Wholeness (Everyone a minister)
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What do I want them to know? They are a priest
Why? It shows them there calling
What do I want them to do? Live into their priesthood, discover their calling
Why? It brings life to them
ME/WE
There are three big questions in life that we all wrestle with, believer, non-believer, it doesn’t matter.
The three questions, how we answer these three questions will determine the quality, joy, life of our life.
How we answer there questions has direct impact on everything
Who is God?
Who am I?
What am called and created to do?
There are the questions everyone asks and how you answer this has a direct impact on all of your life!
These question are connect to each other, how you answer who is God affects who you are and what you are called to do.
Even if you answer there is no God (evolutionary process), that affects who you think you are, you are just a piece of matter and it doesn’t matter so much what you do because you are piece of matter that will be gone in 70-80 years that turns into dust.
Who you believe God is, who you believe you are, and what you are called to do are all related.
The question I want to focus on today is the THRID question, which is tied to the other two questions.
What am I called and created to do?
Have you ever asked this question?
God what do you I want to do with my life?
As it at early age, Johnny what do you want to be when you grow up? (baseball player or firefighter) Sarah says I want to be a teacher
I asked this as young adult, God want have you called me to do?
some of ask this adults, some are asking now because this PANDEMIC has we had one job and now we are looking for another…we are living the great resignation.
God what do yo want me to do? Maybe your asking God is there something I can do? Am I gifted in something?
This is the question I wondered for years
Can God use me?
I am at best average student, had tremendous problems speaking, talked too fast and mumbled.....imagine how I felt when God called me into ministry, what about the preaching?
and what others said about me....I was stupid, not smart, not good for anything
The voice I hear in head and from others are not always positive
GOD is there something you have called and created for me to do?
These question is so BIG that the LIFE of our LIFE is at stake, our JOY is at STAKE
How many of us have worked a job that we just loathed, it sucked the life out of us? Or served somewhere, where you left not with JOY but with exhaustion?
Some will say I just won’t work! That will lead to depression....we are created to work and rest...
I saw this first hand in 2008 when many at the church I were laided off or working 1-2 days a week and they were depressed, one guy I knew barely left his basement because his business was getting almost no business.
God is there something you called me to do?
YES, there is
Who do we discover what we are called to do?
It all goes back to identity, who God has called us to be.
Who has God called us to be, those who believe in Jesus? PRIEST
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.
Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
What God says to us is I have chosen you and now because of Jesus you are a PRIEST.
Do you realize that you are a priest
It is not just pastors and Catholics
It is all of us
What where the priests three main responsibilities?
1. WORSHIPPERS OF GOD, they were people who loved God, that’s a qualification, and they were people who too CARE of PREPARED the temple for worship, they would preform daily temple duties, daily sacrifices at the temple, give the priestly blessing
They were people who worshiped and CARED and PREPARED the temple for worship
So what does it mean when God says we are priest and 1 Cor 3:16
Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?
God is saying to us, what we are called and created to be as PRIEST is worshippers of God.
What does the Westminster Catechism say, question 1
What is the chief end of man?
Man’s chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.
First responsibility of priest
2. In the Old Testament they were Mediators, they served as mediators between God and man. They would go to God on behalf of other people.
Then One day a year on Yom Kipper, The day of Atonement the High priest would get to go to the Holies of Holies, past the veil to meet with God and make atonement with sin.
But then something happened on the cross
What happens on the cross?
Matthew 27:51 (ESV)
And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. And the earth shook, and the rocks were split.
This huge veil that is 60 x 30 4” think was torn
HAVE PICTURE OF TEMPLE
What’s the big deal? This is HUGE, this has everything to do with your identity.
Hebrews 9:11–15 (ESV)
But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation)
he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.
For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh,
how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.
Do you know what this means?
This means that everyone has access to God through Jesus, we are not mediators between God and man, you do not need a priest because you are a PRIEST, Jesus instead in our priesthood we are to be worshippers with direct access to God to worship him, there is not go between.
3. Priest are to be ministers.
They minister to the people, they minister to the needs of the people.
The practice of caring for the physical, spiritual, and emotional needs of others as God directs you.
So when God calls us priests what is saying to us?
- What God says to me and you, what you are called to do is to be a minister, to minister to the people of God and to the world.
This is not just a Pastor Pete thing, or Carla thing or
the reason some of us do not have joy because we are not living in to who are PRIESTLY MINISTER ROLE
but I am not good enough, righteous, wise enough....no not in your flesh
For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
God says we are the priesthood of the believers
Too often we have made the pastors and elders and few other leaders the priests.
and we made our priestly duty only a Sunday duty, it does not say that in scripture
We have made the church building the idol.....we want to preserve the church, we made the church about the gathering and not the GOING....the church building has become the idol....the church is not a building but the body where we gathering and go
God is a saying we are not just WORSHIPPERS on SUNDAY we are worshippers and ministers everyday of the week.
The question is who is God
Who is God calling you to minister too?
Wherever God has called you to be
Neighbors, family, church family, co-workers, friends
You are the minister to the people
How do I minister too? What am I to do?
The practice of caring for the physical, spiritual, and emotional needs of others as God directs you.....you represent Jesus
See the need and meet the need as God directs you.
How do I care for them physically, spiritually, and emotionally as God directs us?
In general and in our gifting
In our gifting…you are a gifted priest
Ephesians 4:7–12 (ESV)
But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift.
Therefore it says, “When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.”
(In saying, “He ascended,” what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth?
He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.)
And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers,
to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ,
What is going on this passage?
Paul is quoting Ps 68 about a divine warrior king
What does it mean that Jesus descend and ascened?
How a king would fight in battle is that when he would see anc enemy king coming he would descend from his throne go defeat the enemy and then bring back the spoils and pass them out to his people.
In a similar manner
Jesus sees the enemy Satan
Descends from His throne (from heaven to earth)
Defeats throw His death and resurrection
Then gifts us with what? $
No
Spiritual gifts
Apostles
Prophets
Evangelists
Shepherds
Teachers
Wisdom
Faith
Miracles
Serving
Administration
Encouraging
Giving
Leadership
Mercy
Prayer
Hospitality
Some of you have the gift of prayer, compassion, wisdom, encouragement,
Why? Are we given these So that we saints, priest can build up the body
This is 2 fold
1. Strengthen the body that is here we need each other to live into their gifting to build us up....you are missed when you are not a part of the church.
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,
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.
Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,
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.
2. Grow the body numerically (Evangelist and Apostles)
And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
Lost people matter to God....they are His one true treasure
And he said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.
What God is saying to us
What you are called to do as a PRIEST is to WORSHIP and MINISTER, in all parts of your life, in your home, work place, church body.
MICHELE VIDEO
God is saying I have called you to be a worshipper and a minister
How are you going to minister to others.
What gifts has God given to you to use to minister to others?
What gifts has given to you?
Take a Spiritual gift test or SHAPE inventory (we’ll text this out)
S – Spiritual Gifts - What has God supernaturally gifted me to do?
H – Heart - What do I have passion for and love to do? (Ages and Causes) young people or financial freedom
A – Abilities - What natural talents and skills do I have? (engineer, structuring mind, some over lap)
P – Personality - Where does my personality best suit me to serve? (I love working with people one on one, in a group, you love working with your hands)
E – Experiences - What spiritual experiences have I had? What painful experiences have I had? What educational experiences have I had? What ministry experiences have I had?
But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation)
he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.
For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh,
how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.