How the Resurrection Defines the Mission of the Church

This podcast is the Ministry of Grand Parkway Baptist Church.

For more information on our church, please visit Grandparkway.org.

Amen.

You can have a scene.

If you've got a Bible, I'd invite you to take it and open up to Matthew chapter 28.

Matthew 28 · chapter mention

And I want to begin this morning with a confession.

You ever wake up and have those days where nothing in your closet feels right?

You don't even feel like putting on clothes, much less leaving the house.

Anybody have those days?

Hello?

Today was that way for me.

I was just kind of like, you don't care.

I'm not dressing up.

I'm just going to put on whatever.

So I picked these pants up off the floor.

They smelled clean, and so I put them on.

And I wasn't going to tuck my shirt in, but I saw some religious person in the hall said, Hey, Pastor, you're going to tuck your shirt in?

Like God cares.

But anyway, I gave in to the religious pressure and tucked my shirt in.

So and my other confession is I just, I'm I'm thinking of a line from a Tim McGraw song.

He says, I got a life that most would love to have, but some days I just wake up fighting mad.

That was me also this morning.

I just woke up surly.

I just woke up kind of like, what in the world?

Man, God, the world is screwed up.

What's wrong with people?

Then I turned on TV and I flipped across a couple of preachers, and then I just wanted to just, I wanted to shoot my TV like Elvis used to do.

And so I just say that to be honest.

If today's your first day at church, relax.

Most days I'm real composed.

And I wear a coat and a tie and I prowl around like a panther on steroids.

No, we're in a series called Raise, Living the Reality of the Resurrection.

And today I just want to say that the last couple of weeks, and by the way, I love this church because some of y'all can't help but just just just saying what you think, even if you don't need to be thinking it like last week, someone came up to me and said, That was kind of technical.

That wasn't very funny today.

It's kind of like being a figure skater in the Olympics.

I give a 5-5 from the East German judge.

You didn't nail the dismount.

Oh, okay, okay.

But it all kind of builds on today because today I want to talk to you about how the resurrection kind of dictates and determines the mission of the church.

How the resurrection dictates and determines the mission of the church.

Matthew chapter 28, verse 16, the Bible says this.

Matthew 28:16

It says, Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee.

I think I told you all, but I didn't tell the last service that Jesus tells them to go to Galilee.

He tells Mary, hey, tell the disciples to meet me at Galilee, because what would Galilee of the nations back in Isaiah chapter 9 used to be a place that people would invade.

Isaiah 9 · chapter mention

They'd come right to Galilee.

And Jesus says, You want to see an invasion?

I'm going to launch an invasion with the gospel from Galilee.

So the eleven disciples went to Galilee to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them.

And when they saw him, they worshiped him.

But some doubted.

And Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth have been given to me.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you.

And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.

Now, here's my fear.

This is often referred to in church as the Great Commission or different things like that.

And here's my fear that some of us, some of you today, this may be the first time or the second time you've ever heard that, and you're kind of like, uh, okay.

And some of you have heard it so much that it it's you, if you're not careful, you just clicked into autopilot.

Okay, I kind of know what's coming, and I want to say, I don't think you do.

I I I don't I don't think you do because I feel compressed.

My wife's been telling me all week, I just wish Sunday would get here so you could get this out of you and give birth to this.

Uh, because we're going to Austin after church today just for a one-night getaway, because I need a break from my kids.

That's why.

Okay?

Uh and she said, I just and so I just want to talk this morning about the mission, the means, and the promise.

How the resurrection defines and kind of determines the mission of the church.

And number one, the mission.

And by mission, this is what I mean: it's what we do, what we do.

We make disciples.

Look at verse 16.

He says, now the eleven disciples went to Galilee to the mountain where Jesus had directed them.

And look at this next sentence, verse 17.

And when they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted.

There's this, in this group of disciples, it says that they worshiped him, but some doubted.

Let me just say this.

I think it's kind of in vogue these days to doubt the Christianity.

And I don't mean by unbelievers.

I mean people that come to church.

You you've lit, you've you've been in it so long, and you're so disillusioned by your inconsistency.

Really, the only thing you can do is kind of doubt, because if all this is really real, how do you explain your life?

And so let me just say this.

There comes a point.

Now just keep in mind, disciples have watched Jesus.

He's kind of told them the Son of Man must go to Jerusalem and must suffer at the hands of sinful men.

He's going to be crucified and buried, and he'll rise again on the third day.

This is not like rocket science.

They didn't believe it.

But now he did exactly all that.

He's killed on a cross.

They buried him in a tomb.

Peter says, I'm going back fishing, and then all of a sudden Jesus rises from the dead.

The angels at the tomb say to Mary, Hey, well, I know why you're here.

You seek Jesus.

He's not here.

He's risen.

Why do you seek the living among the dead?

They go back and tell the disciples.

They show up in Galilee, and then some of them have the audacity to doubt.

Are you kidding me?

I mean, all week long I've just been walking through Psalms.

I was walking through Psalms earlier this week, just mumbling to myself, where do you get off doubting?

Wise person told me this a long time ago.

When you walk into a room, figure out who the most spiritual, the godliest person in the room is, and let them do the talking.

That's what happens here in the Great Commission.

