Nehemiah 11: Commit to the Mission

Patton Shinall

Nehemiah • Sermon • Submitted 5 years ago

Nehemiah 11

Mission

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Intro

Don’t we all love a good underdog story?

We love to see stories of small, insignificant people who overcome all the odds and accomplish something amazing.

Stories like the Lord of the Rings where the hero is not the great warrior king Aragorn but a small hobbit named Frodo who destroyed the Ring of Power and saved Middle Earth

Its the reason we can be watching planet earth and root for the seal as it is trying to escape the killer whale one minute and the next wish that same seal had died in the ocean because now its murdering baby penguins on the shore.

Or even in sports, we love to root for the plucky underdog team in hopes that they win and finally topple that one dynasty’s tyranny of dominance.

I think the reason we like these stories so much is because they remind us of ourselves. If we were all honest with ourselves, every single one of us would like our life to matter for something great.

But we all know that in the grand scheme of history, we are small and insignificant just like the heroes in those underdog stories.

Those stories resonate with us because they give us hope that if someone else who is small and insignificant can accomplish something great, then maybe so can we.

As we continue our study in , we have been focusing on how God invites his people to join him in his work to save sinners and in this chapter, God shows us a very important piece of this invitation.

God doesn’t just use heroes to accomplish his purposes. He uses everyday saints like you and me and everyday churches just like ours to join him in his work of making disciples.

As Nehemiah list the names of different people that move into the city of Jerusalem, what we see is that God uses all of his people to carry out his mission to save sinners.

Allow me to remind you were we are in the book. Nehemiah had been called by God to lead the people of Israel to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.

The significance of the reconstruction effort was not so Jerusalem could have a shiny new wall. Nehemiah was called to rebuild the wall because Jerusalem was the city of God and he had called his people Israel to be a light to the nations of God’s glory and salvation.

However, with the walls of the city in ruins, it made it look like God was a deadbeat who did not care about his people. Why would any nation turn from their false gods to worship the One True God if this is how he treated his people?

So the people of God gather together to rebuild the walls and end their disgrace as Nehemiah said in chapter 2.

Once the walls had been rebuilt, Nehemiah moved from rebuilding the walls, to rebuilding the people of God themselves. To help them recapture their identity as God’s holy people so that they could once again be light to the nations of God’s salvation.

Part of that meant that the people had to move back into Jerusalem so that it would once again be God’s holy city.

If Jerusalem was not restored to be the city of God on the earth where God’s kingdom went forth, then it would be likely that the worship of God at the Temple would decline in importance.

And if the worship of God was devalued among his own people because they chose to willingly live outside of his kingdom, then they would once again be led into sin and idolatry and defame the name of God before a watching world.

So Nehemiah noted in The city was wide and large, but the people within it were few, and no houses had been rebuilt.

The city was wide and large, but the people within it were few, and no houses had been rebuilt.

Seeing this problem, Nehemiah knew that he had to help the people of God live for God’s kingdom rather than for themselves so he reminded them of God’s faithfulness in chapter 7, and Ezra the priest, led a revival amongst the people in chapter 8 by reading from the Word of God, which led the people to recommit themselves to keeping God’s covenant in chapter 9-10.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

Now that the people had been reminded of God’s glory and their call to live for his kingdom by being a light to the nations, it was again time to revisit the population issue in Jerusalem.

Now for us to see what a passage that is mostly a list of names has to say to God’s people today, we need to see the theological significance behind it.

We touched on how God’s mission in Nehemiah was to restore his people and the city of Jerusalem so that they could once again be a light to the nations of his salvation and prepare the way of the Messiah, Jesus Christ, who would die for the sins of the world.

God’s mission in this book is to make worshipers. Both among his own people as they commit to live all their lives for him and among the nations as they repent of their sin through the witness of Israel and worship the One True God of the Bible.

To accomplish this mission, God had led his people to rebuild the walls, and now he was leading them to give up their lives in the countryside to move back into the city.

As God’s people today, God’s mission for us is the same mission God had then. God is saving sinners and transforming them into worshipers or as Jesus called them disciples.

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 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, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.

This is what is known as the Great Commission.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

These verses give us our marching orders as a church. The reason the people of God exist is to glorify God and make disciples so that others might glorify him as well.

