No Greater Cause - Unsettling Times | Unshakable Faith

So the story goes that there was a terrible accident.

Lady was thrown from the car.

She was in really bad shape.

Fortunately, another lady happened to pull up right at that time.

She got out and later testified.

She said, man, she said It's a good thing my first aid training kicked in at just the right time because I remembered to put my head between my legs so I didn't pass out.

Ma'am, please.

That's not what the training is for.

When somebody's in a dangerous situation, there's a life at stake.

You don't think about you.

You think about them.

Tonight, we talk about no greater cause.

No greater cause In a world where a lot of people, a lot of Christians are getting immersed in all kinds of causes, we're talking about the greatest one on earth Because all that you've learned in Christ is not just so you can survive, not just so you can do well, because you got life to be a life giver So if you look at your notes, we're gonna really we're gonna plow fast tonight.

Matthew begins his gospel. with the mission of Jesus.

Because it starts with that conversation right after the genealogy, the conversation of the angel with Joseph, where he says you shall call his name Jesus, which means the Lord rescues.

You should call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.

It begins with his mission.

It ends with his commission, his great commission.

Starts with his mission, ends with his co-mission.

Where he says, go and make disciples of all nations.

He has now accomplished what would make possible The saving of any soul anywhere in the world.

So the life of Jesus is book-ended, as Matthew tells it, by mission at the beginning, mission at the end.

Now, let's just review.

We're talking about the fact that the kind of absolutely unsinkable faith that these times require Pursue six passions that once change the world.

You will find them acted out and lived out in the book of Acts, which we're not studying while we're here.

And let's just review.

The first passion was the authority that determines outcomes.

So the basis of our reason for confidence.

In a world like this, all authority resides in him in heaven and earth.

All the, remember, right to decide, ability to accomplish, and power to prevail.

Exocia.

And that sense of authority took a ragtag bunch of Christians and blew their message across the world.

We talked this morning about the second passion, which was to have a life that is a light.

You are the light of the world, is at the end of the great of the that part of the Beatitudes And the be at a few that we talked about this morning are people who say, I understand that I am to be The living embodiment of what a life looks like when Jesus is totally the king, totally in charge.

I am, in a sense, his walking kingdom of heaven on display And we saw how the Beatitude spelled that out.

Tonight we move into a third passion, knowing that we have behind us all authority.

The one who is all authority in heaven and in earth.

Jesus sends us to live our life for what he gave his life for He said he came to seek and save the lost.

It's the rescuing of the lost.

That is the greatest cause on the planet.

We know that.

Because that's what Jesus gave his life for.

There is no greater cause.

So we're talking about being driven by the passion that defined his life. and defined the lives of the first believers who changed their world.

Passion number three in this kingdom is living missionally that our lives revolve around, exist for, this greatest cause in the world, they are lived missionally Now, this is gonna be exciting, I think.

What you do, what that means is this.

What you do with the rest of your life, what you do with your days, What you do with your resources is governed.

You make your decisions based on three eternity-focused Priorities.

We're going to talk about those.

Remember because it's the kingdom of heaven, and heaven is forever then everything we do and our choices and our our lives are against the backdrop of eternity.

This isn't all there is.

With that in mind Let's look at these three priorities.

First of all is what I call a focus on last quarter choices I remember Brad's football team that ended up uh going to uh the states and winning state championship.

Um you know they they uh the man the coach just killed them in the in practice in the summer And I mean it was like they would come home walking like Frankenstein, you know, and hurting in places they didn't even have places.

But the coach said, we're going to be the fourth quarter team.

Whoever's got the endurance in the fourth quarter wins.

And they were and they did.

And man when the fourth quarter began, they'd stand up and they'd just yell at each other, the fourth quarter is ours!

And it usually was.

That's what God's people should be saying.

The fourth quarter is ours.

Are we in the fourth quarter?

I don't know.

I'm not one of the people who names a date for the second coming of Jesus because he said not to.

I'm not like the guy in California who just, he's extremely frustrated.

He's a prophetic guy, but his sixth Antichrist just died on him.

So he's already had six figured out, and so he's frustrated.

But I do know this.

The return of Jesus has never been closer than it is now.

It may well be that the world has never looked more like the world he said to come back to than it looks now.

So let's talk about what Jesus said, recorded by Matthew, about the last quarter.

Because this has been a centuries-old clash of kingdoms.

It's not new But as it moves toward its climax, both sides, the armies of light and the armies of darkness, step it up I just said this to somebody the other day, and I don't know if you get this feeling, but it seems like, at least in my lifetime, That this is the first time I have seen the enemy playing all his cards.

He's been holding some aces.

But it's like he's got all his cards on the table.

It's like this is time to go for it.

Like never before.

Of course, Revelation 12 tells us this about him.

It says, woe to you, O earth, for the devil has gone down to you.

And he is full of fury.

Because he knows his time is short.