Now, if somebody's been raised from the dead, now if I saw somebody, if I walked with somebody for three years and I saw them die on a cross and they took his lifeless body off and they laid it in a tomb, and then three days later I see him, or five days later, how long it's been now, I see him talking.

What room do I have to doubt?

Who do I think?

See, at some point your doubt is no longer a statement about the resurrected Jesus, it's a statement about the insufficient you.

That's not even in the sermon, but anyway.

I just, it just it kind of concerns me that it's kind of sexy to kind of doubt and say, Well, I don't know about that.

I mean, I just don't know.

I mean, Jesus, good.

I mean, are you kidding me?

This is post-resurrection.

I've done something no one else has ever done.

Therefore, I got the conch.

I'm gonna get to talk now, Jesus says.

And so, because of that, it puts great emphasis on his words with the mission.

What do we do?

He says, Hey, look, look, look at it again.

He says in verse 18, and Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.

That's the mission of the church right there.

It's just two little words.

Actually, people say there's four verbs here.

There's really one main verb and three participles.

The one main verb is make disciples.

It's what we do, it's why we turn the lights on.

When I used to travel, and occasionally I'll go travel, uh, and and and churches would say, Hey, would you kind of, you've been here for three or four days, five days, would you kind of sit down with our staff and ask us questions and help us think about why we do what we do?

And the one question I would ask them all the time is, Why do you turn the lights on?

And they would always say, 'cause it's dark.

I'm like, thank you.

You must be the youth pastor.

I'm glad you're here.

Now shut your cake and just sit here.

And I would ask them, no, seriously, why do you turn the lights on?

And they're like, What do you mean?

Why do you unlock the doors?

Why do you turn the air on?

Why do you play music?

Why do you have why do you do what you do?

And they would come up with outlandish things because we want to be a dynamic regional fellowship, one guy told me.

What?

I don't see that in the Bible anywhere.

Why do you do what eventually if you just keep asking the same question that no one knows the answer to, they get frustrated enough to be honest?

Let me say that again.

If you just keep asking the question that no one knows the answer to.

And so I would sit there in the meetings for 15 minutes drinking my coffee and go, why do you turn the lights on?

Pastor, why do you turn the lights on?

Associate pastor, why do you turn the lights on?

Youth pastor, missions pastor, children's pastor, why do you turn the lights on?

And finally, somebody would blur out, we don't know.

You tell us, why do we turn the lights on?

And then you got them.

You turn the lights on.

We do what we do.

Why do we hold the door open?

Because some of you, see, it's been sexy to be on the 15, the first impression team, the people you see outside.

It's sexy during the fall and the spring to be outside in Houston.

But in about a month, when it's 108 degrees, David Ryder, and you got to have sunglasses and you got to bring three shirts because you're melting out there like the wicked witch in the wizard of Oz.

What a world!

What a world.

And Lance meets with you all on Sunday mornings and says, Hey, let's pray.

What you do matters if it matters so much, why don't you come out here and do it?

Why do you do that?

One reason to make disciples.

See, without the mission, what you do has no context for doing it.

You do it as long as it feels good, then you just quit.

The mission of the church is to make disciples.

We do what we do to develop, fully developed, to produce fully orbed, fully matured, consequential men and women and students who walk with God in whatever context they find themselves in.

That's why we stand outside and say, Good morning, welcome to Grand Parkway.

That's why we rock babies over here.

That's why we have students back there.

That's why we back here behind me, we invest in the lives of first, second, third, and fourth graders who are unruly many a Sunday.

Some of y'all need to start whipping your kids at home before you bring them down here.

It's not gonna be good.

We've got to whip your kids and send them home.

We wouldn't whip your kids.

Now we would fantasize about whipping some of your kids, but we wouldn't put a hand on your children.

We can tell you those of you who do and those of you who don't.

But that's a whole nother sermon.

I told you my wife's like, Can Sunday just get here?

You are about to wear me out, young man.

We do what we do to make disciples.

Now, why am I saying this?

Because there's two things that we got to be clear about, two things that have blurred the simple mission that needs to be spoken to.

You see, that's how hard is that?

What makes it hard is that we make things that are not the mission, the mission.

Like number one, see, meeting needs is not the mission of the church.

Uh people come to me all the time and say, Well, what is your church gonna do about so-and-so?

So-and-so, this is going on, that's going on.

And oh, right over here is four corners.

Why aren't we doing something about four corners?

We're doing things about four corners, but let me just say this unapologetically.

We did not create the needs in four corners, and we're not responsible for all the needs in four corners.

Because here's the thing.

You can stay with me because it's real sexy right now to have social justice, and and we're gonna, and I got friends that write books called For the City.

If you do what you do for the city, you have missed the mission of the church.

Now, I'm not saying we shouldn't do meet needs in Jesus' name.

Give a cup of cold water in Jesus' name.

But here's the thing: if you're not careful, the church becomes the errand boy for the world, and all we do is come and reorganize their clothes pantry and their food closet and all that stuff.

And that's all they want.

You can meet all the needs.

Hear this church, you and I can meet all the needs in the world and fail to meet their greatest need because we don't preach the gospel.

And the church has kind of diluted the gospel and said, Hey, well, let's go meet their needs, and then maybe they'll ask us why we're here meeting their need, and then we'll get to tell them that.

No, they won't.

They'll say, Thank you.

Come back next year.

