Sermon Tone Analysis

Pray

Introduction

So far in our series on discipleship, we’ve covered quite a number of topics...

We’ve looked at the encounter with Jesus - where we meet Jesus for the first time and it’s like our lives will never be the same again.

We’ve looked at the call, where Jesus calls us to leave our old way of life behind and enter into a new way of life with Him.

We’ve looked at the community that is the church, where we can build each other up and encourage each other in the faith.

We then looked at the culture in which this community lives and breathes - the places where we work or live or play - knowing that we can flavour the world for Jesus in these areas.

We looked at the courage we need to go into these places and tell others about Jesus and the cost that following Jesus takes on our lives - that the life of a disciple of Jesus is not a easy one and Jesus tells us it won’t be easy.

So with all of that behind us, we now turn to the challenge - the challenge to put all of this together and go and make disciples.

And that’s where most of us are at…myself included.

Most of us HAVE met with Jesus, most of us HAVE given their lives to Jesus and have asked him to forgive us for our sins.

Most of us meet together as a community of believers and encourage each other and build each other up.

Most of us are living and working in a culture that is worldly and need courage to go and engage with this culture.

And MOST of us are aware of the cost of discipleship.

…but perhaps it’s also true to say that most of us aren’t really experiencing much cost and are at the starting line, but haven’t actually made the move to going and making more disciples, as Jesus commands us in Matthew 28.

We can go to church, we can also tell others with whom we work or play that we believe in Jesus, we give some money into the church, but for the majority of people in this country, that’s about where it stops.

It’s like we’re on the starting line in a race and we’re ready to go, but we haven’t started running.

[Show starting line pic]

We’ve put on the shoes and we’ve put on our shorts and T-shirts.

We’ve even got a 1980s sweatband on our foreheads.

It’s like we look the part, but we are just standing on the starting line and we aren’t going anywhere.

The gun has been fired and we’ve taken the first step OVER the line by saying YES to Jesus, but for so many people, that’s where we stay.

Pause

Let’s take a step back and ask ourselves what all this is leading to?

What’s the point of knowing the cost of discipleship, and the culture within which we live and work and play?

What’s the point of the church community?

What’s the point of having courage?

What is ALL of this leading to?

Because we can know that we need courage, and we might have the courage that comes from knowing that Jesus has given us the power and authority to heal the sick and raise the dead, like we looked at 2 weeks ago - because there’s more than one way to be sick, and there’s more than one way to be dead.

And we might know what our gifts our, and we might know the culture well, but so what?

What’s the use of having courage, and knowing our gifts, and knowing the culture where we live and work and play if we don’t also GO and make disciples in these cultures?

And that’s the challenge that we have as Christians…Now that we know the cost of following Jesus - that it won’t be easy.

Now that we know the culture where we work.

Now that we know that we need courage, once we KNOW these things we need to ask the Holy Spirit to equip us and empower us to take all our head knowledge and put it to use by going into our cultures and making more disciples.

We’ve stepped over the starting line, but we haven’t really started running the race of discipleship…because discipleship, among other things, means making more disciples.

Pause

A quote from the video says something like this...

Jesus doesn’t want converts, he wants disciples.

And that comes from the passage this morning - both in Matthew 28 and in Acts 1...

Now, perhaps one of the reasons why we are where we are is because the gospel has been miss-sold.

When I was growing up it was all about giving your life to Jesus.

Every sermon I heard, especially on a Sunday evening was hell, fire and brimstone - you must be born again.

It was like hungry hippo sermons.

You know the game, hungry hippos - where there are balls in the middle and you have to frantically press your button to make the hippo grab as many balls as it could.

The object being the one who has the most balls in his hippo is the winner.

That’s what it was like - let’s grab as many people as we can to get into heaven and whoever has the most is the winner.

And it was like the whole mission of the church was to get people over the starting line and then leave them there.

But what happens to them after they get over the line?

