Sermon Tone Analysis

Missions Statement Message # 4

Big Idea — god gifts his church with leaders to equip the saints for the work of ministry so that the church body would grow toward maturity.

Read Eph 4:1-16.

The Purpose for our existence at gcmb

Throughout Scripture the fundamental purpose of the church is the Glory of God.

All of creation was created for God and His glory.

Isaiah confirms this, Isaiah 43:7 - 7 everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.”The

apostle John in Revelation re-affirms this truth, Revelation 4:11 - 11 “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.”Peter in his letter to a group of early Christians encouraged them to use their gifts appropriately 'so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever' (1 Peter 4:11 - 11 whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ.

To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever.

Amen.Three times in the opening verses of the first chapter of Ephesians Paul cites that our glorious salvation is designed “to the praise of His glory” (Eph 1:6,12,14).

We know that all of God’s creation was brought into existence to bring God glory.

The question is, does that include the church as well?

Absolutely!

In fact, I would go so far and say that the church is the primary way God desires to showcase His own glory.

That is a big statement.

Do you have a Biblical backing?

Ephesians 3:21 - 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever.

Amen.In Eph.

3:21 Paul make this huge statement that God WILL BE gloried in the church.

In the gospels we see God glorifying Himself through His Son.

Post resurrection we begin to see how exactly the Son will be glorified.

And Paul tells us here, that He will be glorified in the church.

Dr. Saucy in his excellent article “What is the Mission of the Church” said: “The Glory of God is nothing less than the nature of God revealed in His creation and actions.

To speak of God’s will for the Church, then, as His Glory, is simply to say that God intends to display Himself in and through His church.”

- Robert SaucyIn other words God has determined to tell the world how great He is and the message should be seen, heard and felt from the church.

It is the church that displays the glory of God.

The Apostle Peter tells us very clearly why we existence is…1 Peter 2:9 - 9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

Summary Statement - So the purpose for existence at GCMB is to bring glory to God.

How do we do that?

We magnify the Lord Jesus Christ…and we minister to His church.

But what exactly does that look like?

Let's look at our text together.

Our focus will be 11-13.

Outline

I. God’s Gifts

II.

God’s Game Plan

III.

God’s Goal

I. GOD’S GIFTS

Ephesians 4:11 - 11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers

v. 11 begins with “And he gave.”

These are people who have been given gifts to serve the church.

Gift people, given to the church.

v. 11 is not talking about all Christian.

There is a list of 5 specific roles or offices.

Each gifted to be a blessing to the church.

There are many more gifts.

You can find those list of gift in 1 Cor.

12 and Rom.

12.

Those lists are also not exhaustive.

But these here are for specific people and they are gifted by God for a specific purpose.

Let's look the 5 gifted roles:Apostles - Prophets - Evangelists - Pastors - TeachersI’m going to show you why pastors & teachers are in one group in just a bit but lets first look at the first 3 officesApostles Apostle simply means, “sent-out one”.

If we are talking apostle then all of us would qualify since we have all been sent out to be witnesses for Christ.

However, here Paul is talking about the Apostles that were appointed by Christ.

What distinguished someone as an Apostle?

They had to…Be appointed by Christ, the twelve along with the apostle Paul and some also include James, the Lord’s brother based on Gal.

1:19.Be commissioned directly by Jesus (Mark 3:13-14; Gal.

2:7-8).

See the risen Christ (Acts 1:21-22; 1 Cor.

9:1; 15:7-9) Possess the ability to perform miracles as an authentication of their Apostleship (2 Cor.

12:12).

Some of them penned inspired and authoritative writings which constitute the majority of the New Testament epistles (2 Pet.

3:15-16).Exercise authority in the church and build it up (Eph.

2:20; 2 Cor.

10:8).The church was built on the foundation of the Apostles.

Ephesians 2:20 - 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone,Because their role and qualifications were unique, when they died, there were no legitimate successors.

I don’t believe that there are current or modern day Apostles with a big ‘A’.

The Bible is clear that we are all apostles but not in the NT sense of Apostles with a capital A.

Prophets — The text also says that He gave prophets to the church to equip the church.

The prophets were men who received direct revelation from God.

Like the Apostles, the NT prophets helped lay a foundation but I don’t think there are Prophets today.

Certainly not in the sense that people receive new and authoritative revelation.

The prophets were needed in NT times because they did not have the completed canon of Scripture.

Imagine what it would be like if we didn’t have the the Gospels and the rest of the NT epistles.

Well, the early church didn’t have the completed canon.

The bulk of the NT was not available to many of the early Christians.

So the prophets were given to the NT church because they were needed.

The Evangelists — seem to have been a distinct group.

Philip is referred to as an evangelist (Act 21:8) and Timothy is instructed by Paul to do the work of an evangelist (2 Tim.

4:5).

Their role is a bit different.

The apostles and prophets gave us the Word of God by direct revelation.

The evangelists proclaim the Word at it relates to people’s need for salvation.

They were good news proclaimers.

Pastors/teachers to the church.

When Paul refers to pastors and teachers he is referring to the same person.

He is describing the two main functions of this person.It is significant to notice that the word “some” is not found before the word teacher.

It says he gave ‘some’ as apostles, ‘some’ as prophets, ‘some’ as evangelists and ‘some’ as pastors AND teachers…it doesn’t say ‘some’ as pastors ‘some’ as teachers.

The Greek is clear that they are one in the same.

Different functions but the same person.

The words pastor, elder, and overseer (= bishop) are used interchangeably (Acts 20:17, 28; 1 Tim.

3:1; Titus 1:5, 7; 1 Pet.

5:1-3).

Elder points to the fact that church leaders must be mature men of God.

Overseer looks at the main task, that of managing, leading (Heb.

13:7, 17), or giving oversight to the church.

Pastor looks at the task from the analogy of a shepherd and his flock.Pastor = Shepherd This is the only place in the NT where the noun is used to refer to a ministry in the church.

Usually we see the verb form of the word.

Because the responsibility of the pastor is to be a shepherd his people This was Jesus’ instructions to Peter “feed my lambs”, “tend my sheep”, “feed my sheep.”

Jesus wanted Peter to pastor His people. 1 Peter 5:2 - 2 shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion, but willingly, as God would have you; not for shameful gain, but eagerly;Acts 20:28 - 28 Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.The pastor is supposed to smell like sheep.

The pastor is also to be a teacher He must feed the flock of God with God’s word.

He must also teach against and refute false doctrine as he protects the sheep from wolves.

Acts 20:17-30 - one of Paul’s primary functions was to teach them from house to house and the text there says that he did not shrink from teaching the whole console of God.