how important is the church to biblical missions i remember some of you know ethan and kindria hines some of my doctor stuff was patterned after them i learned actually a lot from them but many years ago when they showed up at grace covenant church we had not been there very long ourselves and and they had just gone on a survey trip over to DRC I think or Congo or something like that and they had just come back he was a he's a um is a currently practicing and was back then a family doctor and his wife was a nurse and they had they were hoping to go overseas as missionaries. So they came back to Grace because Kendria, the wife, had relatives there.

I think actually Ethan had a relative there too. That's how they kind of got connected. A little bit of matchmaking going on there. And so they came back and we met up with him one night after a Sunday service and we were chatting and he was like, yeah, we're going to want to be missionaries. We want to go over to Africa. And the first thing out of my mouth was who's your sending church because I'm thinking grace covenants they're saying they're here and they're talking like that it's like who's your sending church and and he gave me this sort of deer in the headlights look right it's like what do you what send what do you mean sending church and it's like well who's responsible for you who's who's sending you what what church is sending you.

And he had no concept. And he's an MK, right? But he had no concept of what a sending church was and what the responsibility of a sending church would be and what the relationship would be like with the missionary and their sending church He didn have any of that We ended up becoming their sending church eventually But the relationship was critical. In fact, biblical missions can't happen unless the church steps up and is actually sending missionaries.

Now, that might sound like overly simplistic. but for years now mission agencies have been assuming that responsibility and the church has just sort of given it over to them now i think in the past 20 years or so we've seen sort of a beginning of a return back to the church taking her responsibility to actually be involved in it but i know that in my experience even 20 plus years ago the mission agencies were the ones making 98% of the decisions that that missionary was involved in. Is that what we see in Scripture? 1 Peter chapter 2.

We're looking at the question, how important is the church to biblical missions? Well, we would say it's very important. 1 Peter 2, 9 through 12. 1 Peter chapter 2, 9 through 12. But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

Once you were not a people, now you are God's people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.

This is a missions passage. This is a passage telling us what the church is to be about. And we are to be stepping up and behaving like who we are. We are a chosen race. We are a royal priesthood. We are a holy nation a people for his own possession And all of that is what the reason That we might proclaim the excellencies of God That we might explain that we might preach that we might teach, that we might tell, that we might herald those things.

That's biblical missions. And the church is the one to be doing it. The church builds up the church. Now, at Grace Covenant Church, We like to describe the mission of our church with a little phrase we use, unity to maturity in Christ. Unity to maturity in Christ. Our people hear that all the time.

Unity to maturity in Christ. This is what we're about. This is why we do what we do. This is what we're moving toward. This is where we're pouring all of our energies, all of our resources. Everything we do is sifted through this reality.

And this goal, unity to maturity in Christ. And we get it from Ephesians 4. And I just want us to spend the last few minutes of our time together in Ephesians chapter 4, beginning in verse 11. Again, being reminded that Ephesians, the entire letter, is all about that. But you know what? To help us understand, let's back up to verse 1 of chapter 4. read this together Ephesians chapter 4 beginning in verse 1 I therefore a prisoner for the Lord urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called with all humility and gentleness with patience bearing with one another in love eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace there is one body one spirit just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore it says, when he ascended on high, he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men. In saying he ascended, what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens that he might fill all things And then 11 through 16 that what we going to focus on And he gave the apostles, the prophets, and the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up, there we go again, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes.

Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. Do you see the common themes, even just in the few verses that we have read tonight, the common themes of God building his church, and yet we are involved in that building process. God is the builder.

He is the architect. But we're a bunch of little builders, right? We're guys running around with the blueprints, the helmets and the tools. We're accomplishing this by His grace. We have a purpose. We have marching orders.

We have blueprints. We have all the tools. We have everything that we need. This chapter starts off by saying that God has laid down the unity. He's put the unity of the Spirit in place already. We don't have to generate that unity.

He's put it in place already. He's already gifted the body. He's already done that. That grace was given. Past tense. Each one of us has that.

