3.13.2022 Tim Brown Jr.

On. There we go. Good morning. And thank you for leading Us in some thoughts. Regarding the Lord's, Supper this morning. I appreciate that very much. Praise team. Thank you for letting us in worship. You always do a fantastic job. Hope you're doing well, this morning for visitors, who are here. Let's take a glance. I'm, I've gotten where I think I've got about 90% of your names down feeling. Pretty good about that. Then somebody's going to come up to me later and say, what's my name? I know you will. I think we might have one or two visitors, but we want you to know that we were glad you're here and we pray that you'll stick around a little bit afterwards. Give us a little time to shake your hand and get to know you just a little bit before you head out today.

We are coming to my favorite part of this whole series, which is on Outreach. Now, you remember last Sunday. We we kind of took a pause. We had gotten into the Outreach portion of our series, decided to go back in, to stay a few more words regarding in reach. And now, we're kind of piggybacking jumping back into the loop. If you will, we're going to do a couple more weeks on the topic of Outreach is my favorite topic out of all of them because I love evangelism. Love talking to other people about Jesus Christ. Before we do though. I want to make you all aware of something that is going to start. In a couple of weeks. I mention to you, I mention to you a couple weeks ago. I think it was about these workshops. We are going to start having some workshops here. They're going to be very informal that basically, we're just going to get together and we're going to start practicing, putting into practice some of the ideas that we've talked about with upreach and inreach. So, we're calling these discipleship workshops discipleship training times. We don't have a set time yet. Basically, I'm going to talk to you about what the first one's going to be about. I may be doing this the wrong way, Roxanne will find out later, but I want to get an idea of how many people might be interested in being a part of it and then we will talk as a group as to which day or time. I might be best now that I realize that might not work we might have to just pick a day. Pick a time and go for it, but we'll try one way or the other. But the first Workshop that we're going to do has to do with this idea of upreach. And basically, I'm calling this first Workshop learning how to hear God's voice for your life. Okay. That's the name of the workshop. Learning how to hear God's voice for your life. Basically. We're going to get together for an hour, maybe an hour and a half, probably no more than that. Probably the weekend will pray. You pick a time somewhere around. One of the services of the church, maybe before Wednesday, after Wednesday before, probably not before. But maybe after Sunday worship service, something like that, but Remember what we said was the most important thing about up, reach a long time ago. We said the most important thing about upreach member the two greatest commandment love the Lord, your God, with all your heart and soul and strength, love others. As you love yourself, the way that you first, learn how to love God, with all your heart and mind so much strength. Is to come to understand the truth that he loves you, with all of his own heart is his love and strength. So the very first Workshop that we're going to be doing, is doing some practices that help you learn how to be in the presence of God's love, how to be in God's present, how to listen for his voice, or some other things that we're going to cover it, how, to engage in personal quiet time. Would I call 95 time? So, we're going to be doing some practicing roll, be sitting in God's presence will be listening for his voice. We're going to ask the question. What is hearing God's voice sound like? Cuz a lot of times, we've never ask these kinds of questions. We're going to sit down with the Bible. I'm going to show you how to hear God's voice. Do the word or else. I'm going to talk about how to hear God's Voice through the Holy Spirit. We're going to talk about the importance of being grounded, in God's word and how to engage, in biblical meditation. There's Eastern meditation, which you probably heard you'll see popularized in the movies, you know, all men are that kind of think there's Eastern meditation and there's also was called biblical meditation. There is a way in which the ancient people meditated in God's word and we're going to do some of that as a as an exercise in this in this class journaling as a written record of your journey with god with your journey with God. One of the things that we do in these workshops as we Journal. We like to keep a record of what God's doing in our Lives. Why is it important? Because later on, you're going to be in circumstances where you're not going to feel God's presence in your life. And you're going to need to remember, right? You're going to need to remember the things that God has done, you're going to need to remember the promises that he's made. So drilling is a really important part of the spiritual journey, the spiritual growth process. And finally, we're going to talk about prayer as a two-way street often times. I think, when we pray, we tend to just kind of give God our list of things that we hope that he'll do a list of people. We hope you'll heal and then we'll move on one of the things I want to teach in this in this training is expect God's answer. Expect God's answer. And we're going to talk about ways in which we can look for God's activity to see the answers to our prayers. So, this is what the, the the workshop is is going to be about, if this is something that interests you, if this is something that you would like to be a part of. Again, this is just about practicality. These are not classes. Okay, so I don't expect to come in a room where I'm going to sit and talk for an hour. It's not going to be like that. We're going to break up into groups. We're going to have exercises. We're going to go to different parts of the church. We may go outside later on down the road. We're going to do other workshops when we get the Outreach. It's what you get is my favorite one. We're going to do Outreach. Okay, we're going to do some things out in the community together. There will be several of these first training Workshop. So if you don't get to come to the first one, don't worry about it. They'll be more. It will cover some of the same material. Some of them will not. Some of you may want to come to all of the workshop training just so you can have more 95 5 times so you can have more practice. You know, enjoy these things a bit more and have more experience with them. So again, our first training Workshop is coming up in the next couple weeks. If you want to be a part of it of this first one, here's what you can do right here. Just send me a text. That's the way I would love to be notified. If you want to be a part of it. Just shoot me a text. Cuz what I'm going to do later on today is I'm just going to take all the text messages. All right, and and we'll put a group together and we'll try to pick a day as to which one's going to be the most important best time rather to it to get together. Okay. So there's my phone number 615-474-1859. Send me a text. If that is something that you are interested in before we move on any questions, any questions about the workshops.

