[0:00] This morning I'm going to talk to you about gospel advancing necessity.! This phrase, advancing the gospel, he says, I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel.
[0:38] So the gospel is supposed to advance. The gospel is supposed to spread. The gospel is supposed to be moving along. And that should be our natural expectation.
[0:51] In fact, Paul said in Romans 1.15, he said, I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome. So we see here, Paul was eager to preach the gospel.
[1:04] Let me ask this question. Are we? Are we eager to preach the gospel? And if we say we are eager, the question is, how eager?
[1:15] How eager was Paul? 1 Corinthians 9.16, Paul says, If I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting. Why?
[1:26] Because necessity has laid it upon me. Woe to me if I don't preach the gospel. Okay? Necessity has laid it upon me.
[1:38] Woe to me if I don't preach the gospel. That sounds pretty eager. That sounds pretty motivated. Right? Are you this way? Would you be able to say that necessity has laid it on you to preach the gospel?
[1:52] Is the gospel being preached, is that optional for you? Is it something you think about every once in a while? Maybe when someone like myself stands behind this beautiful pulpit and encourages us for that?
[2:05] Or is it something we think about on the regular? Is it something that we think about when we're with lost people? Is it something that we think about when there's no lost people around? And maybe there's a pattern of our life where we're not having lost people around?
[2:19] But we think, oh my goodness, necessity is laying it on me to preach the gospel to lost people. And would we ever even go so far as to say, woe to me if I don't preach the gospel.
[2:31] I mean, that's how driven Paul was. That's how necessary gospel advancing was to Paul. He says, woe to me if I don't preach the gospel.
[2:42] What a phrase. What a way of putting it, right? Woe to me if I don't preach the gospel. Maybe you've had a season where you could say that. Yes, where you were really on fire for the gospel saying, I've got to preach the gospel.
[2:55] I've got to find people who need to hear the gospel. Then maybe you have seasons where not so much. Maybe seasons where I'm not thinking about that.
[3:07] I've got a lot of stuff going on. I'm having kids. I'm figuring out work stuff. I've got a house. I've got friendships and relationships and church stuff and all these different things.
[3:20] And maybe we don't think as much about the lost. But I'll tell you what. If you really want to kill a church, stop thinking about the lost. Okay?
[3:32] You really want a church not to grow, not to move on beyond the people that are in their four walls when they gather? Don't think about the gospel. Stop preaching the gospel. Don't start preaching the gospel.
[3:44] You know why so many churches just say the same roughly size? And this happens so often. And it is a travesty that more churches don't ask the question, why does our church just keep staying the same size?
[3:59] Especially when most often the answer is, because we're not preaching the gospel. We're not actively seeking to save people who are lost and get into their lives and preach the gospel to them. You can't grow as a church, and healthy things do grow, if we're not going to people who are currently not in the church, lost people, and preaching the gospel to them.
[4:19] Okay? One of the reasons the church you were sent out of has continued to grow every single year for 13 years, I think, is because of that. It's because there's a culture of outreach.
[4:31] There's a culture of mission. There's a culture of reaching and seeking to get into the lives of lost people, and it never stops. They also cheat by having a lot of kids.
[4:44] That also is a way that they've grown. So that's another way as well, as long as you make them disciples. Okay? But, which is why Gina's in here, because she was at a birth last night.
[4:54] So, he says, necessity has laid it upon me. If you don't have that necessity laying upon you or laying hold of you, you need to pray.
[5:09] You need to get before the Lord and say, God, I don't feel it. I don't experience it. It's not on me. Lay that necessity of gospel preaching on me. Lay it on me.
[5:20] And may you lay it on our whole church. And may we never recover. May you shake us to the core. If we've gotten lazy, if we've gotten busy, if we've gotten too consumed with other things, we can't ever get to a place where gospel advancement is not necessary in our minds.
[5:36] We cannot. We cannot. We must advance the gospel. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 9, 19 to 22, Though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them.
[5:51] See his drive? Gotta have more. Okay? This isn't a selfish more. This is a good more. More souls. I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more.
[6:03] I want more of them. To the Jews, I became as a Jew in order to win the Jews. To those under the law, I became as one under the law, though not being myself under the law, that I might win those under the law.
[6:15] To those outside the law, I became as one outside the law, not being outside the law of God, but under the law of Christ. Why? That I might win those outside of the law.
[6:26] Verse 22, To the weak, I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that by all means, I might save some.
[6:39] I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings. It says, Become all things to all people, that by all means, I might save some.
[6:50] I've taught on this before, and the details of this is not going to go on, but just look at the passion, the drive behind him. Less about the practicals, and more about the motivation of Paul.
[7:01] Paul's saying, there's nothing off the table. All things. How many things? All things. Is that some things? No. Some doesn't mean all. All is different than some. Okay? All things.
[7:13] How many people? Some people? No. No, no, no, no. Not some people. All people. Okay. Some means no. No, not some means. All means. Why?
[7:24] That he might, the only some here is that I might win some. Okay? Don't confuse that. All means, all people, all things, that he might save some. And he does it all for the sake of the gospel.
[7:36] There is this pervasive motivation, necessity on Paul. All things have to be at my disposal. All means, all people. Like, I am, I, woe to me if I don't preach the gospel.
[7:51] May that be us. May we be a healthy gospel advancing church that never forgets the necessity.
[8:01] That never forgets where we came from. Right? David in the psalm says, renew to me the joy of my salvation.
[8:12] Renew to me the joy of my salvation. When you remember what you've been saved from. When you remember that you have, like Sam was just saying, a high priest who is permanently in his high priest position.
[8:24] Who constantly lives to make intercession for us. That he has made us right. That we've been justified in him. That we're being sanctified by his power.
[8:35] And that we were lost. We were totally under the wrath of God with no hope in this world. And he came to us. Plucked us out of the fire. Made us, gave us the right to become children of God.
[8:47] How could we not tell other people? And not just, not how could we not tell other people. How could we not look for opportunities and not just wait for opportunities to come in our lap? Listen, if you're just waiting for opportunities to come in your lap, you are missing it.
[9:01] I don't think Paul was doing that. I mean, these verses I just read. Are you getting that impression? That Paul was just bebopping through life waiting for opportunities? I don't think so.
[9:12] The language he's using here is one of aggressive action and intentionality. He's not waiting for someone to come his way. Now, I'm not talking about some obnoxious in the flesh making something happen that's not there.
[9:26] I'm not talking about that. Okay? So don't, you know, there's ditches on both sides. But listen, if you see Paul here, he's like, I am actively engaging the lost.
[9:37] I'm actively looking for ways to reach lost people. And we must do the same. We can't just be waiting for some opportunity to land in our lap. Although we should always pray for opportunities to land in our lap.
[9:50] But you can't just wait for that. Okay? We have to make opportunities. We have to make the most of those opportunities. Paul saw that preaching the gospel is necessary. Do we?
[10:01] And if we don't, then why not? Okay? I want to talk about four obstacles to gospel advancement. Okay? As I talk about this this morning. Four different obstacles. First one.
[10:13] Fear and unbelief. Wait a second. That's two. I know. But they kind of go together. Okay? Fear and unbelief. All right? Romans 1.16.
[10:25] That verse that Martin Luther was really big on. Right? I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for the salvation of all who believe. Okay? Not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God.
[10:37] All right? A lot of times we say, God, I pray that there would be power in my preaching of the gospel. You know, you really don't need to pray that. The gospel is already power.
[10:49] I think sometimes, and I don't think there's anything wrong with praying that, but really, I want to ask you, is it actually a revealing of your lack of faith in the power of God that's already inherent in the gospel?
[11:02] It's already there. You know, you already have power in the gospel. The gospel itself. Oftentimes, when we're preaching the gospel, the devil whispers to us and says, this isn't powerful.
[11:14] You're not going to do it right. It's not going to be a powerful presentation of the gospel. And I tell you what, Romans 1.16 says the gospel is the power of God.
[11:25] And it's a specific power of God for what? For salvation. You need to know that. You need to believe that. When you're going to preach the gospel to someone, you're not, you might feel weak.
[11:40] You might feel unqualified. You might feel like, I'm going to bungle the words. Let me ask you a question. Has God ever saved anybody through a bungled up version of words that we called the gospel before?
