Father, we ask that you help us to know you,
that you help us to love you,
that you help us to trust you.
We ask, Father, that...
Father, we confess before you
that we regularly face things
that look really, really big,
and they look so big they make you look small.
We ask, Father, that you would help us to remember
that you are bigger than anything
that we will ever come across other than yourself,
that everything is small compared to you.
So we ask, Father, that you help us to trust
in your greatness, in your glory,
that you are the creator,
that you are the sustainer,
that you are sovereign.
Help us to trust, Father,
your means and your provision
for us to be made right with you.
Father, help us to trust you and long for you.
Open our minds and our hearts to receive your word.
And this we ask in Jesus' name,
your Son and our Savior.
Amen.
Please be seated.
Missionaries have been a force of great evil in the world.
Missionaries have been a force for great evil in the world.
And right-thinking Christians will stop sending missionaries
and apologize for all the harm they've done.
Now, that's not actually something that I believe,
but I think if I was to say that in Starbucks
or in Tim Hortons,
people would nod.
Yeah.
Missionaries have been a force for great evil in the world.
If I was to say that,
probably at the University of Ottawa or Carleton,
if I was to say it in many, many, many places,
it would just be part of the common things
that right-thinking people know and understand.
That Christian missionaries have been a force for evil in the world
and that Christians should apologize for it
and they should stop.
And in fact,
denominations and churches that,
in a sense,
come to accept
that common view of Canada
and of probably not only Canada,
but the West,
as that sort of seeps into our consciousness,
there are many denominations
that have stopped, in fact,
sending any missionaries at all.
In fact, the Anglican Church of Canada
no longer,
not as a denomination,
sends missionaries
as it would have been traditionally understood
where part of the primary obligation or role
was the sharing of the gospel
and the teaching of the Christian faith.
And so it's a very, very common thing.
And unfortunately,
or fortunately as the case might be,
today we have to talk about thinking like a missionary
because that's where the Bible leads us.
It's actually one of those hard texts,
in a sense,
just as certain texts around money
or sexuality or politics
or some other things in our culture.
It's one of those parts where,
you know,
in my heart of hearts,
I'd like to have a sermon and a service
that really, in a sense,
is touching the needs of people
who are not yet Christians
and also addresses the needs of Christians.
But nobody outside of the walls of this church,
and maybe some of you in here,
are thinking to themselves,
I really would like to understand
how to think like a missionary.
Like, it's not one of those questions
that we're really conscious of even,
even Christians often don't really,
they're not even interested at all
in trying to think like a missionary
or have a missionary view of the world.
So we have a text here today,
which is a classic missionary text.
It's all about Paul wanting to go.
I mean, Star Trek said,
boldly go where no man has gone before.
That's really just taking from Paul.
I want to boldly go
where nobody has gone before
to tell about Jesus.
And so we have a text,
which is not what really most Christians
and definitely no non-Christians
are even remotely interested in.
And that's what we're going to look at today.
So get your Bibles out.
We're going to look at it.
And I think, I mean,
it will be no surprise to any of you
that I actually think that this,
this biblical text is really, really important
around some of the biggest cultural
and social issues that we face.
It addresses actually profound human problems
and that it's a text
that Christians don't know they need,
but we really do need
because a lot of the spiritual fatality
and vigor that congregations,
that get ebbed away from congregations
or from individuals' lives
and they don't understand why.
And part of it is going back
to this failure to be gripped
by how the gospel propels us
to have a concern,
to go to hard people groups
and places to the ends of the earth
and to share the gospel.
So the text that Nora read,
it was Romans chapter 15,
and she began reading at verse 14,
but we're going to start verse 8
because really verse 14
follows upon what Paul is talking about
in Romans,
beginning at Romans 15, verse 8.
And it goes like this,
for I tell you that Christ became a servant
to the circumcised
to show God's truthfulness.
Now just pause there.
What it means is that
the circumcised,
just one way of referring to the Jewish people,
the promised people,
the ancient covenant people,
and Jesus came as a servant to them
because he is going to be the means,
he's going to be the suffering servant
by which they are reconciled to God.
I'll start with verse 8 again.
For I tell you that Christ became a servant
to the circumcised
to show God's truthfulness
in order to confirm the promises
given to the patriarchs,
and verse 9 is the dynamite.
Okay?
In fact, if you get nothing else
out of this entire sermon in verse 9,
then that's a good thing.
If you leave and you forget about verse 9,
I failed.
Verse 9 is the dynamite.
And it says this,
And in order,
why did Christ come?
In order that the Gentiles
might glorify God for his mercy.
Why is it that Jesus came?
