Growing through Encouragement
Shed Value Statement • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Have the value statement and the discipleship path passed out.
Review Shed Value Statement Series we will cover for the next 5 weeks.
Review Last weeks: Vision & Mission (The Shed’s part in THE Church), Growing with Intention
For the next 5 weeks, I want to answer the question, “Who are we at The Shed.”
If you’re new here and still trying to figure us out, these next several weeks will be integral to your understanding of the culture that fuels everything we do here at The Shed.
Two weeks ago we walked through our discipleship pathway together, leaning in on the fact that discipleship isn’t a class, it’s not a curriculum, it’s not a book…
Discipleship is life lived together, learning and growing into the image of Jesus on the earth.
Jesus exemplified what discipleship is supposed to look like when He spent 3.5 years training, teaching, and walking alongside His disciples before launching them out into the world with this command:
19 “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,
20 teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
He told them, do what I taught you… then teach them to do it too…
That’s what discipleship looks like here at The Shed. It’s a commitment of time and resources where we live life together, walking together throughout the week, not just spending an hour together on Sunday mornings.
“We grow disciples in here that embody Jesus out there.” - Discipleship is at the center of what we do and growth is the expected outcome.
If you’re not growing, you’re stagnating…
If you’re not growing, you’re not progressing…
We are The Shed, and the thought process behind all this is that we are a greenhouse where disciples grow…
We grow disciples in here that embody Jesus out there.
And because Growth is the expected avenue that members should be traveling on, each of our six core values are an expression of how we grow…
You will notice, each begins with “Growing”…
Growing with… Growing through… Growing from…
All of these are intended to guide us in and propel us to GROWTH.
These are how we grow…
Growth is an expectation of the body of Christ:
15 but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ,
16 from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.
And how does Paul suggest we do that? Let’s look a few verses prior:
11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers,
12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.
14 As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming;
15 but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ,
16 from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.
AS A RESULT…
The expected result of what we do in here is growth as we are equipped and it’s Jesus who causes the growth!
So “We grow disciples in here that embody Jesus out there.”
And this is how we do it:
Last week we talked about growing with intention and looked at the abundance of scriptural emphasis on speaking and acting intentionally.
By…
Growing with Intention
Growing with Intention
This week we will move on to our next core value:
Growing through Encouragement
Growing through Encouragement
We grow by inspiring, equipping, and propelling others to fulfill their purpose in Christ.
We grow by inspiring, equipping, and propelling others to fulfill their purpose in Christ.
(Heb. 3:13, 10:24, Eph. 4:11-16)
Let’s look at Ephesians 4 again…
11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers,
12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
I want to clear something up here: Your calling is not to tear down the Church.
God’s mission for your life is not to be a lone wolf, separated from the Body.
You have not been given a special revelation that separates you from the rest of the Church.
If you think that you’re the only one who has it right and everyone else is lost, you need to check yourself and get back in the Word!
Our mission is intrinsically tied to the Ekklesia, this thing we call the Church, that Paul likens unto a body that relies on the joints to hold it all together.
You can’t be disjointed and on mission!
Look at Hebrews 10:23-25
23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful;
24 and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds,
25 not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near.
The biblical author says it twice here: simulate one another to love and good deeds and encourage one another all the more as you see the day drawing near!
I don’t know about you, but I see the day drawing nearer and nearer, we are certainly more near now than when this was written, so shouldn’t we be encouraging one another more and more to love and good deeds?
Don’t forsake our own assembling together! Not because you need proximity, but because you need relationship!
It’s not like we need a central place because that’s where God is, no, this is us coming together to do what he says, ENCOURAGING ONE ANOTHER!
Why is it that we see so much division and backbiting and meanness in the church?
That’s not of God!
In fact, it’s an assignment of the enemy that we would fight each other rather than go to war and take back territory from the devil!
If you’re one of those who is always tearing down other people with your words… especially behind their back…
You know the type… They will smile to your face, but start making calls as soon as you leave to tell the gossip circle (oops, I mean “prayer chain”) what they think about you…
That’s not of God!
In fact, it’s a hinderance to the mission of the church, it’s a bruise on the chin of the body of Christ, and it is a win for the enemy that he never should’ve had rights to!
It’s no wonder the author of Hebrews said this:
12 Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God.
13 But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.
That author looked out and saw what was happening without the encouragement of the body: hearts were being hardened…
I tell you this today, that there are many whose hearts have been hardened by the deceitfulness of sin because they lacked an encouraging word from a brother or a sister in their time of need…
According to this scripture your encouragement to one another even combats the deceitfulness of sin!
We should be the most encouraging group of people on the face of the planet!
Jesus said this:
35 “By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
If you look at the voice of culture today, you would think that the church is just another political organization because there’s as much hate being spread within the church as there is in popular media today…
It’s an embarrassment to the Kingdom of God that we can’t love like Jesus loved, forgive like Jesus forgave, and be who Jesus called us to be!
And it’s my heartfelt opinion that the entire reason we are in that state today, is because we have lacked in discipleship!
The minute we started treating discipleship as something that could be done in a classroom rather than in the field, we missed it.
The second we thought we could bottle and sell what was freely given to us, we failed…
But now is the time and the hour when the Church can rise to her full potential again, where we can see a revival in the land, but that revival won’t look like a place where we cry come and see…
This revival will be a revival of discipleship that happens one on one and in small grow groups where we see an awakening not in a location, but as a wave that covers the nation…
That revival won’t look like loud preaching, moving music, smoke or lights… it will look like living room discussions, kitchen table bible studies, and Christians living life together…
You want to see this country turned upside down again for the Gospel?
This is how we do it! We don’t forsake the assembling of ourselves together, but we live a life of encouragement for those around us, and all the more as we see the day drawing near…
We grow disciples that embody Jesus by being intentional and by being encouraging…
Look at the second line of that core value:
We grow by inspiring, equipping, and propelling others to fulfill their purpose in Christ.
We grow by inspiring, equipping, and propelling others to fulfill their purpose in Christ.
We aren’t just encouraging to make people feel better, we are encouraging with this intent purpose: to propel them to fulfill their purpose in Christ!
Look back at where we started in Ephesians 4:
11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers,
12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
That word service there in the NASB is rendered “ministry” in the ESV.
In the greek the word is diakonia (Dee-ah-k-oh-nee-uh)… it is service, it is ministry, it is preparation, it is serving one another, it is mission, it is assignment…
This is what I’m here to equip you for, to encourage you and inspire you and propel you…
And that’s part of why you are here, to be that iron that sharpens iron… encouraging one another to love and good works…
13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.
The UNITY OF THE FAITH!
The test of maturity is unity of the faith!
We don’t have time to fight and bicker among ourselves, the enemy is doing everything he can to deceive everyone he can, while so many are sitting back discussing theological differences rather than charging the gates of Hell with the oil of anointing!
Let’s get out of the mode where we point out all the wrongs without providing a better alternative!
Be an encourager! Correct in love. Show them the right way, not just condemn them for being wrong…
We grow through encouragement!
And this is the result:
14 As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming;
15 but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ,
16 from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.
Call worship team
This is what we are getting to with these core values, that we find our proper working in the body so that it all comes together for the purpose of growth…
“causes growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.”
How are we built up? How is the body grown? IN LOVE!
We grow disciples in here that embody Jesus out there…
We Grow with Intentionality…
And
We Grow through Encouragement
We Grow through Encouragement
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