Sermon Tone Analysis

! keeping the main thing the main thing

James 1:22-25

 

Today I want to speak with you about the “Main Thing.”

What we must be sure of especially at this time in the life of our church is that we are keeping the “Main Thing, the Main Thing!”

If we are not doing this one thing, that is, keeping the Main Thing, the Main Thing, then everything else that we are doing is irrelevant and futile.

So we must ask ourselves this morning, “are we keeping the Main Thing the Main Thing?”

By now, some of you are totally confused and others are wondering, what is wrong with our pastor?

And just what is the Main Thing anyway?

Very simply, the Main Thing is: Loving God, Loving People and Making Disciples!

As a church and as a people we have so much to be thankful for and we have all been incredibly blessed by God at every level of our lives.

We live in the one of the greatest nations the world has ever know, enjoying a higher standard of living, freedoms and personal liberties that most of the world can’t even imagine.

But above all the physical blessings, if we have come to saving faith in Jesus Christ, we have been spiritually favored beyond our ability to describe it.

Look again at what Jesus said in */John 15:16 /*/You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you./

We have been chosen, we have been ordained and we have been given the amazing privilege of prayer by a God who truly loves and care for us!

But the favor and blessings of God have not been given to us without specific intent and purpose.

They have not been lavished upon us to just to be consumed and used up for our own self-gratification and pleasure.

As members of the body of Christ we have a greater responsibility.

All things are given to us by God to be used and enjoyed but we must also begin to examine what is that we have been called upon by God to do with what we have been given.

Remember that James spoke directly to us all when he said, “/Be ye doers of the word, not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.”

/

 

It is high time that we get back to the Main Thing and make sure we are keeping the Main Thing, the Main Thing!

To better understand how to keep the Main Thing, the Main Thing, I want us to focus upon the three “E’s”, or the three elements that make up the “Main Thing.”

They are:

1.    Exaltation – Worship, Loving God

2.    Evangelism – Outreach, Loving People

3.    Edification – Discipleship Training, Making Disciples.

!!! I.               the great commandment - exaltation

!! *Matthew 22:34-40 *But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together.

35 Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, 36 "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?" 37 Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' 38 This is the first and great commandment.

39 And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'

40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."

A.

This is by Jesus’ own declaration “the greatest commandment.”

These religious leaders were trying their best to entrap the Master and find something by with which they could accuse Him.

1.

Each sect had their own special emphasis that they had placed on certain aspects of the law of God and used them to exclude all those who did not see things their way.

2.    This doesn’t sound much different from our day, does it?

3.

There are many who form their own opinions on the scripture, then use them to divide the Body of Christ instead of uniting it.

*/2 Peter 1:20/*/ //Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.)/

B.

Jesus would not fall for this petty trick of these shallow men, instead, He cut to the heart of the matter and revealed to them the core of what we call the “Main Thing.”

1.

Here it is: Love God with everything in you, and Love other People just as you love yourself.

2.    There it is, now we just need to listen do what the Master says!

How often make the gospel difficult and complicated when all that is truly required is child-like faith and obedience.

C.

Every Christian should be a Great Commandment Christian, and every church should a Great Commandment Church.

This must become our highest priority.

1.

To love God with the totality of our being and then love our neighbors as we love our selves.

2.    Obedience to this great commandment puts us in the right relationship with God and our fellow man so that the riches and fullness of Christ can be released into our lives.

3.    Righteousness is position with God, it is right standing with God and it can only come to bear in our lives through repentance, faith and then obedience!

4.    When we as a people begin to truly walk in this great commandment it will then begin to motivate us to fulfill the next element of the Main Thing.

!!! II.            the great commission - evangelism

*/Matthew 28:18-20 /*/And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.

19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."

Amen.

/

A.   It is in this passage of scripture that we find the great commission of the Lord Jesus Christ to His first followers but also to all true believers of every subsequent generation.

1.

This is the commission given to the church to carry out its mission which is worldwide evangelism.

B.

There is to be preaching, teaching, repentance and baptism, but the imperative clause that is used here by Jesus puts the emphasis one the main thing: Make Disciples.

(3rd “E”)

1.     Jesus never intended for our evangelism and mission efforts to only result in conversions or the enlargement of denominations and the local church membership.

2.     The focus is not decisions, professions of faith or church membership!

3.     The focus here is making disciples!

Raising up men and women who will passionately follow Jesus with their whole hearts that separate themselves from the world and become living examples to the lost that surround them.

C.

The Great Commandment teaches us that we are to love God with our mind soul and strength and the Great Commission teaches us that we are to be directly involved in reaching the lost that are still bound by sin and its deception.

1.

But once they are reached, we are to teach them how to become disciples, devoted disciplined followers of Jesus.

2.    But I want to emphasize that this is not just accomplished in the classroom setting and a twelve week course but by the example of how we live our daily lives!

3.

This is our calling to this community, to our state and nation, and every one of us has a part to play, we are all workers in His kingdom.

!!! III.         a biblical model for evangelism

(*Book mark*)

A.   Now that we have looked to the Commandment and the Commission we have to make a decision.

How do we plan to implement what Jesus has spoken to us through His Word.

1.

There are many methods of evangelism, many types of programs and outreaches that are being used with great success throughout the kingdom of God.

2.    But the methods that others are using may or may not work for us.

B.

What I want to suggest to you this morning is a Biblical style of evangelism that we are already using but perhaps not as intentionally as we should be.

1.    Look at the book mark you were given when you came in.

2.    You will find on one side of it the basic outline to successful Biblical evangelism or better said, “relationship evangelism” that I believe will revolutionize our outreach into this community.

C.

There are three words are the core and foundation to our strategy “Find, Tell and Bring”, and it is a strategy that is found over and over in the Bible.

1.    Let us look to the scripture and find the precedent that was long ago established and see how we can apply it in our lives today.

!! *John 1:40-42 *One of the two who heard John speak, and followed Him, was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother.

41 He first found his own brother Simon, and said to him, "We have found the Messiah" (which is translated, the Christ).

42 And he brought him to Jesus.

Now when Jesus looked at him, He said, "You are Simon the son of Jonah.

You shall be called Cephas" (which is translated, A Stone).

2.    Notice the progression of events in this passage of scripture after Andrew hears Jesus.

a.)  First, he *finds* his brother Simon Peter.

(vs.

41a)

b.)  Second, he *tells* him about Jesus.

(vs.

41b)

c.)

Then, He *brings* him personally to meet the Christ.

(vs.

42)

3.

Where did he go to evangelize?

He reached back into his own family and closest relationships.

D.

Now lets look at another example in this same chapter of John.

!! *John 1:44-46 *Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter.