When A Mission Has A Church | Ps. Jordan Gear

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Amen, amen.

It is so good to be here with family.

Come on, my name is Jordan, as they said.

I serve as a missions pastor in Jacksonville at our church there.

You may not know that, but celebration is a global family.

We're in four nations, praising God.

And I love everywhere you go that's Celebration Church, you know that people are going to be getting saved.

People are going to be welcomed, and there's going to be love in the house.

And so I feel at home this morning.

Come on, I brought some friends with me.

A really special friend, Alyssa, my wife.

But man, I want to honor you, Pastor Keith.

Thanks for letting me come and share.

If you don't like the message this morning, this is what I'll say.

Blame Pastor Keith, because he taught all my preaching classes in Bible college.

So it's his fault.

Come on.

But man, I bring greetings from my pastor, Pastor Tim in Jacksonville.

But also, come on, I don't have favorites, but man, I think he's got to be all our favorite.

I bring greetings from Pastor Dixon in Zimbabwe.

Come on, he called me just two days ago and wanted to say hello.

You may not know this, but from your giving every single month, you guys get so into what God is doing in Zimbabwe.

And they they've planted over 30 churches now, many of them in villages that had no gospel witness.

And they they, along with their partners, feed 65,000 kids a day in schools.

And so you guys are a part of that.

Give yourself a hand.

He sends his love.

But uh I I had to honor my wife specifically today because I'm gonna tell a little bit of a story that might embarrass her.

But come on, it's for Jesus, amen.

But man, uh I want to tell you a story about when we were first-time homebuyers.

Come on, God opened the door.

We got the the nice the house that had the right bones and we had energy.

We didn't have kids yet, so we were like, we're gonna paint this and take this wall out and do this kitchen, and we probably done about 30% of our original vision.

But uh one of the weekends, man, we're in there and we're just knocking stuff out, and I'm away on traveling on mission, and I come back, and my wife had slaved all weekend, and she had painted every wall, it seemed, in the house, and it was like immaculate, it was beautiful, it was definitely way better than I would have done.

It was even, come on, there was no runs, there was the perfectly taped up, everything.

Uh, and then I walked into the dining room, and I look, and there's this wall, and I it's definitely gotta be my fault.

I probably did not communicate well like usual.

And uh the wall that I was about to knock out that week was beautifully painted.

And it took me a couple minutes because I didn't want the first thing to say is, hey, you didn't have to paint that wall.

You said I just gave it a couple minutes of compliments.

And I said, Hey, I just finally, when I worked up enough courage, I was like, I just want to let you know that there's a sledgehammer going through this wall in a couple days.

It's beautiful, I promise, but it's gotta go.

And uh I tell that story, it's a funny story, but I would say that this is the state of the church today.

When I say church, I'm talking about Big C church, Jesus' church.

Is that what we're doing is we're going around and we're beautifully executing things.

We're painting walls and we're fulfilling visions, and it's it's perfectly done.

It's we A plus, if you were to grade us.

But to be honest with you, many of those walls aren't walls that we were asked to paint, or they weren't even, they're just temporary walls that are gonna go away one day.

And then we pat ourselves on the back and we think we're fulfilling the mission of God.

And so I have to reframe us for a moment.

I'm not saying these things are bad.

Come on, the church should be uh in touch with culture, we should be relevant, but that's not the wall we're painting.

Come on, we should take care of the needy, we should help those that are in trouble and those that are put down.

That's the definition of the church, but that's not the mission.

And then maybe that feels makes you feel uncomfortable this morning.

But I want to redefine some things that maybe there's some things that we've defined as the mission that we're meant to be, just defining characteristics of who we are.

So we love people, but that's not the mission.

Okay, and so I want to go straight from the Lord's mouth.

What is the mission?

And so let's go to Matthew 28.

Come on, y'all.

It's mission Sunday.

We gotta go to the Great Commission.

Maybe you've heard it a million times, but I want to pull out some specific things this morning.

Um, and so in Matthew 28, we're gonna start reading in verse 18.

Matthew 28, 18.

To give some context, this is Jesus right at the end.

He's about to ascend and take his place on the throne.

He's about to leave his disciples and say, Okay, it's your turn.

And so he's giving some last instructions.

And so all the things that he's been talking about, he's like, Let me sum this up for you.