And the church needs to be clear and say, wait a minute, this we don't get to promulgate the gospel, we don't get to promote Jesus, we don't get to hold up King Jesus and the sufficiency of God and say, we're here because we used to be damningly self-centered people who loved money inordinately, and now we took a week of our vacation to come over here and not only meet your needs, but to tell you about Jesus.

Because if all we do is meet your needs, you'll be back in the same place a year from now.

Meeting needs is not the mission.

Secondly, your biggest passion is not the mission.

You say, Well, what do you mean?

See, whatever we're most passionate about becomes our gospel.

Let me say that again.

Whatever we're most passionate about becomes our gospel.

Homeschooling becomes your gospel.

Cloth diapers, it becomes your gospel.

Having your baby at home becomes your gospel.

Nursing your kids till they're nine becomes your gospel.

Facebook becomes your gospel, private school becomes your gospel, fishing, golf, reform theology becomes your gospel, social gospel, social justice becomes your gospel, human trafficking becomes your gospel, politics becomes your gospel.

All good things.

All good things.

I'm a very tolerant person.

If you're visiting today, you go, I don't think so.

Yeah, yeah.

No, I am.

I am.

We have friends that they choose, they chose to nurse their kids until they were like in first grade or something.

It was like unreal.

And the ladies just we'll go to dinner, and she's just going on and on and on and asking my wife, how long did you nurse your children?

That's none of your business.

What kind of weirdo are you?

That's questions men don't ask each other.

And you're like, thank you.

I'm glad that's not.

And then she began to burn hot, like 20 minutes about how she was giving her kid all these nutrients, and their child was three years old and still being nursed by his mother, by the mother.

And I'm like, hello, hello.

If your kid can unbutton your shirt, something's jacked up there.

I saw it happen with my own eyes.

The kid just turned and started, and I was like, hey, heh, hey, should we leave the room?

And then here's the thing.

I'm not trying to be off color.

Stick with me, okay?

Here's the thing.

I'm like, this is awkward on so many levels.

And then I felt myself getting angry as she went on and on and on and on about the benefits of nursing your kid as long as they would they were comfortable with it.

And I'm like, why is this?

And then it dawned on me.

Ding! This is the most, this is your greatest passion.

This is your gospel.

And so instead of saying any of that, we're having dessert and coffee, and I'm trying to just be nice.

My wife's kind of giving me this thing kind of like, don't say anything.

And I'm just trying to just keep it in.

And finally, it just came out.

Couldn't help it.

It's kind of like you got to sneeze, you're like, look at the light, look at the light.

There were no lights in the room.

Finally, I just said, can I just ask you a question?

What if you were this passionate about the gospel?

What do you mean?

See, you don't even have a context being this passionate about the gospel.

Now, by the way, that's not a bad thing.

Private school, not a bad thing.

Homeschooling, not a bad thing.

Golf, not a bad thing.

Fishing, not a bad thing.

Human trafficking, that's a horrible thing.

If you want to be passionate about that, that's great.

But it's not the gospel.

See, here's my concern to take up all the needs in the world and be like a statue of liberty.

Give me your tired, you're poor, you're huddled masses, yearning to breathe free.

We've laid down the mission of Jesus to take up all these needs.

And what happens if you're not careful is it's easy to make converts to your passion.

And if that's enough for you, that's all you'll ever experience.

And Jesus said, Hey, here's the mission: the resurrected Jesus, fresh out of the grave.

All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.

Why?

Because no one's done what I've done.

No one has transgressed, has overcome death, hell, and the grave.

I've earned the right to have a place of prominence and priority in your attention and your affections.

All authority in heaven and on earth is rightfully mine.

It's been given to me.

Now, because of that, go and make disciples of all the nations, not geopolitical boundaries, but ethne people groups, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit and teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you.

Behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.

See, the mission is simple.

It's making disciples.

It's why we do what we do.

And so if you're not interested in knowing more about Jesus and becoming more like Jesus and thinking more like Jesus and talking more about Jesus, you probably won't like it here.

And I'm just being honest.

I'm trying to save you some time.

You probably would just go, you know what?

I don't think this is not what I thought it was going to be.

Because we're never going to get off of that.

That is going.

Somebody asked me just last week, where are we going to Romania?

I mean, don't we go to Costa Rica?

Don't we go to Oklahoma City?

Why do we got to go to Romania?

Make disciples.

That's it.

What other explanation do you need?

See, the mission.

That's what we do.

Secondly, the means, how we do it.

And Jesus, resurrected King Jesus with all authority, says, see, here's these three participles.

He says three things.

He says, you go and you baptize and you teach.

That's how you do it.

It's not hard.

I say, he says, go.

Now, this is Jesus who left heaven and came to earth.

Some of you, I know it's socially awkward for you to kind of say, you know what, I need to share Christ, or I need to testify, or give, or bear witness, or whatever you want to call it, to a friend of mine or my neighbor or my co-worker.

That that's kind of that's ah, going makes me uncomfortable.

Can you imagine leaving heaven and coming to earth?

Who got the worst end of that deal?

See, the the Jesus who says go has already went himself.

Sometimes I get go and went mixed up in my wife, who's an English lip major, and the Thor God of the English language gets on to me.

And I have to say, I don't care, and you know why I don't care?

Because God doesn't care.

