Unknown Nations

Well let's pray.

Father, we thank you that in Christ alone.

It's all about him, Father.

I pray that we would be able to do everything because of Christ.

Everything we do, everything we say would revolve around him.

Help us today as we dig into your word today, that we would be able to see your son Jesus moving in this place.

We thank you for him.

We thank you through Christ alone.

All God's people said.

Amen.

Well, today we have a real treat today.

We have Greg Kelly with us today.

And I want to say in 1998, he had this divine call from God to leave the insurance world that he was a part of and join into ministry full-time.

And now he's the CEO of Unknown Nations and just doing amazing things for the Lord.

Kelly has traveled over more than 50 different countries.

I mean, it's more than most people in a lifetime.

And he has seen different things, and he's advocating for those yet to hear and understand the gospel for the very first time.

He's a Western Michigan University grad, and he was in 1991, he was rooted as the MVP of the team, and so he's a big-time football player.

His love for Christ and his family, including his wife Kathy, and kids and grandchildren, bring him immense joy.

He loves golf, snowboarding, college football, and family activities are all of his interests.

Greg and Kathy reside in Byron Center, Michigan.

Can we give him a nice warm pinwater welcome here this morning?

Thanks, buddy.

Thank you so much.

Pastor Matt, thank you.

Hey, it's good to be here with everybody.

I did it uh in the first service, and maybe I suspect you guys are uh similar.

Anyone curious what position I played at Western Michigan?

Any Bronco fans in here?

Any Bronco fans?

Oh, run mate.

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

Blah blah blah, blah blah dum for Western.

Take it like there we go.

All right, I was just testing you.

If you don't know the fight song, you're not really a Bronco.

So position.

Anyone want to take a guess?

What position?

Little guy like me, like what was that?

Okay, ready.

Yeah, yeah.

Okay.

I'll I'll I'll I'll I'll take away all the uh the drama here at the moment.

Middle linebacker.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, that's a little little nutty up there.

The white my first year there, the wide receivers would would line up on the sidelines and watch me.

Because you know, if you're a linebacker, that means at some point in your career you were on the kickoff team.

You know, you were you're running down.

And I just loved being the wedge breaker.

I love that.

There's three guys lined up in the middle, and I just wanted to go blow them up.

I that's I was a little bit off up here.

So you might feel a little bit out of that in my preaching, but anyway, football teaches you so many wonderful life lessons.

Uh a privilege to be here.

Uh in December, Kath and I will celebrate 35 years of marriage.

So we are very yeah, yeah, yeah.

So the the miracle person who would stay with me for 35 years is here.

Kath, would you wave at everybody?

Kind of there she is right there in the flesh.

So we have five children and uh four littles.

So I'll I'll give you a little insight.

Any grandparents uh here?

Yeah, yeah, you guys know what I'm talking about, what I'm gonna say.

It sounds crazy.

And the first time I heard this, I was like, they said, once you have grandkids, you'll still love your children.

But and I was like, wow, that's kind of harsh.

And now that I have grandkids, I totally know what they're talking about.

Like I got five kids or whatever, but I want to know what Lucy and Carter are doing.

So we we went uh to John Ball Park, uh the zoo there, and Kath and I take Lucy in there, and we went to the Red Panda exhibit.

Has anyone seen the red panda exhibit at John Ball?

It's a it's a yes, yeah, they're so cute, these little things in there, and you're in there.

But I'm telling you, when you walk out of the red panda exhibit, there's this magnetic attraction.

Moms, it doesn't hit moms, it doesn't hit grandmas.

It's a magnetic pole that only the kids and the paws are pulled towards.

It's called the souvenir stand.

You know what I'm talking about?

It's the souvenir stand.

And you know, pa's like Lucy, I'm like, whatever you want, Lucy, I'm like, buy you anything.

I want this and that.

Kathy's like, don't do it, you know, and she gets all these different things.

So uh I got the the greatest compliment of a few weeks after that.

Kathy, uh grandma, and and and my daughter Anna, they're they're talking to each other and they're you know back and forth and looking at me, and and I'm like, what?

What did I do?

What did I do?