So looking at what Jesus said about the fourth quarter, let's go to Matthew 24 And here in one of the uh, I think it's five discourses in the book of Matthew, Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives.

This is called the Olivet Discourse.

The disciples came to him privately.

And he had just said, this temple you see here, which was the glory of the Jewish leaders, he said, well, there's going to come a time there won't be one stone left on the other.

That did happen.

They said, tell us when this will happen.

What will be the sign of your coming in the end of the age?

Jesus answered, Well, watch out that no one deceives you, for many will come in my name Claiming I am the Messiah and will deceive many.

You will hear of wars, you'll hear rumors of wars.

Now this is an interesting thing.

He says, but see to it that you're not alarmed.

Well, now why would that be?

Because it is his authority that decides outcomes.

So don't sweat that.

That's good news for you who watch the news, which I do.

But the end is still to come Nation will rise against nation.

Kingdom will rise against kingdom.

There'll be famines.

There'll be earthquakes in various places.

All these are the beginning of birth pains.

Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death and you'll be hated by all nations because of me.

At that time, many will turn away from the faith.

And will , by the way, I think the word there is scandalizzo in the Greek, which is the word we get scandal from.

Many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other.

And many false prophets will appear and deceive many people.

Because, here's the heart and soul of what he had to say, because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most, that's us, it's believers.

Well fire they get fired up.

Now they'll go cold.

But the one who stands firm to the end will be saved We're gonna come and uh look at the other part of that, but I'm gonna save it because it's really good news.

But um Here is how the enemy is going to step up his evil efforts here.

See if any of this sounds familiar.

First, taking Christ's kingdom warriors out of the battle, taking some down with him.

Many will turn away from the faith.

And when we tray and hate each other, let me just say, if you've been keeping up on the Christian headlines, it's happening.

More and more young men and women identifying themselves as what they call exangelicals.

I used to be.

Not no more And some of the most prominent Christian leaders.

I've gone.

He said he will take out warriors from Christ's kingdom, and many will turn away, which shrinks the number of people who will carry out the king's final orders.

To go and make disciples of all nations, just as the game is heating up.

Secondly, he will unleash, I've it's not a word, a tsunami He will unleash a synami on the planet.

Those words increase of wickedness in the Greek.

They mean multiplied lawlessness.

Hasn't there always been evil?

There's always been plenty of sin in the world.

What this is saying is it's going to rapidly multiply Lawlessness, in other words, there are no boundaries.

All boundaries are gone.

Annomi in the Greek, no law.

Sound familiar?

Sounds like the evening news.

So he will release this this tsunami, this tsunami on the planet.

And you would expect, well, this is gonna, Christians are gonna wake up and they're gonna go, well, we we we've got we've got to be as strong as the other side.

No.

No, no, no, no.

They go to sleep.

They're AWOL.

And the chill wind that blows will turn their hearts cold.

There are when I get to Belvedere, Illinois after living in Chicago, we moved there when I was in sixth grade.

As soon as we got there, I said, what is that stink here?

And everybody else went, what's think?

Well, there's a green giant plant there.

They said, oh, you must be smelling the rotting pea vines.

I don't think I even knew there were pea vines.

I certainly didn't know they rotted, but I did now.

The funny thing is it was a horrible smell.

It was all over town.

They didn't smell it anymore.

They were so used to the stink.

There's some towns in this country that have a paper mill.

You ever been out of a paper mill?

Savannah, Georgia, Pine Bluff, Arkansas Please.

But you say, hey, what is that smell?

What smell?

You just get so used to the stink.

God's people are going to get so used to the stink because sin is going to seem so pervasive.

And so normal that they are dulled to it.

And their love for Jesus drifts into a cold heart, a heart that once was warm is now cold.

And they are in essence neutralized as a force for Christ.

At the time they're needed most.

We had had one of those weeks where they could put the weather forecast on tape And not the weatherman, didn't you have to get on again?

Every day it was rain, rain, rain, rain, rain, rain, rain.

You know, you have those.

And it had been just like heavy rain every day.

Everything we were it was just soaked.

I was driving home from the office, I passed an insurance company, I saw the weirdest thing.

All the sprinklers were on I was like, this is so stupid.

I mean, you couldn't saturate the saturated anymore.

I wonder if that's part of how they grow cold.

Saturated with God's teaching, saturated with Christian everything.

We still got the sprinklers on. saturated because they're not giving any of it away.

Well anyway, you can see here that the fourth quarter, the enemy is trying to take out the influence of God's people.

So I put it this way, it's a time of accelerated availability of sin in all of its forms.

It's a time of accelerated availability of sin.

Do you know what was missing in Jesus' day when he said this?

You know what's been missing for 2,000 years?

Technology.

Now you can have any sin, anytime, anywhere in the world.

But you can also have gospel anytime, anywhere in the world.

The battle is on.

But simultaneously with this explosion of garbage will be the greatest explosion of gospel In the history of the planet.

Garbage all over the planet, gospel all over the planet.

Look at the verse I didn't get to.

And it says, And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world. as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.

Do you realize what this means?

When you have this group over here who are the cold and a group over here who are the bold, Who are saying, well, wait a minute, this is not a time to go to sleep.

This is not a time to get complacent.

This is not a time to sit on the ball.

This is not a time to go get a hot dog.

This is not a time to leave the stadium.

This is a time to get in the game.

And the gospel explosion will come from those who are not most of God's people.

Most of them grow cold.

But there will be some who choose to say, I know what time it is, and I'm going to be all about getting the good news to as many people as I can help it get to.

So it forces the people of the kingdom of heaven to choose sides.

By the way, you don't have to choose being the cold.

All you have to do is go with the flow.

If you just keep going to church and occupying your pew and giving your offering and believing what you believe, if you are passive.

You'll just drift into the cold.

You have to choose bold.

You don't have to choose cold And to say, listen, I am going to be aggressive, active, intentional. about representing my Jesus as I've ever been in my lifetime.

I'm stepping it up.

You can focus on one of two things.

You can focus on the exploding wickedness and coldness and complacency, or you can focus on the opportunities we have. to get the good news of Jesus to more people than ever before.

Which you choose your focus.

It's one or the other.

Um you can um anchor your heart to the mess or to the mission.

You can think about all the ground that's being taken or all the ground we can gain.

You choose.

We were in um, I told you a little bit about this uh same reservation when I told about Weston this morning.

We were in Maine with the On Eagles Wings team and it was strange because there's a lot of harbor towns there that have lighthouses, but this one's not on the ocean.

I didn't see ocean.

But after it got dark, right across from the parking lot where the team was presenting Christ.

There was like a lighthouse light went on.

I'm like, excuse me, there's no water here.

I do not see any ships.

Why do we have a lighthouse?

It wasn't a whole actual lighthouse, but there was this very bright revolving light over there, and I thought, this is weird.

So afterwards I asked a local And probably sounded like a tourist. , And I said, what's with the light?

There's there's no no do you have a reason for what?

He said, you bet we do.

He said, this is the deep woods.

And he said, it goes for miles and miles and miles.

That light goes 50 miles.

He said, people all the time are going out in the woods and getting lost.

He said, people died there because they can't find their way back.

So we have this light here on all night so they can find their way to safety, find their way home, and find their way back to life.

And I thought, what a picture of what Jesus said we are.

Just make sure your light's always on.

Make sure it's bright.

Because there's a lot of people lost in the deep woods.

And for them, hope looks like the person you look at in the mirror every day.

You are for them the face of hope.

So that's the fourth quarter.

I have good news for you.

Sin will advance, but sin will not win.

Jesus will win.

For all authority in heaven and earth belongs to him.

Look at 14.

And this gospel of the kingdom.

Will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.

Later in the chapter, he describes that end In um verses 29 to 31.

Immediately after the distress of those days, the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, the stars will fall from the sky, it looks like everything is falling apart, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.

Then, do I hear trumpets?

Then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven, and then all the peoples of the earth will mourn when they see The Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

I'll tell you, when I see some of those billowing clouds in the eastern sky some days.

I just say that's second coming clouds, man.

That's second coming clouds.

One of these days, I'm going to be seeing more than clouds.

He's coming.

So that is the ultimate outcome from him who has all authority in heaven and earth.

So the loyal soldiers of the rightful king.

When they have fourth quarter priorities, are sold out for his final orders to go and tell everybody about him.

How are you doing on that?

It's the second priority.

Doug was eight years old, I think, and we went shopping at the grocery store.

He had just gotten his allowance.

I've just gotten mine.

Karen was very generous And uh we uh uh and when I and I hear him jiggling his change in his pocket.

I said, where are you going?

He said down this aisle.

It was the is there any place other than America in the world where you have entire aisles of junk food?

I don't know, but I mean the yo -hos and the dodles and the hoodles and the d whatever the all the things are.

I mean, I can't believe it.

And Doug's headed that way.

I'm like, he ain't gonna leave here with any money.

I didn't leave.

So I got my groceries.

I'm checking out.

I'm waiting for him to check out.

I said, what'd you get, Doug?

He said, nothing.

Nothing?

Really?

I underestimated them.

I said, why didn't you buy something?

He said, oh Dad, he said, I just I just decided it's best if you spend on something that lasts.

Yeah.

Which is the second priority?

To spend what you've got on something that lasts.

I call it A focus on lasting investment.

Look at these beautiful pictures from Matthew.

Matthew chapter 2, verse 11.

Notice these things of, there's something in common between these two incidents.

On coming to the house, these are the magi, the wise men, whatever you call them.

They saw the child with his mother Mary and they bowed down and worshipped him.

And then they opened their treasures You know, wouldn't it be cool if you could put your name in this verse?

Ron opened his treasures. and presented him with gifts.

I don't have any gold, frankincense, or myrrh, but I get gifts.

Now let's go ahead to the other incident.

While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of Simon the leper I'd love this story.

A woman came to him with an alabaster jar, a very expensive perfume.

We think probably this is her savings account.

This is apparently hugely, hugely valuable. which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table.

Aware of this, Jesus said to them, Why are you bothering the woman?

Judas started a revolt.

Of course, why?

Because he was a thief.

He was the treasurer.

He wondered why he didn't get some deal out of this deal.

She has done, look what he calls it.

He said, when she opened her greatest treasure to me, it's a beautiful thing.

He'll have the same reaction when you do.

It's a beautiful thing.

And in fact, he says, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world.

What she has done will also be told in memory of her.

Extravagant sacrifice.

Because she knew where the ROI was So let's talk about a focus on lasting investment.

Matthew 6, verse 19.

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth. where moths and vermin destroy and where thieves break in and steal.

But No, no.

See, we make our decisions because it's the kingdom of heaven.

Heaven is eternity.

We make it against the backdrop of eternity.

We do what's good for eternity.

So we store up for ourselves treasures in heaven where moths and vermin do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal.

For where your treasure is, where your heart is.

So let me give you the equation You subtract from your treasure here to have it there Or you subtract from your treasure there to have it here.

Those are the two choices we're presented with.

Do I subtract from there, take keep it here, or do I put it there?

And sacrifice it here.

That's the equation.

So here's some good questions to ask What has the king entrusted to me?

Have you thought about that?

Financially?

Talent-wise, influence.

Who do you have influence on?

He's trusted you with influence.

Trusted you with relationships.

It's Matthew who records the parable of the talents and the master coming back and Saying what'd you do with what I gave you?

He'll ask you that.

He'll ask me that.

I trusted this to you.

What'd you do with it?

Oh, and here's a very important question.

Is what I'm doing with what I've entrusted with going to matter in heaven?

Will it really matter in heaven?

Because the question he will ask is, what did you do with what I entrusted to you?

Matthew 25, 21 says, his master replied, the one who was trusted with five and gained five more, well done, good and faithful servant.

You have been faithful with a few things.

I will put you in charge of many things.

Come and share your master's happiness.

You know what I love about this?

There are commensurate rewards.

There are proportionate rewards.

And then there's wildly disproportionate rewards.

You get wildly disproportionate rewards for a little sacrifice here.

He says, you're gonna you make a few sacrifices.

You'll be ruler over many things.

I love the disproportionate nature.

And what Jesus gives in exchange for our relatively small gifts.

It's the ultimate ROI is well done.

I think.

I've thought even more recently since studying this again, when I get to the finish line And I'm still carrying a lot of my stuff.

I just don't want to hear Jesus say, Ron, what are you doing with all that?

Do you know what I could have done with it?

What are you doing with all that at the finish line?

It's time to be thinking eternity, making the kingdom of having an investment, so we have it there, even if we don't have it here for a little while Here's the last one of the priorities.

A focus on lost souls These are all eternal issues, a lasting investment, fourth quarter, offense, and then a focus on lost souls.

Which begins when you see what Jesus sees, when he looks at people.

Folks, I was really Very moved.

I've read this passage.

I've spoken on it.

But when I looked at it in the Greek this time and saw what Jesus really was saying, It was pretty heavy.

Let me share it with you.

You'll know the passage.

Matthew 9, 35 and 36.

Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, healing every disease and sickness.

And when he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them.

First of all, if you look that one up, that's a hard time hard even translating that compassion word.

It basically means way down deep in his guts, Jesus was stirred and moved beyond words in the deepest parts of his soul.

When he saw the crowds, why?

Other people saw the crowds.

Didn't do that to them.

Because here's what he saw.

They were harassed and helpless.

Like sheep without a shepherd.

Well, harassed and helpless, that's sad.

Until you find out what the Greek words are You know what the harassed word really means?

Skinned alive.

Skin alive.

He said, I see them.

Like being skinned alive.

And you know what helpless means?

Thrown away.

Skinned alive and thrown.

That's what I see You may see their political affiliation.

You may see their gender.

You may see their race.

I see skinned alive and thrown away.

They are like sheep without a shepherd.

I talked to a Navajo Shepherdess Who's 80 years old, dear Elizabeth?

Her face looked like leather.

She's been out there since she was a little girl tending sheep I said, Elizabeth, can I ask you a question?

What happens to sheep without a shepherd or when they get away from the shepherd?

And her eyes narrowed, and in typical native fashion, she gave a very short but revealing answer.

She said.

Coyotes.

And they are torn apart, skinned alive, and thrown away Jesus sees doomed sheep because they are shepherdless.

It could not be more vivid.

It could not be more heart-rending.

That's what he sees.

Look at your next-door neighbor.

That's what he sees.

Look at your coworkers.

That's what he sees.

Look at the people at your club you hunt with, golf with, fish with, whatever you do.

What does he see in the people at the gym?

The school.

Doomed sheep.

Oh, you have the shepherd.

You know the shepherd.

They don't even know there is a shepherd.

So you see what Jesus sees and you that's where you start to care about lost souls.

Secondly, you grieve what Jesus grieves Matthew 9, 37, he said, the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.

Oh, what do I know about harvest?

I grew up on the south side of Chicago.

We harvested cockroaches in our apartment.

But I know a lot of farmers now, and I've got a little word association with them.

I've said when I say the word harvest, what do you think of?

Most of the time I get the same answer.

First thing they say is, ready.

Harvest is ready.

Jesus is saying this.

Yes, I see.

Lost sheep.

Ready to be torn apart and thrown away.

But he said, I've got a lot of them ready for me The harvest, they're ready.

They don't know they're ready, but when they hear what Jesus really liked, they'll say that's what I'm ready for.

My problem isn't with the lost people, it's with my people.

Because I can't get anybody to go get them.

Any farmer knows that when it's harvest time, there's nothing else that matters.

You drop everything.

You work as long as there's light and and now with tractors with lights and all kinds of everything, you work you work past that point.

You call in extra help.

It's all hands on deck.

Nothing matters.

Nothing matters because it's not ready for long.

It will die ready.

If you don't get to it in time.

So the spiritually doomed in many cases are ready, but they'll die ready.

Would you think of somebody you know who you think if this was their last day?

Their eternal destination would not be heaven, as far as you know.

You got anybody you know like that?

Oh sure you do.

Got a name We need to put names in this verse.

These verses.

And when he sees Brian When he sees Louise, when he sees Susan, and he sees Bill, and he sees Bob He sees sheep without a shepherd, torn apart and thrown away.

They don't have a shepherd.

But I'm I'm getting them ready for me I just need somebody to go in for the harvest.

You grieve what Jesus grieves and feeling what Jesus feels.

We were on a reservation in Minnesota that they call a closed reservation.

It's a tough place.

The people there are fiercely committed to the traditional religion of that tribe and even other reservations that are of the same tribe.

That is their spiritual center.

And one of our young ladies who had come to Christ through the team three years prior at one of our events was ready to give her a hope story that night and And she's given her whole story a couple times before, but she came to me, she said, Ron, I'm really scared tonight.

It was a pretty intimidating place She would really pray for me, and of course I did.

She was up a few minutes later, and I didn't see her in between, and she went out there, and I was praying up a storm I've never seen her so bold.

Not a sign of the of the nervousness.

It was so, and you could have heard a pin drop there.

And there was a wonderful coming to Christ of people there that night.

I think she was a big part of it because her hope story was right before the gospel wrap-up.

It was powerful And when she came back out, I said, what in the world happened?

She said, Ron, I remembered a prayer you taught us.

And I just prayed it.

Lord, let my heart be broken for what breaks yours.

And she said, when I went out there, I saw their eyes.

And my heart broke and I didn't care what they thought of me.

Pray that prayer, because that's we said You see what Jesus sees.

You grieve what he grieves, but you feel what Jesus feels.

Let my heart be broken, Lord, for what breaks yours.

Mike is a bivocational pastor or was at the time.

I admitted I admire those people because they're supposedly part-time pastors.

That's an oxymoron.

What's a part-time pastor?

And yet they work another job.

So he really is cramming on Saturday for his sermon.

And he tells his little six-year-old daughter, honey, don't bother daddy.

I'm working on my sermon.

And she kind of wandered in while he was working on it, didn't say anything.

She just went over and, you know, ever see these big prophecy charts?

that have everything figured out who's going up and down and when they're going and what's happening and who, you know, it's very elaborate prophecy chart.

You guys are aware that I have solved the rapture controversy of pre-trib, mid-trib, and post-trib because I think people are going to be raptured when they thought they were.

Which means everybody can be right.

Now be but some might wish they had a different view.

But anyway, so anyway, she she's looking at this big prophecy chart.

And she can't contain herself.

Because it ends with the resurrection of the uh resurrection to life and to death.

And she says, Daddy, I'm sorry, but can't you see them?

He said, honey, what can't I see what?

Can't you see all those people going to hell, Daddy?

And he said, in that moment, coming from a six-year-old girl, he said to himself, I hadn't seen him for a long time.

Lost to become a theological concept to me.

He said, but from that day on I've been seeing them again Make sure you never lose sight of them.

And the lostness that breaks the heart of your Savior.

So, Jesus' next move, right after all of that takes place, we'll go to chapter 10, which follows chapter 9 appropriately.

These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions.

What does he do?

His first action, after saying, pray the Lord of the harvest, that he'll send out labors, he sends.

So out of his compassion, he sends and he says, who to go to?

The lost sheep of Israel.

Those doomed sheep before the coyotes get them Well, he's doing the same with you.

His job is he's already sent you by your positioning, your situation, whether you're in the hospital, the nursing home, a neighborhood, your home.

You're in school, you're on the job, you have a flat tire, you need somebody to come and fix the air conditioning.

What?

The heat?

Whatever?

He's he's sending he's putting you in a situation because your situation is your assignment.

Somebody needs to see Jesus what somebody with Jesus in them looks like and sounds like.

Now you remember from this morning That it's like first grade.

Show and what?

Yeah, yeah.

Now what did you have to do to uh to succeed at that?

Two things.

You had to what Am I moving too fast for somebody here?

Show and tell.

That's right.

So if I come in and say I have a gerbil at home named Rodney.

And I describe him, the teacher goes, Ron, you can't just tell about it.

You have to show it.

So the next day I come in with Rodney.

I just stand there and go She's like, Ryan, you cannot just show it.

You have to tell it.

That's right.

When Jesus said, they will see your good deeds show.

And glorify your Father in heaven, tell.

So it has to be, this is assuming that they've had a chance to see a credible representation of Jesus in your life now.

When you're sent, you ready for some fast stuff here?

Here's what it means.

Think going, not them coming.

Over and over in the book of Matthew, the word go, go, go.

Matthew 10, 7, as you go, go.

You don't wait for , we're not going to have a meeting and ask them to come We're going to go to their meeting.

Proclaim this message.

The kingdom of heaven has come near.

In that case, yeah, it's coming near through you.

2819.

This actually, here we go again.

Therefore go and make disciples.

In the Greek, that is having gone.

It assumes you're going.

Yeah, it sounds you're already in motion.

You have to go to them as Jesus left heaven to go to us.

Because you are his embedded reporter Did you know that?

Wherever you are, you are Jesus' embedded reporter.

You are to be the source of the good news of the kingdom of heaven to them.

So think going, not them coming.

Secondly, think world.

What did Jesus say in Matthew 24, 14?

This gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world.

Not just our little bubble where we are.

This is think world.

What did he say in Matthew 28, 19?

Go and make disciples of your neighbors.

Well, they would be included, but he says all ethnoi.

That's ethnic groups.

That's all, that's not national boundaries.

That's all people groups.

Go and make disciples of all people groups.

Eight billion people on this planet.

When Jesus gave the Great Commission, there were an estimated 300 million.

Today there are 8 billion.

If it was the Great Commission then, it's a humongous commission now.

Not now.

Think world.

Don't just think, you know, the goldfish bowl.

We had a parrot.

That's a dangerous pet to have.

You have no secrets.

But we had a parrot named Pierre.

And um since I was the first one up in the morning, I was supposed to lift the little thing off its cage.

He'd be happy.

And I did, and I would always, we had him in the kitchen.

And um, so, you know, and he'd be he would look around the kitchen all day and It was a while before I really realized I always was keeping the backside of the cage covered.

I never took it all the way off.

I just kind of did the lazy thing and threw it up like this.

Well that was the yard out there.

So I said I'm gonna take a I'm he should be able to see everything.

Boy, did Pierre lose Boy did he lose lose interest in the uh kitchen pretty fast.

Could he see this big whole big world out there?

He'd far rather look out the whole yard out there than just the little world that he had a view of.

We gotta get there.

We gotta get the cover off our cage.

And not just be looking at the little space that we know and think world.

And then think tribe.

And I'm gonna talk about Native Americans now.

Think tribe.

I find this fascinating.

Matthew 9 Jesus went from there, saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth.

Follow me, he told him.

And Matthew got up and followed him.

That's great.

Great.

Do you know what the very first thing Matthew did was?

Very first thing he did after he got up and followed Jesus.

While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew's house.

Very next thing.

Dinner at Matt's house.

Many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples , why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinus?

On hearing this, Jesus said, it's not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.

Go and learn what this means.

I desire mercy, not sacrifice.

I'm not come to call the righteous.

I'm here for sinners.

They never did realize that included them.

You know what I love about this?

Matthew's first instinct. was to reach his tribe.

Isn't that awesome?

He gets his tribe together, who is an unlikely bunch for Jesus to hang out with, we would think.

The religious people sure thought that.

And he says, I want them to meet Jesus.

Now Matthew may seem like an unlikely representative of Jesus as just having decided to follow him with the sordid reputation of a tax collector.

But who would tax collectors listen to?

Another That's right.

So he knows.

He's the best one.

Don't call Peter.

Don't call somebody else.

He's the best one to reach tax collectors.

Just like you're the best one to reach people in your tribe.

And I believe God holds you responsible.

For being the face and voice of Jesus to your tribe.

You are his, you may say there got to be somebody better.

You are his chosen ambassador to your tribe.

So think tribe.

They'll listen to you because you're like them.

Jesus sent a Samaritan woman to reach Samaritans.

Matthew reaches publicans and sinners.

That's publicans, not republicans.

And I have to just sneak this in somewhere because I love it.

In Matthew 10, Matthew gives the list of the 12 disciples.

And you list Simon Peter and he may mention who the father was, you know, James and John, sons of Zebedee, and things like that.

But there's a Look, I might be seeing something that nobody else would see, but when he gets to Matthew, when he puts his name in the list, he says, Matthew, the tax collector Do you know what I hear him saying there?

I still can't believe it.

In this list, Matthew.

The hated tags collector is in this list.

I don't think he ever got over that Jesus had called him No extra charge for that.

So just had to put it in there.

Also, think personal.

Think personal.

You know, in uh Matthew 28, we see some of the first hope storytelling He is not here.

He has risen, the angel said, just as he said, come and see the place where he lay Oh, did you notice the invitation followed by the command?

Come and see.

You did that.

Go and tell.

Don't come and see just so you came and saw.

Come and see.

No, then go quickly and tell his disciples.

He has risen from the dead, going ahead of you into Galilee.

There you'll see him.

Now I have told you.

We have in John's Yeah, so the women hurried away from the tomb. afraid and filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples.

When you hear John's account of the resurrection, um He said, by the way, just a funny account, when Matthew says that when Jesus finally, Jesus ends up encountering the women, you know what he says to him?

He has just conquered death.

He has just walked out of his grave.

He goes.

Greetings.

I mean, no big deal.

I just resurrected.

Greetings.

It's like, yo, what's up?

This is crazy, man.

Anyway, I just see these little things and you know my mind goes other places.

But so what what what it says is that Mary Magdalene went and said, I have seen the Lord.

I think that's the first Post-resurrection hope story in the Bible.

And it's only five words.

I have seen the Lord.

So have you.

Where have you seen him in your life?

What's different?

Because Jesus is there.

That would be terribly different if he wasn't there.

That's your hope story.

I know we're living in a time when there's more hostility.

People, a lot of Christians are even saying, I don't even know if we should tell people about Jesus.

It's intolerant and it's not right to judge other people and so on.

Listen, what they can't object to is when you present Jesus in a first person way.

Second person, I'm talking you.

You But I'm talking about me?

Like Brad said.

You can't argue with yours you being a first person and saying, all I can tell you is in a time like that in my life The place I turned was Jesus.

Let me tell you what he's not a religion to me, by the way.

He's a relationship.

And I'll tell you how real he is.

Here's what he did for me.

You know, if you have an opportunity to pray with them, not just for them, you'll be amazed at the reaction I have so often said to somebody, when we're private, not when there's a lot of people around, and say, they've just told me a burden of their life, a crisis, something, a child, a marriage, or a medical, and And I've said, listen, what I do when I'm facing something like that is I go to the most powerful person there is.

I want to do that for you.

And so I'm going to be praying for you.

I'm going to go to God with it.

By the way, would you mind if I Could I start right now?

Is that I mean would that be okay?

I've never heard anybody say no.

And when you take a moment to have your relationship with God in front of them , Somebody who has probably never heard their name in a prayer.

Things we take for granted, they've never heard their name in a prayer.

Sometimes when I open my eyes, there's tears in theirs.

Because they've never felt God so close. as when one of his kingdom kids prayed for them by name.

So think personal Do this in a very first person way.

So you share.

Let's move on to the next one because it kind of goes with it, and that is think story.

You heard about this tonight.

How his story changed your story and could change their story forever.

Your story is just the difference Jesus makes.

They don't care about the religious meetings you go to.

They're not particularly interested in your beliefs.

But what they will care about is how an angry man was changed.

How self-centered person became somebody who was all about other people.

How a control freak isn't doing that anymore.

They'll be interested in how someone who was trapped in an addictive behavior is trapped no more.

They'll be interested in in um um How being at that cemetery or that casket was different for you with Jesus They'll be interested in what does Jesus do when you've gotten bad news from the doctor?

You went in for a routine appointment and you came out with almost feels like a death sentence to you Oh, they'll be interested in that Jesus.

And then you weave his story, the gospel.

Not like a sales pitch to them, but you talk about how what happened on that cross and that empty tomb Change your story.

You are living proof of the difference Jesus can make in real stuff Tell it and get started.

Do it.

Nike, Nike.

Just do it.

No worse feeling than being at the funeral of somebody you should have told.

And looking at that casket and going, it's too late.

Do it now.

And then last of all, think cross.

Think cross.

Nearly one-third of the book of Matthew is devoted to the last week of Jesus and the march to the cross.

Listen to this.

This just came out from Varna.

Nearly 70% of born-again Christians say other religions can lead to heaven. 70% of our game.

John 14, 6, Jesus makes the most audacious claim any human being ever made.

I am the way.

I am the truth.

I am the life.

No one, no one, Protestant, Catholic, Jewish, Moslem, Hindu, Buddhist, New Age.

No one comes to the Father.