He wanted pagans
from every people group
on the planet
to receive mercy from him
that makes them right with him
so that they could glorify God
and enjoy him forever.
And that's why Jesus came.
When we look at the transgendered communities,
when we look at the gay communities,
when we look at the artistic communities,
when we look at
the hard-left political communities
that seem to be so opposed
to much in the Christian faith,
when we look at the people
who are profoundly pro-choice
and find Christians
very, very threatening and hateful,
when we look into Asian communities
and African-American,
African-Canadian communities,
when we look to China
and we look to Japan
and we look to South Korea,
we are not to see people
that we should be frightened of,
that we should treat as other,
or that we should hate
or be afraid of.
We should look at them
and have to know
that it's the heart of God
that people from every one
of those people groups
would glorify him.
That's his heart.
That people from every one
of those groups,
with no exception,
would come to glorify him
for his mercy.
That's the motivation for missions.
And to lose that motivation
is to start to shrivel and die
as a Christian and as a church.
Verse 9 again,
and then we'll keep going,
and then I'm going to put it up
on the screen
just so you get this,
this sort of this big thing
at the beginning,
and all of the rest of the stuff
in verse 14,
and it only makes any sense
if this has sort of gripped
your heart in some way at all.
Verse 9 again,
in order that the Gentiles,
that's the pagans,
might glorify God for his mercy.
And then he's going to quote the Bible
as it is written,
therefore I will praise you
among the pagans
and sing to your name.
And again it is said,
rejoice, O pagans,
with his people.
And again,
praise the Lord,
all you pagans,
and let all the peoples
extol him.
And again Isaiah says,
the root of Jesse will come,
even he who arises
to rule the pagans,
in him will the pagans hope.
Now here's this prayer,
a prayer that God writes
for us to pray.
May the God of hope
fill you with all joy
and peace in believing,
so that by the power
of the Holy Spirit
you may abound in hope.
Andrew, could you put the,
I've just taken the scripture text,
I've just sort of put basically
the beginning and the end together.
I've not done anything
to take it out of context,
but could you,
could you all say this with me
because this is the heart,
all the things that are going to follow,
this is the heart of the text,
this is the missionary heart
of the gospel.
Could you say it with me out loud?
For I tell you
that Christ became a servant
to the circumcisions
to show God's truthfulness
in order that the Gentiles
might glorify God
for his mercy.
May the God of hope
fill you with all joy
and peace in believing,
so that by the power
of the Holy Spirit
you may abound in hope.
That's Paul's message.
And in fact,
Andrew, could you just put up
my summary,
or Rebecca,
my summary point?
The living God
desires men and women
from every people group
on the planet
to enter together
into the joy,
peace,
and hope
of glorifying him
for his saving mercy
in Jesus Christ
crucified and risen.
See, the book of Romans is,
we're going to look at Romans 1,
16 to 17 in a moment,
but the whole book of Romans
begins with Paul's,
you know,
he's unashamed of the gospel.
The gospel is what God has done.
The gospel is power
that comes from God,
that's a right power,
that's a just power,
that's a merciful power,
that comes from God.
It's the news that God
has provided a powerful means
by which,
when we put our faith and trust,
faith in God,
in his power,
his means,
that he will make us
right with himself.
And that's the gospel.
And then Paul has spent
all of Romans 15,
all of Romans,
the book of Romans,
just trying to help us
to understand that
so that we would be
gripped by it.
And now as the book of Romans
is coming to an end,
and his concern
is once again
to just drive into us
that as we receive
this gospel ourselves,
as we receive this power
from God ourselves,
that it would naturally
compel us,
as we're gripped by it,
to have a changed view
of every people group
in the world,
and to have a heart
for every people group
in the world,
with no exception.
And so that's why
I've tried to put it here,
summarizing this scripture text.
Could you put it
in the scripture text again,
Rebecca?
Can you flip back to it?
Could you say it all
out loud with me?
Remember, this is the whole,
you know,
if you're going to fall asleep
after this,
then I guess at least
you'll remember the part here
that's the important part
at the beginning,
not the end.
But could you say this
with me out loud again?
For I tell you that Christ
became a servant
to the circumcised
to show God's truthfulness
in order that the Gentiles
may glorify God
for his mercy.
May the God of hope
fill you with all joy
and peace in believing,
so that by the power
of the Holy Spirit
you may abound in hope.
And then, Rebecca,
if you could flip that first point
back up on the screen.
The living God desires
men and women
from every people group
on the planet
to enter together
into the joy, peace,
and hope of glorifying him
for his saving mercy
in Jesus Christ,
crucified and risen.
Now, there's no question
that some missionaries
have done great evil
throughout the history.