And and they said, Kathy's uh and Anna are like, Dad, we've come to the conclusion you can never take Lucy to Costco, ever.

So I'm like, that's probably a good idea.

That's probably a good idea.

So anyway, we are privileged and blessed to be uh here in West Michigan, and uh it's been a joy.

This is my 30th year serving as the leader at Unknown Nations, and I'm gonna give you a couple of scriptures paired together, like who are these guys, Unknown Nations?

Where does that come from?

The first scripture I'm gonna share with you is one that you'd think the body of Christ would be more familiar with.

Because after all, it's the last thing Jesus said.

It's Jesus' instruction to the church.

It's literally the end of the gospel of Matthew.

Matthew 28, verses 18 through 20, where Jesus gave us, yeah, the the disciples were there, but he gave us the instructions.

Matthew 28:18–20

He said, All authority in heaven and earth is given to me.

Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey all I have commanded.

And surely I'll be with you always, even to the ends of the ages.

Might drop.

End of the Gospel of Matthew.

What's that called?

The Great Commission.

I love to quote that in the presence of followers of Jesus, because it I think we need to be challenged a little bit to look at that instruction and say, how am I doing with that?

How am I stewarding that?

Because Barner Research did a study around 2020.

Now they are a very credible sort of research entity helping us kind of know what's going on and what the priorities are and so forth.

And they did a study on the Great Commission, Burner Research.

And what that study uncovered was that 51% of a majority of churchgoers had no idea what the Great Commission was.

That doesn't mean 49% were intimately committed to it and understanding it or being missionaries, or it doesn't mean that.

It just means that they had no idea, guys.

That's that's sort of an indictment on us.

And I and I think as a church, now you guys talk about missions a lot.

I've been around you guys, I know Pastor Matt's heart.

You guys are different, but I'm just saying the body as a whole, that's the reality for it.

And I love the the part of the Great Commission where Jesus said, make disciples of all what nations.

That's right.

And you know what?

Quite honestly, we've kind of missed it there, just at a basic level, because we've looked at that and we've said, well, yeah, Uganda, you know, Canada, China, uh, you know, Yugoslavia, Indonesia, whatever.

Jesus never meant country when he said nations.

I mean, we're just celebrating our 250th year, right?

He couldn't have meant country because most of them didn't even exist and he didn't.

Because the word nations there in the Great Commission is the Greek word ethne or ethnos, which translates to people groups.

That's the target.

It's not 195 countries, it's over 17,000 nations or people groups.

One of the countries we're gonna speak about this morning that you guys are a big part of is Nigeria, which is one country with over 400 nations inside of it, including the Igbo, Fulani, Yoruba, Hausa, and Kanuri.

Anyone ever heard of those?

That sounds like good pizza topping, right?

From the local pizza shop.

Those are nations.

The five largest nations, mind you, inside of the country of Nigeria.

Now, if I said, hey, we're gonna do a cool mission project among the Yoruba, we're gonna do an outreach among the Yoruba in Nigeria.

That sounds pretty exotic, doesn't it?

But if we peel back the onion a little bit and ask ourselves one important question, I mean, after all, Jesus said, Go make disciples of all nations, not just some, right?

He said, Go make disciples of all nations.

And we get a visual from John in Revelation that said, around the throne will be participation and people from every tribe, every tongue, and every nation.

Do we not?

So we know it's important, the condition, the spiritual condition of the nations.

We need to peel back the onion and ask ourselves that question.

So back to your assignment.

You're going to the Yoruba, way to go, to do a mission project.

Guess what?

The Yoruba are more Christian than the Bible Belt in America, as well as the Igbo.

However, the Hausa, Knuri, and Fulani are 99.9% Muslim.

This project that you guys are working on, you're sending these audio Bibles.

Guess where you're sending them to?

The Hausa, the Kanuri, and the Fulani.

That's where you're sending them to.

So nations, unknown nations.

The other, the other scripture I want to share with you that will give you insight of who we are is we heard about Jesus' assignment.

Now let's talk about Paul's mission statement.

How cool is that?

I mean, when you're talking about missions and you say, hey, my the my mentor said, Greg, if you want to be successful, follow someone who's been successful.