To accomplish his mission to reach the nations with the gospel of Jesus Christ which proclaims his sacrificial life, death, and resurrection, God is making disciples through local churches, and therefore local Christians, just like us.

And because is careful to point out that God uses everyday believers and not just Nehemiah or Ezra or the other religious leaders of the people to accomplish his mission, we must see how God desires each and every one of us to commit to his mission so that he can use our seemingly small, insignificant, underdog lives to accomplish incredible things for his kingdom.

Reason for not reading the passage

Before we dive into our main points and what this text has to teach us, We are going to handle this passage the same way we have handled similar passages throughout this book.

Instead of me mispronouncing Hebrew names for an extended period of time, I want to show you how this list actually communicates some wonderful truths for what it takes for God to use us to carry out his mission to make disciples in this church.

I want to teach you what God’s word means in this passage as we work through it together.

So how this passage is organized is:

Verses 1-2 provide an introduction to how God was accomplishing his mission to restore Jerusalem to be a light to the nations once again.

Then in verses 3-24 Nehemiah lists the names of those that commit to the Mission and uproot their lives to engage in the work of the Kingdom by moving into the city.

Then verses 25-36 provides the names of the villages that surrounded Jerusalem where the rest of the people of God lived.

Summary

So the main idea of this sermon is that: God uses all of his people, great and small, to carry out his mission to save sinners.

And God accomplishes this mission by his people committing to live intentionally for his kingdom by engaging their lives in the life and ministry of local churches just like ours as they work to proclaim the gospel and make disciples.

And what we are going to focus on in our time together is how we as a church, the local body of Christ here at Metro, must go about committing our lives to that mission so that God will use us to accomplish wonderful things for his Kingdom where we will see the dead brought to life, the blind see, and the lost found through the ministry God has entrusted us to do.

And as we dig into , the first thing we see for God to use our church to build his kingdom then our...

For God to use us as we commit to his mission...

1. Leaders Must Commit to the Mission by Example

Now the leaders of the people lived in Jerusalem.

This verse describes a fresh move into the city rather than an existing situation where the leaders were already living there.

It is better understood as “the leaders of the people settled in Jerusalem.”

At this point, even though the walls had been rebuilt, Jerusalem was still a bit of a fixer upper. It was going to take some tender loving care to restore the city back to the Holy city that God desired it to be.

And the leaders of the people see the work that is to be done for God’s glory and said “Sign me up.”

The leaders of Israel knew that it was going to take more than just them to make Israel the city of the great King, God himself like says.

But they also knew moving into the city was a hard sell.

Some of the families in the areas surrounding Jerusalem had been there for almost 100 years after returning from the Babylonian exile.

They weren’t too keen on uprooting all their life just to move into a city that still needed a lot of work.

So the leaders of Nehemiah’s day did what leaders to. They made the sacrifice and led by example.

They were showing with their own lives, that living for the kingdom of God was worth it, and they picked up and moved into Jerusalem.

Church Leaders Today

In the same way, the church today needs godly leaders who are whole-heartedly committed to the mission of God in their own life.

The people of God need godly, qualified leaders to show them what it looks like for a believer to grow in their discipleship. To die themselves and live for the Lord.

Without godly leaders in the church who are able to say with Paul, “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” then the saints will be plagued with ravenous wolves who prey on the weak leading people away into false teaching and false living and the lost will be lead away from Christ to their own destruction.

But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. 15 Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. 16 Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

One thing I do. This is the whole point of Paul’s Ministry. He wanted his whole life to be about growing in his discipleship and helping others to grow in theirs. To live all of his life for the glory of Christ

Let those who are mature think this way. Those that are mature are growing in their discipleship to Christ andThey are committed to God’s mission to save sinners by living it out in their own life as they put their sin to death and follow Jesus and make disciples.

So Paul is wanting those that are mature disciples, living for the Lord to live with such an urgency that Christ and the purposes of his Kingdom is the sole focus of their life.

Let us hold true to what we have attained or been given. Namely salvation in Jesus Christ. Christian leaders must remain faithful to the Lord. They don’t give up or given in when things get hard. They don’t wander away into false teaching. They remember the great salvation God has given them and they continue to labor faithfully for the Lord.