These this is what I need you to do.

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

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

I want to preach a message to you guys this morning called When a Mission Has a Church.

Let me pray for you.

Lord, we just thank you for your Holy Spirit, and we just invite you, Holy Spirit, to come and convict our hearts to encourage us to speak the word.

We thank you, Holy Spirit, that your job is to magnify Jesus.

And so we magnify you this morning, Jesus, and we give you this time in Jesus' name.

Amen.

You see, I want to dig into just three functions of the Great Commission.

Three things that the Great Commission should be doing and working out before our eyes.

Um I would say, even when we start to see these things come to pass, we we know we're on the right track.

And so the first one is this the Great Commission is an invitation into God's mission.

An invitation into God's mission.

I want you to see that language.

It's not an invitation into a mission or the mission or your mission.

It's really clearly put that the Great Commission is our invitation into his mission.

Amen.

And what we get mixed up sometimes is we think this mission started in Matthew 28 or Acts chapter 2 when the church was established.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

But this mission spans from the very beginning of time.

And I want you guys to see, you're gonna see that the Lord, he never asked us to do something he wasn't willing to do himself.

You see, he tells us to pick up our cross daily.

What did Jesus do?

He came and picked up the cross.

And he does the same thing with his mission.

Is if I asked in this room who the first missionary is, we'd probably come up with some great answers.

Abraham, maybe the apostles, what have you, Jesus, whatever.

But really, the first missionary was God himself.

That in the garden, when we made the wrong decision, we decided we were gonna rule and reign over our own life and decide what was good and what was evil.

He comes down from his abode in heaven and he walks in the cool of the day, in the garden, seeking, come on, Adam and Eve, who were hiding and lost in shame, broken in their sin.

And he models for us, making a way for them back into relationship with him.

It's he's the first missionary.

We serve a missionary God, and he set that heartbeat in the church and his people from the very beginning.

And it doesn't stop there, it reaches its pinnacle in Jesus.

Think about it, the King of heaven, seated on the throne, left his place, his abode, and came to ours.

From a throne to a manger, from esteem to rejected, he left his place to be in ours, and he came with a message.

He came with a declaration.

You see, you may not know this, but Jesus in the book of Mark, when he lines out really clearly as he says, hey, this is the reason I came.

When I read this verse, I was floored.

I would have filled in the blank with a million other things.

To die, to resurrect, to bring his people back to him.

You know, I would have thought of a million answers.

But Jesus doesn't say that.

Really plainly, he says, For I came to preach the good news of the kingdom.

What does that mean?

This is one of those churchy words that we see repeated over and over again.

We have them in our songs, we have them in our sermons.

Uh we I love the word kingdom, but if I was honest with you, I didn't fully know what it meant.

It just sounded cool.

Oh, I'm part of a kingdom, let's go.

It sounds manly, you know what I'm saying?

But no, the kingdom, if we just really simplify what it is, it is God's reign, so his ruling presence arriving through Jesus, renewing people in the world now with its fullness still to come.

So that's a lot of words.

What does that mean?

It's the overlap.

It's when heaven and what's allowed in heaven comes and is manifested or made known on earth.

You see, we've what we've done with the gospel at times is we put the wrong emphasis on the wrong part of the gospel.

We've taken things that are true, but we've made them the whole point.

Let me give you an example.

Who's seen the movie Finding Nemo?

Come on, I got young kids.

If I stood up here and I told you, hey, Finding Nemo is an amazing movie about a good friend that overcomes her disability and supports her friend through a hard time.

What I just told you is true.

Come on, Dory, but it's not the point.

And so it is true that if you confess Jesus is Lord, that you will receive the reward of eternal life.

You will go to heaven and be in his presence.

That is not the point of the gospel.

The point of the gospel is that Jesus took heaven and brought it to earth.

And he invites a people to be a part of it and rule and reign alongside him.

And so this is this is a shift that we're going to be talking about when it comes to the Great Commission.

Is the Great Commission isn't a thing of like one day this is going to come to pass, but it becomes an active, ongoing taking of ground in hearts for the kingdom of God.

And so we see that he does the same thing throughout history.

I'm sure there's a million theological reasons why, but I just really simply put, God has always looked for a people or a person to partner with.

And he does the same thing today is that this royal announcement that the kingdom of God is here and can be experienced on earth, he now accomplishes it through his church.