[11:51] Has he ever done that? Has God ever saved someone through a bad presentation of the gospel? You better believe he has. Now, that doesn't mean you should be lazy and not try to preach the gospel in the right way. But listen, do you believe or do you not believe that the gospel is what Romans 1.16 says it is?
[12:09] That it is the power of God for the salvation of those who believe. We so often believe that the gospel is impotent or that our presentation of it is impotent when it is in effect of itself powerful.
[12:22] So much confidence can be derived from this one verse. You know, if you possess something of power, it makes you confident in that power.
[12:36] When you possess something that's weak, you start to get insecure about it. You maybe want to hide it. You don't really want to use it. When you have something that's very powerful, you want to use it.
[12:47] You want to share it. When you don't believe that the gospel is the power of God for the salvation of all who believe, you will most likely be hesitant to both share it, preach it, and even look for opportunities to give it.
[12:59] If you possess something of great power in and of itself, you want to go out and declare it, knowing that even if I'm weak and we are weak, even if I don't do a great job presenting it, and sometimes we don't do a great job presenting it, even if I'm tired, even if I don't know what to say, even if the person I'm talking to is smarter than me, has more knowledge than me, so what?
[13:26] Is the gospel power or not? Like, think about that. You might say, well, these other things are powerful too. Really? Are they as powerful as the good news of the gospel of Jesus?
[13:42] It is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes. We need to put that in the bank and say, hey, I need to believe this.
[13:56] Very important. Isaiah 63 verse 1 speaks of God in a specific way. It says that he is mighty to save. When you preach the gospel, when you think of the gospel, when you think of even trying to engage a lost person or try to get into contact or relationship with a lost person, are you thinking, my God is mighty to save?
[14:20] Do you think that? Or do you most think of my presentation is not very good? Or do you most think of I'm not a very good speaker?
[14:32] Or do you most think of I'm not very good at presenting things? Or do you most think of, you know, fill in the blank. Where is our focus? What could stop us in our gospel mission if we truly believe that the gospel is the power of God for all who believe, and we believe that our God is mighty to save?
[14:53] He's mighty to save. I'm going to say it again. He is mighty to save. When you believe that, it will build your faith.
[15:06] But sometimes we don't believe that. Sometimes we're not engaging with that truth. He is mighty to save. This is why 2 Timothy 1.12 says, I'm not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed.
[15:19] What is the key to not being ashamed? Knowing whom you believe. What do you got to know about him? That he's mighty to save. And then you won't be ashamed. Then you won't be ashamed. And it's good to know that in Luke 9, verse 26, Jesus had some pretty strong words for this.
[15:34] He says, Whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed. When he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. I don't want Jesus to be ashamed of me.
[15:47] I don't want Jesus to be ashamed of you. I don't want Jesus to be ashamed of Christ's church. Okay? I would hope when we get to those pearly gates, Jesus is like, Oh, Christ's church.
[16:00] Aptly titled church. I love these guys. These guys believe that I was mighty to save. This church believed that I was mighty to save.
[16:11] And boy, I saved some people through this church. Come into my inheritance. I am not ashamed to call you my brothers. I'm not ashamed to call you my children. You guys weren't ashamed of me.
[16:26] Number two. Hindrance to gospel advancement. Preaching the gospel is costly. Okay? Philippians 4 verse 3.
[16:37] Paul said, I ask you also, true companion, help these women who have labored side by side with me in the gospel, together with Clement and the rest of my fellow workers, whose names are in the book of life.
[16:50] So he calls this gospel activity he's doing, he calls it laboring. And then he calls the people who are doing it, his fellow workers.
[17:03] Okay? It takes work. Preaching the gospel takes work. Preaching the gospel involves you getting out of your comfort zone. It involves me getting out of my comfort zone.
[17:14] It involves me going to people I'm not, that I don't know. Strangers. Involves building relationships with strangers. It involves speaking to people who I don't know, who are strangers.
[17:26] Okay? It involves time. It involves being rejected over and over and over and over again. It involves being misunderstood.