17 Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us.

Brothers, join in imitating me. What an amazing statement. Paul is telling this church that if they want to see what it looks like to follow Jesus, to commit to the mission of God to save sinners by growing in holiness and proclaiming the gospel, in other words if you want to be a disciple who makes disciples, Paul says “Then look at my life.”

This isn’t pride on Paul’s part. He is not telling the Philippians, oh look how holy I am! No. What he is doing is saying, “Brothers, sisters. I want you to grow in Christ and to do that, I want you to follow the pattern of my life because all I’m doing is trying to follow Jesus.

These are the kinds of leaders the church needs today.

And if you are a leader in this church, you might say, "But that was Paul. He was an Apostle. Maybe even one of the greatest Missionaries of all time. Of course he could say, imitate me and actually mean it. I’m just a normal person. What hope do I have?”

But look what he says. And keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. Paul says, don’t only look at me, but look at your leaders who are in your midst who are living the same kind of life we are living. Look at your leaders who are following Christ in their discipleship and then follow their way of life.

This is a sobering call for every leader in our church. Whether you are an elder, a deacon, a community group leader, a women’s ministry leader, a serve team leader, a Little Metro Bible Room teacher, any person that is a leader in this church is called by God to live in such a way to join Paul in saying, Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ ().

Now this does not mean you need to be perfect in order to be a leader in this church and help others grow in their discipleship.

What it means is that if you are a leader in this church or you want to become a leader in this church, you must look at your life and ask, Do I live in such a way that others could imitate my way of life and grow in Christ?

Am I in the Word? Am I repenting of sin?

Am I engaging my life in the local church, committing myself to the body in order to help our church build itself up in love?

Do I live for Christ’s heavenly kingdom or am I living for the things of this world?

Am I sharing my faith with the lost?

The people of God need examples of what it looks like to commit to the mission of God and join God in his work to save sinners so they can follow suit..

And so often, people will here mission type talk in the church and automatically associate it with evangelism. And evangelism is surely a part of it. We should be a witnessing people.

But the mission of God is to make disciples who make disciples. Therefore, part of committing to the mission necessarily means that we are disciples of Christ.

And if the people of God are going to grow in their discipleship, then they need godly leaders who can show them the way.

To show them a life that is marked by following Christ in such a way, that they can say if you want to follow Jesus, then follow me.

So if you are a member of this church and you want to grow in Christ, look at the life of our leaders. Look at how they live, at their habits, at how they go about their life and imitate their way of life as we try to imitate Christ and grow in him.

And the stakes are high for leaders to hold themselves to this expectation because look how Paul continues.

18 For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. 19 Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. 20 But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,

Without godly leaders who lead by example, there will be many who will walk as enemies of Christ.

There are false teachers who lead people way from the true gospel and encourage them to make their god their belly.

We must lead by example to show the flock of God what it looks like to live committed to the mission of making disciples.

17 Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. 18 For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. 19 Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. 20 But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,

In other words, they become insatiable and begin filling their life with anything and everything they think will satisfy them. It doesn’t matter if its sin. It doesn’t matter if it is foolishness and ungodliness. They hunger for it because their minds are set on earthly things and not on the work of the kingdom.

So, if God is going to use our church to build his kingdom, then we must have leaders who lead by example to show the flock what it looks like to live committed to the mission of making disciples.

And they do this by living a life that is marked by mature discipleship that they can then lead others in by their example as they follow Christ.

Grow in our discipleship and love for the Lord

Engage our life in the local church

May we be the kind of leaders Paul talks about in You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, 2 and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. 3 Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. 4 No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. 5 An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. 6 It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

Live with kingdom vision, always viewing our life as how can I glorify Christ

The leaders of God’s people must lead by example and commit their lives to the mission of God to make disciples if God is going to work in an through our church to save sinners.

You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, 2 and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. 3 Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. 4 No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. 5 An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. 6 It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

Number 2. If God is going to use our church to build his Kingdom, then...

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Php 3:13–20.

2. Our Church Must Joyfully Commit to the Mission

And the rest of the people cast lots to bring one out of ten to live in Jerusalem the holy city, while nine out of ten remained in the other towns. 2 And the people blessed all the men who willingly offered to live in Jerusalem.

Now what exactly is going on here?