But then I want you to see the pattern because it is so beautifully put throughout scripture.

Come on, we see that it says that the Father sent Jesus to redeem you and ransom you from death.

The Father sent his son.

But then we see at the end of Jesus' ministry, he says, Hey, it's better that I go.

That's first of all, that's a crazy statement.

The God of the universe, if he would have told me, like, hey, it's better that I go, I'm like, that's not true.

Right?

But come on, he says, it's better that I go because I'm sending you a helper, the Holy Spirit.

So we see, come on, God sends Jesus, Jesus sends the Holy Spirit.

And then what does he say?

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth.

So come on, I want you to see it from the beginning.

God sends Jesus, Jesus sends the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit sends you.

We are the continuation of the work of God.

Think about the dignity that that gives you.

No matter what your problem is or was, no matter what your background is, no matter what your ethnicity is, no matter what your education is, and no matter how long you've been walking with Jesus, he's saying that I want to clothe you in power and send you to be a part of what I'm doing.

That is powerful, that's uplifting.

I see people in societies have been to places where they're so downtrodden, rejected, put down.

And then the gospel of the kingdom is proclaimed and dignity is restored, mission is released, and purpose fills that community.

Come on, God's hand comes down, and if we're willing to say yes to his mission, he lifts us up and he puts us a part of the kingdom of God.

It's incredible to see how it works out.

That he had us in mind.

And so as we explore this, I want to point this out to us.

Is yes, we see that it's an invitation into his mission, but the second thing is we see the Great Commission is the manifestation of God's kingdom.

Okay, we have some, we have a weird word.

Maybe that means a lot of things to you.

Manifestation.

What do I mean by that?

Come on, when we manifest the kingdom of God, it's when the king's decree is proclaimed and the Spirit of God makes it real.

Come on, it's not just talked about, but it's experienced.

See, manifest means the unseen thing now becomes seen through proclamation and when Jesus enacts his rule.

Okay, what do I mean by that?

We it doesn't always connect to us because we're thinking 2,000 years ahead, right?

And so when we find out things, government shutdown, how did we find out about it?

Maybe it was the news, it was Instagram, TikTok, fill in the blank.

Maybe your employer called you.

See, that's not how it worked 2,000 years ago.

But it these words, especially the reign of a new king, were always released by a herald.

And so what did that mean?

Over time, the empire, so say that Nero was killed or he he died.

So there would be a new emperor put in place, but the rest of the empire would have no idea.

And they would be operating serving the old king under his rules, under his taxes, under his ways of doing things.

And he would be dead.

There would be a new king in place.

But then the moment that a herald walked into the city, he would proclaim there's a reign of a new king.

And that that truth would now become reality.

The taxes would change, the culture would shift, everything would shift into that.

And you had a choice.

They took this moment extremely seriously.

You had a choice to either accept it and bend the knee or rebel.

And the same thing happens when we preach the gospel.

When we accept this message of the kingdom, and we begin to go and make disciples, is we are doing the same thing, is that we're tapping into this kingdom that can't be seen.

Come on, it Jesus already said it's already at hand, it's already real, but now when we proclaim it, it manifests in a place.

So what does this look like?

It looks like people getting saved.

But it also looks like, come on, people with demons getting set free.

Jesus said to the woman that was demonized after he cast the demon out, he says, For surely the kingdom of God has come upon you.

He sees the crippled woman and he heals her and he says, Surely, for the kingdom of God has passed you by.

So what is he saying in this?

That because of their proclaiming and their believing in the kingdom, in that moment his reign came into that place, and it broke the power of sickness or any demonic power or anything that is against his kingdom.

And we see the kingdom exacted in that place.

It is manifested.

We see what is to come because there's gonna be a day where that is the reality of all of earth.

That it's gonna be every people, tribe, and tongue worshiping him.

And so we see the kingdom of God is manifested.

What I want to point out in this as well is he didn't only announce it.

Y'all, we have to have a gospel of power.

We have to have a gospel that shifts realities, that opens eyes and heals bodies.

This is the full gospel.

And church, we've we've shied away from it.

And I want to call us back today, back on mission, to declaring the kingdom of God in whatever circumstance we face.

You see, I wanted to tell you a couple stories of real things that happened this year that I've seen with my own eyes.

