Advancing The Gospel

Here we are, end of Romans.

Three weeks left.

It's been a long journey.

And I've told you a lot of things about the Book of Romans over the last several months.

We've said it is the greatest treatise on the gospel in the history of the world.

That's true.

We've said it's this amazing legal argument that was actually used by Harvard Law School for the first hundred years as a textbook on how to build an argument.

That's true.

We've told you it is written to the most influential city in the ancient world.

As a launching pad for the gospel, and that's true.

But in Romans 15, we get a plot twist.

We find out that the book of Romans is actually a missionary support letter.

Did you hear that when Callie was reading?

Paul is writing to the Roman church and he says, guys, here's my strategy, I'm going to explain it, and here's the results that I've seen so far, and here's my goal for what's coming in the future, and I'm asking for your help because I want to come visit you.

And it's going to take some money to get this thing done.

You heard him say all those things, right?

And so we ask ourselves, like, when we read the missionary support letter from the Apostle Paul to the church at Rome, how are we supposed to hear and understand that?

Like, how do we apply that to our lives today?

And I think that the easiest, probably the best way to do that is that we seek to embody the principles that Paul outlines.

Like, that is a gospel advancing church 2,000 years ago.

What are the core principles we can embody today?

We're gonna boil it down to five resolutions of the gospel advancing church.

Five resolutions that every single one of us should make with our lives.

And the reality is for Parkside, the timing is absolutely perfect.

Like as we're taking steps to plant this church, we're in the middle of 21 days of prayer, asking the Lord to direct us.

Would you step out into this church planting team or would you step up in the ministry here at Parkside?

What does that look like?

We want to see gospel growth across this region.

And like I said before, we prayed.

The risk here is that we would be, yes, two cheers for gospel advance, for church planting.

We would be enamored by the idea of being a gospel advancing church, but not activated this week.

That's the risk.

Everybody can be enamored by the idea.

Everybody can be excited, but you gotta be activated for it.

That's what we need to see happening this week.

I remember growing up, maybe some of you remember these commercials you'd watch.

It starts out, you could tell it's a military commercial.

They got the inspirational music going.

You got some jacked dude without a shirt on climbing up like the face of a cliff.

It goes on and towards the very end, finish the sentence for me.

The guy in the dress blues pops up there and says, the few, the proud, the marines, everybody knows, right?

And sometimes I think that's how we think about the Great Commission.

The few, the proud, the missionaries.

Bom bada bom.

The few, the proud, the church planters.

The few, the proud.

Listen, guys, the Great Commission is not reserved for the elite few.

It is given to every single Christian.

Like when you heard the call of Christ to come and follow him, receive his gift of salvation, then all of life is given to this task of making disciples.

The disciple-making task is not reserved for like the super saints.

That's every single one of us.

God calls you and then equips you.

He's not looking for the all-stars.

We were all cut from the C team spiritually.

None of us made the freshman team.

Not me, not you, not any of us.

And God says, that's okay.

I see you in all your weakness and all your neediness, and I will cover all of your weakness with my strength.

Now you get going and I'll be with you as you go.

Core conviction we have to have coming to this.

So what I'm gonna ask you to do as I walk through these five resolutions of a gospel-advancing church, the call to action is that you will circle one of them.

They're in your bulletin already written down, and you'll commit to activate on one of those this week.

All right, one final comment before I get into the five resolutions, the gospel advancing church.

Sometimes in this kind of sermon, like a clear call to action sermon, it ends up being a lot of guilt from the pastor.

I've probably preached sermons like this, so I'm not slapping somebody else around.

Maybe you've been to church and it goes like this Listen, church, you guys don't evangelize enough.

Get out this week and do it.

You guys don't give enough.

Give more this week.

You don't pray hard enough, that's why nobody's becoming Christians in this area.

Pray harder.

And you just slap enough guilt on over and over that eventually you get somebody to do something.

Now, look, if the Holy Spirit's bringing guilt into your life, you need to listen to that and respond in repentance and faith.

So I'm not down on guilt because I think sometimes guilt's a good thing.