Is it for kids to the answer is? Yes, it could be for kids to if there is a kid who is interested Logan. You may come up to your mom and dad. Okay. All right, very good. A couple of Sundays ago. When we, when we got to the Outreach portion of this series, we we talked about I wanted to make the point that evangelist on the very first point that I wanted to make about Outreach and evangelism is if you remember, evangelism, Outreach is much bigger than just inviting someone out to church. So often I think we have a very unclear vision of what church is. We have a very unclear Vision as to what our identity as who exactly. Are. We as Christians? Who exactly. Are we as the church? Because I think what tends to happen is we tend to think of church with a consumer mindset, do not We come to church and typically it's what do I get out of it? Now? We may not say that but all the times that's how we operate. That's how we feel. What am I going to get out of church today or will invite somebody to church? A lot of times will invite somebody to church because they've got a good prayer preacher or because they got a new preacher or maybe they'll invite somebody to church because they've got a good youth program. I've seen some get excited about inviting people to church because they were the popular Church in the community, you know, it's kind of high school. You got a popular kid and everybody likes the flock around that kid will Sun Communities. Have a popular church. And so they'll invite people at church because they're proud of the congregation. I please, listen, I'm not saying any of those things are bad or wrong. Okay, if you're excited that you got a new preacher. God bless you and bite somebody to come, you know, that's, that's nothing that I'm angry about a frustrated. I'm just saying church. It's a lot bigger than that. Right, and that's the mindset that I want us to have weed as a church. Are they on going living body of Christ? And that's just a different way of thinking, that's what the bigger way of thinking and what we're inviting people into on Sunday morning is not an institution. Ultimately, it's not an institution. It has nothing to do with a preacher. Has nothing to do with the youth program. Has nothing to do with, whatever we can offer the community. It has everything with inviting people to have a relationship with Jesus Christ. And the only way that we can authentically authoritatively invite other people to have a relationship with Jesus Christ, is if we first have our own relationship with Jesus Christ, amen, so that's what I preach is all about all about up reach that the, the, the, the, the workshop that we're going to be doing is all about igniting the fire of your relationship with Jesus Christ. OK, Google have never been on fire for the Lord or if you have been on fire for the Lord and his kind of quiet and down that Workshop is going to be for you. Okay, that'll help rekindle the fire and help, Kendall the relationship. Like we said in the first time and we didn't Outreach, we have to remember that the Great Commission. And that's the text that we're going to talk about here in just a moment. You can turn over your Bibles to Matthew. 28, if you want to go ahead and get your thumb ready, because that's, we're going to be there in just a moment, but we have to remember that the Great Commission. To go into all the world is not a new idea. That was another thing that I wanted to make clear. And that last sermon week before last, if you remember going all the way back to Abraham, and this was a point that I had brought out back then, but the last of the week before last, every since Abraham, God has been working on a plan to bring about the salvation of the world. If you remember, we talked about that. We looked at passage after passes, that showed that, Israel's calling Israel. Destiny was to be what I like to the nation's right. God says, I'm going to take all the peoples of the earth. I'm going to take one guy out of that one guy. I'm going to grow a nation and out of that one nation. I'm going to use that one nation to bless and touch all the nations of the Earth. But they messed up, right? They kept on messing up this man day that God has given them. Instead of turning that light into all the world and bring people to the one true God, they turned it to themselves. They became selfish, right? And so what does Jesus do in the course of time? God raises up the Messiah races up a son of Israel to become the representative Israel and to do for is real. What is real could not do, right. Which was be a light to the Nations and so he died. He's buried. He's raised back to life. And now the light of his message is now carried out through his disciples. To fulfil the biblical mandate to be a light to the Nations. Will guess who gets to fulfill the biblical mandate not ancient Israel. Us. Who have been grafted into Israel. We have become is real today because of Jesus Christ. We have been passed to carry out this message of redeeming mankind before the final rate. I know it's not a, a new testament passage. But but because we see that this is a fulfillment of an Old Testament, mandate. Look at Isaiah, 42 verse 26, through 7. I love this. I am the Lord I have called you in righteousness. I will also hold you by the hand and watch over you. And I will appoint you as a covenant to the people as a light to the Nations to open. Blind eyes to bring out. Prisoners from the dungeon and those who dwell in darkness from the prison. Incredible description of Jesus's Ministry is in. Sounds very similar to the description. He reason Isaiah, which jiri he actually quotes from another portion of Isaiah. And I think it's Luke chapter 4. When he opens his ministry, and he reads from the scroll. Remember that? He talks about releasing the captives and in, and helping those who are blind to see and those, okay, they comes from that same exact idea. Okay. So are you ready to engage in evangelism?