I just this year we were in an uh Islamic country and we were in a place where if you got caught preaching the gospel, you'd be stoned to death.

And we had a witch who heard about us that we had been uh healing people and preaching the good news, and she was intrigued.

She said, you know, some of the things I'm hearing about I've never seen before.

Can you come visit me?

Okay, we're like, uh either this is a trap and this is gonna go really bad or this is gonna be really awesome.

Let's go for it.

And so we go to this lady's house, y'all, and I want you to see this.

There's no one special there, there's no person of note or notoriety, but we were being sent by the Lord, and we weren't going on our own accord, but just like he said, go therefore and make disciples, and then how does he end it?

For surely I'll be with you until the end of the age.

And so all I had to go do is go, and I knew he'd be with me.

And I'm telling you, this is the craziest thing.

But the moment we got to her house, we didn't even get to say hello yet.

We stepped across the threshold of her house, and the kingdom of God filled that room, and the demons began to screech out, and they were so terrified they were trying to run from us.

The lady that everyone was scared of was trying to run out the back window screaming.

And I'm telling you, we cast every single one of those demons out.

And Jesus got the glory in that place, and now it's an underground church of 25 people meeting every single week.

Because the kingdom of God was at hand.

Come on, in another Islamic country I was in this year, we were talking to a woman, and she was part of the sect uh there that we would consider a terrorist organization, very, very uh devout in her beliefs.

And uh I just I'll never forget it, fully covered, you could only see her eyes.

And we were trying to share the gospel with her, and as that as you would think, it wasn't going very well.

Um but then in that moment she said, I'm sorry, I can't really hear you on this side.

I'm deaf in this ear.

Could you come over to the other side?

In that exact moment, no one special, a 23-year-old girl with no theology degree, no title, just a girl that loves Jesus and knows she's sin, put her hand out and put it on her ear and said, In Jesus' name, we command that ear to open.

She didn't scream, she didn't speak in tongues, she didn't plead with God.

She commanded the ear to open.

And in that moment, we watched that girl's eyes fill with tears as she heard from her ear for the first time ever.

And we began to preach the gospel to her, and that by the end of the night, we had her in the bathtub, baptizing her, giving her.

To Jesus.

Because the kingdom of God was at hand.

But He needs a people.

He needs a people that are willing to go and forsake comfort.

And so the last thing I want to point out as we wrap up is the Great Commission is the culmination of God's kingdom.

The culmination.

What does that mean?

If we define the word culmination, it simply means the highest point or climax.

It's something coming to its completion.

And so I want to just read it straight from Jesus' mouth because he says it way better than I do.

Can we put Matthew 24, 14 up there?

Is the Great Commission not just some side quest that we're doing until Jesus decides?

See, the Great Commission, I'll even say this about end times.

When we're talking about the end of the age and Jesus coming back, people have made it weird, y'all.

You see the guy on Instagram telling you that the rapture is going to be September 23rd.

You see the guy with the giant crucifix, and he's saying, Oh, they finally did it.

They have the red heifer in Israel, and it's going to happen, and get ready, the one world system, and all this stuff.

And I just have to say, y'all, we're painting the wrong walls.

We're looking at the wrong thing.

Jesus makes it really clear what we should be looking at.

And he says this, and this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.

You see, this is what we should be looking forward to is that as we proclaim the gospel and people get saved and we reach new places, we are coming closer to the day where there'll be no more tears, there'll be no more sickness, there'll be no more human trafficking, there'll be no more hunger, there'll be no more pain.

And as you preach, you usher it in.

Look at it.

He he says, I want you to work, and then let me do what only I can do.

And we have to begin to get back on mission.

Uh I'm maybe gonna ruffle some feathers here, but uh oftentimes the way that we look at mission is like, okay, God has his church, his people, and then he gave them a mission.

Okay, I have these people, now go do this.

That is not how it played out.

I want you to look at it in scripture.

Matthew 28, he gives the mission, right?

When is the church formed?

Acts chapter 2.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

And so this isn't what God did.

He didn't say, hey, here's a little mission, go do it.

But what he did was he had a mission at hand.

And in his perfect will, in the dreams of his heart, of how he was going to accomplish this will in this mission, he said, I have to create a church.

You see, the church isn't meant to do a mission, the church is the solution to the mission.

