Global Focus: Seeing the World Through God’s Eyes
1. I want to begin by asking a question: How many of you here are Christians? What I mean by that is not that you have joined the church, not that you have been baptized, not that you try to live a good life; but you have repented of your sins, by faith acknowledged Jesus Christ as God’s Son, accepted His death on the cross as payment for your sins, and totally committed your life to Him as your Lord and Savior.
2. Now my second question is this: How many of you are missionaries? Now be very careful, because if you responded to the first question, but not to the second question, then you ought to be embarrassed. Because a Christian and a missionary are really the same thing.
3. What is a missionary? Webster’s dictionary defines a missionary as "a person sent on a mission, especially on a religious mission." Well by that definition every Christian is a missionary. Because every Christian is here on a mission. That mission has been defined for us in II Corinthians 5.
"Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation,that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God. For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. (vv. 18-21)
It has been well said that every person on earth is either a missionary or a mission field.
Have you ever thought about the last words Jesus ever said before he ascended into heaven? Did you know that the last words Jesus ever uttered while he was on this earth were these: "to the end of the earth." (Acts 1:8) When Jesus left this earth He had missions on his mind. Jesus came as a missionary from heaven that he might make us missionaries for heaven.
5. As you can see from our banner we are wanting to make a big deal about our Global Impact Conference. This is going to be a wonderful time for our church and I believe it will greatly assist us in moving into the level of missions involvement that Jesus wants us to achieve.
There are many reasons for having a conference like this, but let me quickly give you three:
* Information
We need to learn about the needs of the world, what God is doing in the world through His people, and how we can personally get involved.
I believe that many of us are woefully ignorant of our responsibility to missions and the great heritage that we have as Southern Baptists in taking the gospel around the world.
I heard about a pastor who asked his Women’s Missionary Union Director to visit a new family that had just moved into town. After the visit was over she came back and said, "Pastor, you won’t believe this!" She said, "When I began to talk to this lady I asked her who Annie Armstrong was, and who Lottie Moon was, and she told me she had never heard of them." The pastor said, "Well, what did you tell them?" She said, "I told her she needed to to study her Bible more."
Well you won’t learn anything about Lottie Moon and Annie Armstrong studying your Bible. But you will learn that our God is a God with a missionary heart who has sent us into this world as missionary servants with a missionary message that we might fulfill the mission of The Great Commission.
That leads to the second reason for a conference which is inspiration. It is our prayer that through this conference you will get a missionary heart, that you will give to missionary work, and that you will go to a missionary field, whether it be home or abroad.
We believe that God’s people need to be excited about missions. After all, Jesus was excited about missions and he commanded us to have a concern for missions.
The last command he ever gave on this earth was The Great Commission: "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." (Mt. 28:19-20)
A theological named Dr. W. T. Conner, said, "Our mission is to bear witness to Christ from Jerusalem to the uttermost part of the earth. Any form of Christianity that does not have throbbing through it a mighty missionary and evangelistic impulse, is a degenerate form."
God has given us Christians the job of telling the world about him and that job is getting bigger every year:
* Not until 1850 that number of people on this earth reached one billion.
* Eighty years later, in 1930, the number doubled to two billion.
* Thirty years later, in 1960 the number reached four billion.
* In 1985 it reached five billion people
* It soon will pass 7 billion
Simply put, that means there are multiplied billions and billions of people who have never even heard the name Jesus. Only 8% of the world’s population are Christians 92% are not.
We want to inform and inspire our church to hear God calling them to missions because we believe with all of our hearts that people without Jesus Christ are L-O-S-T.
Romans 10:14-15 -- "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. How, then can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can they preach unless they are sent."
When the great missionary Hudson Taylor was on his way to China he was confronted one day by the ship’s captain. He said, "Taylor, do you think the heathen will be lost if you don’t go to China?" Taylor replied, "I think the heathen are lost, that’s why I am going to China." Well, if we really believe that people without Christ are lost, if we really believe that the good news is the gospel of Christ, if we really believe that Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven, then we must have a sensitive ear to hear the calling of God for missions.
Now God has not left our mission enterprise to chance or trial and error. God has told us perfectly how we are to carry out the work of missions, and has already given us all the tools we need to do it.
5 Steps to Global Focus
I. Capture God’s Passion
This is the first step and it is the most critical. Before a person gets concerned about reaching others for Christ they must understand how much God cares it.
The verses we have already read are just a few of the windows into God’s heart of concern for the lost.
Peter - God is not willing that any should perish, but that all come to repentance.
2. Tap Into God’s Power
Here in Acts 1:8 - Jesus leaves us with one of the greatest promises
he ever gave, "But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you." God has given to each one of us supernatural resources to carry out the work of missions.
The foundation of missions is not money, nor manpower, nor methodology. It is the power of the Holy Spirit that gives missions its thrust. That’s why everybody can be a missionary right where they live.
You see, witnessing is not dependent upon your personality. It’s not dependent upon your persuasiveness. It’s not dependent upon your position. It is dependent upon the power of God and every Christian has available to him the power of the Holy Spirit.
And if you have the power of God you don’t need anything else. God will supply the rest.
3. Commit to God’s Plan
Now notice the purpose of this power. Power is given so that "you shall be witnesses to Me." The Holy Spirit is never given for our enjoyment. It is given for His employment. The reason why God gives to each one of us the Person, Presence, and Power of His Holy Spirit is so that we might be a witness for the Lord Jesus Christ.