I'm not going to say
that every missionary
was perfect,
that he or she
did a spectacular job
that they were
self-effacing
and humble
and sacrificial.
Nobody can make
that type of claim
about anybody
or any group.
But, you know,
it's really, really,
you know,
I think if you actually
were to study
the history of missionaries
in terms of what
they've done,
and then you compare it
to what armed forces
have done,
business people have done,
academics,
aid groups,
the United Nations,
Christians,
I actually think
Christians don't have
to hold their head low.
I really don't.
It's not as if
somehow or another
the United Nations,
for instance,
has done such a
spectacular job
throughout the world
that it's putting
Christians to shame.
I don't think it's the case.
And I think
it's a lot of time,
a lot of the criticism
of missions
is really a criticism
of just of the gospel
in general,
but it's not really
a fair type of thing.
And in fact,
actually,
and here's the human problem,
in our culture,
it would be widely
accepted in our culture
that we shouldn't be
ethnocentric.
And in fact,
one of the dangers
of some missionary movements
throughout the past
is that they didn't
just share the gospel,
but they also were trying
to share British culture
or Canadian culture
or American culture.
And there's no denying
that sometimes missionaries
would get that
quite confused
or not be able
to necessarily understand
the difference
between a cultural thing
and a biblical thing.
But it's a common
human problem
if you think about it
for a second.
And it's,
on one hand,
at least in our culture,
because many cultures
think there's nothing wrong
with ethnocentrism.
They would just say that,
I don't know,
our culture is the best culture.
I mean,
that would be,
the whole idea
of actually being critical
of our culture
is really a Christian idea
because it's a Christian idea
because the power
of the gospel
is that the gospel
does not emerge
out of any culture.
The gospel is something
that comes from God.
And the culture
is going to come,
the gospel is going to come
from God
just as the Bible
doesn't in a sense
really emerge
out of any particular culture,
but that the Bible
is ultimately God's word.
And as a result,
every culture,
there's going to be
some things in the culture
that resonate with the gospel
and resonate with God's word.
And there's always going to be
in every single culture
something which is offended
by God's word
and is offended
by the gospel.
There's not going to be
as if there's a culture
that perfectly aligns
with the Bible
and with the gospel.
So, you know,
at the very, very heart
of this Christian faith
is this idea
that there's always
something a little bit
limited
about every particular culture.
And, you know,
so it is in our modern age,
we, you know,
accuse people
of the dangers
of ethnocentrism.
Yet, you know,
if you think about it,
when it comes to things
like abortion
or same-sex rights
or transgendered rights,
our culture,
the leading progressive edges
of our culture
are quite willing
to transgress
and step all over
other cultures
in pushing that.
But isn't that ethnocentrism?
Like, why isn't that
ethnocentrism?
Like, why isn't it?
I don't understand
why that isn't
ethnocentrism.
And, like,
where is it
within the culture
that you can find,
like the leading
progressive edges
of our culture,
that you can find
some type of
self-critical approach
to understanding
what it is
that's going on
in the Western cultures,
whether it's
through business
or whether it's
through the media
or whether it's
through social action,
where is it
within a culture
outside of
the Christian faith,
any type of
self-critical reflection
upon what's being done.
You see,
I actually think
that texts like this
and the biblical mandate,
that the understanding
that the Bible
is coming,
something that's
a word from God,
that Jesus,
actually,
why don't we put up
Romans 1,
16 to 17.
Can you put that up
for me, Rebecca?
Can we all say this together?
For I am not ashamed
of the gospel,
for it is the power
of God
for salvation
to everyone
who believes,
to the Jew first
and also to the Greek.
For the righteousness
of God
is revealed
from faith to faith
as it is written,
the righteous
shall live by faith.
So here we see
that the gospel,
that means good news,
not good religion,
not good advice,
not good culture,
not good techniques,
but good news
and it's good news
that God
has revealed
a type of power
that God has revealed,
not that sort of
somehow human beings
have discovered,
but that God has revealed,
God has done something
and God has done something
that breaks into
our human order
and it's something
that he does
which is right,
it's his power,
it will make people
right with him
and it's a way
that will make people
right with him
that's completely right,
it's completely just
and it's completely
and utterly,
it fits with who we are
and who God is
and it's completely
and utterly received
by faith
and it's a power
that comes from God.
And so even if we Christians
don't always get it,
we at least understand
that there has to always
be a bit of a self-critical
perception of our culture
and our practices
just as there should be
a heart for other people.
This was very, very,
very powerfully illustrated to me
about 13 years ago
when I went,
I was one of four Canadians
that was invited
to go to this
international consultation
of Anglican evangelicals,
an international consultation
and it was in Kenya,
Limuru, Kenya
and I was one of four Canadians
who got to go.
