PJ: Well, as you're being seated, as you're taking your seat, if
you can grab your Bibles and open up to Romans chapter 12.
Romans chapter 12 is going to be part of our text this morning.
This is week 2 in this three week mini series on the type of church that
I believe that God wants us to be.
In fact, not just wants us to be, the type of church we must be.
Our mission here at Compass Bible Church is that we would be a church that
is reaching, teaching, and training.
That is, that we are You Carrying out the great commission in the lives
of our flock and those around us.
And if we're going to do that, then we envision being a church that, as
we talked about last week, is Christ exalting this week, church equipping,
and then next week culture engaging.
And so as we come to this.
that is well equipped, that's going to be our focus this morning.
As we get there, though, I don't know if you've heard of this individual on
the screen, but he is the only member of the United States Coast Guard
ever to receive the Medal of Honor.
And it was awarded to him in 1943 for actions that took
place in September of 1942.
September of 1942, in the Pacific Theater, it was the Guadalcanal
campaign, uh, Coast Guard Douglas Monroe.
Was involved in transporting troops from the the ships the Marines from the ships
to the the shores to the island there in the Solomon Islands and There was
a particular excursion that they were going on to take what they termed Hill
84 And as they were going up Hill 84 the the Marines got Stranded atop Hill 84
because what had happened is two Japanese forces had come in on either side of
their path back down to the water And, and so the Marines radioed in for help
and they began to get artillery, uh, bombardments coming in from off the shore
on either side of the main thoroughfare there to, to try to, to distract and,
and keep the Japanese at base so that the Marines could get off the island.
Well, meanwhile, back on the boats in safety, as they're firing these cannons,
uh, the, the Coast Guard was mobilized again and they said, Hey, we need to
get those marines off that island.
And so Douglas Munro, who had just driven one of the transports to get them to the
island, stepped forward and said, I'll drive one to get them off the island.
As they were driving back to the island, and as they approached the
island, there was fire coming off of the island from the Japanese who
saw what was happening and wanted to prevent these Marines from escaping.
And so these boats, as they were coming close to the island, they
were taking fire from the enemy.
And Douglas Munro was one of those boats taking fire from the enemy and he noticed
as he was drawing near to the shore that one of their other troop transport
boats had become stranded on a reef.
And so Munro took his transport boat and he placed his boat between the
enemy fire, And the boat that was stranded there on the reef, and he
got out and got into the machine gun position and began to fire on the enemy.
And he was doing this in hopes of two things.
Number one, being able to free that one boat so that it could get back
with the troops that were on board.
And number two, to try to finish the mission, to get all of those 500 marines
off the island and back to safety.
As he was there and as he was firing, Monroe didn't notice that there was
a stream of machine gun fire from one of the Japanese that was coursing
across the water straight at his boat.
And sure enough, that machine gun fire, one of those bullets came up and hit
him right at the base of the skull, where the skull meets the neck there.
Monroe dropped unconscious to the deck of his boat.
One of the fellow soldiers there grabbed him and brought him back onto his boat and
they were driving back to safety, back to the boats that Monroe had enjoyed safety
in previously and could have stayed in and let somebody else go and be the driver.
And as he's going back, Monroe briefly regained consciousness to
look at the troops that were around him and say, Did they get off?
That was his question.
Did they get off?
And the troops around him said, yeah, we, we, we got them to safety.
When he heard that Monroe slipped back into unconsciousness and never recovered.
So the medal of honor was actually awarded posthumously in 1943 to his mom and dad as
the only member of the United States coast guard ever to receive the medal of honor.
What made him do that?
What produced that in him?
I think The answer is he was all in with the mission at hand.
He knew what the purpose was, and he knew initially his purpose was to get
the Marines from the boats to the island.
And then he understood after that, that the purpose was to get the Marines
from the island back to the boats.
And again, when the call came to say, hey, they're in trouble, we need somebody
to go after them, Monroe, on the safety of his ship, on the safety of his
boat, could have stepped back and said, somebody else will step forward and do
this, I don't need to volunteer again.
I was the one that took them out there to begin with.