They’re on their own with no sense of direction.

I remember a clip from Monty Python of the 100 m sprint for people with no sense of direction?

If anyone has seen this sketch, it’s part of the silly olympiad - where there are different silly games, like the marathon for people who are incontinent and so on.

Well, part of it is the 100m sprint for people with no sense of direction.

People line up at the starting line, the gun is fired, and people run off in different directions.

Here it is...

[Show Clip]

And that’s what many people are like in this country.

We bring them into the kingdom and then we leave them to fend for themselves.

And then we wonder why people drop out or why they struggle as a Christian, or we wonder why the next generation are NOT bringing people into the kingdom - and part of the reason is because nobody knows what they’re doing or what the Christian life is like - because all that’s been done is that people have been told that they’re going to hell and they need to ask Jesus to forgive them of their sins.

And so people have done that, and they’ve stepped over the line...but where’s the follow up?

And as a result, we’re running in all different directions thinking this is the right way, but we don’t know, because nobody has told us.

Pause

Now, this is not the case for everyone...

…but Paul talks about running a race - it’s not about getting over the starting line, it’s about keeping running, pushing on - pressing forward to get over the FINISH line...

Paul is pressing on to win the prize.

Jesus doesn’t want converts, he wants disciples.

He wants people who are pressing on for him, who are accepting his mission and COMmission to be disciples who go and make more disciples.

Pause

So why isn’t there more of a push for discipleship in our churches?

There are probably many reasons for this, but here’s one suggestion...

Perhaps, if we ARE just over the starting line and we’re not sure where to go, or we’re happy to stay there because at least we’ve got our ticket to heave... maybe what we need is a renewing of the mind.

Paul talks about this in Romans 12, which we read earlier...

Now, let’s look at this for a second…

Paul urges us, in view of God’s mercy towards us, to offer up our bodies - our whole lives - as a living sacrifice.

Now stop there.

A sacrifice is something that is given up - something that you could really do with having, but you give it up.

In terms of the bible, the sacrifice was a bull or a goat - a perfect specimen…the BEST of your flock or herd - the one that you really could do WITHOUT giving up.

That was the one that was to be given up and sacrificed for the forgiveness of sin or whatever.

And this links to last week when Jesus says we need to deny ourselves - to say NO to ourselves and our own ambitions and goals and look towards Jesus’ ambition for us.

Paul says, ‘offer yourself up - YOURSELF - your whole self - as a living sacrifice.

In other words, give yourself up - Give every bit of yourself up to God as a living sacrifice.

THAT’S your act of worship.

Going to church and singing songs is part of worship - but Paul says, there’s more to worship than singing a song or going to church.

In fact, our whole lives are an act of worship…and we take a step further on this race.

Pause

But how do we do this?

Because this isn’t natural… And Paul continues, here’s how you can give yourself up as a living sacrifice - you need to renew your mind.

Paul says, don’t let the world squeeze you into its mould - don’t be conformed to this world.

Don’t be like this world.

Don’t act like the world, don’t be the same as the world.

Don’t be NO different to the world.

Because if we are just like the world, then we will THINK like the world and we will therefore live for ourselves and for our own worldly ambition.

Because that’s what the rest of the world does.

They live for themselves, their own ambitions.

And if you conform to that then you’re not going to want to deny yourself - you’re not going to want to say NO to your own success and ambition, and you’re NOT going to want to sacrifice your whole LIFE as an act of worship for Jesus.

The only way you can do this is if you have your mind renewed by God.

And if you do that, then you’ll be able to discern what God’s will is.

Pause

So if we think of the race analogy - it’s like there are many people who have heard the gun fire, and they’ve crossed the starting line - they’ve become a Christian - but they’re just loitering around the starting line and they have no idea where to go or what to do.

But there are some who have started running, and they are heading towards the finish line.

These are the ones who have their minds renewed and have given themselves up as living sacrifices.