But I want to model a little bit different approach this morning.

I want to tell you a lot of stories through the way of encouragement of how it's happening to see there are regular people in our congregation embodying this already.

And the majority of the stories, think all but like one, are not from pastors, not from missionaries, not from church planters.

They are from regular members in this church.

And I just want you to know that on the front end, like that is the intentional approach, and those are the kinds of examples I'm giving, so that we are embodying this reality.

The Great Commission is not reserved for the elite few, it's for every single Christian.

All right, what's Paul say are the five resolutions of a gospel-advancing church.

Number one, motivation comes from the gospel.

Motivation comes from the gospel.

Now, I hope you have Romans 15 still open.

I want to look back at it.

I'm gonna show you exactly where Paul says this.

Look at verse 14.

Here's what he says I myself am satisfied about you, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able to instruct one another.

Okay, pause right there.

Paul writes to the church at Rome's like, guys, you're doing great.

You're crushing it.

I'm so satisfied.

Look at the growth of the gospel.

This is outstanding.

But then what does he go on to say next?

He says this, but on some points I've written to you very boldly by way of reminder, because of the grace given me by God.

He says, I'm motivated by the gospel.

We keep going.

To be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles in the priestly service of the gospel of God, so that the offering of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit.

Paul's pleased with what's happening in Rome, but he writes very boldly on a couple of points.

And there's there's two major things.

Why is he writing so boldly?

Number one, because of the grace given to him.

Because I'm motivated by the gospel.

I didn't earn this, I didn't deserve this.

But what Christ has done for me has gripped my heart and it's changed my life.

And the second thing he says is because of the Gentiles.

That's code for people who haven't heard about Christ yet.

He said, Yeah, God has changed me, but there's people out there who don't know.

And I'm motivated because I gotta go tell them.

This is the same way of saying what we've said the last few weeks.

Remember, we said we are saved by the gospel and then shaped by the gospel and then sent by the gospel.

That's just my phraseology for what Paul says right here.

The same exact idea.

Look, it's important you get this.

The Bible's core message is not a message of moral improvement.

It's not a message of hard work or how to run an ethical business or how to be a good neighbor or a good team player.

There are some principles that tie that, but that is not the main thing the Bible is telling you.

The main message of the Bible is a message of righteousness, that God is totally righteous, totally perfect, and he demands that of us.

And the harder you try to be a perfect person, the more you will realize that this righteousness demanded by God is missing in you.

And that's why it's really good news that the righteousness that God demands, although missing in you, is revealed in Christ and can be received by faith.

Jesus, I need you.

I can't do this.

Like if you're not a Christian, that is the most important thing you could hear this morning or any morning, and the response is to cry out and say, God, I see that I've been trying to do this on my own, to earn your favor, to be good enough, to work hard enough, and I can't do it.

But praise God, Jesus did.

That's the message that grips Paul.

He says, This is awesome news.

He realized he couldn't be good enough to earn God's favor, and he couldn't be bad enough to be beyond God's favor.

Boy, that's that's awesome when you realize that.

And that's what we mean, Park Side, when we say the foundation of our core values is delighting in the gospel.

To be gripped by what God has done for me that I could never do for myself.

But the reality is week in, week out, it's pretty easy for us to hear that word gospel that I say all the time and explain regularly, and not like verbally yawn, but in our spirit kind of yawn.

To not be gripped by it.

To not have our affections stirred by it.

Like I told you in my preparation, I had like some tears this week.

That doesn't happen every week.

I wish it happened more often.

If you were honest with yourself, when is the last time your affections were stirred by the gospel?

The great hymn writer John Newton, near the end of his life, summed it up real simple.

He says, Hey, I may not be able to remember much because I'm pretty old, but I know that I'm a great sinner and Christ is a great savior.

And that's what it boils down to.

I was talking to one of our members this week who had made some pretty significant mistakes.

The kind of mistakes that end up with the police at your home.

The kind of mistakes that end up on the news and can make a bunch of people in the community look at you shamefully, can kill your business.

And this member told me they received a phone call from a marketing firm that said, uh, hey, I know how to make this stuff go away.