Elders. I'm sorry is not very exciting right now. Alright, good. Good. Good good. Alright. So before we do, before we do it again, we're going to have workshops on actually doing evangelism later. But before we do, I want to go back and I want us to revisit the Great Commission, one more time. I know that we've looked at this text to three times, so I don't want to point out some things and I think, maybe we didn't catch the first time. And I think it's going to help us to formulate our minds for what. We're going to be talking about next week, Matthew chapter 28, while you're turning over there, if you have it already. I want you to think with me when you think of evangelism, when you say as a church. I think we need to do more Outreach. I think we need to get more people in. I think we need to try to knock on doors. Whatever. It may be. What are some things you tend to think of, when you think of Outreach, when you think of evangelism,

WhatsApp. Bringing more people to church, okay. Knocking on doors, you can just yell it out if you have an idea.

Programs.

I think I heard Augustine. Listen to all, okay. Put some things out on Facebook. Okay. So when we think about reaching bansal evangelism, the first two things that we tend to think about Is we we tend to think about programs and we tend to think about strategies, right? So we think about programs, for example, you know, I think about how there's been many times over the years. Elders, have asked me to do a special sermon series right for Outsiders and, and during that sermon series. It's the role of the church to get to, to go out into invite people to bring a man because I hate the preacher's, got a special series to hear. So invite people to church to hear that special. Siri. That's a program that we've done. I member in 1995 and a church that was apart of we had this huge door-knocking campaign campaign called Outreach 95. And I mean, we had map rooms of all the maps around the church and we had people that were praying down every single Street. Then we had people that were getting zip code names and numbers. And we we knew the people's names before we knocked on their doors. We knew that they had children. I mean, it was like this big organ. Is ever. So we tend to think of programs, right things like that. That take a lot of work and energy. We also tend to think of strategies. What are some strategies who have used over the years? And if I ever heard of the Jule Miller film strips man, that was my first way to evangelize people. I pulled out those old July pulled out, the ones that still have the, the the film that you had to put in the film projector. Remember those, I use those man. Now later on, those got digitize VHS at BHS, Jule Miller, film strips. Do those. I want their time. Where I went through that mirror, the Romans road Bible study, where you take people to different passes through the book of Romans courseware Church of Christ. So we had to throw in Romantics into that. They didn't have the room 16 for baptism. But there's that. So there's all kinds of ways in which we can involve ourselves in door-knocking campaigns. My point is, when we think about reach, we tend to think more about doing things like that. What's the focus have? Good preaching? Have good programs, then invite your people to go to church. And then hopefully over time, those visitors will hear a sermon. They'll hear a class will start to prick their hearts a little bit and then hopefully over time, they'll become a Christian, we we we baptize them, right? That's 10. That's usually the first thing we do, we invite people to church and then we let him hear some servants. We hope that they'll listen will hope that they'll be convicted, then it's time to get him. Baptized will get him baptized. And then what's the Hope after they're baptized, they keep coming to church. Go to more Bible classes, make sure you and nff. We really really, really hope that they'll get involved right because once somebody gets involved, they're usually going to stay there. Going to get plugged in and they're going to, they're going to grow.