Oh, God cares you use proper grammar.

No, he doesn't.

No, and you're never gonna use algebra either.

I don't care what they tell you.

That's another lie they've promulgated on us.

Kitty me?

Go.

Why?

Because all authority in heaven and earth.

And by the way, we don't be careful that we get.

I I get leery when I get around Christians who have this militant posture.

We're gonna go out and do this.

No, we don't go out to win.

We go out because he's already won.

That way you can have a smiling orthodoxy and a generous theology that's God-centered and theologically rich.

You ain't gotta go to Romania.

When I say go, don't think, oh, I gotta go.

No, just this week, just this week.

I gotta met a guy for breakfast.

We guess they're talking.

He's telling me a story.

Here's the deal.

I breathe to make disciples.

I preach to make disciples.

I don't preach to be funny.

I don't preach.

I don't pastor this church because, oh, this is the greatest thing in the world.

Some days it is, and some days I'm just like, can somebody else do it?

Lance, you about ready to take this over?

I need to go get be a greeter at Walmart or something.

These people make me want to drink.

Pull up in Alexis and say, hey, I need some money.

Why don't you go trade your car in and drive a Hyundai?

Get you a beat up thousand dollar vehicle.

I bought a truck for 3,000.

Why are you hating on me?

I'm not hating on you.

I just don't buy your story.

And then it's I grew up poor.

I grew up on food stamps.

We never never was Alexis in our driveway.

You overshot the runway doesn't mean we gotta go pave more runway.

And the guy didn't know what that meant.

It meant we ain't giving you nothing.

What kind of sorry so-and-so church is this?

I tell you what, it's got a bunch of rednecks here.

You keep talking about this, we might have to go out in the playground and play king of the cage.

It's kind of like we're just because you show up with an unmet need, we're supposed to jump up and step and fetch and do whatever.

No.

No.

What church are you a part of?

Well, what's that got to do with anything?

Go to your church.

Somebody came here from Lakewood, wanted us to give them money.

Thank you.

What?

I'm not hating on Lakewood, so don't come up to me afterwards and go, you shouldn't talk about Lakewood.

That's not even that gospel's not gonna be important.

That's a great place you want to go if you want to be motivated.

Great motivational speaker.

That's all it is.

There's no gospel in there.

Are you kidding me?

The kingdom gospel of Matthew 24 is never gonna be that popular.

It's just not.

You'll be hated by all nations on account of me.

I lost some of you right there.

It's okay.

Get on a plane, going to Africa.

This week I meet a guy for breakfast.

This guy goes to our church and said, Hey, it's a friend of mine.

He's kind of down now.

He's low.

Meet for breakfast.

We sit down, we start talking.

And I said, about 10 minutes into the story, I said, Well, tell me about you spiritually.

He smiled, he said, Well, I said, You can be honest.

He said, Well, I just don't believe in immaculate conception.

I said, Okay.

He kept talking.

He said, I guess the bottom line is, I just don't believe Jesus is the son of God.

And I smiled, he goes, Why do you smile?

I said, Because I heard a sermon last Sunday.

And the first point, the guy said that the resurrection testifies that Jesus is the Son of God.

Romans chapter 1 says that Jesus, it demonstrates that He's the Son of God raised from the dead by power because he was raised from the dead.

Romans 1 · chapter mention

He said, I guess that's my problem.

I just don't believe that.

I said, Well, you got bigger problems than that.

He said, What do you mean?

I said, if Jesus is not the Son of God, who dies on the cross is payment for your sin.

You see, you should be on the way, becoming disciples where you can think, where you can enter the dialogue and anywhere.

You don't memorize things.

Jesus told his followers in Luke chapter 21, matter of fact, do not sit around and think of what to say before you get there.

Luke 21 · chapter mention

That's stale.

Who bakes cookies one day and hope one day they're going to meet hungry people?

That's lame.

That's why we'll never have classes where we teach you, here's what you say, when somebody says this.

No, Jesus says, I'll give you a mouth and wisdom.

The bane of this world is people who have a mouth but no wisdom.

And he says in that same passage in Luke 21, and your enemies won't be able to refute it.

They'd be like scarecrows coming to a bonfire.

And it's not a contest.

You're not zinging them, you're just dialogue.

So I said, Well, you got bigger problems.

If Jesus is not the Son of God who dies for your sin.

Well, I never never thought about that.

I'm just very intellectual and I just think of things that way.

I said, I'm not very smart at all.

I lay around, I can't do a crossword puzzle, okay?

I'm just dumb as a mud fence, but I can think about that.

He said, Well, you know, I've never never thought about that.

But so, so, so how do you work out your forgiveness?

He said, Well, I don't believe in original sin.

I said, You know, I heard a summary a couple weeks ago, and the guy talked about original sin.

He says, in the garden in Adam and Eve that ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

It's not that they will wanted to, they didn't they they all of a sudden they knew right or wrong.

They knew right or wrong.

They wanted to be like God.

That's what God says in Genesis chapter 3.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

Hey, he's like us, knowing good and evil.

Not that it exists, but I get to determine it.

He says, What does that mean?

I said, Well, the guy that stood up on the stage said, human nature is not just to break the rules, human nature is to make the rules.

Well, I guess that's me.

Are you aware how you're just kind of sinking deeper here, dude?

Yeah.

See, you ain't gotta go far to find people who've never been taught.

Two days later, I'm walking down the sidewalk.

Some of my friends sat down having a few adult beverages.

Pull up a chair.

Okay.

Start talking.

Ladies, can I ask you a religious question?

Absolutely.

In our tradition, we believe that you go to heaven because you're baptized as because we've been baptized as if not you, but we've been baptized as infants.

You believe it's because Jesus died on the cross, right?

Well, not exactly.

Jesus died on the cross, but me believing that doesn't make me a Christian.

I have to accept that, I have to accept the fact that I'm a sinner by nature and by choice.

Well, I don't believe in original sin.

Hello, what's going around this week?

See, go and make disciples is not get on a plane.

It's just in your walking, talking life.

I said starting a dialogue, and she says, So you so you believe you have to accept Jesus?

I said, Yeah, I said, because, and here's the problem with what you believe.

If I could just be on, oh, please, because if you can be saved, if you can go to heaven just by being baptized as an infant, you don't even need Jesus to come.

You don't need virgin birth, you don't need the incarnation, you don't need the crucifixion, you don't need the resurrection.

She goes, Well, why not?

I said, Because what has Jesus accomplished?

You got baptized as a child, that's all you need.

You need the church.

That's how the church obligates you to come to the church.

The church is not the vehicle of salvation, Jesus Christ is.

And she looked at me and she said, I've never been told that in my life.

What?

And I wanted to cry.

And she said, Well, we just I said, That's how they guilt you and obligate you and tell you if you ever leave this church right here, there's no way you could go to heaven.

That is a lie from hell.

That's not the gospel.

My people, matter of fact, right now, I mean, for a while it was packed.

And I told the staff, we need to have three services.

No, wait till about April 15th.

And Lance's like, What do you mean April 15th?

People file their taxes, then they just go on vacation.

And they'll show, we'll drop by about a hundred, they'll show up about August 15th.

I'm not mad at you.

The other day he said, Man, that kind of happened.

I said, Yeah, it warms up down at the beach.

Gotta go unlock the beach house, air it out, wash the sheets, find the good new restaurants.

People should be burning in hell, but they got beach houses.

Is God good or what?

Now, if you got a beach house, don't feel guilty.

And if you're if you're visiting today, I'm not kidding.

It's a sin to have a beach house and not enjoy it.

It's a sin to have a good motorcycle like a Harley with a little V Twin on it and not go ride it.

So you don't make your people come?

Heck no.

They want to come, come.

If they don't, don't.

I mean, if you're a believer, should somebody shouldn't have to tell you, hey, I played golf and driving rain before in Arkansas.

I mean, it's lightning in the distance.

I'm like, we got three holes to go.

Come on, we can finish.

Because I love golf.

It's hard to make you come and and experience something you don't love.

And they said, so church is not the vehicle.

No, it's not.

No.

Because if, one more time, if by being baptized as an infant you can get into heaven, Jesus is the most unnecessary person that ever lived.

See, so when we say go, and Jesus says go, don't think, well, I gotta go on a mission trip with the church.

That'd be great, but you don't have to.

Just open your eyes and look around.

Just push past the fear of being socially awkward.

Because people in our city are starving for the truth.

This is the mission.

This is what what we do, how we do the means, this is how we do it.

We go, first of all.

Secondly, he says we baptize.

What do you mean?

I don't want to spend long on this, but let me just say this, because I keep meeting people who say, Yeah, I'm a Christian, but I've never been baptized.

Or I'm a Christian, but I was baptized as an infant.

Got nothing to do with anything.

That is a beautiful, empty ritual that has no bearing on your salvation or your eternal security.

Once again, because if you can go to heaven because you got sprinkled as a kid, Jesus is the most unnecessary being that ever existed.

I also told my buddy at breakfast, my new best friend, I said, by the way, I said, if Jesus is not the Son of God, you got bigger problems than just your sin and everything.

You've also got a delusional God who thinks he has a son that doesn't exist.

He said, What do you mean?

I said, twice God spoke at his baptism on the Mount of Transfiguration and said, This is my son whom I love, with whom I'm well pleased.

So either God knows what he's talking about or you do.

And see, some of you are like, Man, you are a jerk.

No, this guy said, dude, that makes sense to me.

And I'm an engineer.

By the way, some of you, your gospel is your intellect.

And the first thing the gospel does is it crucifies your intellect.

It doesn't say don't be smart.

It just says, love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

See, being a Christian is not taking out your brain and putting it over here.

And formalgahyde.

I'll get that right before I go back to heaven.

Because if I start thinking about the deep mysteries of life, this will be proven untrue.

You kidding me?

And people are longing for it.

Our waitress comes over and she says, Y'all aren't drinking, y'all aren't doing much drinking.

You're doing a lot of talking.

I said, If he keeps talking, I'm gonna have to do some drinking.

When we got done, he said, thank you.

Can we do this again?

Oh, absolutely.

My truck's got round wheels and they roll.

That cat drove in from the woodlands to meet me for breakfast.

They're willing to go.

Are you willing to go?

Secondly, he says, Here's how we do it.

You baptize.

He says, go.

Therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, the Holy Spirit.

Some of you, your gospel is, is, is, is, is spiritual controversy.

I have people come up to me and go, hey, you know, why don't you just baptize in Jesus' name?

You know, it says in act.

Here's why when we baptize people, we say, I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, the Holy Spirit.

Because it's what Jesus said to do.

Any other questions?

Get off the internet.

You got too much free time.

You say, What do you mean?

It's hard for anybody to take you, to think you take the Great Commission seriously if you live in violation of it.

So if you're here and you're a quote-unquote unbaptized believer, I'm talking to you.

Baptism isn't just a symbol of salvation, it's a symbol of incorporation that says, I've been baptized into the body of Christ.

You can expect of me what you see in these people and what you've seen in the men and women of God throughout all ages because I am one of them.

I said to my friends, I said, you know, I'm not disparaging your religion, right?

They said, Oh, I understand.

We just have all these questions.

No one's ever explained it to us.

So don't take up offense.

I know a lot of you come from that religious background.

I'm not sticking a sharp stick in your eye, going, take that.

I'm just saying, hey, I would be hating you if I didn't love you enough to tell you that is no hope of salvation.

Thirdly, Jesus says, What do we do?

We teach.

He says, Teach.

Look in the text there.

He says, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit in verse 20, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you.

Now I read and preach from the ESV, the English Standard Version.

The reason I do is because it's one of the most literal translations.

Most translations take a phrase and they translate the whole phrase.

The ESV takes each word and translates each word as close as they can to the Greek or the Hebrew language.

Now, the reason I say that is not to sound like an egghead, but for some of you, your translation says, Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey.

And the reason I bring that up is because the Great Commission is teach, baptize, and teach.

You don't stop teaching when people become a Christian.

And here's why I'm telling you this.

Look at me.

You can't get everything you need to know in this room right here on Sunday morning.

Sometimes you've got to climb the stairs and sit in one of these Bible community classes up here and sit under the teaching of different people.

We have gifted men and women in this church that teach.

Tommy Hammer has been teaching in this church for a long time.

There's things that Tommy can teach you that I can't teach you.

There's things that Lance can teach you that I can't teach you.

Wade, our student pastor, who come in August and September is going to become our missions and outreach pastor.

He's like, Well, you know, Sunday morning.

I want you to teach a Bible community.

I don't want you to walk around combing your goatee, drinking coffee.

I ain't paying you for that.

And by the way, do you own scissors?

Could you trim that thing up?

Robert Bork is looking for you.

Why?

Because that's the way you become fully mature disciples.

Is that you don't just teach what's necessary for salvation and then accept Christ and become a Christian and then just go, huh?

Okay, I don't really know.

You got to put yourself in a discipling environment where you can grow.

Otherwise, if you're in Matthew, turn to the right to the book of Hebrews.

This is not on the outline.

Hebrews chapter 5.

Hebrews 5 · chapter mention

I just want to show you something.

Are you still with me this morning?

Hebrews chapter 5.

Hebrews 5 · chapter mention

My wife is going to be so glad when this is over.

Because I've been, you ever seen a pregnant women walk?

I just walk around our house like this all week.

She's like, what?

I said, I just got a lot in my heart for Sunday.

Well, Sunday hurry and get here.

Like, what do you care?

You're going to New Orleans on some drunken spree with a couple women in our church.

You may come back with tattoos for all I know.

Hebrews chapter 5, verse 11.

Hebrews 5:11

The writer of Hebrews says this.

About this, we have much to say.

And it is hard to explain.

Look at me.

Not all of Christianity can be gathered in 35 minutes.

You need to be around people who have much to say.

Michael Vow, sitting right over here, been teaching the boundaries class, has much to say.

Tommy Hammer, much to say.

Steve Matank, teaching right upstairs right now, right over here, much to say.

Wade and Amy Burgess, Mike and Lane Rice, teaching young marriage class, has much to say.

The writer of Hebrews says about this.

We have much to say, and it is hard to explain.

Oh, you got to think about it.

Since you've become dull of hearing, uh-oh.

Why is it hard?

Because you don't know how to listen.

You listen to the filter of your preference instead of, Lord, I'm going to follow truth wherever it leads me.

If it means I abandon my most precious theology, I'm going to abandon that.

That's what Curtis Vaughn, New Testament professor at Southwestern, used to say to his students.

You follow truth wherever it leads.

He says, About this, we have much to say, and it's hard to explain since you've become dull of hearing.

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God.

You need milk, not solid food.

For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he is a child.

But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

That's why you teach after a person comes to faith in Christ.

You just teach.

We got to think about that.

Please do.

Absolutely please do.

About two months ago, I was watching the news, and yet again, somebody had a baby and just put it in a dumpster.

I don't know about you, but that just I gotta go walk around my block or something.

That just walks on the fighting side of me.

Because I know people that would love to be pregnant, can't get pregnant.

Just take it to a fire station or somewhere and put it up for adoption.

It's not a fetus, it's a person made in the image of God.

And the last time I saw it, that happened, and I was just so enraged I had to just go walk, and I just was like, oh, and clear as a bell, the Holy Spirit said, now you know how I feel.

I just stopped.

I was like, excuse me, you gotta help me with that.

And he said, When people become Christians, and they don't, no one teaches them to obey everything I've commanded you.

You don't disciple them into mature uh uh faith.

It's just like birthing a baby and just laying it on the ground and watching it fend for itself.

That's why we have classes on Wednesday nights.