[17:37] Sometimes it involves actual persecution. In the vast majority of the world, it involves actual physical persecution. And one day we'll hear as well. As you said, all nations will hate you on behalf of me.
[17:51] It will happen. Okay? Right now, we don't live in that, but it will happen. It's costly. It takes work. Are you up for the work?
[18:02] Are you doing the work? Or are we making excuses because we don't want to do the work? Because we're tired. Because we already have, we're busy with a lot of things. What if we're busy with the wrong things?
[18:14] And not busy with the work of gospel preaching. The work of gospel building. Where I'm actively looking to build relations with people. You might say, well, I just don't have those people in my life.
[18:24] Well, guess what? Someone in this church does. Partner up with them. Partner up with them. You might say, I don't have anyone in my life and the people I'm partnering with don't have anyone in their life. Well, then partner in prayer.
[18:38] There's no excuse, though. The work must be done. If you got people, do the work. If you don't have people, do the work. Say partner with someone else who does. And if you don't have someone who does, then do the work of partnering in prayer knowing that God is mighty to save and he wants to save.
[18:55] Okay? But it takes work. 2 Timothy 1 verse 8 says, Do not be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me as prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God.
[19:06] Okay? It takes a willingness to work, a willingness to suffer. It costs. It costs to be a gospel preacher. And there's no way to think about God didn't bring this church together so we could just have a smaller church with our buddies and really have close, familiar relationships and not invite other people into the family of God.
[19:33] Okay? Not enjoy our right to be called children of God and enjoy the fact that us being children of God makes us brothers and sisters and enjoy our meals like we're going to do today and enjoy our time together and enjoy our fellowship, which is all good stuff, but not actively, consistently be looking to engage with lost people, build relationships with lost people, pray for lost people so that they too can hear the good news of the gospel.
[20:03] And that's going to take time. It's going to take effort. It's going to take sacrifice. It's going to be costly. Are we up for it? Are we up for it? Are we bought in? And listen, it's going to take consistent buying in.
[20:17] Okay? May 1st, it's less than a month away, will be one year as a church. Okay? Have we won a lot of people to Christ in this last year? No.
[20:29] Okay? That means we've got to keep going. It means we've got to persevere. It means the shiny gloss, the sexiness, the glamour of a church plant.
[20:41] If it hasn't worn off, it's sure starting to wear off, right? Now we're a year in. Who's going to keep saying, I wasn't doing it for that reason. It wasn't just the shiny new objects.
[20:55] It's the beauty of Christ. It's the beauty of my Savior saving me and His power and desire to save other people.
[21:05] And I joined together with this group of people to be a people that don't give up, that keep pressing in in prayer, that keep pressing in in building relationships, that keep pressing in in speaking the gospel to people.
[21:18] No matter how many times we're rejected, no matter how many times that seed falls on the wrong soil, we just keep going and we keep going. And there's a consistency. When everyone's discouraged, there's people within our church who say, keep going, keep going, don't give up.
[21:34] We didn't sign up for the easy road. We didn't sign up for some, you know, dog and pony show, you know, the Holy Trinity of church planting with a charismatic speaker, a killer children's ministry, and the full band of hired musicians.
[21:50] We didn't sign up for that. No one's coming for that. You can't just get comfortable and say, well, the preacher and the children's ministry and the worship ministry, they got it.
[22:02] We're just going to grow through addition. Those things will keep adding to a church. We don't believe in growing by addition. We believe by churches growing by multiplication. Multiplication happens exponentially, very slow on the front end, very slow on the front end, very slow on the front end.
[22:20] Every single one of us, building relationships with people, preaching the gospel, not giving up, continuing to spread gospel seed, continuing to get on mission to specific people in specific places, keep praying for people, praying for men and women of peace, continuing, continuing, continuing, not giving up, that consistency.
[22:43] Are you consistent? Are you up and down? This last year, have you been consistent? Is your passion for what is true based on your experience of your feelings, your church experience of your friendships here in this group of people?
[22:59] Or is it based on the sustained, unchanging nature of Jesus Christ, who he is and what he's done? And are you being fueled by him or are you being fueled by novelty?
[23:10] Are you being fueled by him? Are you being fueled by the new shiny small object? We must fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.
