Make disciples...
Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 6 viewsNotes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
A
D
F
J
S
Emotion
A
C
T
Language
O
C
E
A
E
Social
Read . WHAT DO YOU DO NEXT?
After six hours paddling down the Amazon and what feels like six hundred mosquito bites, you’ve arrived. You’re part of a missionary team sent to live with the tribe in the middle of the rain forest for the next decade. You tie your dugout canoe to a tree, and your translator asks around for your local contact. You meet him, then get settled into your five-foot-diameter hut.
What do you do next?
You walk out your front door, like you do every day, head to the car, get in and start driving to work. You give an obligatory wave to your neighbor, whose name is either Jim or John; you’re never quite sure which. You work hard all morning. You eat a quick lunch at your desk alone, then back to the grind. You get home, mow the lawn, eat dinner, and watch TV until you drift off to sleep.
What do you do next?
MISSIONARIES AT HOME
We’d probably approach the first scene above with more missional intentionality, because that’s more of the scenario we picture when we think of a missionary. But in truth the second scenario is no different: we each live in a city on planet Earth just like “real” missionaries do. That city is filled with neighbors, coworkers, classmates, and friends who need Jesus, just like other missionaries’ cities. And we were sent to our city by God, for the same purposes as the missionaries that are sent to the Amazon.
If we’re honest about the second scene, “What we’d do next” is pretty much the same thing we did yesterday, and what we’ll do tomorrow. We’d work the daily grind and wait for Saturday when we can relax and hit the beach or bike trails. We live in a context where everyday routine, comfort, and convenience can distract us from our missionary calling.
But what if our relationships had a higher purpose? What if every friendship and interaction was intended by God to foremost, shape us, and change us spiritually?
According to Scripture, that's exactly what God intends. Every relationship in our lives has a growing or developing purpose.
And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;
Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were loosed. And the keeper of the prison, awaking from sleep and seeing the prison doors open, supposing the prisoners had fled, drew his sword and was about to kill himself.
And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;
For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.
God has determined where we live and who lives near us. All things, including our relationships, are from him and for him. The community that we are a part of it is not an accident. It is purposeful.
And just as God sends people to the Amazon or Asia or anywhere else in the world, He sent you into your city. Maybe it wasn’t a canoe or plane that got you to your mission field. More than likely a U-Haul or a buddy’s pickup. Maybe you thought you were moving there for four years of college. Maybe a job transferred you there, or a promotion took you there. Maybe…just maybe, you were even captured during a war, caged up, and exiled to your current city.
GOD ALONE PUTS HIS PEOPLE WHERE HE WANTS THEM
Being exiled for the sake of mission might seem unlikely, but that was the case for ancient Israel. The army of Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar had take some of God’s people captive into Babylon.
