SPEAKER_00: Would you rather be given 1 million dollars or one penny doubled every day for 30 days?
SPEAKER_00: You remember this question from math class, right?
SPEAKER_00: This is when we all learned the power of compound interest and exponential growth.
SPEAKER_00: At the end of 30 days, that doubled penny becomes just over five million dollars.
SPEAKER_00: Turns out, the same concept applies to missions.
SPEAKER_00: Imagine you filled a football stadium with 100,000 people for a gospel outreach event, and 20% of them came to know Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That day, 20,000 people would come into the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: If you did that every day for a year, over 7 million people would come to faith.
SPEAKER_00: That sounds pretty great, right?
SPEAKER_00: Here's the question though.
SPEAKER_00: If you kept that pace of 7 million people each year, how long would it take to reach the world's population of 8 billion people?
SPEAKER_00: Over 1,000 years.
SPEAKER_00: 1,095 to be exact.
SPEAKER_00: A 100,000-person outreach event every day for a thousand years?
SPEAKER_00: From a pure number standpoint, mass evangelism will not reach the world for Christ in our lifetime.
SPEAKER_00: What about a different strategy inspired by that original math problem?
SPEAKER_00: Instead of preaching to 100,000 people every day, suppose you made one disciple each year, focused on their development, and equipped them to make their own new disciple every year.
SPEAKER_00: At the end of the first year, you would have two followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: You and your disciple.
SPEAKER_00: At the end of the second year, you would have four.
SPEAKER_00: Eight the third year, sixteen the fourth, and so on.
SPEAKER_00: Thirty-two, sixty-four, one twenty-eight.
SPEAKER_00: How many years would it take to disciple the world using this strategy?
SPEAKER_00: Thirty-four years.
SPEAKER_00: Do the math.
SPEAKER_00: Something profound happens when we take a multiplication mindset.
SPEAKER_00: In the Great Commission, Jesus tells us to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: He continues by instructing us to teach those disciples to obey everything he commanded us.
SPEAKER_00: What was his final command?
SPEAKER_00: Go and make disciples.
SPEAKER_00: So our role is to make disciples that obey the command to make disciples that obey the command to make disciples.
SPEAKER_00: We're to go to all nations and make disciple-making disciples.
SPEAKER_00: That's multiplication.
SPEAKER_00: Reach the few in order to reach the many.
SPEAKER_00: What if you didn't feel the burden to preach to an entire village or city or country?
SPEAKER_00: But instead we're faithful to the simple multiplication principles of the Great Commission.
SPEAKER_00: The entire world could be discipled in our generation if we started with just one.
SPEAKER_00: What about you?
SPEAKER_00: How might God want you to be involved in making disciples that make disciples?
SPEAKER_00: And seeing movements of Jesus among every tribe, tongue, people, and nation?
SPEAKER_00: Would you rather fill a stadium every day for the next thousand years or commit to making one disciple this year?
SPEAKER_00: Let's do this together until all have heard, starting with discipling one.
SPEAKER_00: So, who's your one?
SPEAKER_03: Who's your one?
SPEAKER_03: We've talked about this so many times, and uh, and I love Mission Sunday because we get to bring up a common topic and try to take a look at it from a little different perspective.
SPEAKER_03: And I'm so glad that you guys are here this morning.
SPEAKER_03: If you don't know me, my name is Chad.
SPEAKER_03: I'm the missions pastor here at FBC.
SPEAKER_03: Uh I love the role because I get to do, I think, the funnest things in the church.
SPEAKER_03: I get to encourage people to go and do the things that God's calling them to do.
SPEAKER_03: And uh, and really, this is an amazing church to get to be a part of a community like that.
SPEAKER_03: If you see people wandering today wearing all the blue shirts, uh, they represent people who are going on mission trips this summer or participated already in the mission trip this year.
SPEAKER_03: Uh, you heard Daniel in the video talk about this year we have 160 people signed up to go on mission trips, and those are the ones we plan for.
SPEAKER_03: In addition to that, I hear almost every week of another couple or another family or another ministry that's going somewhere and doing something that we haven't planned for.
SPEAKER_03: And it's overwhelming for me to try to keep up with and understand all that God's doing internationally through our church, not to mention locally.
SPEAKER_03: You heard about over 200 volunteers here for Starlight Ball.
SPEAKER_03: I hear about people who are serving in all the different ministries we partner with, from Meadowlands Ministry to uh Hill Country Pregnancy Care Center to Hill Country Daily Bread.