Somebody else will do this.
And, and then on top of that, as he's going and sees the boat that
stranded, he could have thought to himself, wow, how unfortunate for
that person in, in this place of need.
And, and, and they're in a desperate circumstance.
I'm, I'm just glad I'm not them.
And he could have probably kept himself safe, but rather because he knew what
was at stake and he knew the mission and he knew the purpose, and he knew
the role that he needed to play in that.
Monroe was willing to go to the furthest extent that he possibly could in
order to see the mission accomplished.
Church, we don't have enemy fire in the same way that
Monroe did, but be not deceived.
There's an enemy firing at the church today.
There's an enemy active in the world all around us.
that doesn't want to see the mission of the church succeed.
And right now we have a mission reaching, teaching and training.
We have a mission.
We have a purpose to see lost people saved in Christ exalted.
As we talked about last week, that if we're not all in as a
church, we will not succeed in.
And so as we come to Romans 12 verses 4 through 6, here's what I want you to
think about church I want you to think about this and it's cheesy albeit But it
hopefully will stick with you a church.
That's all in is a church that will win a Church, that's all in is a
church that will win That will win in the eyes of Christ that will win
more souls to Christ that will win when it comes to accomplishing the
mission That we have A church that's all in is a church that will win.
What does a church that is all in look like?
We're going to look at that from Romans chapter 12 and also from
First Corinthians chapter 12.
Romans chapter 12 verses 4 through 6 says this, For as in one body we have
many members and the members do not all have the same function, so we though many
are one body in Christ and individually members of one another, having gifts that
differ according to the grace given to us.
Let us use them.
That's where we're going to stop for right now.
In Romans 12 4 through 6 and then also in 1st Corinthians 12 and other passages I
think we see if we're gonna be a church that's all in to be a church that's
gonna win There's three commitments that we need from the church and these
aren't just commitments broad level These are commitments and this is gonna
be a sermon this morning church if I can put it this way I'm gonna get in
your kitchen a little bit this morning Okay, I'm gonna step on some toes But
hopefully in love this morning With what we're gonna talk about as far as what I
believe that the Bible teaches and that's what I'm asking you to do don't Don't,
don't take my word for it, but hold me accountable to what Scripture says.
Turn to the passages that we're going to be looking at together this morning.
Ask yourself, what does this actually look like in action this morning?
But these are commitments that we're going to need this, we're going
to need commitments from each and every single believer, follower
of Jesus Christ in this room.
If we're going to accomplish the mission that God has for this church.
First commitment is this, number one, commit to us by getting connected.
That's point number one this morning.
Commit to us by getting connected.
Back in Romans 12, four says this for as in one body, we have many members.
Okay.
There's diversity, but unity in the body.
There's a cohesiveness, many people, one body here in the church.
And then look at verse five.
He says, so we though many are one body in Christ.
And then this phrase and individually members of one another.
See, y'all, God has designed the church and the local church to consist
of many people who are all committed in relationship to one another.
We are members of one another.
Paul addresses this in 1 Corinthians chapter 12.
In 1 Corinthians chapter 12, verses 12 through 14.
1 Corinthians 14 says this, For just as the body is one and has many members,
and all members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.
For in one spirit we were all baptized into one body, Jews or
Greeks or slaves or free, and all were made to drink of one spirit.
For the body, does not consist of one member, but of many.
Okay.
So Paul's talking about the same thing in first Corinthians 12 that he's
talking about in Romans chapter 12.
He's talking about the body is diverse but unified, many members, one body.
Now you may be tempted to say, or maybe you have in the past, or you may
have thought in the past, okay, sure.
Universal church, right?
The church capital C, many members, one universal church.
And that's what he's talking about here.
Pastor, he's talking about the universal church.
He's not anywhere here saying that anything about the local church.
Well, I disagree, and I disagree because of what he goes on to say.
Look at verse 18.
If you're in 1 Corinthians chapter 12, in fact here it is up on the
screen, verses 18 through 20.
Paul goes on and says this, but as it is.
God has arranged the members in the body, each one of them, notice the individuality
here, each one of them as He chose.