Most of the people
who were there
are from the two-thirds world
and one of the things
that went on
in the conference
was that we spent
most of the time,
about half the time
with about the same group
of about 15 people
discussing some theological issues
to try to come
to a common mind
and the one
that I was in
was one of the most
theological issues.
Some of them were more
missiological or economic
but it was around
the uniqueness of Christ
and there were three guys
there from England.
They all had PhDs
from Oxford or Cambridge.
From their point of view,
I'm a guy from third-rate universities
and only a master's degree
and there was Sri Lanka,
India, Singapore.
There was lots of Christians
from Africa.
There was somebody
from one of the indigenous tribes
in South America
and I went into this conference
excited, a bit nervous
because as I've shared
in other times,
it was a time
when there was some
significant violence
and most airlines
weren't flying into Kenya
but I decided
that I would go.
My wife and I prayed.
We decided I would still go.
Anyway, I really wanted
to try to honor
this distinction
about not importing
my Canadian way
of doing Christianity
and talking about
the Christian faith.
I really wanted to sit
and listen deeply
to how a Nigerian
or a Kenyan
or somebody from Sri Lanka
would articulate
these theological things.
Anyway, we go into this
and we get talking about this
in our group
of about 15 people
and lo and behold,
to my complete
and utter surprise,
the three people
from England
with their doctorates
were basically trying
to change the doctrines
of the uniqueness of Christ
to make it compatible
with fashionable
post-modernism
in England.
And I'm really
taken aback by this.
At first, I'm just sort of
giving them the benefit
of the doubt
but they just keep
wanting to change
the doctrines,
changing the wordings
and everything
and I know
because of my background
that they're just
wanting to make
this doctrine
acceptable
to post-modern
narrative and discourse
in the West.
So I start to go after them
and I start to challenge them
and it really,
you know,
I go after them
and they're also making
all these really negative,
you know,
they're making these
like dismissive comments
about the idea of demons
and stuff like that.
Dismissing it is
like a type of myth.
I'm going after them,
going after them.
For two days,
I'm the only one
going after them
and I'm getting tired
and nobody else,
the other 11
are just silent.
At the end of two days,
I say,
well,
I'm tired of doing this.
I'm just going to be silent
from now on.
You know,
whatever.
I just got the worst group.
Like,
why is it always me
that I get the worst group?
And then just,
this doesn't always happen
this way in life
but this is one of those times
where it happened to me
in life this way.
That after I had made
this decision,
I was going to speak out anymore.
the very next day
at breakfast,
three brothers,
one from Sri Lanka,
one from Singapore
and one from Nigeria.
They said,
can we talk to you?
And I said,
sure,
let's talk.
And then,
they said to me,
you know,
a guy from Sri Lanka,
a guy from Singapore
and a guy from Nigeria,
they said,
when we came to this conference,
we didn't want to mistake
our cultural practices
in our countries
for what's in the gospel.
We really wanted to learn
from each other.
That's what they said to me.
And so,
at first,
when these three guys
from England
start talking,
we just think,
well,
okay,
this just must be something
the way they talk
in England.
But then they said to me,
you're white.
You're from the West.
And you start
disagreeing with them.
And everything you say,
we agree with.
And everything that they say,
we completely disagree with.
And it's taken us two days
because we wanted
to be really patient,
but we came to understand
that it's not a cultural difference.
They're wrong.
That they're not being faithful
to the gospel
and they're not being faithful
to the Bible.
We want to thank you
for revealing that to us
and to keep it up.
After that,
they went after them,
by the way.
It's one of those funny things.
I could just sit back
and they went after them.
And that really made them squirm,
the three people
from England,
because they did not want
to be ethnocentric.
And now all of a sudden,
it's not just the rube
from Canada
who's going after them.
But what do they do
when all of the rest
are going after them
to challenge them
as to whether they're being
faithful to the Bible?
You see,
what I'm trying to get at
is that there's something
inherent to this message
that both draws us
in love to the world
and acts,
if we have a conscience at all
or a heart at all,
to make us challenge
and try to understand
the difference
between our cultural practices,
our personal likes
and dislikes,
and what's God's heart.
And the true and living God
is the true and living God
for every person
who is on the planet.
There is only one
true and living God.
There is only one creator.
There is only one sustainer.
There is only one
who is sovereign.
And he does not
pick and choose
and say that America
is his favorite
and he hates South Korea
or North Korea
or China.
He doesn't pick
any favorites like that.
Every nation,
every people group
is under God's judgment
and every people group,
every person
in every people group
needs the gospel.
There is both something here
which is universal,
which we can share.