SPEAKER_03: Over and over and over again, I hear stories about you serving within our community, and it's such an encouraging thing to know that our community is extremely connected to what God's doing and God's moving around us here locally and domestically, and of course around the world as well.
SPEAKER_03: And so today, what I want to do is I want to push you just a little bit more.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe you're on the edge, maybe you've wondered if God has a purpose for you.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe you wondered, do I really have a seat in this place?
SPEAKER_03: And I want to tell you, I can't say it anymore.
SPEAKER_03: The video made a good, good, good goal of this, but we need the whole church to do the things that God has called his church to be a part of.
SPEAKER_03: We cannot do it without you.
SPEAKER_03: There are some churches seem to approach uh ministry like this, like you hire staff to take care of it, but really I want you to know in our church, we see that you've hired us to equip you to do the work that God's calling you to do.
SPEAKER_03: It's not just my work or Jason's work or Daniel's or Mark's or any of the many people who serve.
SPEAKER_03: It's gonna take all of us to accomplish the goal.
SPEAKER_03: And I want to tell you that's a global statement.
SPEAKER_03: It's gonna take the whole church of God, which goes far beyond First Baptist Bernie, to meet the entire needs of a world made by God.
SPEAKER_03: Do you know that?
SPEAKER_03: But we can start with those who God's put in front of us, and our job is to equip you.
SPEAKER_03: And so I want to start with this beautiful verse today out of John 17.
SPEAKER_03: John 17, he uh Jesus prays for his disciples.
SPEAKER_03: And uh he says in verse 18, as you have sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.
SPEAKER_03: I want to stop.
SPEAKER_03: Uh you can see all through uh if you if you get emails from different missionary groups, if you if you've heard us talk, there's a word we call it send with a D at the end, S-C-N-D.
SPEAKER_03: And I got frustrated with it recently because send is such a passive thing.
SPEAKER_03: It's like it's like for us to say, what are you calling me to do, God?
SPEAKER_03: And you're like, I'm gonna send someone else.
SPEAKER_03: Uh it's like outsourcing the work that God has put on our hearts.
SPEAKER_03: And it doesn't mean that our as sent ones, we don't have an opportunity to send others.
SPEAKER_03: We definitely do, but I don't want you to bypass the very real truth that God has called you to be sent.
SPEAKER_03: Not somebody else, not a professional.
SPEAKER_03: He's called you.
SPEAKER_03: If you follow Jesus, you're a sent one.
SPEAKER_03: That doesn't mean you don't have a role in sending others, but Jesus said, As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.
SPEAKER_03: He continues in verse 20.
SPEAKER_03: My prayer is not for them alone.
SPEAKER_03: I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message.
SPEAKER_03: I love this because you're some of the generations of faithful who will come as a result of the disciples sharing the faith that they've gained from Jesus.
SPEAKER_03: We're part of that.
SPEAKER_03: If you follow the chain down through history, God has been moving throughout the last 2,000 years to draw the nations to himself.
SPEAKER_03: And we're some of that fruit.
SPEAKER_03: You and I who love Jesus and follow him, we're some of the ones who God has called, and some who will believe through the message of the apostles.
SPEAKER_03: So keep going, verse 21, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
SPEAKER_03: I love this that Jesus even puts an emphasis on the fact that our being one in Christ is what will draw the nations, draw the very world into relationship with him.
SPEAKER_03: There's one more verse at the end here.
SPEAKER_03: It says, Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
SPEAKER_03: I love that you said that, brother.
SPEAKER_03: This is a good place for an amen.
SPEAKER_03: As we love each other, as we're following Jesus with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, the world sees him in us and seeks him.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: We're sent one.
SPEAKER_03: So wherever you go from one day to the next, God has a purpose and a plan.
SPEAKER_03: I would say that if you're alive, hopefully you're all alive.
SPEAKER_03: If you're alive, then God has a purpose for your being here.
SPEAKER_03: And we're gonna talk a little bit.
SPEAKER_03: There are times in our lives when we might feel like we're just far from what God wants.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe we're not able to do the things he's called us to do.
SPEAKER_03: But even in those moments, he has a purpose.
SPEAKER_03: You know, this isn't new, this is a pattern that God's been pursuing throughout history.
SPEAKER_03: He is a God who sends his people.
SPEAKER_03: You go all the way back to Genesis chapter 1, or sorry, chapter 12, verses 1 through 3, when he calls Abraham.
SPEAKER_03: He says, Go from your land, from your father's house to the place that I will show you.
SPEAKER_03: If you remember later, he says, I'll curse those who curse you and bless those who bless you.
SPEAKER_03: And it says, All the peoples of the earth will be blessed through you.