[23:21] We must constantly be looking to him and be fueled by him, motivated by him, motivated by his gospel. Utmost importance. Number three, hindrance to gospel advancement.
[23:35] Cynicism. Cynicism. What's the point? Barely anyone gets saved. Grief. Okay? I used to preach the gospel, but it's, you know what? There's so many times I've talked to people, I've reached out to people, we've been on a mission to people.
[23:51] It's like people just aren't getting saved. Matthew 7, 13 to 14. I mean, good grief. Jesus said it, right? Enter by the narrow gate. The gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction.
[24:05] For those who enter it, enter by it, are many. It goes on in verse 14 and says, the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life and those who find it are few.
[24:21] Those who find it are few. Guess what? You're right. Few find it. Most aren't saved. Few will find it.
[24:32] Okay? So number one, the great thing, one of the great things about Jesus is he tells us ahead of time things are going to happen, tells us ahead of time things are going to be difficult and that's loving and helpful so we know how to handle it.
[24:46] If you're expecting the masses to get saved when he said few will find it, you're going to be disappointed. Okay? And we've been deluded and fallen asleep a little bit because 65% of America says they're believers.
[25:02] 65%, when you ask them, are you a Christian? They say yes. But if you ask them three other questions and you say, do you believe that Jesus is the only way? Do you believe that Jesus is God? Do you believe that the Bible is the Word of God?
[25:13] That number drops to 6%. That's like 10% of the total people who say they are Christians actually believing in some pretty minimum stuff to be a Christian.
[25:26] That means we can safely say that 90% of professing Christians in America are not Christians. Do you hear me on that? So we've been deluded.
[25:37] Oh, no, no, no. So many people get saved. Majority of America is saved. 65% of America is saved. Hogwash. There's no way. We're lucky. We're lucky if 6% is.
[25:49] That means that a good 90% of professing believers are not Christians. Means we got our work to do. But, just because few find it doesn't mean that some don't.
[26:02] I mean, just because few find it doesn't mean that's telling you some find it. Okay? And how do they find it? Because that's the question. Okay, some do find it.
[26:13] How? How do they find it? Exactly. Romans, that's my next verse. Romans 10, 13. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
[26:26] How then will they call on Him who they have not believed? Great question, Paul. And how are they to believe in Him of whom they have never heard?
[26:36] And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? And as it is written, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach good news. Faith comes from hearing the message and the message is heard through the word of Christ.
[26:49] Okay? How are they to believe in Him whom they have never heard? It's a rhetorical question. They can't. They won't. How are they to hear without someone preaching?
[27:01] Someone's got to preach. So you might say, well, I'm just kind of cynical. People aren't getting saved. Yes, majority don't get saved, but some do. And Paul said, hey, I'm doing everything I can so that some would.
[27:15] And what is that that you have to do? They have to be preached to. People have to be sent to preach to them. You have to go to them. But we've created for many years, for a whole generation of church, we created this thing where we think, no, it's all about people coming to us.
[27:36] We designed our churches to be attractional, and it's just about getting people to come to church services. Totally not what you see in the Bible. Nobody's inviting people to church services in the Bible, and yet we had a whole generation that taught church that this is what church is.
[27:53] You, the work of evangelism is inviting people to church so someone else can preach the gospel to them. This is wrong. This is wrong. Okay?
[28:03] The attractional mindset is missing so much. I praise God that Christ is preached in attractional churches, but this is not what you see in the Bible.
[28:13] In the Bible, they were on mission to people. They went to where the people were. They didn't just expect people to come to them, and we need to do the same. Jesus said, I came to seek and to save that which is lost.
[28:25] They're seeking them out. Instead, we turned it into seeker-sensitive services. Instead of seeking them out, we said, bring the seekers here. It's like, no, you go to them because you know what?
[28:36] The majority of people are never going to come into our service until they're Christians, and that's fine because the services aren't for unbelievers, they're for Christians. Church is for Christians, so we need to go out to where people are at and preach the gospel to them because they're not going to believe unless someone, unless they hear, and they're not going to hear unless someone preaches, and they're not going to be preaching unless someone sent.