I can I can work with Google and nobody will ever find this out.

That doesn't sound like a bad gig, right?

Nobody will have to know.

Here's what this member said to me and said, I told them that is the worst thing that could ever happen.

I hope people find out about the most shameful thing in my past, so that it's an opportunity for me to tell them how much mercy I've received in Christ.

That's somebody who delights in the gospel.

That's somebody who says, My core identity is not in the good life that I can maintain, but in what Christ has done for me.

And if me being shamed in some way means that I get to tell others how merciful Christ is, that's far better than me looking like the hero of the story.

Look, when we talk about being a gospel-advancing church, Paul's talking about how can I take this gospel forward?

If your motive is one of guilt, eventually you're gonna dry up.

You just won't keep like guilt gets you going for a little while, it doesn't keep you going for a long while.

And if your motive is ego, like to look good about yourself, or for our church to be known as like a powerhouse gospel church or something like that, you're not gonna dry up, you're just gonna blow up.

Right?

And you've seen a lot of like famous pastors that have done that.

It ends up being all about their ego and not actually about the gospel, and they blow up.

So you can dry up from guilt or blow up from ego, but when the gospel is your motivation, you actually grow up to maturity in Christ.

It's like, oh man, I can hold everything with an open hand right here.

I don't have to account my life as worthy of anything except that I would be able to know Christ and make him known.

There was a guy named C.T.

Studd about 130 years ago.

C.T.

Studd was the best cricket player in the world.

He was born in England, which kind of means nothing to us right now, but back then that was kind of a big deal.

And at age 25, C.

T.

Studd led England to win the biggest cricket tournament in the world.

They defeated Australia.

This is somewhere between like the World Cup and the Super Bowl being combined at one time.

And yet when C.

T.

Studd was 18 years old, someone had shared the gospel, he'd become a Christian.

And at age 25, seven years later, after winning the greatest cricket tournament in the world, he retired from cricket to go be a missionary to China.

And they were interviewing him and they said, What would make you do this?

Like, just imagine Patrick Mahomes walking off during like preseason and saying, Nope, I'm gonna go be a missionary to South Sudan.

And I was like, Whoa, Patrick, what are you doing?

Like, can't you wait a few years till your prime is passed?

And here's what C.T.

Studd said to them He said, If Christ be God and died for me, then no sacrifice from me can be too great for him.

He was motivated by the gospel.

And he went and he poured out his life for the advance of the gospel.

A regular guy who was just an athletic jock that realized that God's love for him was better than any performance he could have in life, in sports, or in business.

Parkside, I you may not be called to give up a cricket career.

I doubt any of you are called to give up a career in cricket, because I know of none of you who have a career in cricket.

But you are called either to step out on this church planning team or to step up at Parkside as some go out, motivated by the gospel, saying, I see what Christ has done, I can withhold nothing from him, and there are people who don't know, just like Paul said, I have to go tell them.

You're motivated by the gospel.

That's a resolution of a gospel-advancing church.

Second resolution comes right here.

Bold ambition honors God.

Now, since the bulletin was printed, I've updated this one.

So I want you to write right after the word ambition.

One of those little like triangle arrow deals, I don't know what those things are called.

For the church.

Bold ambition for the church honors God.

Because I realized after I got into it, I want to be a little more specific.

But as we go back to Romans 15, what I want you to listen carefully for is this bold ambition for the advance of the church and the gospel that Paul has.

There's two towns he listed, Jerusalem and Illyricum.

I'm going to read it in a second, starting in verse 19.

But you need to know those two towns are 1,400 miles apart.

This is not like Brownsburg to Avon.

That will help you as we read this and you consider his bold ambition.

Now, let's look at the end of verse 19.

Here's what it says.

From Jerusalem and all the way around to Illyricum, I have fulfilled the ministry of the gospel of Christ, and thus I make it my ambition to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named, lest I build on someone else's foundation.

Now drop down to verse 24.

What does he say there?

He says, I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain.

In that day, Spain was the edge of the world.

Right?

They didn't know what was past that.