SPEAKER_03: That verse is talking about the blessing that that comes through the Abrahamic line that ends up in the person of Jesus and makes that grace, that blessing known to all the peoples of the earth.
SPEAKER_03: There's so many examples of sent and being sent in the scripture.
SPEAKER_03: You can think about Isaiah, who says, Here I am, Lord, send me.
SPEAKER_03: Or you might think of the study we just did on Jonah, a very unwilling sent one, right?
SPEAKER_03: He really didn't like the fact that he was being sent, but he got sent anyway.
SPEAKER_03: And the results of it, even in his extremely frustrated position, was that the Nedvites came to faith in God.
SPEAKER_03: You've heard us quote the Great Commission so many times when Jesus says, All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.
SPEAKER_03: Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey all that I've commanded you.
SPEAKER_03: He says, I am with you always to the very end of the age.
SPEAKER_03: It starts with his command and it ends with his presence.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: It's all in him.
SPEAKER_03: It's his authority and his presence that drives us out as sent ones, but it's him, it's he that we carry.
SPEAKER_03: Often we think of those who have been sent as someone who has a special calling, maybe some unique gift.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe they're unusually close to God.
SPEAKER_03: They're called to be professional ministers.
SPEAKER_03: We may be pastors, or you might think of missionaries, maybe someone that leads a nonprofit that's faith-based.
SPEAKER_03: You think, man, these people, all they do every day is seek God and do what he says.
SPEAKER_03: That's an amazing thing.
SPEAKER_03: I'm not like them.
SPEAKER_03: Have you ever had that thought or that feeling?
SPEAKER_03: I want to tell you, as a professional minister, you are just like us.
SPEAKER_03: We get up and have problems every day.
SPEAKER_03: We have families that struggle.
SPEAKER_03: We have family members who are far from God that we pray for.
SPEAKER_03: We have trials and tribulations daily in our own life and oftentimes within our own families.
SPEAKER_03: God has a purpose for every single person he's made.
SPEAKER_03: He has a purpose for every disciple that includes disciple making.
SPEAKER_03: We are made in his image and we carry the dignity and the value of God's special creation.
SPEAKER_03: You may not be a pastor, but you can be pastoral.
SPEAKER_03: You may not be a missionary, but you can live on mission.
SPEAKER_03: You may not be a minister, but you can be doing ministry.
SPEAKER_03: And God has a ministry for you.
SPEAKER_03: God has called every single one of his followers to be sent as his disciples.
SPEAKER_03: That verse we just read says, I have sent them into the world so that the world will know that you have sent me.
SPEAKER_03: Again, think about the correlation.
SPEAKER_03: As you act as a sent one, the world sees that Jesus was sent to them.
SPEAKER_03: If you don't live it out, how will they know?
SPEAKER_03: How will they hear?
SPEAKER_03: Many people believe that they don't know enough, they're not good enough, they're not trained enough, or they're not qualified enough to lead others to God.
SPEAKER_03: But I could spend hours and hours leading you through not only Bible passages and stories of unqualified people doing what God's called them to do, but we could also talk about hundreds and thousands of stories from around the world, mission stories or your own personal stories, how God has showed up and done amazing things through people who didn't expect him to do it in them.
SPEAKER_03: You may have heard it said that God does not qualify or call the qualified, but he qualifies the called.
SPEAKER_03: Have you heard that before?
SPEAKER_03: Like you don't have to come to him and say, I finally have it all together, now I'm ready.
SPEAKER_03: It actually starts the other way.
SPEAKER_03: You say, Lord, here I am, do something with me, and he gives you what you need to do exactly what he's called you to.
SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna invite my friend Rachel Russo here up on the stage.
SPEAKER_03: Uh many of you know Rachel, she is an incredible part of our church, and uh, she has been such a blessing to so many families.
SPEAKER_03: Um, you know that she started Vault Fostering Community, you probably have all heard that before.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, please give her a hand.
SPEAKER_03: You know that she's adopted three amazing boys, and she's been such an inspiration to FBC's faith community.
SPEAKER_03: Uh, and I brought her here this morning just to tell us a little bit more of her story.
SPEAKER_03: Um, so I really just want to say thank you.
SPEAKER_03: Thank you for joining me.
SPEAKER_03: Thanks for for uh putting yourself in a position like this.
SPEAKER_03: I know it can be uh overwhelming.
SPEAKER_03: Um but let's jump in.
SPEAKER_03: I have a couple questions for you.
SPEAKER_03: So, first one, in your adult life, you've served the Lord in many capacities.
SPEAKER_03: Uh, like I said, many of us are aware of your role founding and leading Vault.
SPEAKER_03: But before Vault, how did God call you as a sent one?
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, so I I grew up with um a missional lifestyle being modeled for me from a very young age.
SPEAKER_04: Um my dad growing up as a daughter of a pastor, um I saw firsthand what vocational ministry looked like.
SPEAKER_04: I um as a young girl, I really hoped that I would never be called into vocational ministry because full-time ministry looks and feels like full-time sacrifice, and that's not appealing, probably to anyone, right?
SPEAKER_04: Um, but God still put in me this thing that's like I want whatever I do to have purpose and be meaningful and matter, and I believe that's in all of us.
SPEAKER_04: Um so when I graduated high school, I was like, I can't stand to this day wasting my time on something that doesn't have purpose or meaning or matter.
SPEAKER_04: And so I was like, I'm not going to school if I don't know what I'm doing.
SPEAKER_04: What's the plan here?
SPEAKER_04: And I didn't have a plan.
SPEAKER_04: And so I took a gap year to figure out what God's plan was for my life, and I spent a year um right down the road in Comfort, Texas at His Hill Bible School, um, which eventually led me to be a part of this community here.
SPEAKER_04: But um, I my goal in going there was I'm gonna go to Bible school and seek God, and then He's gonna tell me what the plan is, what I'm supposed to be doing.
SPEAKER_04: And I definitely I was frustrated at the end of that year because I didn't know anymore about what I was supposed to, what the next step was.
SPEAKER_04: However, I did leave there with a really deep understanding of what it looks like um to allow Christ to be my life.
SPEAKER_04: Oh jeez.
SPEAKER_04: Um I walked away actually really eager.
SPEAKER_04: I had been talking about this idea of like Christ living in me and through me and learning about it in classrooms.
SPEAKER_04: Um what kind of rookie move doesn't have tissues for the I I'm feeling it right now.
SPEAKER_02: Like I'm even looking underneath the fuse that we cleaned it up.
unknown: I might cry.
SPEAKER_04: Uh no, I I walked away with an eagerness to see what it would look like in real life to try this dying to yourself and seeing what God would do with my surrender.
SPEAKER_03: Rachel, uh many here know you and we've watched you live this out.
SPEAKER_03: And uh, and I get that some of you may not know Rachel, but she she is uh, I do believe you have extremely unique gifts, and the way that God has called you has been amazing.
SPEAKER_03: We see you as exceptionally gifted.
SPEAKER_03: Do you see yourself as someone that just has this you have everything you need, you're just perfectly formed to go and do what God's called you to do.
SPEAKER_03: Do you see yourself as exceptionally gifted?
SPEAKER_04: Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_01: Perfect.
SPEAKER_01: That's why I called you up on the stage.
SPEAKER_01: It's awesome.
SPEAKER_04: You didn't expect me to answer with that.
SPEAKER_04: No, absolutely, absolutely not.
SPEAKER_04: Um, in fact, I was listening to you talk, now I'm already off script, um, listening to you talk about people looking from the outside.
SPEAKER_04: And I can I know there's some foster families here in the room today, and it is very common to hear people say, Oh, you are special because you do that.
SPEAKER_04: Um, or and and I hear that.
SPEAKER_04: People, oh, God made you special and different from everyone else.
SPEAKER_04: And um that is so unbelievably untrue.
SPEAKER_04: And this might sound even like preaching a little bit, but if you're believing that about other people and not yourself, then I believe that might be a work of the enemy just paralyzing you um and not allowing you the freedom to live in what God might be calling you to.
SPEAKER_04: So that was also off script.
SPEAKER_04: I apologize.
SPEAKER_03: No, you're fine, you're fine.
SPEAKER_04: Um but I um I never went to college after that Bible school year.
SPEAKER_04: I just kind of started doing the next mission, and I kept saying, if God calls me to something and I need to be equipped in school for that thing, I absolutely will let's go to school.
SPEAKER_04: Um but it still hasn't happened.
SPEAKER_04: So I sit, I find myself in rooms, sitting at tables with people who are much more educated than me, much more um, much better communicators than me, uh, much more life experience, and a lot more resources than me.
SPEAKER_04: And I literally ask myself all the time, how did I get here?
SPEAKER_04: What am I doing here?
SPEAKER_04: And the Lord consistently whispers, you followed me here.
SPEAKER_04: I we got a tissue for you.
SPEAKER_01: Such a sweetheart, thank you so much.
SPEAKER_04: Um I have brought nothing at all to the table except for a yes and an availability.