[28:58] So we can all say, here am I. Send me. I want to go. Here we are as a church. Send us. And we keep going. We go and we keep going. Michael Tucci, when we were talking about some of this on Wednesday, brought up the parable of the sower.
[29:16] And a great point about the parable of the sower is that if you notice when they were spreading the seed, did the sower only throw seed, you know, really make sure that the seed was thrown on the good soil?
[29:28] No. Mark 4, 3 through 8, says some seed fell on the path, other seed fell on rocky ground, other seed fell among the thorns, and other seeds fell into the good soil.
[29:42] Four categories. Three of them are not good. One of them is. What is he doing? Why is he throwing seed all over the place? Do you see that? We think, oh, I have to make sure I only, no, no, no.
[29:54] We're just, it's not our job to make sure that the seed is only on good soil. It's our job to spread seed. You don't know if the soil's good. You're not God. Now, there might be sometimes where it seems like, oh, hey, this guy seems like he's not far from the kingdom.
[30:10] Praise God. You can discern that sometimes. But just because someone doesn't seem far from the kingdom doesn't mean that God couldn't save them. That one hearing of the gospel, which is the power of God for the salvation of those who believe to the hardest heart could break it and melt it.
[30:30] So, we can't just go around saying, well, I don't know. I think he's pretty far here. I don't want to preach to this guy. He's just a complete reprobate, man. He's just a God-hating, not open to the gospel kind of guy.
[30:44] And I say, again, so what? Is the gospel the power of God for the salvation of all who believe? Or is it just the power of God for salvation of those who are really close to believing who look like good soil?
[30:59] As far as what I've read, it says it's to all who believe, and even the hardest of heart can be broken and melted by the Son of God. Do you believe that? If you do, you do with the sower, you're just spreading seed.
[31:11] That's our job. One of the reasons that we get mixed up with this is that, which is my fourth one, is that we think it's on us to save people.
[31:23] Okay? Number four is we lose heart because we think it's on us. That's a hindrance to the gospel. It's not on us to save people. Our job isn't to make sure that the seed falls in the right soil.
[31:33] Our job isn't to make sure that that soil grows up. Our job is to spread the seed of the gospel. God makes things grow. 1 Corinthians 3, 6-7, Paul says, I planted, Apollos watered.
[31:47] But who gave the growth? God. So what's our job? Planting, watering, planting. Someone plants the seeds of the gospel. Maybe you come along, you give the gospel again and you're watering those seeds.
[32:00] It's not your job to make it grow. It's not my job to make it grow. It's not any of our jobs to make it grow. That's God's job. But sometimes we lose heart because we feel like, oh, I'm just not being effective to make the gospel grow in someone's heart.
[32:15] Whoever said that was your job? You're losing heart for the wrong reasons. 2 Corinthians 4, 1-6, says, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart.
[32:30] Verse 3, Even if our gospel is veiled, it's veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
[32:45] For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God who said that light shine out of darkness has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
[33:04] Okay? He says, we don't proclaim ourselves. Why? Because we're not God. We don't save people. He says, we don't lose heart. Even though, isn't it interesting?
[33:16] He says, we don't lose heart. And then he goes on to say how the God of this world has blinded the mind of unbelievers. Doesn't that kind of sound like a good reason to lose heart? Wouldn't you say, well, wait a minute, why aren't you losing heart?
[33:28] The God of this world has blinded the mind of unbelievers. That seems like a pretty good reason to lose heart. Okay? But they don't lose heart because he says, we're not proclaiming ourselves.
[33:40] We're proclaiming Jesus as Lord. We're just servants proclaiming Jesus as Lord. You think Jesus can't open the eyes of the blind?
[33:52] What do we sing? That great hymn, Amazing Grace. I was what? I was blind. But what now? Now I see. Why does that line in that song so popular?
[34:04] Because that's what happens in salvation. So why do we get so discouraged? It's so amazing. If you would ask us all to get up and share our testimonies, at some point in time we'd probably say, maybe not with these words, but with some similar language, we would say, at some point I was lost and then I was found.
[34:21] At some point I was blind and then I saw. But then for some reason when we start ministering to unbelievers and we find out they're blind, we get so discouraged and lose heart. Hold on.