Maybe they were flat earthers back then.

Who knows?

Maybe you'd fall off.

But that was as far as anybody knew about.

So this dude has a bold ambition for kingdom expansion.

His vision is like 1,400 miles, we got that covered.

Now how do I take on 1,500 miles and beyond?

Like this is not a small-minded man.

And if there's anything that the United States does well, guys, it is bold ambition.

Like 250 is showing all of it off.

Like I don't have to tell you what it is to have bold ambition for bigger fireworks, more bands, all-day celebrations, parties, parades, the whole thing.

Elephant ears, state fairs.

Like, we as Americans, we get this naturally.

Does your ambition for the advance of the gospel match up with the ambition in the other areas of your life?

Does it exceed the other areas of your life?

It should.

Now, Paul says here that he has fulfilled this ministry from Jerusalem all the way to Illyricum.

Now, what does that mean exactly?

Like, does that mean in 1400 miles every single person has been converted?

No, that's not what it means.

What Paul means by this, I have planted churches, I have established gospel outposts in key cities all the way through.

So Paul's like, yeah, I got my guy Titus.

He's over there in Crete.

Titus 1, 5.

I actually told him, appoint elders in every town and put things into order.

Okay, and then I got my dude Timothy.

He's over there in Ephesus, port city, he's crushing it.

My guy Apollos, he's over there in Corinth, he's taking on that church.

They're planting churches.

Like he's got his gospel outpost.

They've been planting churches all over the place.

And it reminds us the normal way the gospel advances is through starting and strengthening healthy churches.

That's the normal way the gospel advances.

So if you want to have a bold ambition for gospel advance, then look for starting and strengthening healthy churches in areas of need.

Now, I gotta make a confession to you.

A lot of times I'm more risk-averse than risk-taking in my life.

I don't consider that a great part of me.

I'd like to be more of a risk taker in a lot of ways.

But if there's any spot where I am going to take a risk, it's going to be in starting and strengthening healthy churches.

Because this is the way the gospel goes forward.

And there's only one promise to an institution in the whole Bible.

It's not to seminaries, it's not to Bible colleges, it's not to Christian schools, it's not to mission agencies, it's not to Christian camps.

It's God says this I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

That promise tells me if I'm going to take a risk, it's going to be through starting and strengthening healthy churches, and it should be ours as well.

I get a little cautious thinking about like saying we're going to plant this many churches or this many cities or that kind of thing.

Some people do that.

I get concerned about my own ego in it, so I don't like to attach that.

But in general, I want to think less about planting one, more about planting 20.

How's that gonna happen?

That's kind of my thought process there.

Let me tell you a little bit about need, because it's important to think about a bold ambition, not only in this country but around the world.

There's a term called frontier groups.

Frontier groups.

Here's what is meant by a frontier group.

If there are a thousand people, one or zero of them are Christians.

That's a pretty unreached area, right?

Out of a thousand people, one or zero are Christians.

Guys, that is 25% of the world.

Staggering need around the globe.

And if I zoom it into Indiana, 6.7 million residents, 5.5 million in Indiana are not Christians.

Like there is huge need.

Paul says Jerusalem Illyricum to Spain, huge need here.

Like, okay, who's going out to Terre Haute?

Who's going out to Greencastle?

Who's going up to Logansport?

Out to Richmond, down to Seymour.

Like there is need all over the place.

May it be our bold ambition to say, I have fulfilled the ministry of Christ from Jerusalem to Illyricum, and I'm trying to get to Spain.

And I'm trying to send people to get there.

Because this bold ambition is a mark of a gospel-advancing church.

What does it mean for you to live that out?

Like to put feet on it in the day of an everyday person here in Brownsburg, Indiana?

Let me try and put some feet on it for you.

Because I think what often happens is we start to build the life we want, the community we want to live in, the kind of house we want to have, the job we've been seeking, and after we get some of those like rough sketches in place, then we look for a church.

But what if we flip that around and said, my boldest ambition in my life is to see the gospel advance.

And if it means I need to find a different school district or a different home or a different job or a different community, if my life can be leverage for the gospel, then that would be better.