And at the same time,
as we go deeper
into the gospel
and deeper into the scriptures,
provides a mechanism
by which we can be
self-critical
about our culture.
Could you go back
to the point number one?
Could you put that up again,
Rebecca?
I'm really making it
work hard today.
The living God
desires men and women
from every people group
on the planet
to enter together
into the joy,
peace,
and hope
of glorifying him
for his saving mercy
in Jesus Christ
crucified and risen.
Now here's the big challenge.
We're not going to look
at verses 14
and follow.
We're going to go through
them very, very quickly.
And I'm going to do something,
any of you who've studied
how you do public speaking
or if you listen
to Andy Stanley,
they'd all go,
oh my good grief,
this is the wrong way
to do it.
I'm going to have
lots of points.
It's really just,
what I'm going to try
to do for the rest of it,
I'm going to help you
to pray the scriptures.
That's what I just want to do.
I just want to help you
to pray the scriptures.
To take a text
and say,
how do we pray it?
But here's the thing,
you know,
this is a huge challenge
for me
because I can be
very, very shy
about sharing the gospel.
I really can.
Like, it's not something
natural that I do.
This past week,
there's a man
that I've been praying for
at one of the Starbucks
that I regularly go to.
I've been praying for him
off and on
for several years.
He's about my age.
He's very, very fit.
Drives a really,
really, really high,
I mean,
a really expensive vehicle.
He just,
he's,
I don't want to say
anything more about him
in case I give away
some identity things,
but he's obviously
very, very, very,
very successful
and he seems
very, very confident.
And I have to confess,
I just think that people
who are very successful
and very confident,
often they can be
very far from God
and not know
they realize
and they don't,
maybe they can be like
the story of the rich man
not knowing
that they need God.
So I started to,
I've been praying
for him off and on.
So this week,
I think it was Thursday,
I'm there
working on my sermon.
He comes up to me
and he says,
because we've been
nodding at each other
for a while,
hi, hi, hi.
And he comes up to me
and he says,
whoa, I see you
working here all the time.
Are you working on a book?
Now, okay,
here's what goes on
in my mind, okay?
Because here,
I'm being honest,
I'm not a natural evangelist.
I really,
I get terrified, okay?
In our culture,
saying that you're a pastor
goes, boo.
Saying you write a book
goes, whoa.
Whoa, you're working
on a book, buddy,
you know, whoa.
Pastor, boo.
Book, whoa.
Okay, so you,
this is going through my mind,
right, very, very,
very quickly,
you know,
I could say,
yeah, yeah,
you know,
I'm doing some writing
and thinking
and, you know, etc.
You know,
I could probably
even turn it about,
yeah, you know,
the meaning of life
and deep questions
and I could answer
that question
in such a way
that he'd go,
whoa.
All flashes quickly
before my tired
little mind
and I say to him,
this is one of those
good stories for me,
not one of the bad times
when I failed, okay?
But I said to him,
well, actually,
I'm not working on a book.
I'm a pastor of a church.
I'm working on a sermon.
And I'm reading the Bible
and I'm working on a sermon.
And he goes,
oh,
well, that's interesting.
Then he said to me,
I thought that's
what you were doing.
I thought that's
what you were doing
because I've seen you
with your Bible open,
pounding away at it.
Anyway,
it turns out
that he goes to
one of the better-known
evangelical churches
and has been a Christian
for 40 years.
I've been praying
for the wrong guy.
I didn't tell him
I was praying
for his salvation
for the last two years.
But I,
you know,
the angels laugh,
right?
And here's the whole thing
because I,
you know,
I have shared times
where I do share something
about like I'm a pastor
and people go,
oh,
like that,
you know.
But this is one of those times
that he became
even more friendly,
right?
And he'd noticed
that I was reading the Bible,
that I wasn't just writing a book.
I don't know why
he asked me the question
in that way,
but anyway,
it was all from God,
I guess,
right?
So,
there's a reason
why I was telling you
this story.
I can't remember
what the reason is now.
Anyway,
oh,
that's it.
That's it.
This text
is so important
for us.
If we understand
that the reason
that God,
Jesus came,
not only to show
God's truthfulness,
his faithfulness
and his truthfulness,
but it's his heart
that people
from every people group
would glorify God
for his mercy,
that they'd enter
into hope,
that they'd be filled
with joy,
that they'd have peace,
that they'd know
the power of the Holy Spirit,
that they'd abound
in hope,
that that's why
Jesus came.
That's why he came.
And so my neighbors,
I shouldn't look at it.
I should look at it
that this is what
God wants for them.
And he's put me
in my neighborhood
to pray for them.