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

Well at several times in the OT, the people of God cast lots in order to determine God’s will. This would be like rolling the dice or drawing straws.

Now before you go out to buy a new set a dice, Christians today do not depend on this as a way to know God’s will.

Its not like you can grab Yhatzee, pray over the little blue cup and then ask God to show you whether or not you should buy that house.

Today, the Holy Spirit dwells in every believer and we can expect God to make his will known through the Scriptures that he has written and guiding us by the Spirit to live according to them.

But in the OT, they cast lots to determine God’s will and thats what they do here.

They cast lots in order to bring 1 out of 10 people to live in the city of Jerusalem and the rest of the people would continue to live in the surrounding villages farming the land to provide food for the people of Israel.

Now why do I say that the people joyfully moved into Jerusalem? I mean, if I drew the short straw and had to go move into a dump like Jerusalem was, I don’t think I’d be very happy about it.

I mean it was dangerous to live in Jerusalem. If some army came through, they would focus their attack on the walled city, not the surrounding villages.

Moving into the city was like painting a target on your back. Not to mention, the enemies of the people, Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem who have been harassing Nehemiah from the beginning are still out there.

Not only that, but if you lived in the city, you would have less land, and in a culture that was largely supported by agriculture, less land meant less money. So either you were going to have to find a new way to make a living in the city, or commute back to your farm every day.

It might seem like them casting lots was actually a way of forcing people to move into Jerusalem, however I don’t believe thats the case because verse 2 says And the people blessed all the men who willingly offered to live in Jerusalem.

Now this can mean one of two things. Either that there was a group of people who drew the short straw and another group of people who willingly volunteered, OR those on whom the lot fell, accepted it as God’s will for their life they willingly offered to live in Jerusalem.

I think the second is more likely given the revival going on among the people.

I think that the people of Israel cast lots and then those who were then called to move into the city accepted it joyfully as God’s will for their life.

They were content to do anything the Lord asked them to even if it meant moving into a torn up dump with a new wall.

These people were putting God’s kingdom, God’s mission above their individual desires.

Moving into the city was less advantageous for them, but they did so willingly because Jerusalem was where God was building his kingdom on earth

Jerusalem was where God was at work in the world even it it seemed unimpressive and dangerous at the moment.

That is why Nehemiah multiple times in Chapter 11 notes that Jerusalem is the holy city.

It is a city set apart for the purposes of God where God is worshiped by his people as testimony of his power to save sinners.

These saints were devoted to God and worshiping him rather than their own little lives with trivial concerns. They were pursuing God’s kingdom by moving into Jerusalem because they wanted to live for something more. They wanted to live all their life for the Lord.

Just because they were willingly moving into the city doesn’t mean that they weren’t sacrificing something to do so. Many of them might have preferred to stay where they were with their friends and family, but they submitted their will to the will of God by faith and moved into Jerusalem.

Church Today

So what does this have to do with us today. God is not calling us to pick up our lives and move to Israel.

I think the principle for us from this passage is to see, that God’s will for us is to join him in his mission, and then to submit to that will by joyfully engaging our lives for his purposes even if that means we make sacrifices to do so.

At the risk of overemphasizing, let me again remind you what this means.

God’s mission is to make disciples who know and love Jesus Christ and obey his commands.

God is accomplishing this mission today through local churchs just like ours as we gather together to spur one another on towards love and good works. In other words, the reason we join a church is to grow in our discipleship to Christ.

That means that the people of God, must engage their life in the life and work of the church in order to grow in their discipleship, help other Christians grow in theirs, and to proclaim the gospel to the lost so that they also might become disciples.

All that to say, if you want to commit to the mission, if you want your life to matter for something more, that means you work out your salvation as Paul said in by growing to be a disciple who makes disciples in a local body of believers.

God is using everyday Christians like you and me to grow his kingdom in our lives and in the lives of other people.

And because God is inviting us to join in his mission, we should do so joyfully.

17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

This is the gospel. Through Christ and his sacrificial life, death and resurrection and when we put our faith in him we are forgiven of our sins and given new life.

We are born again and the old nature of sin and death passes away making room for the newness of life in Christ.

This is the beginning of what it means to be a disciple and engaged in God’s Mission.