How's that working for us as a method for evangelism?

Not working. The reality is we're not doing something right now. I realize there's other things going on here. Right? I realized culture, Place into this church, has our sing a mass, Exodus of people. Okay, so there's not a lot of growth happening across the board. There are some really big churches out there who are gravitating, lots of people toward it, but it's not real growth because a lot of it is actually just smaller churches. People are kind of leaving. The smaller churches are going to the bigger church is, right. So it's not true gross. I realize there's some of that going on. But the same time we're not doing something right either. What in the mache, a shocking statistic. And I realized it just exchanged all the time. But look, I was thinking about you this week when I read this because according to Barna over 60% of young people raised in the church leave before adulthood.

So I'm at so see what's going on here. You've got this mediocre effort to to do Outreach, which a lot of churches aren't doing that anymore. And you're hoping to get him baptized. You're hoping that they'll stay, you're hoping that they'll get plug-in. You're hoping. They'll become disciples. All the while. The next generation is exiting out the back door.

How many people have you heard say? How many times have you said? The more and more? I go to church, the more and more. I see his turning white. Because you don't see the young people, right? Okay, so we're not doing something right. There is room for us to learn room for us to grow. Maybe there are different ways in which we can begin to think about Outreach and evangelism. I want to suggest to you, that we need to go back and we need to listen. We need to really hear what the text is saying. There's a text that I want to get into this week and there's a text that I want to get into next week. And then I want to tell you about a movement that's taking place in Africa, and in different parts of Asia that is sweeping the place. Like, like, like going to storm. Its I've never seen growth. I have not seen growth for the church like this. It's very akin to what you see happening in the book of Acts. There are Miracles that are happening in the midst of it. There are people that are coming to Christ that you would never expect are coming to Christ bad, what you would consider very bad, people who are having dreams and Visions were coming to Christ and the church is spreading like I told you a few weeks ago a couple weeks ago and about I think it was a span of five years is why it right when it first started it was exploding so much. They had about 9,000 home churches, in a span of five years because it just blew up and now it's all over the place. What we're going to be today and next week and the following week. I'll have to do with what does it look like if we as a church are used by God? To do something new and Snyder. What is the holy spirit? Empowers us to do something new and unique? That's really not new and unique. It's just revisiting things that happened two thousand years ago and believing them. What would happen if God is going to use something new and unique like that with us here in Snyder. Okay, so let's get into the text and let's, let's look at a couple things that maybe we've not thought of or maybe haven't thought of in a long time.

Because I think what we're going to discover when we get in the Matthew 28, is it Jesus's methods? His program is a lot different than ours primarily because he does not rely on methods and programs. He relies on God's, holy spirit. I want to say that one more time. Jesus doesn't rely on methods and programs. He relies on the Holy Spirit. And that's what I want us to do. Okay, let's get into it. I want to suggest to you. Matthew 28. Let's look at See here.