SPEAKER_04: That's it.
SPEAKER_03: I love it.
SPEAKER_03: There's so many I I want to stop and preach on her points, but we're gonna keep going.
SPEAKER_03: Um over the last several years, of course, we know you found Advault, you've adopted your boys, um, you're fostering another one right now.
SPEAKER_03: And in addition to that, you take your boys on these mission trips.
SPEAKER_03: And I I I I sit back and think, this this woman is serving God in so many ways.
SPEAKER_03: Why does she keep adding more?
SPEAKER_03: You know, even in the video today, I saw you're taking pictures.
SPEAKER_03: I'm watching you take pictures at Starlight Ball.
SPEAKER_03: I'm like, there's Rachel in the corner doing this.
SPEAKER_03: Nobody even knows you're a great photographer and a uh designer and all these things.
SPEAKER_03: Why do you keep doing more?
SPEAKER_04: Um why do I keep doing more?
SPEAKER_04: That isn't the question that was on the paper.
SPEAKER_03: It's close, it's close.
SPEAKER_04: The question was why you take your kids on mission trips.
SPEAKER_01: It's close, it's close.
SPEAKER_01: Why do you keep doing more like taking your kids on mission trips?
SPEAKER_04: No, I um I again we're just following God where he's at work.
SPEAKER_04: We're and I really believe um there's two reasons why I want my kids to go on mission trips.
SPEAKER_04: Um one is that I want them to walk away with the understanding that the people in Mexico or Peru or Africa are not very different from us.
SPEAKER_04: Um and I don't really want to take them to expose them to the struggle of people somewhere else to come home grateful for this life we have here.
SPEAKER_04: I take them because I want them to see that people all over the world are following Jesus, they are depending on him, they are experiencing joy in their walk with Jesus.
SPEAKER_04: Um they are that God is at work everywhere, not just at home or not just in our lives, but everywhere.
SPEAKER_04: Um, and the other is that He's He can use us anywhere.
SPEAKER_04: So when I was a teenager, my whole family, like my church family, went through a series called Experiencing God by Henry Blackaby.
SPEAKER_04: I'm sure a lot of you guys have heard of it.
SPEAKER_04: But there's like two principles that are a part of that, and it's that God is always at work around us, and find out where God is at work and join him.
SPEAKER_04: And so my hope is that my kids would see.
SPEAKER_04: Oh, God is at work there.
SPEAKER_04: Let's join in.
SPEAKER_04: So maybe that's the answer to your question.
SPEAKER_04: Why do we keep doing more stuff?
SPEAKER_04: That's perfect.
SPEAKER_04: I see where God's at work and I don't want to miss it.
SPEAKER_04: I want my kids to be able to, sorry, to identify where is God at work and join him.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's I couldn't I couldn't ask for more.
SPEAKER_03: I went through the same study when I was young, and it really continues to have an impact.
SPEAKER_03: Well, the last question I have for you is you've been a part of this community here at First Baptist for some years, 20 years, I think.
SPEAKER_03: And I want to ask you, how has the body of Christ blessed you throughout the seasons of your faith journey?
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, this is very hard to summarize in a very short paragraph.
SPEAKER_04: I was first exposed to the community of First Baptist Church when I was 22 years old.
SPEAKER_04: I had been visiting this church and had made no real commitment to it.
SPEAKER_04: I was just kind of checking it out.
SPEAKER_04: And I unexpectedly found myself hospitalized for three weeks with, you know, I was having this outpatient kidney surgery, and it turned into more complicated than that.
SPEAKER_04: And then I was actually out of work for six weeks.
SPEAKER_04: And people that I barely met here, and then people I had never met before, showed up to the hospital to pray with me, or they delivered food to me or my mom who was here out from out of town to stay with me.
SPEAKER_04: And they even like pooled together money to help me pay bills while I was out of work for so long.
SPEAKER_04: And that I have watched happen over and over in this body over the past 20 years.
SPEAKER_04: The First Baptist Church is really, really good at seeing a need and running towards it instead of crossing the street and walking on by.
SPEAKER_04: And so for that I am so grateful, but I will say I could, since then, I could fill a book with stories of how this body and people in this church have come alongside me and carried me in some really dark times.
SPEAKER_04: Um they have cheered me on and encouraged me and even believed in me when I didn't think I could do something.
SPEAKER_04: Um they have partnered with me in raising children and discipled my children alongside me.
SPEAKER_04: They have loved.
SPEAKER_04: Sorry.
SPEAKER_03: It's okay, we have an issue for you.
SPEAKER_04: They have, they, I said I should say you.