And that when I go to,
whether it's a Tim Hortons
or a restaurant
or a Starbucks,
part of the reason
that God has put you
in that restaurant
is that you can pray
that those people,
you don't know
if they're Christians or not,
but if they're not Christians,
that God wants them
to have joy.
It's not all about you.
It's not all about
your experience.
It's not all about
how successful you are.
It's not all about
your problems.
It's not all about
how perfect you are.
It's all about the fact
that God has done something
and he desires.
Human beings were made
to glorify God
and enjoy him forever.
And we share the gospel
so people can enjoy God
and worship him.
we're to pray
for that opportunity.
Let's go through this,
the rest of the book
very, very quickly.
Verse 14.
I myself am satisfied
about you, my brothers,
that you yourself
are full of goodness,
filled with all knowledge
and able to instruct
one another.
Now just pause.
Isn't that sort of
a neat thing?
Paul's done a lot of rebuking
throughout the book,
but at the end of the day,
he believes that,
you know,
goodness is one of the fruits
of the Spirit.
Did you know that?
Look in Galatians chapter 5.
What are the fruits
of the Spirit?
Love, joy, peace,
patience, kindness,
goodness, faithfulness,
gentleness, self-control.
Could you put up
the prayer, please, Rebecca?
Can you,
I'm going to ask you
to say these prayers
with me.
This is the really
powerful thing.
At the end of the day,
Paul, this is what
Paul believes.
That because it's a power
that comes from God
and God,
the gospel still works
and the Holy Spirit
still works.
And that means,
could we pray this together?
Lord,
please help me
to trust
that you can work
in and through
ordinary Christ followers.
So we need to pray
that God,
God does work
through ordinary people.
He uses ordinary people
to instruct others.
The gospel works.
verse 15.
But in some points,
I have written
to you very boldly
by way of reminder
because of the grace
given me by God
to be a minister
of Christ Jesus
to the Gentiles,
to the pagans
in the priestly service
of the gospel of God
so that the offering
of the Gentiles
may be acceptable.
In other words,
that as the pagans
come to faith
and they offer
themselves to God,
that it will be
acceptable,
sanctified by the Holy Spirit.
in Christ Jesus,
then,
this is verse 17,
I have reason
to be proud
of my work for God
for I will not venture
to speak of anything
except what Christ
has accomplished
through me
to bring the Gentiles
to obedience
by word and deed,
by the power
of signs and wonders,
by the power
of the Spirit of God,
so that from Jerusalem
and all the way
around to Illyricum,
I have fulfilled
the ministry
of the gospel of Christ.
I'll just sort of
pause there
for a second.
Could you put up
the next point,
please?
This is what we're being
asked to pray for here,
is that Paul was able
by word and deed,
and when it says here
by signs and miracles,
that's not something,
like you can't go out
and say,
well,
if you do,
you know,
400 push-ups,
God will do a miracle,
or if you run the marathon,
God will do a miracle.
You can't engineer that.
There's no technique
to accomplish that.
What you do is you ask.
You say,
Lord,
I need a miracle here.
We don't have any money.
We need money, Lord.
We need a miracle.
Every conversion
is a miracle.
Lord,
that man,
that woman,
looks like they could,
they hate God,
or they don't need God,
or that man or woman,
look,
they're far more educated
than I am.
They're far more powerful.
They're far more successful.
How can they ever
possibly need the gospel?
You know,
we look at the world
and we see all these
big things,
and we don't realize
that they're small
and that God is bigger
and we've got to call out
to God in prayer,
and God does do miracles sometimes.
Some of us can testify
to different miracles
that God has done
in our lives,
but we accomplish them
by prayer.
And so what the challenge
here is for us
to pray the scriptures
is this.
Could you pray this
with me, please?
Lord,
please help me
to bear witness
to the gospel
with words,
to live a life
that is gripped
by the gospel,
and to pray
with persistence
and hope
for the lost.
And I put down
the word the lost.
I know that's very
politically incorrect,
but it's a Bible word.
Not right here,
but it's a Bible word
in the book of Romans.
And that's what this,
this is a challenge
for us.
Is,
you don't have to explain
the whole,
I got into a conversation
yesterday
with two Jehovah Witnesses
in one of my Starbucks.
20 minutes.
one of them is
the mom,
a very, very active
witnesser in Ottawa,
and her daughter
just come back
on furlough
as a missionary
to another part
of the world
who's a Jehovah Witness.
And, you know,
at the end of the day,
I just shared
with her,
with them,
you know,
you don't normally
get to have
a longer conversation
like this.
Most of the time,
you don't.
Most of the time,
just bearing witness.
I'm a pastor.
I go to church
on Sunday.
Will I actually pray?
I actually believe
the Bible.
It's just a small
word of witness.