18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

Do you see what Paul is saying?

Because Christ has reconciled you to God, he has invited you to join him in his work of reconciliation by proclaiming the gospel.

In fact, Paul goes so far to say that you have been entrusted with the message of reconciliation.

You have been entrusted with the message that God was not content to allow people to perish under his wrath in their sin.

Instead, he sent his Son Jesus Christ into the world to live a sinless perfect life only to die on the cross as our substitute absorbing all of the wrath that God had against us in himself. He paid for our sins and rose again bodily three days later so that all that put their faith in him would not perish, but have eternal life.

This is the message you and I are entrusted with as God’s holy people today. THEREFORE, we are Christ’s ambassadors. We are his representatives, and God himself, makes his appeal to the lost through us.

Now don’t miss the through us part. God makes his appeal through his holy people, and yes he does do this through individuals who evangelize, but he does this through individuals who evangelize that are a part of local churches.

The collective members of the church together are the ambassadors for Christ. As the world looks upon our body and how we love one another and worship Christ together, it proves that the Father sent the Son.

It takes all of us together as a church body to proclaim the message of reconciliation so that more people might hear the gospel and be saved.

It is when those who are lost see the gospel in action through transformed lives in the life of the church as God’s new Kingdom people, that they believe its message has the power to save.

It can’t just mean be a part of a church can it?

And we can carry out this ministry of reconciliation joyfully because we have been given the joy of salvation in Christ. We joyfully commit to mission of God together as a church because God saved us in Christ we want more people to know the joy of salvation for themselves.

This leads us to point number three if God is going to use our church to build his kingdom, then the whole church must commit to the mission.

3. The Whole Church Must Commit to the Mission

- Names of those who moved into Jerusalem

-36 - The Names of the Villages where people lived outside Jerusalem

What you have here is recorded a list of names of all the people who made the sacrifice to live for the Lord and not their own desires.

God honored them in his Word by writing the names of those who in faith stepped out to engage in God’s mission to make Jerusalem a holy city where where God would be worshiped and be a city on a hill as a light to the nations.

Conversely, you have just the names of villages where other 90% of the people lived.

What this shows us that God honors those that get off the sidelines and get involved in the work of his kingdom.

Not only that, but it might seem tedious to us to see such a long lists of names, but it reminds us that God’s work is done by individuals.

Even though the work of the Kingdom is a community activity, each and every person a part of that community is important to fulfill the work God has given his people to do.

It is also important to note, that those that God chose to move into the city were not just the priests and the Levites. It was also normal everyday Jews who were going about their normal life.

The work of the kingdom cannot be left to the “Religious Professionals” God wants all of his people engaged in his mission to make disciples.

4 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up 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 mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 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 in deceitful schemes.

Notice what Paul says. God gave the apostles, prophets, the evangelists, and the shepherds and teachers. A quick note on the shepherds and teachers. In the Greek that is one idea. Shepherds is the same word for pastors so Paul is saying the Pastor-teachers. Those that shepherd the flock of God. All of these are the leaders given to the church by Christ. Evangelists and Pastor-teachers continue today whereas the apostles and prophets completed their ministry in the New Testament times when the NT was incomplete.

And Christ gave these leaders to the church why? to equip the saints for the work of ministry for the building up the body of Christ.

And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up 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 mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 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 in deceitful schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 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.

That means that God wants to build his kingdom in Metro through you. Not just our Elders and deacons. God has given you to this church to help build up the body of Christ.

That means if you are a member God has given you to this church to help our church proclaim the message of reconciliation to a lost and dying world while we all grow together to be God’s holy people.

That’s what Paul says in verse 13. Until we all attain the unity of faith, knowledge of the Son of God, for mature manhood.

That we would all grow to be mature disciples. What is a mature disciple, those that look like Jesus Christ, that is why Paul says to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

And the saints must fulfill the work of ministry that the Lord has called them to do so that the people of God would no longer be children, tossed to and fro by every false teaching and instead remain committed to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 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.

If the mission of God is to build his kingdom and save sinners by building his church, the only way this will happen will be when every part is working properly.

Now this doesn’t mean that God is powerless to build his church unless we do our part. God is all-powerful and he has promised to build his church for his purposes.