That's that's good, that's good wisdom, isn't it?

No matter what you're doing.

Well, hey, if you're in missions and you want to be successful, who are you gonna follow?

Of course, Jesus.

But how about Paul?

You know, arguably the greatest missionary in history.

And if I said I know his mission statement, wouldn't you be like, ooh, tell me it?

We're gonna talk about that.

That's in Romans chapter 15 and verse 20.

Romans 15 · chapter mention

Where Paul said, It's my ambition to preach the gospel where Christ is not known, rather than on another's foundation.

That means Paul was drawn to darkness, doesn't it?

He was going places where Christ was not known and sharing the good news of Jesus Christ.

So a church could be established, leaders could be raised up and mentored and multiplying, as Paul would say, I need to go where Christ is not known, and off he would go to the next assignment of darkness and do the same thing over.

Unknown nations, including places.

There's a there's a photo here of a visual of the places, and for the last 30 years, we've been building infrastructure in this area.

It's called the 1040 window.

You'll see the slide of it as it as it pops up that shows us what our aim is.

So the aim for us as an organization is places that are zero access.

What does zero access really mean?

Zero access means that from cradle to grave, you will never encounter Christianity.

That's what zero access means.

No one's making it a priority.

These are places that are barrier-ridden, spiritually antagonistic, spoken, word-dependent.

That means they're not just illiterate in many instances, but these guys are oral learners, which means I prefer to learn in a non-literate way, which is gonna get you really excited here in just a moment.

There's no pastors, no Bibles.

They've never met a Christian.

As I said, they've never heard the name of Jesus, and they're less than 2% followers of Jesus.

Places in the world like northern Nigeria.

Oh, let's talk about that project.

So proud of you guys, as you guys are leaning into this project to go to a place.

You ready for this?

That is probably, not probably, I think statistics would support what I'm about to say.

The most dangerous place in the world, northern Nigeria.

How can you say that, Greg?

Because more followers of Jesus are killed simply for saying, yes, I'm a follower of Jesus, than the rest of the world combined.

A study was done a year ago that found 72% of the people around the world that were killed for simply saying I'm a Christian.

It took place in northern Nigeria, distinguished from southern Nigeria.

That gets us back to this concept of it's not about country, it's about nations.

Because there's a hundred million Christians in the country of Nigeria, where do you suppose they all are?

Mainly in the south, among the nations, the Yoruba and the Igbo.

Praise God for it.

I'm not knocking that at all.

I'm just simply telling you that if southern Nigeria is more Christian than Birmingham, Alabama, and the northern part and Kano and a place called Yola and other places like that, 99 out of 100 people, not only are they not Christians, they've never heard of Jesus.

Excuse me, where's the priority?

In the north, among the Fulani and the house on the Kenora.

That's where you guys are sending these audio Bibles.

You see this photo here of a listening group.

A listening group in northern Nigeria.

What are they doing there?

They've got this, they're oral learners.

Again, spoken word-dependent people.

They're sitting there listening to the word of God on something called the treasure that you guys are in that photo.

You guys are in that photo.

That photo doesn't happen.

And so you you see this and you're like, man, Greg, that's really cool in Africa.

But what happens when it runs out of battery, right?

I don't see it plugged into anything.

They go down to the you know, the the recent uh, you know, store, grocery store.

Is there a Walgreens there?

No, no, no, there's not.

On the back of it, there's a solar panel.

Isn't that cool?

So it just keeps on going and going.

Now we have done studies on this.

So you just need to know this because it's solar powered, it works everywhere in the world except for West Michigan in January and February.

It just we can't get it to go, Pastor.

I don't know what it is, but anyway, this guy is in all these different languages, including this one right here, it's Hausa.

Hausa.

So you'll play that.

I know Pastor Matt, he's gonna share that with you, but that it plays their language so they gather around and they listen and they hear the word of God.

That is one of the weapons, right?

I mean, when you're talking about such a hostile place, it seems like we would need a strategy.

Guys, I am telling you, when Jesus said, Go make disciples, you need two things.

Just don't show up, snap your fingers, and say, Let's go make a disciple.

And I would, I'm pretty sure that in your fellowship right here, you would follow these.