SPEAKER_04: You have um loved on children who have come into our home for very short amounts of time and come and gone, and you have um helped us love on them.
SPEAKER_04: I wish that, not I wish, I know, I want you to know that these stories are not few and far between.
SPEAKER_04: These stories of um our needs being met because of this church body, they are extremely consistent and extremely current.
SPEAKER_03: There's so much here, and I want to say this church would be also really easy in the same way that sometimes we pedestal people like Rachel or pastors.
SPEAKER_03: We could easily pedestal our church and say, first Baptist is the best.
SPEAKER_03: That's why.
SPEAKER_03: No, no, it's really not that.
SPEAKER_03: It's like Jesus is moving among the people here, and our hearts are turned towards him.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: Nobody gives to foster families because they just feel like it.
SPEAKER_03: It's because God is giving us compassion in the heart, and you're helping cast vision for what that looks like.
SPEAKER_03: So we're so thankful for your ministry, for your heart, and um your impact here in our own community is massive, but also in uh the community of Bernie and Kendall County and even Bear County and beyond.
SPEAKER_03: I know the impact continues to grow.
SPEAKER_03: Before Rachel leaves the stage, would you guys pray with me?
SPEAKER_03: Just pray over her.
SPEAKER_03: Thank you for being willing to come up here.
SPEAKER_03: And let me let's let's reach your hands out and let's just pray that God would bless her.
SPEAKER_03: Jesus, we thank you so much for Rachel.
SPEAKER_03: May the Lord bless you and keep you and make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you.
SPEAKER_03: May he look your way and give you peace.
SPEAKER_03: May the Lord cause you to flourish, filling your days with his favor and your life with his good gifts.
SPEAKER_03: May the Holy Spirit strengthen you with power in your inner being, leading you beside quiet waters and restoring your soul.
SPEAKER_03: May He go out with you, enjoy, and be led forth with peace.
SPEAKER_03: May the Lord's leading hand grant guide you and guard you every step of the way.
SPEAKER_03: May He give your hand strength to continue the work to which He's called you.
SPEAKER_03: Lord, bless Rachel, her boys, her parents, and every family that's been and is being impacted by Vault.
SPEAKER_03: It's in Jesus' name that we pray.
SPEAKER_03: Amen.
SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much, Rachel.
SPEAKER_03: The challenge now is for you to see what I hope the Spirit is saying to you.
SPEAKER_03: And while we can say things like, we're so thankful we have an example like Rachel, what I want you to do is praise God because the way he's been working in her family, in her life, and continues to work through her.
SPEAKER_03: Praise him for what he's doing through her.
SPEAKER_03: And what I want you to see is when she says to you things like, I don't have a college education, I haven't done everything perfectly, and there's all these little steps along the way that she didn't necessarily plan.
SPEAKER_03: I asked her one time, when you were a young kid, did you plan on opening your garage to hand out things to foster families?
SPEAKER_03: She said, No, of course not.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: But what happened is she found a need and she started meeting little ways to meet that need, and God has grown it into an entire ministry that's blessing many families.
SPEAKER_03: Guys, that's what being sent looks like.
SPEAKER_03: It's you seeing a need in your community and God giving you the opportunity to step into it.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe it's in a small way that no one will notice, or maybe it becomes something more.
SPEAKER_03: No one can tell you whether it's ever going to be a big deal or not.
SPEAKER_03: And while we always search for words like impact, if we measure impact by obedience to Christ, then we can be impacting every day.
SPEAKER_03: Every day.
SPEAKER_03: You know, uh Acts uh 13 is where Paul and Barnabas are part of a church in Syria.
SPEAKER_03: It's in Antioch.
SPEAKER_03: And while they're worshiping, it says in verse 2, it says they were worshiping in the Lord and fasting.
SPEAKER_03: The Holy Spirit said, I wonder how he said it.
SPEAKER_03: Did someone hear the voice internally, or did they hear an audible?
SPEAKER_03: I don't know how well.
SPEAKER_03: Anyway, the Holy Spirit said, Set apart from me Barnabas and Paul Saul for the work that I've called them.
SPEAKER_03: Look at verse 3.
SPEAKER_03: So after they had fasted and prayed, they put they placed their hands on them and sent them off.
SPEAKER_03: We do this all the time.
SPEAKER_03: When people get ready for our mission trips, we bring them up here, we pray over them, and we send them off.
SPEAKER_03: But but this is such an incredible moment in the life of uh of the church because this is the first time we've seen something like this.
SPEAKER_03: And think about it, this was out of the church in Syria.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: This isn't the church in Jerusalem where we always have it all based.