Okay, Matthew chapter 28, now do bear in mind. He's about to tell them to go out into all the world and preach the gospel, but I understand that he has already walked with them for three and a half years, that makes sense. So he's already trained them. So when he tells them to go out and make disciples, you understand. He's already trained them. How to do that. In the next week. We're going to show you how Jesus trained his disciples and how he expected his disciples to train other disciples. OK, Google Anderson, and that that's already happened by the time we get to this text. So we're not going to talk about that. Today. We're going to talk about that next week, but I want you to start with me and look at verse 16. It says, when the 11 disciples, when the 11y 11. Judas has already killed himself, right? He's already gone. So when the 11 disciples went to Galilee to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go, again, does not matter. This is a pre-arranged meeting place by Jesus and his disciples. We don't know where don't care about the point. The point is, Jesus told them to go here and wait for him. Sober 17. It says, when they saw him they worshipped him but some doubted who doubt it. Don't know. But then again, it does it really matter if they're struggling with faith. That's very common verse 18. Listen to us. Jesus came to them and said all of Thor, t. Is given to me in heaven and on Earth? Now, I don't know why when we read this passage, we typically very quickly just kind of glanced over that verse and we go on to the next one, but I want you to hear this verse very very carefully because this verse might very well be the most important verse in the whole conversation.

Jesus came down and said all authority in heaven and on Earth has been given unto me something. Extremely exciting, difficult happened on the cross. Didn't it? Let me go to the texture.

Okay. Nope.

There we go.

Now, I don't know what I'm doing now. Yep. There we go. Okay. Thank you. Alright, birthday team. Then. Jesus came to them and said all authority in heaven has been given unto me. Remember John chapter 12, John chapter 14, John chapter 16. All tell us that Satan is a ruler in the power of this world, right? We handed that power over to Satan. In Genesis chapter 3, when we decided to believe him and instead of God and take that fruit, we handed our Authority and power over to him. So he has control over all the work today. He has control over the government's. He has control over, the military, has control over the power. He has control over the, the thought centers of our cultures, and life. He has control over all of it. Paul reminds us in, Ephesians, chapter 6. I'm hitting the next button and it's going back to the beginning.

I don't, okay. I'm just going to leave the button alone cuz I'm getting myself in all kinds of trouble with it. Can you take it to the next one?

This to the Matthew 28. Yeah, to the Matthew 28. Thank you. Let me read you. This passage from Ephesians chapter 6. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood. But against principalities against Powers against the rulers, of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in Heavenly places. Therefore, take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand. See you after. Remember, what happened on the cross? What happened on the cross with a usurping of the power and authority of Satan? Okay, so Colossians chapter 2 verses 13 and 15 list of that says, when you were dead in your sins, in the uncircumcision of your flesh. God made you a live with Christ, having disarmed, the powers and authorities. He made a public spectacle of them. Triumphing over them by the cross. Now won't you stop right there. Listen to what he's telling his disciples. He says, I've overcome the enemy. As long as I am in you and you are in me, you can walk right into enemy territory.

And not be afraid. Because I've disarmed him. Imagine what it would be like if you had a an invading Army and God says I went in and I've taken away their m-16s and I've pulled the the bullets out of their guns are pulled the bombs out of their, their their tanks and I've pulled the weapons away. And now what do you do? If you walk right in there? You walk right in there with a message of the gospel because basically, we're going to take ground for the kingdom of God. They've got no defenses. Now, their defenses are down City. I did. He's saying so, so, I will Empower you. Why? Because I've already overpowered them.

And I will Empower you to go out and continue the work that I've started. So therefore verse 19. Therefore go and make disciples of all Nations, baptizing them in the name of the father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Now, did you notice? What are we do? We, what do we do? We invite people to church and I can, listen, stop, not saying it's wrong. What we do? I'm saying, we knew might need to think differently about what we do. What do we tend to do? We tend to invite people to church. We hope they get baptized once they get baptized will we're going to hope they're going to keep coming to church. We hope they get in Bible class. We really hope they get involved and through that process through time. We hope that they'll become disciples. But I want you to notice when Jesus says, do he does not say invite people to church.