If all were a single member, where would the body be?
As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.
Listen, this makes no sense if Paul just has in mind here the universal church.
What in the world does it mean if all of this is the universal church and
there's no focus on the local church at all here, what does it mean that God
has arranged each member as he chose?
And what does it mean that each one of them, if a single
member, where would the body be?
As it is, there are many parts yet one body.
Why would it matter if this is simply this amorphous, ambiguous universal
church that he's talking about?
But I would argue instead, and I think this is what he's talking
about in Romans 12 as well, that he's talking about the local church.
He's talking about this body right here and committing to one another and being
a multi faceted, multi diverse group that all comes together as one group
because we are committed to each other.
And so that's why commit to us by getting connected.
Now let me flesh out that second part for just a second.
Here at Compass Bible Church, a lot of people will come and say, what does it
look like to be a part of the church?
What does it look like for me to be a member of the church?
And right now we don't have a formalized membership, but
this is what we'll tell you.
If this is your church home, if this is where you're saying, this is,
I'm all in and I'm going to commit here and this is where Pastor Rob,
Pastor PJ, they are my pastors.
Then to be a part of our church looks like this.
You attend, you connect, and you serve.
attending is what you're doing right now.
So congratulations.
Check the box on that, right?
But connection, right?
And that's where I want to dive in next because I think that's
the bread and butter here.
And you're like, but wait a minute, I thought this was a
sermon on getting equipped.
It is about getting equipped, but we can't effectively equip the church.
If we're dealing with the church that's not committed, that's not all in,
that's not connected to one another.
And so the second component of connection here, and this is where I'm going to
begin to, to, to, to meddle a little bit.
And here's what I want to say, church, if you're not connecting,
you are missing a vital component of God's purpose for having you here.
And we are missing a vital component of God's purpose for having you here.
Connection, building relationships, getting involved in community
is integral to finding your place in the body of Christ.
Again, I go back to 18.
God has arranged each member as he chose.
You are here because God has placed you here, and God has placed you
here to be in community with other brothers and sisters in Christ.
I tried to highlight the language, but here it is literally highlighted for you.
Romans 12, 5, We though many are one body in Christ.
And listen to this language.
Individually, we are members of one another.
We are members of one another.
That is intimate language that Paul is using here for the church.
This is not Sunday only language here.
This is doing life within community with each other.
This is weeping.
In fact, that's the context in Romans 12.
Romans 12 9, let love be genuine, abhor what is evil, hold fast to what is good,
love one another with brotherly affection.
How can you do that without being connected to the church?
Love one another with brotherly affection.
He goes on, he says, Rejoice, verse 15, rejoice with those who
rejoice, weep with those who weep, live in harmony with one another.
These are all descriptors.
These are all things meant to be carried out and lived out
within the body of Christ.
And you can't do that if you're on the outside, not, not connected, not committed
in the community of the body of Christ.
Ephesians 4.
25, he uses the same language here.
He says, Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each of you who speak
the truth, or let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor,
for we are members of one another.
We're members of one another.
This is the church membership that matters, y'all.
This right here, being members of one another, being committed
in community with one another, being many members, but one body.
Realized here in the local church, and so we wanted to see you commit to us by
getting connected, but here's the thing y'all It's not just about committing to
those to your left and and your right It's it's about committing to God's
design for the church There is I'm gonna argue no such thing in the New Testament
as a Sunday only Christian Now those of you who have community group on Sundays
you guys are exempt from that statement not really though Because we still want
more than just, you know, showing up at church and going to a community group.
But listen, there's no such thing in, in the category of the church.
You can read it, find it, bring it to us.
Say, look, here, here's the example of the Sunday only Christian,
the two hour a week Christian.
We, we talked about this last week in the Christ exalting sermon.
If Christ is going to have first place in your life, and that right now for
you looks like showing up for, for a two hour service on Sunday, hour and a half
service on Sunday, then there's something missing, a lot of something missing.
Look at Acts chapter 2, look at the birth of the church, look at how they
were sharing all things in common.
They were meeting together daily.
You say, okay, well that's a unique stage of the church, and I'll give you that.