What would that look like?

Let me tell you a couple of stories.

I was talking to a member of Parkside not so long ago.

They told me, it is my ambition to see every single person on our street come to Christ.

And when every single person has come to faith on our street, then we're gonna think about moving and buying a different house.

And right now there's one more person.

And then we'll get a different house.

I was talking to a different member.

They said it is our bold ambition for the gospel, is our aim to give a higher percentage of our income every single year to the advance of the gospel.

So they're not just saying, like, I get a raise, my giving goes up with the raise.

They're actually saying I want the percentage of my income to increase on an annual basis.

So I am growing in generosity.

My bold ambition is to see the gospel go forward.

That's what that looks like in Brownsburg, Indiana.

There's a family in our church right now that I'm praying with them.

They told me, said Justin, we have a bold ambition to see the city of Indianapolis reach for the gospel.

I want to be part of a church planning team going east into the city.

In some of the hardest to reach areas.

I realize this one going west, that might not be us.

That's okay.

We're praying about it.

They're looking at changing jobs, selling a home, moving into the heart of the city.

Praying, God, how can I leverage my life for the advance of the gospel?

Step out, step up.

21 days of prayer.

What's it look like?

Resolution two of a gospel-advancing church.

You have a bold ambition to see this thing go forward.

Listen, I'm not saying you have to embody every single one of those.

That's not what I'm saying.

But is a bold ambition for the advance of the gospel the dominant thing in your life?

Or is it the icing on the cake for your otherwise suburban life?

Boy, there's a lot to think about.

Maybe that's the resolution that you need to commit to action on this week.

I recognize it's a high, it's a high call I'm putting before you, right?

It is costly to live like that and to give like that.

You bet it is.

And as a pastor, let me just tell you, it is costly to think about saying, who are our best servers and our biggest givers, and how do I commission them to go somewhere else for the advance of the gospel?

Like I feel that too.

But Jesus is worth it.

The gospel is worth it, and people have to know.

So let's get after it together.

Third resolution.

The gospel advancing church.

Discipleship is essential.

Discipleship is essential.

Here we're in verse 18.

Look what Paul says.

He says this I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to bring the Gentiles to obedience by word and deed.

Catch this.

What's his aim in the Gentiles?

It is their full obedience.

He's not after people just praying a prayer, getting in the front door to heaven.

He's not merely trying to make converts.

He wants full disciples living in full submission to Christ.

Now, the very first sermon to the Roman series, I'm going to go back to here, and I don't expect any of you to know this.

I'm not going to raise your hand if you remember it.

But Romans 1, 5, Paul says, I have come to preach that you would follow and believe.

And he uses this phrase, the obedience of faith.

That's what he's after.

The gospel produces this.

And then at the very end of the book, second to last verse, chapter 16, verse 26, he says, I'm after the obedience of faith.

Full life committed to Christ.

Not merely first day Christian belief, but all of life Christian obedience, which is basically the same thing as what Jesus said in Matthew 28.

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

This is Paul's aim, full discipleship.

This is why at Parkside we say, what do we want to see happen in 10 years?

What's our big picture aim?

We say a culture of discipleship where it's normal for Christians to be making disciples.

That's the expectation for all of us.

That it would be weird at Parkside for anyone to not be actively making disciples.

It's following these kinds of verses that tell us here's what it means to be a gospel-advancing church.

Pastor Mark Dever out in Washington, D.C.

says it a little differently, but I think it's helpful.

And he says it in a there's a sharp point on what he says, but there's a good point.

Here's what he says.

If you say you're following Jesus, if you say that, and you're not helping others know and follow Jesus, then I don't know what you mean when you say I'm following Jesus.

The task of making disciples is given to every single one of us.

So guys, catch this.

When we say growing through relationships, our core value, that's not merely, oh, we've got a warm welcome team with green shirts on, and they can help you find the bathroom if you don't know where it is in this building.

Growing through relationships is your discipleship to Christ as you invest in others, and together you are growing towards Christ through relationships that are formed about specific intentional spiritual good.