What does Jesus say do? First thing he says to do is go go.

Okay, go go. Where?

Go wherever go where they are. Right. Not invite them, where I'm comfortable. Cuz let me tell you something. These These are comfortable. Thank God. I'm the preacher. If I were sitting in these the whole time, listen to my boring self talk, I go right to sleep now, but these are comfortable, right? But Jesus says, don't do that. Go out there, go where they are. Get out of your comfort zone, where you are and go where they are. We're going to see why next week. We're going to see why the reason behind that is because the holy spirit is already working on the person you need to talk to. And you don't know who that person is, unless you first are in tune with the Holy Spirit.

So, if you're out there just using a buckshot approach. I'm just going to tell everybody tell anybody most likely what happens if I tell nobody. But if you're walking with the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit, makes it clear that he's working on someone. Guess what? The moment you become aware of that is your invitation to go. Tell them about the gospel. Jesus Christ. Does God's already soften the heart. Getting it ready for you. You just need to find out where the Hearts Are. But nine times out of 10. You're not going to find a new person to talk to you about Jesus here. We have to go out there. Okay, so go he says I want you to go and then he says I want to do what? no, not teach go and vitamin Church. And say that, did he? He said go and make disciples. Did you notice? He says make disciples before he even talks about baptism? I think we have with your way around. We got we we could all benefit, we are getting baptized right now. Get them wet.

Jesus says, take your time.

Make disciples. OK? Google make disciples you say. Okay. How do I do that? Most of us don't know.

Do you realize that most of us don't know how to make disciples, you know, why? Because most of us were never discipled. Most preachers don't know how to disciple, because most of us whenever discipled. Not unless you actually had a spiritual Mentor, email a man is someone who was a spiritual father who could come and walk with you through life and disciple you. But guess what? Most of us do not have that. So, how can we even carry out the Great Commission if we can't even start with the very first thing cuz we equate discipling with a vinyl people to church. That same thing. So we have to first know what discipling is. We have to know how to disciple. And if you've never been discipling, guess what you feel like you're in the boat without any paddles. So, come back next week. To come back next week. And we're, I want to show you how Jesus disciples told his disciples and how he trained them to be ready to do the same thing and disciple other people guys. Why do you think in the Bible? It talks so much about older women? You are to leave the younger women. Older men, you are to lead the younger men. There is a there is a relational role that is supposed to exist inside and outside the church that has this built upon relationships. We do this. We think that discipleship is the acclimation of Bible knowledge That's not discipleship. But so often, that's what we're content to do. If we just feed them knowledge. If we just, if we can help them to answer, all the Bible questions that we have in like to ask and answer, then that means they're committed follower disciple, Jesus Christ. That's not true.

We have to get people to have their hearts change and the only way people's hearts can change is if they're in a relationship with Jesus. And the only way that they can have that relationship with Jesus is if you first model it and allow that person to have a relationship with you. Discipleship is not a one-and-done deal. I wish it was. I wish it was just as easy as doing something. Cool and filling up the church with 200 people and baptizing 10% of them. I can I could use that model. I can Broadchurch with that model, but that model is not the way it works. Jesus. Got to know his people. He spent life with them. He cried with them. He's served with them. He prayed with them. He taught them. He took them through experiences with them. He didn't just tell them. Here's what you do. He took them and said, let me show you. This is what you do and he walked with him for how many years, three and a half years was the process. It took two disciple. These guys and by the time you get to the end where they finally spiritual Warriors No, they were not spiritual Warriors. They were still not there, but they were on the process. They were in the process, right?

Be ready to make some changes in your thinking in regards to outreach and evangelism because the biblical model is going to require us to get out of our comfort zone, get out of this church building and go and be with people who are outside the church to get to know them to build relationships with them to genuinely care for them. So that overtime, guess what you will earn the right to tell them about Jesus Christ. door and the right to tell them about Jesus Christ, OK, Google

Verse 19, therefore, go and make disciples of all Nations. Then he says, baptizing them in the name of the father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. So as you are making disciples, as you're making these committed followers of Jesus, as your meeting with them, as you're showing Christ to them, as you're showing Christ to them in your life, at some point in that process, they will make a decision either. Yes, or no, for Jesus, when they make a decision. Yes, you baptizing. Jesus, as in the name of the father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. So make disciples first. Then baptize those who are ready to commit their lives and die for Jesus. First 20, teach them to obey everything that I've commanded. You. Once a person has decided to follow Christ with her whole heart and life. Guess what? They're ready to be obedient. You know what we do.