What that means is that unless we play our part and commit to the mission of God at this church, then God will not use us to build his kingdom.

We will not see brother and sister members grow in Christ.

We will not see new people come to saving faith through the proclamation of the gospel.

We will not see pastors raised up to go and start new church or revitalize dying churches.

Unless every member of our body commits to the mission of God for our church, we will not equip people to live lives changed by Jesus and we will not see lives changed through building healthy churches.

As we grow in our discipleship to the Lord through committing to the process, we become disciples who make disciples.

But, if we humble ourselves before the Lord and commit to live out the Great Commission in this place, to grow in our discipleship and to lead others to do the same, then God will use us mightily for his purposes and we will all be able to stand before the Lord at the throne of Judgement and hear “Well done good and faithful servant!”

Valiant Men

The reason why this church exists is not just because you are supposed to come to church at 10 am every Sunday. We exist to carry out the Great Commission that God has given each and every Christian and each and every Church to engage their life in.

For the True Worship of God

We exist to make disciples by growing to follow Christ as we put our sin to death, and by calling others to die to themselves and follow Jesus.

The way that God has made for Christians to grow to be disciples who in turn make disciples is through local churches just like ours.

And God uses seemingly small insignificant churches just like Metro and seemingly small, insignificant people just like you and me to accomplish his mission to save sinners if we would just engage our life in the work.

And as we’ve studied , we’ve seen that God will use us to build his kingdom and make disciples if we:

1. Have godly leaders who lead by example

2. Joyfully commit to the mission by willingly making sacrifices for the kingdom

3. Have the whole body, each and every one of our members engaged and commited to the Great Commission

If that is what it means to commit our lives to the mission, how then do we actually go about doing that?

The people of God in willingly committed to living for God’s kingdom instead of their own individual lives by moving into the city of Jerusalem.

So for us today, we must ask...

How Do We Live for God’s Kingdom and Commit to the Mission?

How Do I Grow?

1. Commit to a Local Church

We grow in our discipleship as we engage our life in the life of the local church.

That means we see the church as God’s primary means for how we grow in Christ in our spiritual walk.

No one is able to grow in Christ on their own. Remember, it is only when the whole body is working properly together that we are built up in love.

So to commit to a local church means to commit to their process for making disciples.

For us, we call this simply The Process. This is how we make disciples at Metro Church.

This starts with Committing to God where we gather together to worship the Lord and hear his word preached so that we can see how he has loved us in Christ. And as we see his glory we see how unsatisfying our sin really is and put it to death by the Spirit.

and as we see his glory we are compelled to put our paltry sins to death and live for him.

The next step is to Commit to the Body.

This is where we take God’s command to love one another as he loved us in Christ seriously.

Committing to a local church doesn’t mean you just show up on Sunday morning means to committing to other members of that church in biblical community.

Biblical community is where we live with and love one another in a way that says, I’m committed to growing in Christ in this relationship and I’m committed to helping you do the same. So we join one of our small group ministries like community groups, or women’s ministry, or our student ministry in order to get around other believers to spur one another on in Christ.

Ultimately the pinnacle of committing to the Body means committing to covenantal membership with other believers.

Are we really members of one body if we have a prosthetic hand that is content to bail any time it wants to?

Becoming a Member of a local church is so implied in the new testament, that you won’t see an explicit command to “become a member.”

What that means is that a Christian who is not a Member of a local church is such a foreign concept to the NT Authors that such a person doesn’t actually exist.

This is seen in the biblical images that the NT Authors used for the church. We are one body. We are God’s family. Theses are images that support the idea of commitment and being joined together in an intentional way.

Finally we Commit to the Mission.

We join in the work that our church is doing by serving in one of our ministries.

That looks like serving by giving of our time and talent by serving on a ministry team to use our gifts in some particular area of ministry to bless the church and promote the ministry of the Word.

We also give financially to support the ministry that takes place in this church.

God wants your heart not your money. When we give financially to the church we are a part of, we say in a tangible way that the mission of God in the church is more important than anything that money could buy us.

Membership

Then we commit to the Body. Committing to a church is more than just showing up on Sunday. It is about committing to other people in the body to love them and grow in Christ together and this happens through committing to biblical community.