Nobody loses out when it comes to missions. Nobody, there isn't anybody who can say, well I don't have a part in this because I'm not going see and that's a misapplication of that going thing because we think if we don't go that we're not somehow a part of missions that can't be farther from the truth We all have a part in fulfilling the Great Commission, every single one of us. And we're going to talk more about that as we go on.

But he gave leadership in the church, the apostles, the prophets, evangelists, shepherd teachers, pastor teachers. Sometimes it's translated that. And their purpose is to what? Verse 12, to equip the saints for the work of the ministry. That's what leadership does. We have to be doing that here if we hope to plant a church.

Now, you guys are way ahead of the game. You've already planted a church. I mean, I might as well go home. Right? You guys should be coming to Grace Covenant Church and telling us what we should be doing. All right?

You've already been involved in it. You've seen it happen. You're watching it unfold even now. All right? And by the way, we've been very encouraged to watch that from a distance. We've been watching that too.

So don't think that your little church planning thing is just you guys. Okay? We've been watching with great eagerness and praying for you, too. I mean, we've been praying for that work and the folks that are there. I was telling somebody tonight, I remember walking one of these last times I was here. It was a long time ago, too long ago.

Came in here, and there was that little group in the nursery. They used to meet in the nursery, right? And they're in there, and you point it out, and you say, those are the guys that are going to go plant a church right there. That's Josh, Josh House. That's him. He's going to go, and they're going to do that.

He was pretty excited about that when he was telling me that. And it was. It was an exciting thing. But God has already, he's given the leadership to equip the saints for the work of the ministry so that the body is being built up. But it all happens in Christ. And this is why we can't get caught up in programs and schemes and all of these things.

Because missions is about, and we're going to talk about this on Sunday, it's about carrying the word of Christ. And if we, as a local church, are not existing in the presence of Christ, if we're not experiencing that in our own faith, understanding that we're already in his presence, what's the last thing he tells them in Matthew when we read that passage? He gives them the authority to go and make disciples and the last promise he gives them is what And lo I will be with you always even to the end of the age Why do you think he says that Why do you think he gives that promise Because we can't hope to do any of this apart from his presence.

He is moving among the lampstands, Revelation says. we exist in his presence and if you've lost sight of that go back to John 15 read and meditate on that again the fact that he dwells in us he dwells in each one of us and he dwells and moves among the lampstands there will be no effective missions ministry that does not take into account the presence of Christ. It won't happen. It might be a really cool scheme.

It might have some really cool aspects to it. And you might be able to generate some humdinger of numbers. But apart from the presence of Christ, it's for naught. And the goal in any ministry, whether it's here or halfway across the world or whatever, is to attain that unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God. And here's the tension in Scripture.

Scripture is full of tension, isn't it? He's already told us that we have the unity. It's already there. There's one body, one spirit. He gives a whole list in several verses up there at the beginning. Eager to maintain the unity of the spirit.

The idea is that the unity is already there. But then he tells us that we have to attain that unity. It's a tension. It is both. Both are true. The unity is there. but we're moving towards this unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God because we're not there.

We're not there. We have much to do. There needs to be some maturing going on to mature manhood, to the measure, the stature, the fullness of Christ. We don't want to be tossed about, verse 14 says. And again, we've mentioned the myriads of missions, schemes that have come up where the church is bombarded, literally, with some new missiology, some new thing.

Another book comes out and we got to do this I remember when I was in Bible school this guy from India comes over and I can remember his name starts with a P can be Patel maybe it Patel I don know no it not it Patel and he a doctor no it not But this guy came over, and I'm not trash-talking him, his salvation or anything like that. I'm just assessing his missiology, which I'm allowed to do. Am I allowed to do that?

I'm allowed to do that, as long as I assess it biblically. So he comes over, and he gets trained at Dallas Seminary. I'm not going to touch that one either. But he gets trained at Dallas Seminary. He got some kind of an education there, I'm sure. And then he wrote a book.

And then he wrote a book. Because that's what happens. You write a book. Come over and write a book. So he wrote a book. And it was just a, you know, paperback thing.