Wait, wait right where it's like the bait and carry. I think this is what we've done it with a lot of churches. We try to put the most tastiest bait on the hook. Whatever that is. Maybe it's a warship group or a cool preacher or whatever maybe and we'll throw that hook out there and we'll try to get a man right? Just we want a real a man or what not. And and we hope that they'll become obedient disciples. When is a person become obedient to Jesus? When their hearts change.

And I think one of the reasons why we struggled with so many churches, who were full of folks, who have such a shallow Faith, why we have churches, where people argue and bicker and fight all the time, why we have preachers, who care more about being right about this theological point, and that theological Point as opposed to being a pastor and caring about the needs of the people. The reason why we struggle with so many of these things is because we've gotten more people wet, Then we have gotten people to be committed followers of Jesus who want to obey his word.

Jesus says, baptized the people who are ready to be obedient.

When you baptize people who are ready to be obedient, the next part of that verse then becomes much easier teaching them to obey what all the things I've commanded. Now. What are those? Were the gospels, right? Matthew was a great example Matthew and Luke brought out the other day and great Point Matthew was written as a manual for the first century Church. I ain't so all the teachings of Jesus are collected right there. It's literally listen to. It was A discipleship manual that was used in the first century church. So, he'll learn how to be the obedient to all the things that Jesus taught take the Book of Matthew seek to be obedient. That's how you do it. Okay. That's how the first century Church did it. And then lastly, my favorite part of the verse. I Am With You, Always until the very end of the age. That's a dynamic statement. That means that Jesus Christ is saying that miraculously through the spirit. I will dwell with you as you walk this process out. When you're praying to find someone out there whose spirit is working on their heart. I'm with you. When you go out and you start to seek to find that person. I'm with you, when you find that person and you go into their house and you start reading God's word with him. I am with you there when they start asking you questions. I'm with you when they start wanting to be obedient and you baptism, baptism. I'm with you and as you're teaching them to obey everything, I have commanded Jesus as I'm with you, you know, that tells me That tells me then since the end of the age, has it happened yet. As far as I know, we're still here. The nth and happened yet. So that means that Jesus is still with us. Jesus is still with us. So as we close.

Are we ready to join Jesus and his mission to spread the good news about the kingdom of God? If we are then as you have seen in the text, we're going to have to make some changes and we got to change the way we do things, rather think a little bit differently around to do things a little bit differently, but we have to remember that being a disciple being a disciple is about hearing God's word. And doing God's work. So often, I think with churches, we want discipleship to be about, just hearing the word. But it's more than that. Once you've heard the word now as Disciples of Jesus in obedience. We need to obey the word. Would you go out with me and pray?

Heavenly Father, we thank you for what you've done for us and what you've given us. We thank you God that through the course of time and history through events things that we had no control over. You have orchestrated things to which we are now able to be here tonight or this morning. You have orchestrated things so much that we were able to hear the gospel. We were able to find you. We were able to come to you. We were able to bring our sins before you we were able to repent. Until father. We thank you and God now we receive. This calling that you placed upon us. The down, turn to the person to the left and turn to the person, to the right, turn to the person down the street and say, listen, I want to share with you what I have found. I want to share with you. Jesus Christ. So God, I pray that you would help us to have that spirit that hard inside of us, that wants to reach out to a lost and dying world around us, forgive us. Father. When we fail you. Please be with us today in Jesus name. Amen. If we need to, if you need to respond to the invitation today. Remember that the very first thing that he tells you to be obedient to his baptism and baptism is just a, a reenactment of the death of Aaron resurrection of Jesus Christ. If you have not been baptized, we can do that for you this morning, and if you want prayer for anything, then come forward, as we stand and sing.