That's most of the time
all that we have to do.
You never know
when it will be like
the Jehovah Witnesses
that had seen me there
with the Bible
many times
and they finally
initiate a conversation.
We have a 20-minute
conversation
about how
unless you understand
the Trinity,
there's no understanding
of God's true love
and unless Jesus
is actually God
and man,
there's no way
he could possibly
be your Savior.
And that you need
God to do everything
to make you right
with him.
If you're depending
upon your own efforts
and that's how
our conversation went.
A Jewish man
at the same Starbucks
that I've talked to
for several years now,
just after Easter,
he said to me,
these are these times
when you get
these opportunities.
I don't know
what happens to them.
All I can do
is pray.
And I'd had lots
of very small conversations.
It just began
with the fact
that I was reading
a Bible in public.
It just began
with very simple things
about the fact
that I'm a Christian.
And he came up to me
about three weeks
after Easter
and he said,
he's from Israel,
he said,
George,
I've been asking
many Canadians
this question
and none of them
can give me
a good answer
but I think
maybe you can.
He said,
you believe
that Jesus
is the Messiah?
Yes.
You believe
that he came
from God?
Yes.
And you believe
he died on the cross?
Yes.
Why do you call it
Good Friday?
So I said to him,
well listen,
I'm working on my sermon,
I don't have time to talk.
No,
I didn't say that.
I got this
20 minute opportunity
just to talk to him
about the Old Testament law,
about Passover,
about the whole thing,
about Jesus.
You know,
I fail many,
many opportunities.
There's,
I share with you
some of the times
I walk away
wishing I'd said something
and,
but sometimes
all you're asked for
is to bear witness
with words.
And all you're asked for
as well
is as much as possible
to try to,
by deeds,
to live a life
that reflects
the glory of God.
And to not say
people's no for them
but to not only pray
for your loved ones
that they would come
to a saving faith
in Jesus
but to pray
for hard people.
Pray for the Orthodox Jew
that you know.
Pray for the devout Muslim.
that you know.
Pray for the transsexual activist
that you know.
Pray for people
who are hard as well.
God has put them
on your heart
or in your path
for a reason.
It might be
that you are the only one
on the planet
who will pray for them.
verses,
let's continue reading
verse,
where am I?
Verse 22.
How are we doing?
Yeah, we're doing fine.
Verse 22.
For this reason,
sorry,
this is the reason
why I have so often
been hindered
from coming to you.
But now,
because he's been hindered
because he's been working
in all these other areas.
Okay?
But now,
since I no longer
have any room
for work in these regions
and since I have longed
for many years
to come to you,
I hope to see you
in passing
as I go to Spain
and to be helped
on my journey
there by you
once I have enjoyed
your company
for a while.
At present,
however,
I am going to Jerusalem
bringing aid
to the saints.
Now just sort of
pause there.
It's beyond the scope
of this text,
but for internal reasons
in the book,
this book was probably
written when Paul
was in Corinth
and he's writing it
to Rome
and he says he wants
to go there
and he says,
but first I'm going
to go to Jerusalem.
That's the opposite direction.
And the reason
he's going
the opposite direction
is because
the poor
need help.
Because he's been
raising money
for the poor.
Could you put up
the next point,
please?
Oh, sorry,
I've missed a point.
Never mind.
Let's,
that's the two points
down.
Lord,
there we go.
That's the one.
Could you say this
with me?
Lord,
please help me
to remember
the poor.
That's a good
prayer to pray.
Lord,
please help me
to remember
the poor.
I don't know
what's going to happen
when you pray
these prayers,
but you see
how all of a sudden
this is all connected
to the missionary
endeavor.
You see how so many
things in this text
are connected
to being a vital
Christian life
is to have this heart
that God has the heart
for the world
and if we lose
our heart
for the world,
then we,
other things
go too.
Could you go back
to the earlier point
that I skipped over?
This was the,
this is the thing
from the fact
that Paul had gone
to Alaricum
and he's gone here
and he's gone there
and this for Paul
is just the normal
Christian life.
Could you pray this
with me please?
Lord,
please help me
to be a local
Christian
and a world
Christian.
Like we not only
have to have a heart
for Ottawa,
we have to have
a heart for the world.
It should excite us
to hear what's going
on in the world.
We don't want to just
be caught up
in our own little thing.
Let's just continue
reading.
We're almost done.
Verse 26.
For Macedonia
and Achaia
have been pleased
to make some
contribution for the poor
among the saints
at Jerusalem.
For they were
pleased to do it
and indeed
they owe it
to them.
For if the Gentiles
have come to share
in their spiritual blessings,
they ought also
to be of service
to them
in material blessings.