Twelve weeks in the fall, 12 weeks in the spring.

Not because we want you down here all the time.

We want you to be mature.

We want you to get tired of milk and have an appetite for meat, to be trained in the teaching in the teaching of righteousness.

So when people start talking and saying things that are contrary to scripture, not so you can go, I object, but you can just gracefully and with a smile on your face say, Well, actually, what the Bible teaches, and as a Christian, as a follower of Christ, that that's the objective authority of my life.

What it says is this.

I had a guy tell me the other day, I think the one thing that ought to distinguish Christians from everybody else in the world is that we don't drink alcohol.

What'd you say?

Yep, yep, yep.

I can defend that in the Bible.

No, you can't.

No, you can't.

And I'm not saying drink.

Some some I told myself, I got people in my church that have the freedom to drink.

Some people can't because they drink too much.

But that's just behavior modification.

That's all that is.

That's just moralism.

What are you saying?

I'm saying that's not true.

In a phrase, you're wrong.

But see, we want to we want to somehow get it on a level that we can.

The Bible says maturity, right here in Hebrews chapter 5.

Hebrews 5 · chapter mention

He says, You you you need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness.

You need to be skilled in the word of righteousness.

That's how you move from milk to solid food.

And then finally, he just gives us this promise back in Matthew chapter 28.

Matthew 28 · chapter mention

And you're still with me this morning.

And here's one of the best parts of the whole deal: you say, man, do not leave here and go to your community group tonight and go, man, I wish I could, because you people send me emails and go, yeah, our community group wishes they could talk like you in situations.

No, talk like you.

Because if you sit there and think, I wish I could do that.

No, talk like you.

Be you to the glory of God.

My wife would tell you, please don't be him.

She came in from New Orleans last night, 10:30, 11 o'clock.

She said, How'd it go?

I just had a few suggestions on how to parent our kids.

She didn't want to hear that.

I just said what I found works.

Oh, oh, really?

What I found works is when I come in from a trip, you shut up.

And you just leave me alone.

Let me check my email, let me watch some HGTV, and then I'll be open to your tips maybe tomorrow, the next week.

Alright, if you don't want to learn, not my issue.

Look at verse 20.

Teach them to observe all that I've commanded you, and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.

See, the promise of God never outlives the presence of God.

I'm with you always, to the end of the age.

Someone asked me recently, said, you know, I, and yeah, just you talk about these stories, and and I just wish I could.

I mean, what what when you're kind of there and you're thinking about saying something, what tips it over the top?

I just, in my spirit, I just go, you're with me.

You're with me right now.

What would you?

It's not enough to say, what would you do, Jesus, if I'm not willing to do it.

And so I just, I just kind of just inwardly just remind myself, you're with me.

And you're with me so I can continue the mission of God, of making disciples.

And sometimes it gets me in trouble, and sometimes it doesn't.

I was at a place eating, and a tall stranger walked over and threw a$5 bill on my table and said, I'd I'd pay for whatever you're talking about.

I gave up on church ten years ago.

Sorry, I wasn't eavesdropping, I was just being fed.

And the Bible says, Those who teach you the word are worth double honor.

That's all I got.

If I had more, I'd give it to you.

The guy looked at me and I said, Happens all the time.

Don't be distracted.

If you got your Bible, turn to Exodus, the second book in the Old Testament, Genesis, Exodus chapter 33.

Exodus 33 · chapter mention

We'll be done this morning.

Exodus 33.

Do we have a video ready for this morning back there, Marcus?

Do we have my friend Penn?

Is that ready back there?

Alright, we'll get to that in a minute.

I want to close by showing you a video.

Some of you have seen it.

I showed it to the staff a couple years ago.

Uh, but I want you to see kind of the they're more ready than we think.

But you say, what do you mean?

Why are we reading Exodus?

Because Jesus says, and I'm with you always, even to the end of the age.

Here's the thing: the greatest commodity we have is the presence of God.

It's just to embrace it.

He didn't, he not sent you out and said, Hey, go, good luck.

He says, I'm with you.

I'm with you.

And that's a big deal.

Exodus 33, verse 1.

Exodus 33:1

The Lord said to Moses, Depart.

Go up from here.

You and the people whom you have brought up out of the land of Egypt.

See, God blames Moses.

These are your people.

You brought these people up out of here.

Don't blame this on me.

To the land which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, To your offspring I will give it.

I will send an angel before you, and I will drive out the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.

Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey.

But I will not go among you.

Lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.

God says, Hey, you can have the land full of milk and honey, but you can't have me, because I will kill all of you.

I'm sick of your nonsense.

And when the people heard this beautiful word, they said, Thank you.

Now that's America.

We'll take the promised land without the presence.

And when the people heard this disastrous word, they mourned.

And no one put on his ornaments.

For the Lord had said to Moses, say to the people of Israel, you are a stiff-necked people.

It is for a single, if for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you.

So now take off your ornaments, that I may know what to do with you.

Therefore the people of Israel strip themselves of their ornaments from Mount Orob onward.

And then Moses goes into the tent and meets with God face to face as a man talks to his friend.

But we'll just pick up in verse 12.

Moses said to the Lord, See, you say to me, Bring up this people, but you have not let me know who you will sin with me.

Yet you have said, I know you by name, and you've also found favor in my side.