SPEAKER_03: It's it's the church in Syria, in Antioch, that lays their hands and sends them off.
SPEAKER_03: And did you have you guys ever read about this first missionary journey of Paul and Barnabas?
SPEAKER_03: The first place they go is Cyprus.
SPEAKER_03: It's Barnabas' homeland.
SPEAKER_03: And it says they go through all the towns and villages, and they end up this place called Paphos.
SPEAKER_03: And there's this interaction with the sorcerer, the sorcerer goes blind, and the proconsul comes to faith.
SPEAKER_03: You probably read that.
SPEAKER_03: Church history says that before that happened, that they actually had beaten Paul and Barnabas, and there's a stone in that city today that they say Paul was beaten on.
SPEAKER_03: So you think about there's suffering attached.
SPEAKER_03: Uh later, Paul writes that that uh he had been lost at sea.
SPEAKER_03: If you guys remember this place, and it says that he spent a day and a night in the ocean.
SPEAKER_03: Um mystiologists placed that between them leaving uh that place there and going across to Perga.
SPEAKER_03: So I want you to hear this.
SPEAKER_03: He also, when he writes to the Galatians who are in Pisidian Antioch, he says, When I arrived to you, I was sick and you nurtured me back to health.
SPEAKER_03: I want you, you put all those things in context.
SPEAKER_03: And Paul's first missionary journey was a train wreck.
SPEAKER_03: He's beaten on Cyprus, they're tri they're they're shipwrecked and spend time at the sea.
SPEAKER_03: You wonder why John Mark left?
SPEAKER_03: It's a really tough trip.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: They get to Perga and they go up into the mountains, he's sick almost to the point of death.
SPEAKER_03: Uh, and when he gets to Galatia, we hear and read Acts, and it's all the celebration stories, which you have to pick in these little pieces.
SPEAKER_03: Later in that same journey, he goes on to Iconium and they think that he is literally Zeus.
SPEAKER_03: And they think Barnabas is uh is Hermes, his mouthpiece.
SPEAKER_03: And then they go a little bit further, and the Jews come and get really angry and stone him, and it says that he they they stone him until they think that he's dead.
SPEAKER_03: And then it's this little verse says, the believers, what believers?
SPEAKER_03: They gather around and pray for Paul, and he gets up and walks back into the city.
SPEAKER_03: If this was your first mission trip, it's probably your last mission trip.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: Like, you've got everything from beatings to shipwrecks to even a death and resurrection story in this first trip.
SPEAKER_03: And then Paul goes on and has journey two and three, and we've talked about how the impact of Paul's journeys is massive.
SPEAKER_03: Here's what I want you to see at the end of Paul's life, 15 years after his first missionary trip, he's put into jail first in Israel and then sent to Rome.
SPEAKER_03: And he spends the last couple of days, years of his life, in prison in Rome.
SPEAKER_03: And I wonder how he felt.
SPEAKER_03: You know, this is the same Paul that's traveled all over the place doing all these things on the Lord's behalf, and now he's stuck in one house with the guard on him, and he's allowed to meet with some people here and there.
SPEAKER_03: But think about the difference of what his calling was earlier in his life to what his calling is at this point in his life.
SPEAKER_03: And here's what I want you to see.
SPEAKER_03: The calling to sent ones is not just sent to outside worlds, some big thing out over there that one day you might get to.
SPEAKER_03: Being sent ones is following and obeying Jesus right here in the moment that he's given you.
SPEAKER_03: Some of our church is in uh in nursing homes, and some of you are are facing the ends of your days, and you're wondering, what can God do with me now?
SPEAKER_03: And I want to tell you, he's doing exactly what he wants to do with you now.
SPEAKER_03: He has you here with that purpose and that place, and the seasons of your life are gonna change.
SPEAKER_03: They're absolutely going to.
SPEAKER_03: If you've lived from your teenage years to the years you have now, you know that there are seasons and times where things get harder and more difficult.
SPEAKER_03: But serving God is not one of them.
SPEAKER_03: We follow him every day with the time he's given us.
SPEAKER_03: We're sent ones.
SPEAKER_03: We remain in him, we abide in him, we we seek him every day, we trust him, we love him, we have joy in him, and then we live out our days to the best that we can with the opportunities he puts in front of us.
SPEAKER_03: So I said earlier, you may not be a pastor, but you can be pastoral.
SPEAKER_03: You may not be a missionary, but you can be on mission.
SPEAKER_03: You may not have a ministry, but you can be ministering to the people around you.