And so I read the book. Somebody gave it to me and said, you need to read this book about missions. So I read it. And through the whole book, he's saying how amazing the work is in India. And the churches, you know, they need all of these things. and da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And he gets to the last chapter.

And the whole premise of his book comes out in this last chapter. And I'm just going to give you the 10-cent version. And that is, if the church in America is going to help the church in India, don't send us missionaries. Just send us money. That was his thing. Don't send us missionaries.

Just send us money. And that was the start of this whole support nationals thing that has gone on in missions for a long time now. Just send those guys the money and the resources. Why? Because they know the language. They can do the thing that they need to do there.

Don't send us missionaries. Now, I am not saying that we should not support national workers. If you've got a guy who is faithful and you have measured him, right, in every way that the scriptures tell us to measure church leaders, right, and he is a tested and tried church leader, and he's in a situation that could benefit from some monetary assistance.

And by all means if the church is up for doing that go ahead and do that But that not what this guy was saying in his book His book was basically saying we don want anybody who going to come over here and tell us how to do things And it was sort of a backlash of the colonial thing, you know, where the white missionaries went over and built their little kingdoms and things. And we saw, honestly, in the time that we were in Kenya, we saw how that was a reality. It really did happen, right?

Because there was a mindset back in a certain time when Western missionaries would go in and they would do that. They would build these kingdoms in the name of missions, right? So I think that this guy was sort of lashing out against that. The problem is, and we saw the problem with it, and that is that many times all of this money would come over into situations where you had men who weren't tested.

Men who had no business being in leadership in the church. And they're all of a sudden given all of this money with no accountability. Yeah. You can picture the end of that, right? And it did. It went 15 ways to south.

And it was bad. And it was ugly. And the church was destroyed by it. It wasn't built up. It was not a wise approach to missions. But the church here in America wasn't discerning.

It was a book. This guy wrote a book. Well, of course we should believe what he said in this book. Nobody went back to the scriptures. Nobody went back and said, you know, we need to test this. We need to see if this matches what the word of God is saying should be going on over there?

How is this money being spent? Who is this man? Right? Now, Tim, I know you go overseas and you work with some men over there who are qualified men. Right? Niku is coming to our church when he comes here, gosh, next week.

I think. Yeah, next week. So we're very much looking forward to that. Right? But see, he's a man qualified. We know him.

We've met him. He's commended to us, Tim and other men like Tim and pastors have gone over there, seen these men, spent time with them, right? Their lives have been tested. Their ministries have been tested. And so the church then can get behind them because they've been sifted in a good way. They've been tested in a good way according to what the scriptures say.

But somehow there's this magical aspect to missions that seems to tell us that we can bypass scripture. Because it's missions. It's sort of sacred. Or it doesn't fall under the same headings that ministry here falls under. But that's a lie. That's just not true.

Everything that happens here is what's going to happen over there. Only slower and usually worse. right it's just it's just how it is but the ministries here when this when this church is where it ought to be and i don't mean that in a sort of navel gazing introverted way we just need to be about what god tells us like we've read in these few passages many more what we ought to be about here and i know for a fact that in much of this you are but like paul told the thessalonians there's always room to grow, right? Keep on going, keep on moving, keep on getting better at what we are doing.

Always returning to the Word of God. Always looking for those areas that need to be shored up. Always testing ourselves. Are we concerned about this unity to maturity in Christ? Is it happening? Are the ministries that we're involved in accomplishing that, missions included?

Is it being pursued with a passion? And if it is, you're off to a good start. Well, there's much more that we could say. But I really like verse 15. And I want to end with that. Because he said, well, back in 15, he tells us that we are to be speaking the truth in love.

And that's to each other. And that's to our missionaries, too. You know, Jack and Polly need to have the truth spoken to them in love, don't they? They need that. Do you know what the numbers are of failures on the mission field these days? It's heartbreaking.

Because when they come back after six months, they've raised $65,000 a year in salary and their in outgoing costs and they go out there and six months later they home That tough That tough That a draining of the resources of the church number one but emotionally, spiritually, it's a huge toll, right? And that's because oftentimes care is not taken to speak the truth in love. You know, when we back in the day went to our elders in California and went to them.