You need a local church, right?

You need the presence of the body.

You also need the word of God if you're gonna make disciples.

And so this solar-powered audio Bible will go in there, but there's something else that you need to do what we are doing together.

It's not just the scripture.

There's something I think that's maybe just as important, if you will, because someone has to deliver that, and it takes an attitude inside that person.

It takes a certain attitude.

I mean, if you're gonna go, and don't get me wrong, we're not gonna do an altar call and ask people who wants to sign up and get a visa and go to, we're not gonna send anyone there, but I'm telling you, your role is just as important as these brave men and women who will be distributing the auto Bible.

But all of us can have the same attitude.

I've looked through scripture for like what is evidence of this attitude, Lord, and I believe it's found in Acts chapter 20 and verse 24, where we see Paul revealing this attitude.

Acts 20 · chapter mention

And this is what he said.

But my life is worth nothing to me unless I use it for finishing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus, the work of telling others the good news about the wonderful grace of God.

Friends, we are not just called to be passive participants in this assignment of making disciples of all nations.

I believe we are called to finish.

But it's gonna take something inside of us to have that sort of attitude in order to do that.

And it's it's this right here.

And Paul says, Are you kidding me?

My my life is worth nothing?

Like that seems like a crazy statement, especially for a guy that we so highly esteem in the body of Christ.

He's saying his life is worth nothing.

Oh, don't miss the understanding of that.

Paul's not saying he hated his life.

Far from it.

Paul understood he had a role to play.

But what it reveals is it means that he realized his life belonged to someone else.

It wasn't about Paul's agenda, as brilliant of a guy as he was.

It wasn't about Paul's agenda, Paul's ideas, Paul's vision.

He understood he was surrendered to Jesus' agenda.

Romans 14 and 8 is a powerful scripture.

This whole idea of your life is in your own.

I mean, that's kind of audacious, isn't it?

Guys, when you signed up and you said yes to this thing called Christianity, your life became someone else's.

Who happened to give everything?

Jesus didn't just give table scraps, he didn't give a little bit.

Guys, he gave everything for you and for me to deploy in this one life as we apply it.

Here's a scripture in Romans 14, 8.

It says, if we live, we live for the Lord.

And if we die, we die for the Lord.

So whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.

You've been bought.

You've been bought.

And I promise you, the price was high.

It was high and it was understood.

And as you're deployed, you're gonna have this understanding of, yeah, it's his agenda, it's his priority, it's his assignment, but you also have this understanding of guess what?

What's the impact of one life?

Yes, we are the body of Christ and we work together.

But guys, as we understand this idea of the impact and the possibilities of one life, it changes everything.

When we don't put ourselves, uh, when we don't bottle ourselves up and say, Well, I'm too young, I'm too old, I just say came to know Jesus.

I really haven't been a steward of the Word of God like I can.

When you said yes to Jesus and got filled with the Holy Spirit, that's the only ingredient you need to understand this.

And what it says in Ephesians 2 and 10, it says, We are God's masterpiece.

He has created us anew in Christ Jesus so we can do the good things He planned for us long ago.

You know, He's got great things planned for you and for me.

Yes, these people in northern Nigeria, you could look at it and say, Well, they got the heavy lift, Greg.

I mean, they're they're they're facing the tip of the spear.

I think the Lord's looking down at his children and going, I'm proud of my children who are facing adversity like I did.

After all, they said Jesus, then he said, Hey, they're gonna hate you.

They hated me, so why are you surprised they're gonna hate you too?

It's but they and he's gonna look at you and say, Wow, you put this in their hand.

I'm proud of you too.

It's all about that life, that understanding of what one life can do.

And I would argue that the life that's the most dangerous is the one that's surrendered completely.

It's hard to argue with that, isn't it?

And and Paul again captures the essence of this in 2 Corinthians chapter 12 and 9, and he said, My grace is sufficient for you, and my power is made perfect in weakness.

2 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses so that Christ's power may rest on me.

It's easy to look 2,000 years ago and we see the life of Jesus.

And then we look at the life of Paul, we say, okay, yeah.

But sometimes we can get a little detached from that because it's so far ago.