Biblical Community

For us this looks like joining one of our small group ministries like community groups, women’s ministry, or student ministry to grow in your discipleship with other believers.

And ultimately, committing to the body means you join the church in biblical membership.

Now I can’t show you a verse in the New Testament that says you must become a member of a local church.

But the reason I can’t do that is because believers who do not commit to a church by joining that church is such a foreign concept to the authors of the New Testament that they didn’t even consider it a possibility.

The reason we join a church in biblical membership is so we can bear a true witness to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

If there are false Christians out there who do not know Jesus and live for their sin while still claiming to be saved, it defames the name of Christ and the power of the gospel.

Church membership helps us to guard our witness to the gospel by affirming the holiness of one another and as Christ’s ambassadors proclaiming to the world this is what a Christian looks like. This is what the gospel does for sinners.

By joining a church in membership we are able together to say we a

The aim of biblical Church membership is to only have members who are true believers as evidenced by their faith and life as best as we are able to tell.

Therefore, church membership enables us proclaim a true gospel and bear a true witness and back that proclamation up with transformed lives.

Finally, the third step in our process is that we commit to the mission. This is where we use our Time, Talent, and Treasure for God’s kingdom by joining a serve team to help promote the proclamation of the gospel so more people might hear it and we give our tithes and offerings to support the ministry of our church.

Finally committing to the Mission means we engage in personal evangelism with the lost which leads to the second way that you and I live for God’s kingdom. Not only do we Commit to a Local Church, but we also...

Serving

Giving

2. Commit to Live on Mission in the World

Separated to the Word of God

Living as a Light of the gospel

Last week we talked about how Christians must live separate from the World as God’s holy people in order to be a light to the nations that God saves sinners.

But separating from the world does not mean that we completely remove ourselves from those in the World.

Rather, it means that we live with God’s Word as our highest authority. We live in the world, whether that is in our jobs, at our kids school events or practices, at the grocery store, wherever we might be in the world, we live a distinctly Christian life.

We live as Jesus’ disciples, loving God and loving others by obeying God’s Word.

Jesus said You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.

You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.

What Jesus means is that you should live in the world as a Christian. Not someone who fits right in with the culture around them. That You should be as distinct from the way unbelievers live in the way you live your life as a lamp is in a dark room.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

The second way that you and I commit to live on mission in the world

Bear Witness to the Gospel as often as we are able

Notice I use the words bear witness intentionally.

Somewhere along the line, Christians have gotten it into their head that the only time they are successful in evangelism is when the lead someone to “pray the prayer.”

But the emphasis in the NT is less about winning converts, although that is certainly our hope, and more about bearing witness or just proclaiming the gospel.

What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. 7 So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. 9 For we are God’s fellow workers.

God is the one who saves sinners. Not us. We are just called to bear witness in hopes that whether we are planting or watering that God will give the growth to the seeds of the gospel.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), .

Let me tell you how simple this can be. I met someone just last week that said it was their first time coming to our church. And when I asked them how did they hear about us, they said that there was a mom at a local splash pad who had cupcakes who invited her to church.

Now I don’t know who that person was in our body, but that is a great start of bearing witness whenever you have the opportunity. Basically in inviting this woman to church all that person did was essentially say, “Hey, I follow Jesus. You should follow Jesus. Why don’t we do that together at my church?”

Thats all it means to bear witness. To look for opportunities to share the gospel and talk about Christ and then to seize those opportunities in faith.

And by God’s grace he will give the growth.

So if God is going to use us to build his kingdom, we must commit to engage our life in the life of the church and commit to live on mission in the world by living as a light to the gospel and bearing witness whenever we are able.

Conclusion

God is building his kingdom through local churches just like us and he invites each one of us to commit to that mission and join him in his work. May we be faithful to answer the call and commit to the mission to be disciples who make disciples.

Let’s Pray

Leaders

Joy in the work

Burden all of us with the work of the kingdom

Endure

Scripture Reading

8 Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, 9 who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, 10 and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, 11 for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, 12 which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me. 13 Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 14 By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you.

Leaders

Joyful commitment

All of us would live for the kingdom

Allow our church to build itself up in love

Show us opportunities we can bear witness

Scripture

ANything?

Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, 9 who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, 10 and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, 11 for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, 12 which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me. 13 Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 14 By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you.

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