SPEAKER_03: That's a calling that we all carry.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe you're seeking public office and have public influence, or maybe you're a military leader, or maybe you are someone who's just trying to get by.
SPEAKER_03: Maybe you lost your job recently and you're wondering what purpose does God have for me in this place?
SPEAKER_03: I really can't give you the answer.
SPEAKER_03: But I promise you, He does.
SPEAKER_03: As you walk around today, as we finish our sermon in a few minutes, as you look around at the people who are wearing the blue shirts, just know that they're trying to follow God to the best of their ability.
SPEAKER_03: And we're inviting you to do it with us.
SPEAKER_03: We need you.
SPEAKER_03: It's gonna take the whole body of Christ to accomplish the work to which he's called us.
SPEAKER_03: I want to finish uh in 2 Corinthians 5, which is a beautiful picture, um, starting in verse 17.
SPEAKER_03: It says, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come.
SPEAKER_03: The old is gone, the new is here.
SPEAKER_03: All of this is from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.
SPEAKER_03: Reconciling is making what was broken uh whole or making what's wrong right.
SPEAKER_03: It's it's it's fixing something that's not doing what it's supposed to do.
SPEAKER_03: So, verse 19, that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people's sins against them.
SPEAKER_03: And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.
SPEAKER_03: There's so many places here that he gave it to us, he's he's given to us over and over again.
SPEAKER_03: You notice that this is a ministry he's handed to his people.
SPEAKER_03: And then in verse 20 it says, We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us.
SPEAKER_03: We implore you on Christ's behalf to be reconciled to God.
SPEAKER_03: Two pieces to this.
SPEAKER_03: God has given you a ministry of reconciliation.
SPEAKER_03: Yesterday I was thinking about this, and I'm gonna stop praying that God would give us new believers.
SPEAKER_03: I don't want any new believers.
SPEAKER_03: I want new ambassadors.
SPEAKER_03: Because every believer is an ambassador.
SPEAKER_03: Right?
SPEAKER_03: Sometimes we we separate a non-believer and a believer and an, but really you go from non-believer to ambassador.
SPEAKER_03: There's no one between.
SPEAKER_03: The day that you ask Jesus to be the Lord of your life, his mission becomes your mission.
SPEAKER_03: You become a minister of reconciliation.
SPEAKER_03: You tell the world that there's hope to be found in this Jesus who has not counted men's sins against them.
SPEAKER_03: What an amazing verse.
SPEAKER_03: That when we seek Him, He forgives us our iniquities.
SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna invite the worship team to come up.
SPEAKER_03: We have a few more things as we close the service, but there's two pieces as we just ask you to consider.
SPEAKER_03: One, if you've never surrendered your life to King Jesus, there's nothing preventing you from becoming an ambassador today.
SPEAKER_03: The Bible says really simply, repent.
SPEAKER_03: For the kingdom of God is at hand.
SPEAKER_03: Turn from our sin and ask Jesus to fill our lives.
SPEAKER_03: And he promises that his sacrifice is enough to overcome all of our bad things, all of our sin.
SPEAKER_03: If we will turn from our sin and believe in him, he will forgive our sins.
SPEAKER_03: And if today is the day that you need to confess that Jesus is Lord, do not wait.
SPEAKER_03: Secondly, if you are a believer, if you are an ambassador and you've been afraid to step out and do something like this today, ask the Lord to speak to you what he's calling you to do.
SPEAKER_03: And make a commitment in your heart, and I would say share it with a friend, what he's asking you to do in the days that you have remaining.
SPEAKER_03: Church, we need you.
SPEAKER_03: We cannot do this without you.
SPEAKER_03: We need your skills, your talent, your heart, your resources.
SPEAKER_03: We need the whole church to accomplish the work to which God has called us.
SPEAKER_03: As we sing and as we pray, we have people that are gonna be standing here to pray with you, to encourage you.
SPEAKER_03: I'll be here.
SPEAKER_03: Jason is back there.
SPEAKER_03: Jason can come down.
SPEAKER_03: We would love to pray with you.
SPEAKER_03: And after we sing, we're gonna pray for all of those going on mission later this year.
SPEAKER_03: So you're gonna see a big pile of people in blue shirts.
SPEAKER_03: And I just ask that you would pray that God would use them.
SPEAKER_03: So in these next few minutes, do work with God.
SPEAKER_03: Ask him to speak to your heart.
SPEAKER_03: If you've never asked Jesus to be your king, make him your king today.
SPEAKER_03: And folks, if you're not sure about what he's called to do, ask him to reveal what that is and find a way to get involved.
SPEAKER_03: Let's see.