Let me tell you about a guy who understood this, a missionary in the late 1600s.

His name was William Carey.

He had the subtitle of being known as the father of modern missions.

How cool is that! All of us have kind of a DNA connection, if you will, to William Carey.

Who was that guy?

Well, he translated the Bible into dozens, not one language, dozens of.

I was actually in Bangladesh.

One of my favorite pictures internationally is this image of William Carey, because he had such an impact in that part of the world, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, that area.

And it's like, there's William Carey, and I'm like, Stan, I'm like, oh my gosh.

I mean, it's just a mural of him or whatever, but it was such a powerful monument and reminder.

He established educational institutions, pioneered campaigns for human rights in India.

He stood up against this demonic thing in India called Sati.

Sati, it essentially was this idea that widows would be burned alive.

They'd literally throw their bodies on the cremation of their husband to demonstrate, yeah, I'm a faithful, I'm a faithful woman, a faithful wife.

Can you imagine that?

Sati, demonic.

And William Carey stood up against that, including all kinds of other atrocities that were embedded in their culture.

That was William Carey.

I mean, what a resume this guy had.

Yet, on that man's tombstone, read these words A wretched, poor, and helpless worm.

On thy kind arms I fall.

Guys, that's someone who understood it.

Who got it?

It's not about me.

Lord, your strength through me.

That's the key.

This surrendered life is everything, and the people in Northern Nigeria that we are partnering together, they also get that.

They they understand this idea of being surrendered, the attitude.

They, I mean, they live there.

How cool is that?

You guys don't have to worry about getting a visa.

Worry if your passport's expired or not.

No, no, no.

But we have an equal role.

They're there.

And this photo uh shows another visual of the people.

Yes, even, I mean, there's men, there's women, there's children, they're all sharing the audio Bible with people who are hearing their ears, our virgin ears, hearing the good news of Jesus Christ for the first time in their lives.

But they also have one more thing.

There's one more thing that they have that I think the Lord is speaking to us even this morning about are you surrendered?

What does the heart look like?

Whether you're in Nigeria or here in Pentwater or you're from Grand Rapids or Chicago, I don't know where you're from.

That's not the important part.

What is, is this.

Whether you're in Northern Ontario or not, is it surrendered?

Is it all in?

And the final thing that I think these guys get is this sense of urgency.

I'm convinced that we can be the generation that fulfills the Great Commission.

I really am.

I think there's something missing though.

Because I've run across this, I've talked to people, and oh my gosh, Greg, you've been doing it 30 years, and you're doing this and that, and that's great.

Here's what I think.

I think when the Spirit of God calls, I think too few of his children respond with urgency.

I think we're busy.

I think we got stuff going on.

Good things.

Good things, don't get me wrong.

Pastor Matt and I were talking before we came out, and we were both sharing the same sentiment.

The thing that's going to separate and determine how well you stewarded Jesus' last words is how well did you say no to good things?

We're all busy, guys.

We're all busy doing good things.

But what's the one thing?

The one thing is the most important thing.

And it's being available.

And finally, this idea of living with urgency because those two things tie together.

Living a life on point and being available and doing it urgently, they go hand in hand.

And scripture in John chapter 9 and verse 4 says we must quickly carry out the task assigned us by the one who sent us.

John 9 · chapter mention

The night is coming, and then no one can work.

I don't know when your night is, but I do know this.

There's not a single person in this room guaranteed to see the sunrise tomorrow.

I can promise you that.

Not one of us.

And so when we're living this one life, we are stewarding the most important.

What does that look like?

And I think just asking the Lord, how do I live with a sense of urgency in Ephesians 5 and verse 15 and 16 says, but be very careful then how you live.

Not as unwise, but as wise, making the most of every opportunity.

This is an opportunity.

Because the days are evil.

Let me just dream with you as we're closing here, just a little bit, because it's easy.

That's so far away.

Let me instill something inside of you that I pray gives you faith.

We know the word will not return void.

We send these in there, we know it will.

There will be sacrifice and commitment required to have that happen.

But let me just instill something inside of you that's way more recent.

One of the participants of this project on the other side, he was in a meeting like this a number of years ago.