That's what we're after.

All right, let's get practical.

How do we put this into practice today and this week?

In your community group, in your Sunday school class, are you pushing beyond group time for specific spiritual investment with others there?

Look, there's a lot of good that happens when a community group meets, when a Sunday school class meets, but both have their limitations in that gathering with 30 people in the room, right?

You've got to push past that with a smaller group.

Couple of examples.

I know some ladies in our church.

The kids go to bed, they're folding laundry, and they get on FaceTime at nine o'clock at night.

So they can pray for one another and confess sin to one another and grow in godliness together with the gift of technology while they fold the laundry, an otherwise menial task, and they're redeeming the time.

I know some others in our church who say it's not a late-night thing, it's an early morning coffee.

We're gonna get together and we're reading the Bible, actively praying for people who don't know Christ, and confessing sin to one another, putting sin to death.

That's what that looks like.

I know of another dude.

He he asked somebody else to meet, he said, Hey, I think, well, not I think, he said, I'd like to see my marriage grow.

Could we meet for like 12 weeks, every other week, just to get some intentional spiritual input to my marriage?

Because I want my marriage to look more like what Christ says it should look like and less like what I say it looks like today.

Praise God.

Or maybe you're gonna take that same approach.

I want to grow as a parent.

I want to think about leveraging my singleness, or that whole bit about giving generously.

Justin, you talked about that.

I want to be discipled by somebody who's lived that way, knowing like the water of life that Jesus brings, the water's free.

Right?

Right.

But the pipes to get it to people, the pipes cost.

So we got to give to get it there.

See, I want to be discipled in that area.

Like there's tons of ways that we take this idea of obedience and we go with it.

Now, some of you might be saying, Justin, I would love to meet with somebody.

I'd love to have that kind of discipling relationship to be poured into, to do some outpouring of myself into them, and I don't know who it is.

Come and talk to me.

One of my roles as a pastor is just to play connector.

You talk to you, you guys get together, great, go for it.

You two ladies, you get together, you go talk, great, go for it.

If this is your action point, this is the resolution you're committing, not to be enamored by, but activated by, come and talk to me and let me try and make a connection with somebody else.

But let me leave one question before we move to the fourth.

Here's the question If our entire church was a clone of you, as it relates to disciple making, what would our church look like?

What would it look like?

This must be a resolution of the whole church in order to be a gospel-advancing church, the discipleship is essential.

Fourth resolution.

Word and deed go together.

Word and deed go together.

I'm gonna go back to verse 18 again, because verse 18 is packed, and I just read it, but I'm gonna read it again.

Here's what it says Paul writes, I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to bring the Gentiles to obedience by word and deed.

And then in verses 25 through 29, I'm not gonna read all of those, but he just talks about bringing aid to the saints.

Like there is a deed ministry of seeing physical needs, you guys give to them, and Paul delivers it because deed ministry matters.

So you think of these like two wings of an airplane.

And I'm not much of a pilot or an aerospace technique technology guy, but I know this if you only got one wing on the airplane, you're probably not flying very far.

Word ministry, deed ministry, two wings of the plane, you have to have both of them.

In word, we explain the truth of the gospel.

In deed, we adorn the gospel and show that it's actually a beautiful thing to believe.

It's not merely true, it is also good and beautiful.

Word ministry, you think, yes, we're gathered to preach and sit under the preaching.

You bet, but does word ministry characterize the whole life of the church?

Like I hope as you look back on the last couple of years, you can see our main strategy is to equip you to read your Bible better and send you to go read it with others.

So when I'm preaching, I'm trying to explain some principles of Bible study so that you can read the book of Romans more effectively with someone else in your life.

This is why in Bible Institute we're all about teaching you to read your Bible more effectively.

So you can read it yourself and go read it with others.

We're studying first and second Thessalonians starting in about six weeks.

You should be there.

Word ministry.

I I heard about a guy, another encouraging story this past week.

One of his friends did some dumb stuff and has ended up in prison for about six months.

So this my friend goes to prison with this other guy.

Well, he went to visit him in prison.