But how about 1 Corinthians 13?
The great passage on loving.
Love is kind, love is patient, love does not boast, it does not rejoice in
evil, it does not insist on its own way.
You know what, we read that at weddings, but you know what that was written to?
That was written to this group right here, that was written to the church.
How can you be obedient to the call to love the way that Paul
calls us to in 1st Corinthians 13?
By only showing up on Sunday mornings and never darkening the doors of the
church or seeing anybody else from the body of Christ the rest of the week.
Or how about Galatians chapter 6?
Paul says there that we are to bear one another's burdens, that if we see
a brother or sister in sin, we are to restore that person in a spirit
of gentleness and love for them.
Listen, it's easy for you to show up this morning looking as best
as you possibly can all week with the facade on and looking like
you've got the Instagram family.
That's not hard to do.
What gets hard is when you begin to let somebody else into your literal kitchen
because you're having them in your house or you're going to their house.
When you begin to get to know someone, where they see you when you're showing up
and man, your last nerve has been frayed.
That's where relationship, accountability, love for one another really takes off.
Showing up on Sunday morning is not hard to do.
Showing up the rest of the time and investing the way that God
calls us to in the church, that's where the bread and butter of true
connecting and true commitment to the bride of Christ looks like.
We have a luxury in our society here of saying, well, you know, I go to
church on Sunday, isn't that enough?
And the early Christians wouldn't have even fathomed that luxury.
And I don't think it's a good luxury.
I don't think it's a good thing for us.
Maybe you think, yeah, but they were under intense persecution and
they, they really felt that need.
Okay.
What happens when intense persecution does come to us?
Do you think a switch is going to flip for you?
What relationships have you invested in with other believers right now, that if
tomorrow it was going to become illegal to gather together as a church, you would
have somebody that was going to care for your soul, that was going to be there?
So it's not just about your commitment to one another, your commitment to
the Lord, but also it's all about your commitment to your, your pastors.
This is something that Pastor Ron and I spent a long time this week
talking about and also with Mark.
Hebrews 13, 17 says this.
He says, Obey your leaders and submit to them.
But this is the part that I want you to focus on here.
For they are keeping watch over your souls as those who will have to give an account.
Let them do this with joy and not with groaning for that
would be of no advantage to you.
Our primary means church of shepherding the flock to this level is through
you being committed to us through community Here's what I mean by that if
this is your church home and you would say pastor rod and I are your pastors
You need to be in a community group And I'm not trying to be legalistic.
I'm not saying you're not saved if you're not in a community group I'm
just saying if you're opting in to us if you're saying you guys are my
shepherd I want you to care for my soul Then we need you in community groups.
Here's the thing, Church.
We have about 180 on average on a Sunday morning.
There's two of us that are pastors.
Mark is bearing some of the shepherding load as well.
But even if that's three of us, that's 60 adults that are parsed
out to each of the three of us.
We only have about 120 of you, 127 of you involved in community group.
Those numbers, You talk to any other pastor to have 70 percent of
a church body in community, they're going to be like, that's amazing.
It is amazing.
And we love that, but we're not satisfied with that.
Because here's what I mean by that.
When you plug in to community group, here's how this helps me
and Pastor Raj shepherd your soul.
When I'm able to reach out to our community group leaders and say, Hey,
how's, how are things going in your group?
Are there any needs going on that it would be helpful for me to be made aware
of that, that I can be praying for?
Are there any counseling issues that I can help serve in?
Are there any financial needs that we can come alongside and
help support as a church family?
Are you guys doing okay?
How are you doing?
Then what's able, able to happen there is they're able to take their
group 15 20 people and they're able to give me a rundown and help me
understand the shepherding needs that exist within the church.
If all you're doing is coming here on Sundays and then leaving, I,
I can't effectively shepherd you.
I can't know you to the level of knowing what your needs are.
But when you place yourself under the care of undershepherds, then
you are also placing your care under, yourself under the care of
your pastors and shepherds as well.
Maybe I can try to give this a little bit more thrust here.
This phrase, give an account, is the idea of being called in front of
your employer and ask, hey, did you do the job that you were assigned?