And a missionary came.

Remember, it's not about country, it's about the nations.

And this missionary came in and he said, friends, there's a people group, nation, called the coma, K O M A.

And they live up in the Atlantica Mountains, and we don't know of a single Christian among them.

Not one.

Someone needs to go to the Coma.

They they look like cavemen.

I mean, they're like 200 years back in history.

They come now, most of the women don't have any clothes on, just little grass skirts.

They scurry down to the market, do a few transactions, and they scurry back up to the top of the Atlantica Mountains.

Someone needs to go.

And my friend, my best friends in the year, he was in that meeting.

Great government job.

He was busy.

He was busy.

He had a family.

Great job.

But this idea of urgency and surrender just overcame him.

And in that moment, he walked to the front and he said, I will go.

And everybody erupted in applause and, like, praise God, here's someone who's going to the coma.

And the missionary, after the applause, stopped, he goes, Oh, he goes, Minor detail.

I am sorry, I forgot to mention this.

Among the coma.

Also, not only do they not know Jesus, but as far as we know, again, a minor detail, they're cannibals.

Lovely, lovely.

My friend's still with us today.

Safe to say that was an urban legend, but they didn't know Jesus and they were hostile.

And he lived among them for three years.

One life.

Surrendered with an incredible sense of urgency, lived there for three years.

And today I could take you to the base of the Atlantica Mountains, nearby where we are going to do our project together.

And in every direction, you see settlements of coma that have come down from the mountains who are 100% Christian.

They're sending missionaries now, the coma.

I'm not satisfied with the house and the Fulani and the Kenori, just hearing about Jesus.

I see the day where they're sending missionaries out among neighboring majority Muslim people groups.

That's what we need inside of us, guys.

And that is our opportunity.

What a precious Lord we serve.

Guys, it's possible.

And it can happen right here from Pentwater.

Let's pray.

Lord, we're grateful for our opportunity to serve you and steward this assignment.

There's 300 faithful men and women, indigenous missionaries, ready to receive like a catcher, a pitcher's throw.

Lord, will we encourage them?

Will we send treasures, Lord?

I pray that this morning we're living with a sense of surrender, with a sense of urgency.

And Lord, whatever we do and however we apply, I pray you would get all the honor and glory in that northern Nigeria will say yes to Jesus and we'll give you praise for it all.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

God bless you, friends.

Amen.

Thank you, Greg.

Thank you.

You know, there's an old story about this rope.

You think of a rope and we throw it out, we could put someone at the end of this rope and they're going off a clip.

Imagine they're they're jumping off of the cliff.

They're going to need someone to hold on to the rope, right?

And some people, they're called to go, and there's some people who are called to not let go, both of which are super important in our lives.

Some are called to go, some are called to stay and pray.

They're called to stay and encourage, and they're called to pray for the individual, or necessarily even give to the project, so that the person on the end of the rope can keep on doing the work that God's called them to go and do.

Both of which are super important roles in our lives.

Some are called to go, and some are called to not let go.

And we've been in the series in Philippians, joy in the journey.

Joy in knowing Christ, joy in serving Christ, joy in living for Christ.

And there's another thing that Paul mentions, and it's later in the book of Philippians, in Philippians chapter 4, there's joy and giving together.

Philippians 4 · chapter mention

Philippians 4 10 says, I rejoice greatly in the Lord.

That at last you renewed your concern for me.

Indeed, you were concerned, but you had no opportunity to show it.

The Philippian church had come alongside this apostle Paul.

They prayed, they supported this man, they gave, they held on to their rope.

They knew that Paul was called to go.

And they knew they were called to not let go.

This little church in Philippi.

And Jesus, when we look at the example of Jesus and this Jesus that Paul describes in the book of Philippians, we see that Jesus gave everything.

Jesus joyfully gave himself for all of us.

When Jesus gathered with his disciples around the table, they took bread in 1 Corinthians 11 24.

It says this, this is my body, which is for you.

Do this in remembrance of me.

Those words are for you.

You think about that.

For you.

Before God even asked us to give anything that God gave.

He gave first.

Before we ever gave, Jesus gave.