I should clarify how that went.

And uh they start reading the Bible together.

And the dude in jail's life got some free time, so he reads the whole Bible in 43 days.

And um, the first time they get together, the guy says, Well, I've read the book of Genesis now.

First time he's ever read the Bible.

And so my friend asked him, What do you think?

He says, There is some wild stuff in the Bible.

Like, yeah, there is.

But buckle up, because it's about to get crazier.

So he comes back the next time and he's just finished 2 Kings.

And then my friend asked him, he says, Hey, so what'd you think of it?

And he goes, It's the scariest thing I've ever read in my life.

He said, What do you mean?

He said, You read all that stuff in the law?

It is impossible for anybody to do that.

We're all toast.

And he goes, bingo.

You got it.

It's meant to show you your neediness that you can't do it all.

Reading the Bible together, great strategy for word ministry going forward.

But it's not just word ministry, it's deed ministry too.

Two wings of the plane.

Words explain the truth, deeds adorn the truth and show that it's beautiful.

We've got opportunities to mobilize the church coming up.

Fast track is like a month or less away.

It's an opportunity to see families in our community in need and help to get them educational materials coming into the start of the school year.

Community Christmas is a couple of months away, but an opportunity to engage people in our community who have needs with the gospel and meeting tangible needs.

Look for those opportunities.

Like we're trying to advance deed ministry as a church.

That's why this year we brought on two deacons of local missions.

That's why the budget you're voting on in two weeks has double the money for local missions as last year.

Saying, how do we put these things together?

Let me give you a fun story to kind of see how the whole thing gets married.

One of my former students, so some of you know I taught high school Bible for about six years before I was a pastor.

One of my students was not a believer.

And uh and we talked about all kinds of stuff.

Struggled with science and the Bible.

How's that go together?

How could a loving God send people to hell?

What do we do with this whole doctrine of predestination?

I mean, just hours and hours and hours of conversations.

Two years ago, this dude gave his life to Christ.

And I hadn't heard any of his issues intellectually get resolved yet.

And so we say, Well, what happened?

What how what flipped the switch?

You know what he said?

He said, I saw genuine love within the church over a period of decades, and I realized there's only one way to see that kind of love get produced.

It's a human change from the inside out.

He saw word ministry and deed ministry going together, and it was persuasive for the gospel to advance in his life.

Fifth resolution.

Here's our last one.

Prayer is the work.

Prayer is the work.

Look at verse 30, skipping down towards the end a little bit.

What's Paul write?

He says, I appeal to you, brothers, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit.

Just pause for a second there.

Like, if Paul has an intro like that, like that's a pretty good idea.

You should listen to what comes next.

Like the biggest boss church planner in the history of the world says, I appeal to you, you should listen up.

But then he's like, nah, I don't know there's enough weight on that yet.

I appeal to you by our Lord Jesus Christ.

Now you should really listen.

It's like, nope, I'm gonna up the ante.

And by the love of the Spirit.

It's like a big deal what he's about to say.

What's he say next?

To strive together with me in your prayers to God on my behalf.

Strive in your prayers, that I might be delivered from the unbelievers in Judea, that my service would be acceptable to the saints, that by God's will I may come to you with joy and be refreshed in your company.

Listen, there's a core conviction that we can dream about the advance of the gospel, we can talk about the advance of the gospel, we can strategize, we can take action.

God does the work.

We often say before our prayer meetings, we don't pray before we work, prayer is the work, and then God works.

That's exactly what Paul is saying right here at the end of this passage.

And the scriptures all over the place are bursting with this theme.

Psalm 127, unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain.

2 Thessalonians 3 and verse 1, Paul says, Pray for me, brothers, that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored.

James 4, why are these gospel advances not happening like we want?

What does he say?

You have not, because you ask not.

Isaiah 56, verse 7, maybe not the prophet you've committed to memory, but Isaiah 56, 7 says, My house shall be called a house of prayer.

Isaiah 56:7

And that verse is quoted in Matthew's gospel and Mark's gospel and Luke's gospel, driving the centrality of prayer for the advance of the gospel.