"The goal of the Spirit-filled life is to be so vitally connected to Christ that you can’t stop talking about Him."
Jesus is the Person of missions.
The Spirit is the power of missions.
Witnessing is the plan of missions
We are the people of missions.
God’s Plan is to use us. God has chosen not win this world to Himself without us.
I read one time a story, a legend, about a convocation of angels who had gathered around the Lord Jesus Christ after he had come back from earth. They were asking him questions, and one angel said, "Lord, how are you going to spread the gospel message throughout the world?" Well, the Lord Jesus said, "I have called out some disciples to carry out my great commission. They in turn will go and share this wonderful message with others who will respond, and they in turn will go and share with others who need to be saved."
The angel said, "Are you telling me that you have entrusted the task of getting out the message of eternal life and salvation to those earthlings, counting on them to be witnesses to the gospel message and take the gospel around the world?"
The Lord Jesus said, "That’s absolutely right."
The angel said, "Well Lord, if they don’t do what you command them to do, what is Plan B?" To which the Lord replied, "There is no Plan B."
I want to say to you this morning if you want to know how God intends to reach a lost world for Jesus Christ, go home and look in the mirror. There is no Plan B. If we do not do it in the power of God’s Spirit, it will not be done.
Now nobody can win everybody. But everybody can win somebody. It will be the nobodies that God will use to win people to His Son. Somebody said, "I wanted to be a somebody, but God allowed me to be a nobody, so that I could share with everybody about The Somebody who can save anybody."
Notice carefully that God has called us to be witnesses. God has not called us to be lawyers. He has not called us to be prosecuting attorneys. He has not called us to be judges. He simply called us to be witnesses. Now all a witness does is simply to tell the truth about what he knows, and what he’s seen.
God has not called us to persuade, force, coerce, or manipulate anybody into the Kingdom of God. He has simply called us to witness to the Lord Jesus Christ and His saving power and leave the results to Him.
Incidentally, our witness is to be about Jesus. I’ve heard some people say that we ought to share our faith. Well, a Buddhist can share his faith; a Muslim can share his faith. But what is unique about us is, we can share Jesus.
What this world needs is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the subject of missions. He is the source of missions. He is the sustainer of missions. He is the strength of missions.
Jesus Christ is the only universal need in all the world. He is the need of the Communist and the need of the Capitalist. He is the need of the Republicans and the need of the Democrats. He is the need of America. He is the need of Russia. He is the need of the rich, and He is the need of the poor. I can tell you something about every man, woman, and child alive on this earth right now, their greatest need is a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.
Our great God has no other plan, no other method, no other idea on how lost people are going to be reconciled to His Son except that we take a saving message to a lost world that has yet to hear the wonderful gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.
4. Follow God’s Pattern
Now the plan for missions is so simply beautiful, and yet so
beautifully simple. We read it here. We are to be witnesses to
Jesus "in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and Samaria, and to the
end of the earth." (v.8)
The Lord has not only told us how to go, He has told us where to go.
A. We Are To Go To Our Community
1. Now Jerusalem was where they were when the Lord spoke these words. He said to them in effect, the first place you ought to go is next door.
There’s an old saying I’ve never forgotten that goes like this: "The light that shines the farthest, shines the brightest nearest home."
I want us to become a church that prays for missions, gives to missions, and go on mission partnerships, but more than anything if we are to be the church God intends for us to be we must live missions.
B. We Are To Go To Our County and the Carolinas
After our own city we are to "Judea" this would represent our county and the Carolina’s. As you know we enjoy a unique role being so close to the state line. Our ministry neighborhoods are in both South Carolina and North Carolina.
C. We Are To Go To Our Nation
Samaria - United States
Yes, there are many people in America who have heard the gospel
more than a lot of people will ever hear the gospel. But that still doesn’t excuse us from the fact that we have over 100 million people in this country who do not know Jesus as Savior and as Lord.
You do realize don’t you that churches in other countries are sending missionaries to the United States. They see the downward moral decay of our nation and want to be used of God to get this nation back to God.
4. Uttermost Parts
It is very interesting to note that the progression of missions given in Acts 1:8 is exactly the sequence in which Acts was written. In chapters 1-7 the focal point is Jerusalem. In chapters 8-12 the disciples go to Judea. Then in chapters 13-28 they scatter to Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth.
Standard Oil Company once had a slogan that the church should try to revive:
"Get the light to every dark corner of the world." That is exactly what God has called us to do, and we must, we shall not, we dare not shirk that responsibility.
Our own Missions Team has created a similar slogan to describe the dream they have for our church:
Sharing God’s Love - Across the Street and around the world
I read a story one time of a military patrol that was operating in enemy territory. They were very very tense, probing every tree and shadow looking for the enemy. Suddenly there was a blinding flash and the soldier at the point was mortally wounded.
The bullets began to fly and the Sergeant screamed for his unit to take cover. The one young recruit, crawling on his face, plunged ahead to his dying comrade. He, too, was shot. But in extreme pain and mustering his ebbing strength, he dragged his friend, who had died, back to the unit, and
collapsed.
The Sergeant looked at this soldier and said, "You fool, why did you go and get yourself shot for a man that was dying?" The recruit said, "Because Sir, I had to hear him say, ’I knew you would come.’"
There is a lost world out there that needs us to come even though they don’t even know it. But what matters is when we stand before
God, God looks at us with a heartbeat of heaven, and says, "I knew you would go."
Invitation:
1 - Salvation
2 - Membership
3 - Bring Global Impact Conference Commitment Sheets to front