Could you put up
the,
I think it's
prayer number six,
please?
Could you pray
this with me?
Lord,
please help me
to grow
in generosity.
That's what happened here.
As the gospel
touched their hearts,
generosity grew.
Generosity in terms
of their finances.
And so they
willingly gave
not only for Paul
to be able to
preach the gospel
without charge,
but they gave
so that the poor
would be helped.
And so that's why
this prayer,
this Paul
is just teaching us
that if we want
to pray the scriptures,
this text is asking us,
asking us,
asking God
to help us
to become
more generous
with our financial resources.
Verse 28,
when therefore
I have completed this
and have delivered
to them
what has been collected,
I will leave
for Spain
by way of you.
I know that
when I come to you,
I will come
in the fullness
of the blessing
of Christ.
Now just pause,
second to last,
almost done.
a church father
who wrote
around the year
a little bit
after this,
a letter of his
has been found
and he claims
that Paul
did go to Spain.
After his Roman
imprisonment,
he did go to Spain.
But Paul,
in desiring to go
to Spain,
wanted to go
to a hard place.
Why is that
a hard place?
They didn't speak
the language
that Paul spoke.
There's no record
at that time
of any Jewish
settlements in Spain.
So that meant
that Paul
would have to go
to a place
where he couldn't
first go to his
Jewish brothers
and sisters
and speak the gospel
and use maybe
having the first
converts be Jewish
people.
But he was going
to go to a place,
obviously some of them
would have known
Latin and Greek,
Paul would have
known that,
but they had their
own local
indigenous languages
that he wouldn't
have known.
Paul wanted to go
to a hard place.
That's where he
wanted to go.
Now this text
isn't telling all
of us to individually
go to hard places,
but what it's telling
us is that we
should have a heart
that God is always
raising up people
from our midst
who will go to
hard people
and share the gospel
with them
and go to hard places.
That's part of
healthy Christianity.
Could you put up
the prayer,
please?
Could you pray
this with me?
Lord,
please raise up
people to go
to hard places
and hard people
groups,
and please help
us to support
them with our
prayers and time
and resources.
Because Paul says
when he's going to
Spain,
to Rome first,
he's hoping that
they'll financially
support him,
he's hoping for
logistic advice,
and he's probably
hoping and praying
that maybe one
person there was
originally from Spain,
and that he could
talk him out of
being a lawyer
or something,
to go and do
a hard thing.
Final bit,
verses 30 to the
end.
I appeal to you,
brothers and sisters,
by our Lord Jesus
Christ and by the
love of the Spirit,
to strive together
with me in your
prayers to God.
The word strive
can also mean
struggle,
to struggle,
to strive together
with me in your
prayers to God
on my behalf,
that I may be
delivered from the
unbelievers in Judea,
and that my service
for Jerusalem may be
acceptable to the
saints,
so that by God's
will I may come to
you with joy and be
refreshed in your
company.
May the God of peace
be with you all.
Amen.
Last prayer.
Could you put it up,
please?
Could you all stand
for this bit?
We're going to close
with, we'll pray this
prayer together,
and then I'll just
close with a prayer,
because this is how
Paul ends this bit.
Romans 16,
he's going to be now
saying, you know,
next week we look at it,
Romans will be finished
next week, he's
thanking this person,
commending this,
and like a final
benediction, but this
is this final thing.
Paul's asking them to
commit to struggle in
prayer, to strive in
prayer, not just say a
quick prayer, nothing
wrong with quick
prayers, love quick
prayers, pray that we
can say more quick
prayers, but sometimes
God calls us to a
season of life where
we strive and struggle
in prayer.
We commit to not just
pray, it doesn't come
easily that we're
called to a deeper
season of prayer, and
that's the challenge of
this scripture text to
us.
Can we pray it with me?
Lord, please make me a
person of prayer, and
make us a praying church.
Let's just bow our heads.
Father, we thank you for
the many missionaries that
have arisen out of this
congregation, and the
many different places
they're serving.
We thank you, Father, for
the two in our midst that
are just on the edge of
going to, one to a very
hard place, one to just a
distant place, all with
hardness and hardship, but
we thank you, Father, for
them.
We ask, Father, that you
make us not just a local
church with a concern for
our neighborhood and
concern for our city, but
you help us to always be
world Christians, Father,
with a heart for the poor
across the planet and a
heart for the great need
for the gospel across
the planet.
Father, make us local
Christians and world
Christians, and make us a
praying people, Father.
Make us disciples of Jesus
who are gripped by the
gospel, living for your
glory, who are pouring our
hearts out in prayer and
living generous lives.
And this we ask in the name
of Jesus, your Son and our
Savior.
Amen.