You can look back on history and see every major revival in the history of the world has begun with a concerted effort for prayer.

Every single one of them.

And you could smile and you can nod and you can be enamored by the idea of prayer.

Or you can be activated to pray this week.

21 days of prayer are upon us.

Maybe you miss the first week.

Second week begins tomorrow.

Let's get on it.

The call this week is that you would fast and pray for at least one day over this church plan.

Is your role to step up?

Is it to step out?

What might it be?

I don't know.

But let's commit to this together.

Recognizing this.

You can have a gospel motivation for the advance.

That's good.

You should have that.

You can have a bold ambition for the gospel.

That's also great.

You can have all your discipleship fundamentals down.

That sounds like a great formula.

And if you subtract the work of the spirit out, that formula leads to gospel stagnation.

The best motives with the biggest ambition and the best fundamentals minus the spirit equals stagnation.

Prayer is the work.

Maybe the thing for you to activate on this is when we have our monthly prayer meeting.

That's been your Sunday to sleep in a little bit.

Like, no, I need to commit to be here.

This one's gonna be extra hard.

It's July 5th, the night after the 4th, when everybody is either staying up late partying or unable to sleep because everybody else is shooting fireworks off.

We're not moving the prayer meeting.

We can be there.

Martin Lloyd Jones, famous preacher, said that the prayer meeting is the thermometer of the local church.

I get asked all the time by other pastors.

Hey, what's your guys' attendance?

What are you running these days?

You know what nobody asked me?

How many people come to the prayer meeting?

They should.

It's a much better question.

Parents, can I give you a special charge here?

Involve your kids in 21 days of prayer.

I heard somebody last week, they told me this.

They they read through the little half sheet.

If you didn't get one, they're in the back, pick them up.

Read through it, they're prayed through all the prompts, and their four-year-old says, Mom, dad, I would love to be part of something like that.

They're in kids town.

They're still getting potty trained.

And God is stirring in their heart, I want to be part of that.

Involve your kids in it.

Five resolutions.

Guys, here's what I'm thankful for.

I am thankful that 30 years ago, this church committed, resolved to be a gospel-advancing church, planting 10 or 12 churches in a short period of time.

And this Sunday, do you know there are more than 10,000 people around the city of Indianapolis gathered in churches planted by this one?

That in the last three years, more than 500 people have confessed Jesus as Lord and been baptized at those churches.

That in the last 12 months alone, more than$4 million has been sent overseas of the global advance of the gospel through those churches.

Of course, it's hard to think about selling your house or getting a different job or moving to a different school district or figuring out who's gonna serve in the hole you leave when you go.

On the 30-year view, it's worth it.

And how much more is it on the 300, 3,000 or eternal view of it?

Jesus, worth it.

May we resolve to be a gospel-advancing church.

So what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna pray for us here.

I'm gonna do this a little differently than we usually do.

But what I want to do, I want you to look back at that outline in your bulletin.

It's got the five resolutions.

And I want you to commit to circle one.

This is the one I'm activating on.

I'm not just gonna be enamored by these ideas.

I'm gonna do something about it.

Whether I go, whether I stay is totally beside the point.

But we together are committing.

We are gonna activate on this thing.

Let me pray for you.

And after I pray, we'll start moving towards communion.

The way we're gonna do that is if you're if you're a follower of Christ, you've been baptized, you're in good standing at a church, you're welcome to observe the Lord's Supper.

You don't have to be a member here is what I'm saying.

But during our silent prayer time, I want you to circle one of those and then start praying on it.

Circle that one and start praying on it.

Our communion buckets are underneath here.

So if you're close to one of those, just snag it, pass it to the aisle, and it goes back.

We'll do all that.

Let me pray over you.

And then we can pray to the Lord and talk to him and see what he has to say.

Lord Jesus, we need your help.

Would you help us not to be enamored, but to be activated as a gospel-advancing church?

Help us not to smile and nod, but to take a step this week.

And we ask that your kingdom and your glory would go forth around this nation and to the ends of the earth.

And we pray it in Jesus' name.

Amen.