And so if we try to exist as the church and not on mission, y'all, we are missing our identity of who he created us to be.

And then we have people, I maybe this is you, and I need you to hear, this is out of love, but this is too important.

Is we have over 3.5 billion people in the world that have never heard the gospel before, and they'll never meet another person in their immediate life to ever hear it.

And they're dying and they're going to hell.

And Jesus says there's only one way to the Father, and it's through me.

And then we have a church and we have people.

I was you sitting in the seat where God radically changed my life, radically set me free, and we're doing nothing about it.

Y'all, that's not the church of Jesus.

The church of Jesus is on mission, and our our part that we play looks different.

I'm not beating you up and saying if you're not moving to Zimbabwe or Egypt tomorrow, then you missed it.

But you have a part to play because the whole reason we exist is to complete it.

And so maybe your part to play is to give.

And it's time that you realize you are a steward in God's kingdom and you have to begin to sow into the Great Commission.

It's not an option.

This is why we exist.

Come on, and I'll just tell you, you are called to pray.

Whether you're going or giving or whatever, we are all called to pray.

He says, Ask the Lord of the harvest.

Jesus is looking out over the countryside.

It's at night, and you can see the fires in the distance of all the little villages in Galilee.

And he's overcome this language, all of it is radically like, it's like as if he's mourning, is the tense of the Greek.

And he says, this word ask that we translate is really beg or plead.

And he says, plead with the Lord of the harvest that he would send more workers out.

You see, this is what Jesus is talking about is he in this moment he's having a radical realization of his humanity.

He is one man that can go to a finite amount of places.

And what he's saying is, pray with me that you will raise up, that God will raise up millions more of me that have the Spirit of God on them and the message of the kingdom to go forth into all nations and preach it.

And in that moment, we can be the answer to Jesus' prayer.

To go and make disciples.

And so I'm going to challenge you today.

If you don't even know a name of a missionary to pray for, come on.

We've gotten off target.

We're painting the wrong walls.

If we're not sewing something in a mission, we've gotten off target.

It's time that the church rises up and takes its place in the Great Commission.

And come on, this isn't a reckless thing.

We're not just going towards the end of time recklessly until it happens, but we get to be the engine.

I want you to think about that.

Our being obedient brings about the end.

We get to be the engine of the kingdom of God being established in this earth.

And so I just want to ask you if you're willing to say, Lord, burden me for the great commission that I'm going to step into, whatever my assignment is.

I'm just going to encourage you to stand up right where you're at, and I want to pray for you.

It could look like giving, it could look like praying, going on a short-term trip, being sent full-time, whatever that looks like.

But you're saying, God, I know this matters to you.

Make it matter to me.

Amen.

This is the church of Jesus.

Come on.

God is so faithful and he touches us and he heals us and he comes into rooms just like this every single week.

But then we have to go.

And I I felt this really strongly for this service.

I have to say this as we wrap up is the nations are here in Orlando.

See that word nations isn't like what we think of when we think of a country.

But that word actually means ethnic group.

And there are ethnic groups right here in Orlando that are billions of people in the nations that they're originally from that don't even have one believer amongst them.

There are Afghan refugees right here in Orlando that have been placed here.

There are Indians from the north of India where they will live, get married, have children, and die and never meet one person that could tell them about Jesus.

And it's time that as a church we do something about it, whether here in Orlando, whereas God sends us to the ends of the earth.

And so I'm gonna pray for you.

And I believe that God's gonna give you the burden that He gave me that messed me up.

Come on.

And so, Lord, we just thank you, Lord, for your heart, Lord, for the lost.

Lord, we just repent, Lord, for where we've grown cold for those that don't know of King Jesus.

And we just say, Lord, we say yes to being the solution, whether it means giving or praying or going, Lord, we say that we're in, Lord, on your great commission.

And we believe what your word says that one day we will be one family under one banner, the banner of Jesus, and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord.

And so, God, we just give you our sacrifice.

We give you our everything, Lord, to see your kingdom come and your will be done.

In the mighty name of Jesus we pray.

Amen.

Thank you for joining us to learn more about Celebration Orlando, a church devoted to reaching the lost, equipping the found, and helping the hurting.

Follow us on social media using the handle at celebrationorl or visit our website, celebrationorl.org.