Except through me.

Um there can't be any other way Um I saw in the news uh a about a surgeon in New York City who donates his time once a month, uh once a year.

He goes to a poor country, third world country, and uh donates his surgical services.

And uh this year he went to Costa Rica And uh while he was there in a kind of a makeshift little tent hospital in uh Outback, basically, he was operating on a little boy And all of a sudden the boy in the surgery developed a desperate need for blood.

Sadly, his blood type is something only 2% of the human race has.

His life's dependent on it.

It looked pretty bad.

The doctor said, excuse me.

And left.

Said, I'll be right back.

Minutes later he came back with his blood.

For he too was in that 2% It was only the blood of one man that could save that life, that boy's life It was only the blood of one man that could save this boy's life.

Because you can't pay a death penalty any other way than somebody dies.

And the wages of sin is death.

Believe me.

If there was anything else that we could do to get to heaven, God would not have had his son on a cross.

There can't be any other way.

For no one else paid for my sin.

And my sin unpaid for means I cannot enter heaven And so our job is to not get into religious controversies This is about taking people by the hand and walking them up Golgotha on Skull Hill to the foot of the cross and in essence saying, my friend, this was for you and me.

This is how much he loves you.

Our sin was that bad.

It took that to pay for it.

And his love is that big that he did it.

Matthew includes details.

Like the five the time Jesus cries out, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Every other time Jesus talks to God, he says, Father, not then.

This one time, it's my God, my God.

For in that moment, the Father is turning his back on his son.

Because he has my sin.

So he would never have to turn his back on me.

That is the overwhelming love.

That is your good news to tell.

Are you telling it?

How can we sit on this when it cost him that much?

Matthew goes on to report that when Jesus died, the veil The curtain in the temple was split from top to bottom.

I mean God did the splitting.

Do you know that um they say that that curtain was sixty feet long, thirty feet wide.

Four inches thick.

And they said that if you put horses on each side, they could not pull it apart But in a moment, the curtain had been the wall between God and man that only one man could enter once a year after total cleansing?

Some of us are old enough to remember when there was a wall in Berlin.

It divided communist East Germany from Free West Germany.

And we remember the amazing scene of people tearing that wall apart.

And a hundred thousand Germans surrounded in Berlin Square And in it in circles just chanted, the wall is gone, the wall is gone, the wall is gone, the wall is gone.

And that day.

And ever since we could say, the wall is gone, the wall is gone.

I could be friends with God.

I could be a son or daughter of God Think cross.

It's the center of everything And it is only that man's blood that can save any life.

As Charles Spurgeon said, the cross is God's magnificent magnet.

I've seen it all over the country and all over the world.

There's a lot of stuff when you go other places you sort out in your messages like that ain't gonna fly.

They're not gonna get that.

That's too American.

But everywhere I've ever been, the cross crosses every culture.

It is the love that melts and captures the heart.

As a little boy.

I remember hearing a song that goes, I will cling to the old rugged cross.

On a hill far away stands an old rugged cross The emblem of suffering and shame.

I didn't know much about Jesus.

My family didn't talk about him.

But to this day I love that cross more than ever.

Take them to the cross.

Don't get bogged down in other things.

Let me just leave you with the startling sight, the day the whole world knows that Jesus is King.

One little detail from the book of Revelation.

He is dressed in a robe, dipped in blood.

It's still there.

And his name is the word of God.

And the armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and dressed in fine linen, white and clean.

Coming out of his mouth is a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations who have assembled from all over the world, saying we will defy his return.

And they're gone in a moment.

He will rule them with an iron scepter.

He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty on his robe.

And you're going to read the bold with me On his robe and on his thigh, he has this name written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

But when he comes as the all-conquering king, and every human knows now that he was and always is, will be the king He still comes in a robe stained with blood.

And what will they sing in heaven and what are they singing today?

What is my Karen singing today?

Worthy is the Lamb. that was slain because the people who are around him all day every day can never get over the cross Let's not us ever get over it.

I leave you with a bottom line kingdom question.

As you start chapter 1 of volume 2, after the great interruption of the past year or so.

And the question should be the one that I think we helps us set our priorities and choose our causes.

Will it matter in heaven?

That is the kingdom of heaven question What I'm doing, what I'm fighting for, what I'm investing in , what my days are all about.

Will it matter?

In heaven.

Let's pray.

Lord um You lived every minute here missionally.

Your early followers Never got distracted by lesser causes.

They lived missionally Lord, would you help us to refocus ourselves on what will matter in heaven?

And what will matter most to you, Jesus, I think, is who's there that you died for.

And the responsibility of helping him know how to get there, you've left in our trembling hands May we be more all in.

Fourth quarter priorities.

With eternity investments, and with a deep heart for lost souls May we be all in at a level we've never been all in before?

It's time.

To seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.

By your grace we will In Jesus' name, King of all kings, Lord of all Lords.