That's the future that Pastor Rod and I are going to face, and what's going to
be the litmus test is, did you shepherd this room, and how did you do with that?
And so you help us to be able to do that and do that effectively.
And for us as pastors to be obedient to Christ, as you commit to us by
getting connected and Pastor Ron, I desire to be obedient to Christ in this.
We want to be effective at being able to shepherd you.
And the way that we're going to do that is when you commit to us.
Now, maybe you need a little bit more than this.
Here's what commitment looks like.
Here's some of the benefits to you.
You may be saying okay, Yeah, but what do I get out of this by
being committed to a community group other than losing some time?
And I confess that this is super small.
I apologize for that.
It's not the best.
So let me read them out for you.
First, your needs are gonna be made known and provided for.
When you plug into community, And you get connected with other
brothers and sisters in Christ.
You're able to bring your needs to a group of people that are able to
care for you, provide for you, and if necessary, raise those concerns up
the flagpole and help the pastors to get involved in that as well, or the
church at large to get involved in that.
Second, counseling takes place in the context of community.
You have situations, again, like I said, it's easy for you to show up this morning
looking nice with the church facade on.
But community is where you begin to build relationships and trust is transferred
from one to another, where you are able to sit down with someone and say, you
know what, I know it looks like we have it all put together on Sundays, but, man,
our marriage is struggling right now.
Can I meet with you?
Can I talk with you?
You get that in community.
You don't get that through showing up once a week and then turn around and leaving.
Accountability takes place.
You're going to be able to form relationships with people where
they're going to get to know you and get to know how you're doing.
And you're going to be able to say, Hey, can you help me in my pursuit of Jesus?
Can you hold me accountable to this and hold me accountable to this?
The sermon, also, is going to be applied in community.
If all you're doing is showing up here, and then you're leaving, and you're
not involved in the community of the church, then I'm effectively your
podcast pastor, just a worse one, because you can find better ones out there.
Honestly.
I mean, John MacArthur can preach circles around me, obviously.
That's not a newsflash.
John Piper, find your favorite podcast pastor, go listen to them
and free up your Sunday morning.
But when you get involved in community and you connect in community within
the church, then you're able to take the sermon, you're able to apply it
with brothers and sisters in Christ, you're able to talk through, okay,
hey, when he was talking about that one point, what does that look like in you?
I'm trying to figure that out for me.
And our small groups, our community groups are built on that
foundation and around that as well.
Fourth, questions are raised and answered.
You have questions, you're doing the daily Bible reading, you've
got something come up, you're like, hey, I'm curious about this.
Community and being connected to other brothers and sisters in Christ, great way
to get your questions asked and also maybe you have answers that some people need.
Future leaders are identified.
And we're excited about what God's doing at the church and as God grows the church
We're going to need to raise up more leaders and getting you getting known
by other believers is a way for you to be identified As somebody that we're
saying hey, this is a future leader.
We want to develop them.
We want to invest in them You're next you're prayed for Your community
group, that's gonna be, those are our brothers and sisters in Christ
that will be praying for you.
But also, your pastors are gonna be praying for you.
We're gonna take our roster of our community group, like we did this last
week, and we're gonna break it out.
We're gonna say, hey, these are the souls, check in with these
people, check in with the leaders.
Hey, be praying for them.
You're gonna be prayed for when you're committed with us and connected with us.
And then finally, mutual commitment is expressed.
You're saying, I'm in.
And we're looking at you saying, we're in.
Right?
Mutual commitment is expressed.
So commit to us by getting connected.
There may be some roadblocks to that, and I get that.
There may be some things that you're sitting there going, man, I, I, there's
some impediments to me getting plugged in.
So I want you to think about those things and think about what's keeping
you from getting connected and saying, What can I do to overcome those things?
Some questions for you to consider.
Number one, where are you moving?
Where are you buying a house?
Are you buying a house in a place that's gonna take you out of community?
out of connection that as we're talking about this, which again, I think is
the biblical picture of what we see in scripture, the one another's the
loving all the stuff being expressed.