This is what we said to them. We're going to be missionaries. That's what we said to them. And that's pretty much how we said it to them. We're going to be missionaries. We're going to go to North Carolina and we're going to get a year of training and then we're going to be missionaries.

And they said, okay, here's $500 a month. We'll see you. That's it. And I thought, we thought, this is cool, yeah. Right? Nobody spoke the truth to us in love.

Now, I'm not saying God is sovereign. He used the whole thing. I mean, there's some things we regret. But you know what I mean. It's like God used it. But as we look back on it, I would have to say, no, I don't think we should do it that way.

Right? I don't think we should do it that way. I wouldn't want somebody to come to me. Now I'm the elder, right? I wouldn't want somebody to come to me and say, we're missionaries, so we want to go do this. Right.

Can you support us? If they're in our church, I would want them to not even say that. Right. I'd want them to live the life of a servant first. And then, you know, if God is working in their heart to do that, it's going to come out. Right. and then I would want them to come and say you know I really we see this passion in us and if they're single or whether they're you know at that point single or whether they're married you know we want to see this passion there already and a passion because we want to export that passion a biblically secure passion a passion that comes from scripture and involved in ministry that comes from the bible because that's what we're exporting and if they not doing it here then it not going to happen there and if we sending them over to plant churches if we ourselves aren doing what we ought to be doing here then we not going to export it over there.

And I'll tell you, we were over there, when we were over there, we were eager to hear news about our church here, our sending church. And it was wonderful when we heard that things were going well. But it was very difficult for us when we heard that things weren't going well. Because that's our sending church. That's our lifeline. That's our tether.

Right? They're not just the people cutting our checks. Now, the church that became our sending church, it wasn't that original church that said, yeah, here's 500 bucks. We'll see you in a year kind of thing. We ended up actually having to leave that church because of a situation with their missions, doctrine, and philosophy. And a church plant from that church became our sending church and sent us back.

And it was a wonderful relationship. I actually functioned as an elder in that church. And we're going to talk tomorrow in our first session about the elder as missionary. The elder as missionary. but from the whole body that is Christ joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped when each part is working properly and that's the responsibility laid on each and every one of us when each part is working properly makes the whole body grow so that it builds itself up in love so that's how that building up process goes and that's what we want to export that's that process that we want to export with our missionaries.

It's not about sending warm bodies. It's not about money. There's plenty of money. Plenty of money. You guys have plenty of money. You might not think so, but you have plenty of money.

You have plenty of resources. You have everything that you need. This church could send missionaries. Have you sent missionaries, by the way? Homegrown? Homegrown.

One. Right. Okay. Right Well no That what I saying He not here right He there As far as a leader goes right The only difference as we going to see the only difference in doing it overseas is just that it's overseas instead of marrying. And you've got cultural things that come wrapped in a cultural package that you've got to deal with, right? And those are definitely decisions that have to be made about that.

I don't know, is there a difference in culture between here and marrying? Yeah. Yeah, maybe. So each one of us have a part to play in that. And each one of us need to be making sure that our part is working properly. Because that's what will make the body grow and build itself up in love.

Let's pray. Father, we thank you. Lord, you are good. you are a God who accomplishes your will because you have all power we thank you that you can be trusted we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ Lord forgive us for when we err in our thinking and we allow ourselves to succumb to human traditions as Paul told the Colossians the elementary principles of the world rather than Christ.

Lord, help us to understand how we should be making sure that our part is working properly in this. And that as we think about missions and becoming involved either further or for the first time in a missions ministry, that we would measure all things by your word that we would understand that you have given us indeed everything necessary for life and godliness Lord I pray that you would give us a passion for this that would cause us Lord to move in the direction that you would will and I pray for the leadership of this church Lord that you would ignite in them this desire and that, Father, you would accomplish much through them as they equip the saints for this ministry. And we'll thank you, Lord, for all that you will accomplish for your glory and the good of your people.

In Jesus' name, amen.