And when we're taking communion today, you think of the bread, you think of the body that was crushed for our sins.

You think of the things that Jesus did for us.

His body was crushed for you, 100% him.

Jesus carried our sin.

Jesus died in our place.

Jesus made forgiveness possible.

He says, This is my body, which is for you.

Because Jesus gave us, we joyfully can give together.

Because the King of Kings gave, we can joyfully give together.

Listen to what Paul says about the church in Philippi.

He says in Philippians 4, verse 15, and you Philippians yourselves know that in the beginning of the gospel, when I left Macedonia, no church entered partnership with me and giving and receiving except you only.

Philippians 4:15

Even in Thessalonica, you sent me help for my needs once again.

I love that picture.

You see, they couldn't go with him.

They couldn't travel everywhere that Paul was going, but they knew they had a responsibility as a church.

They had to hold on.

Paul was sent to go, and they were sent to not let go.

And this summer project is an opportunity where we get to put this little treasure in the hands of individuals who have never heard the gospel.

At 1040 window.

They've never heard the gospel, nor could they read the gospel.

They don't even have literary, they can't even understand how to read.

And this thing, all you gotta do is push on.

So it turns on.

Let's see if we get it to turn it on.

Here we go.

And then listen to the language here.

The battery never runs out, it's solar powered, and they'll be able to hear the gospel for the very first time.

It's a simple way to give.

We see that God is moving in Pentwater.

Those eight individuals who got baptized, we see locally giving to Love Inc.

and seeing what God's doing in that ministry.

Now we're able to go from Pentwater beyond and share the gospel.

People who've never even heard the gospel before.

We have the opportunity to give all that we can give and hold on to the side of this rope.

Maybe God's called you to go.

Or maybe God's calling you, hey, don't let go.

What has God called you to do?

Philippians 4.18 says, I have received full payment and more.

I am well supplied, having received from Aphrodite the gifts you sent, a fragment offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God.

The Apostle Paul even says, Thank you.

It's like a this uh fragment that you guys have given in this offering, the sacrifice they're giving was worship.

This church in Philippi, he never forgot, even though he was in a Roman prison.

And he never forgot them.

And Jesus, when he got to the point where he was dying in our place, he says in 1 Corinthians 11 25, this cup is the new covenant, my blood.

This due in remembrance of me.

Remember what I gave.

I gave everything.

I gave my body, and my blood washes away your sin.

We have to ask ourselves, Jesus, have I lost the joy of what you've given me?

The book of Philippians is all about joy.

Have we lost this joy that Jesus has given us?

Jesus, have I lost that, Lord?

How do you want me to participate in what you're doing?

Joy in the journey.

Joy in the journey.

There is joy in giving our lives away for something bigger than ourselves.

We heard of that from Greg, that missionary, who had done that very thing.

In this communion, we can remember Jesus gave us everything.

He couldn't give much more than his life.

And he gave us eternal life for those who receive Christ.

Jesus will use us.

He'll use our prayers.

He'll use our resources, our gifts, our encouragement to not let go.

And to send others who are called to go.

Father, we thank you for giving us your very best, your son Jesus.

We thank you for the gifts you've given our church.

And you're using this little church in Pentwater, and people are like, Where is this church?

They keep on blessing different people in the community and different things that keep on happening.

Father, thank you for that.

May it be said of us that we were alongside those who were called to go, and we as a church did not let go.

We held on through prayer, through giving, through encouragement for those who are called to go.

And not only did we do that, but we sent those who were called to go.

Father, may we follow your son, Jesus' example, and learn that our lives are not our own.

When we give our lives to Christ, we have given everything, and we need to give everything to him.

So we thank you for Jesus who gave us the perfect example.

And today, Father, may we never lose sight of what your son did for us.

May we remember Jesus.

And all God's people said.

Amen.

If you have your communion elements, let's take the first part.

Remember what Jesus did for us, a sacrifice of his body on our behalf.

Let's partake in the bread together.

And let's partake in the blood that was shed for each and every one of us.

Jesus gave all.

Let's partake in the cup.

Amen.

Why don't we stand together and continue in our worship and reflect on what Christ has done for us?