Are you going to be found in a place where your mortgage may
lessen, but man, your spiritual oversight is going to lessen too.
Is it worth it?
What job are you taking?
Are you taking a job that you have no time to be able to invest in the
community of the body of Christ?
What extracurricular activities are you committing to?
What do you fill in your calendar with?
We talked about this last week with a Christ exalting person.
Is Christ preeminent over your calendar?
Such that you were saying, I'm going to commit to the bride of Christ.
And then finally, what attitudes may need to be changed?
Some don't want to get involved in community.
If I can just be blunt because of pride, you don't feel like you need it, or you
feel like you're going to be smarter than everybody else in your community group.
If you are great, they need you.
To bring your wisdom that God's giving you to bear in their lives.
But my guess is you're gonna be encouraged to.
So maybe there's some attitudes that need to be changed with this connection.
Commit to us by getting connected.
You might say, what does that look like?
How do I do that?
These are the groups that are available right now, that are open right now.
We hope to, to multiply these groups.
And again, I confess, they're small.
We've got the Bradleys, they're meeting on Sundays at 4.
30 over in Salina.
We've got the Kim group, they meet on Sundays at 4.
30 in Little Elm.
Kogans meet on Mondays at 6 in McKinney.
The Kellys meet on Tuesdays at 6.
30 in Aubrey.
And the Littles meet on Thursdays at 6.
30 in Salina.
Now, This, we understand we're gonna need more groups.
We do have more groups.
Some of them are just already full and that's why they're not up on the list.
But if you go to our website and you go to get connected, they're
gonna, there's a drop down menu.
You can find one of these groups and get connected.
So here's the thing.
Again, we're at about 70 percent participation of our church body.
It's connected in community groups.
That's great.
And that also means for those of you who are not, you're not going to have
to look very long or far after service to find somebody who is and talk to
them about the benefits that they've experienced by being in community.
And so that's homework step one after church.
Find somebody who's been in a community group.
Talk to them.
Say, hey, what's it like?
What are the benefits that you've experienced?
And then homework step number two, you guessed it.
Register for a community group.
I warned our leaders as we talked about the sermon, as I sent them the, the
recap, or the, the precap of the sermon, uh, before, uh, yesterday, I said,
look, we may, we may get an influx.
Lord willing, we will get an influx of people signing up to be in
community groups after this sermon.
Be ready for more people to get involved.
We would love to have that be the result.
If this is your church home, if I'm your pastor, if Pastor Rod's your pastor,
then you need to be in a community group.
You say, but I thought this was about being equipped.
We're about to get there.
But we can't effectively equip you if you're not all in with us.
We can't effectively train you up and, and, and be a church that's
serving to the capacity that we want to serve as effectively as we would
if you first are all in with us.
It's like this, you see a little old lady at a stoplight getting
ready to cross the street.
I've never found that by the way.
I don't know if any of you have ever seen the random little old lady by herself
at the stoplight getting ready to cross the street and been like, I've been
waiting for this moment my whole life.
Never seen her.
But my guess is, because I believe the best about this group, that you would,
out of the goodness of your heart, you would help her cross the street.
If nothing else other than that's what you're supposed to do.
That's the reason why it's a cliche, right?
There's a difference in the way you would help her across the street.
And if it was your grandmother that was at the street corner.
All of a sudden, as you're helping your grandma across the street, you have a, you
have an investment in her, her well being.
That, that, in essence, her well being is your well being, as you're helping your
grandmother to cross the busy street.
Why?
Because you're committed to her.
You're all in with her.
You've got community.
You've got relationship with her.
We have to first be all in with each other, if we're gonna be effective as a
church at doing the work in the ministry that God is gonna equip us to do.
Okay?
So commit to us by getting connected.
There's another commitment though, and, and again, this is, I think,
what, what Scripture teaches us here.
What Paul teaches, Romans 6, 4, he says this, For as in one body we
have many members, And the members do not all have the same function.
Look at verse 6.
Having gifts that differ according to the grace given us.
Okay?
So not all members have the same function.
There are gifts that differ according to the grace given us.
That would imply that, what?