Now therefore, if I found favor in your side, please show me your ways that I may know you in order to find favor in your side.

Consider too that this nation is your people.

It's not my people.

This is your people, God.

Consider this.

Remember this.

Consider.

Put it into the thought process, into the pool of knowledge.

This is your people.

You told me earlier, hey, you brought these people up out of here.

I didn't do this.

You did.

And you said, My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.

And look at verse 15.

And he said to him, If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here.

For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your side, I and your people?

Is it not your going with us so that we are distinct?

And I am your people, I and your people from every other people on the face of the earth.

The ESV gets it kind of all irregular.

But like the NLV and other translations, it asks it real simply.

Moses says, What else is going to distinguish us from all the other nations on the earth if you don't go with us?

See, that's what Jesus picks up on in Matthew 28.

He knows what's going to distinguish you is not your personality, it's not your lifestyle, it's not the church you go to, it's not the car you drive, it's not the clothes you wear, it's not the behavior of your kids, it's the presence of God.

That's why he says, Lo, I am with you always, and even to the end of the age.

Because this is what distinguishes you, it's God's people.

That's the promise, and the promise makes it all possible.

And it is a target-rich environment.

People are starving.

Well, no, no, no, where you meet these people.

I met one and the Denny's of A Tim and North Wilchrist.

I didn't even know it was even there, but it's there.

They're everywhere.

I want to close this morning by showing you this little clip.

This is uh you ever heard of Penn and Teller?

Out in Vegas?

Some of you have seen this before.

I think we we showed it recently in a class up here, but uh I want you just to see, he's basically retelling some guy came and gave him a Bible after one of his shows.

Look what he says about it.

I want to talk to you about this.

Uh I get home from the show, and at the end of the show, as I've mentioned before, we go out and we uh we talk to folks and you know, sign the occasional autograph and shake hands and so on.

And there was one guy waiting over to the side in the um what I call the hover position after I was all done.

Big guy, probably about my age.

Big guy.

And um he had been the um the guy who has uh picks the joke during our psychic comedian section of the show.

Uh so he had the props from that in his hand, because we'd give those away.

He had the joke book and the and the envelope and the paper and stuff.

If you haven't seen the live show, it's not worth explaining.

But he had props from the show that we'd given him from the night before.

Uh he wasn't the guy that night.

And he walked over to me and he said, um, I was here last night at the show, and uh uh I saw the show and I liked it.

I wanted he was very complimentary about my use of language and um complimentary about you know honesty and stuff.

He said nice stuff, no reason to go into it, but he said nice stuff.

And then he said, I brought this for you.

And he handed me a uh Gideon pocket edition.

Um I thought I said from the New Testament, but I also thought it was- It was Psalms from the New Testament, right?

Uh Psalms from the New Testament, just part of the New Testament.

Little book about this big, this thick, you know.

He said, I wrote in the front of it, and I wanted you to have this.

I'm kind of uh proselytizing.

And he said, I'm a businessman, I'm I'm sane, I'm not crazy.

And he looked me right in the eye and did all of this.

And uh it was really wonderful.

I believe he knew that I was an atheist.

But he was not uh defensive, and he looked me right in the eyes.

And he was truly complimentary.

It wasn't in any way, it didn't seem like empty flattery.

He was really kind and nice and sane and looked me in the eyes and talked to me, and then gave me this Bible.

And I've always said, you know, that I don't respect people who don't proselytize.

I don't respect that at all.

If you believe that there's a heaven and hell and people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life or whatever, and you think that uh, well, it's not really worth telling them this because it would make it socially awkward, and atheists who think that people shouldn't proselytize, just leave me alone, keep your religion to yourself.

Uh how much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize?

How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them that?

I mean, if I believed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that a truck was coming at you and you didn't believe it, that truck was barren down on you, there's a certain point where I tackle you.

And this is more important than that.

And I've always thought that, and I've written about that, and I've thought of it conceptually.

This guy was a really good guy.

He was polite and honest and sane, and he cared enough about me to proselytize and give me a Bible, which had written in it a little note to me, uh, not very personal, but just, you know, like to show and so on.

And then like five phone numbers for him and an email address if I wanted to get in touch.

Now, I know there's no God, and one polite person living his life right doesn't change that.

Uh, but I'll tell you, he was a very, very, very good man, and uh that's really important.

And with that kind of goodness, uh it's okay to have that deep of a disagreement.

I still think that religion does a lot of bad stuff, but man, that was a good man who gave you that book.

That's all I wanted to say.

Not only is that man an atheist, he's also a homosexual.

And a man had the courage after one of his shows just to go up and just give him a little giddy, and then and yes, no, Psalms are not in the New Testament.

That's how far from God he is.

And people, thousands of people this year will get on planes and go to Vegas and buy tickets to a show because he and Penn and Taylor are brilliant illusionists.

And if you really believe in heaven and in hell, and that people go there, how much do you have to hate them not to tell them?

Stand to your feet and hold your hands, I will speak a blessing over you.

Your God is a speaking God, but he's also a knowing God.

He knows who he's talking to.

And so on that day when he was commissioning his disciples, Peter was in the crowd.

And he knew Pentecost was coming.

And he believes that you can be used just like Peter was to speak the good news.

So depart now and take the good news with you in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Bless you, you're dismissed.