[34:35] Weren't you blind? And you saw? Wasn't the person sitting next to you blind and they saw? Weren't we all who are in Christ Jesus at one time blinded by the God of this world and then we saw?
[34:49] Why do we get so discouraged by people's blindness? Why do we get so discouraged that someone's blind and they can't see that the God of this world has blinded their eyes?
[34:59] We're servants preaching the one who shines light into darkness in the face of Christ Jesus and who opens the eyes of the blind.
[35:12] Do you believe that? He opened your eyes. Why don't we believe He can open someone else's? But so many times you say, man, this guy's so blind. This woman's so blind. I don't know.
[35:23] I don't even know if I'm going to preach the gospel to them. I'm just kind of losing heart. No, no, no, no, no. Hold on. Time out. That is the best person to preach the gospel to. I'm just so hit by how blind they are.
[35:35] I don't know if I even I kind of lost heart to preach the gospel. No, no, no, no, no. No, you have to preach the gospel to them. That's the perfect people to preach the gospel to. But the God of this age is blind to them.
[35:49] So what? Is God mighty to save? God is mighty to save. John 6, 44 says, no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.
[36:00] And you better believe that when the Father who sent Jesus draws them, they're coming. They're coming. Okay?
[36:11] And the only missing factor then there, and God will find someone, if it's not you, He'll find someone else, is that they gotta be preached. Someone's gotta preach to them. But when He's drawn them, next step is someone preaches to them and then the God of this age, the blinders come off.
[36:29] They were blind but now they see. And what happened to us happens to them. So we have to target specific people and places.
[36:39] We have to. We gotta keep at it. We gotta keep finding specific people and places. Some of us already have those existing. Some of us don't. If we don't, we gotta partner with those who do. Some of us say, I don't even have that.
[36:52] Then we need to pray. We need to pray. We need to see the difference between our own individual mission where we're just, you know, throwing out those lines, fishers and men, trying to cast in that line, hoping it'll work out.
[37:06] And then it's maybe there starts to be some drawing or maybe there's some natural teamwork and partnership where we can reach out to people together. We reach out to people together. We expose them to the family of believers.
[37:17] We keep praying for them. We keep preaching the gospel to them. And then we get them saved and we make them disciples. And then we rinse and repeat. We just keep doing this over and over and over again.
[37:27] Building relationships with unbelievers. Praying for those unbelievers to get saved. Preaching the gospel to them. Right? Making disciples of them. And we just keep doing it over and over and over again.
[37:40] Close with Ephesians 6, 18 to 20. Paul says, Keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints. And then he says, And also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am ambassador in chains, that I might declare boldly as I ought to speak.
[38:04] We are to pray the same prayer. And I would ask you, if you're someone that feels like any of these illnesses in your life, there's one thing that will take care of the whole kit and caboodle.
[38:16] Okay? You know what it is? Get filled with the Holy Spirit again. Or maybe get filled with the Holy Spirit the first time that we could be as witnesses. You never stop needing the Holy Spirit. You never stop needing to be filled with the Spirit.
[38:28] And when you're filled with the Spirit, you know what you do? You speak the Word of God boldly. Okay? You do what he says right here. When you're saying that, pray that my words may be given to me in my opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, Acts 4.31 tells how you speak the Word of God boldly.
[38:44] You get filled with the Spirit. You get filled with the Spirit and you keep getting filled with the Spirit. And so, if any of these are true of you, if any of these have hit home to you, listen, I'm not here to condemn you.
[38:57] I'm in the same lot as you. I get weary sometimes. Okay? I forget where I've come from sometimes. I get afraid sometimes. We're all in the same boat here. But listen, we can't give up. God sent us to establish this church for His glory and for the furthering of the gospel.
[39:13] And necessity needs to be laid upon us to preach it. And if we've lost a little bit of that necessity or a lot of that necessity or maybe that necessity was never on us, we were just kind of psyched up for that new shiny church plant, we need to pray, God, fill me afresh with your Spirit.
[39:30] Fill me up. Fill me up because when you do, I'll tell you what's coming out of my mouth. Boldness. Boldness. Amen? Amen.
[39:40] Let's pray.