That there's a variety of different ways that we can be useful to the
bride of Christ in here this morning.
And that means this.
If you are in Christ, If you are a Christian, you have something to
contribute to the overall health of the bride of Christ here at
Compass Bible Church this morning.
Point number two, commit secondly to contribute, not just to consume.
Commit to contribute, not just to consume.
So commit to us by getting connected, right?
And then it's, man, and commit to contribute to the common good of the
body of Christ, the building up of the body of Christ, not just to consume.
1 Corinthians 12, 4 7, Paul expands upon this idea.
He says this, he says, Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.
There are varieties of service, but the same Lord.
There are varieties of activities, but it's the same God who
empowers them all in everyone.
Notice that, in everyone.
To each, to each what?
To each Christian.
To each individual is given the manifestation of the Spirit.
For the common good.
Now you've heard me say this before.
I'm going to say it again, and I'll say it again.
If you are in Christ, you have the Spirit.
Romans 8, 9.
Okay?
Romans 8, 9, Paul says if anyone does not have the Spirit of
Christ, they do not have Christ.
There's no such thing as a Christian without the Holy Spirit.
Okay?
So if you are in Christ, you have the Spirit, and that means you've been
gifted by the Spirit for the common good of building up of the body of Christ.
Amen.
That is only expressed locally in the local Bride of Christ.
You can't apply your spiritual gift universally to the universal church.
It happens and it's seen and it's realized within the local Body of Christ.
Paul says in 1 kind of this metaphor building on the body imagery here.
He says, if the foot should say to the hand, I'm not a hand,
I don't belong to the body.
It wouldn't make it any less a part of the body.
And if the ear should say, because I'm not an eye, I don't belong
to the body, that would not make it any less a part of the body.
If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be?
If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be?
And so Paul's addressing the idea that just because you're not this
gift doesn't mean that you don't have something to bring to the table.
Okay.
The human body has parts of it that we don't need.
That's crazy to me, right?
Like the one we often think of the most is the appendix.
You can live without your appendix.
You don't need it.
Some of you in this room, if I were to ask for a show of hands, which
HIPAA, we don't need to do that.
Okay.
Keep your, your lost body parts to yourselves.
Some of you in this room don't have an appendix.
And here you are.
Congratulations.
Good job.
Uh, your gallbladder.
That's gonna change some things.
Maybe change your diet a little bit.
But you're okay without your gallbladder.
Um, your tonsils.
Some of you are better off because you don't have your tonsils.
And, and so you're not getting strep throat all the time anymore.
You can live without your tonsils.
You don't need your tonsils.
Your spleen.
I didn't know that one.
Apparently you don't need your spleen.
Which when people's spleen ruptures, that's good news for them.
Hey, we're good.
You don't need your spleen.
We're going to go ahead and take that one out for you.
You can live without your spleen.
Uh, even, okay, we're getting into more intense territory here.
You don't need both kidneys.
You can, in some kidney transplants have taken place.
Maybe some in the room here have given a kidney to a loved one.
You can function, your body can with, with one kidney.
Did you know your body can function with one lung?
You don't need both lungs even.
That's shocking.
Your other lung will expand and cover the, the territory there.
I wouldn't recommend trying that one.
Um, Two lungs are better.
You don't need part of your liver.
You can't lose your whole liver.
You need some liver, but you don't need all your liver.
You can lose part of your liver and still live.
Part of your intestines, those can be gone and you'll be okay.
Your thyroid gland, apparently, you don't need it.
You'll be okay.
Listen, in the church, in the local body of Christ, there are no appendices,
tonsils, gallbladders, spleens, extra kidneys, extra lungs, parts of liver
that you don't need, parts of your intestines or thyroid glands, okay?
Those parts don't exist here.
Why?
Because we need every single one of you.
Every single one of you have a vital role to play in us accomplishing the
mission that God has for our church.
Again, the church that all, that's all in is the church that's gonna win.
And, and Paul's gonna say in Ephesians, and we're gonna get there, that when
the body of Christ works properly, The way that the church works properly is
when everybody is doing their part.
When all the parts are functioning properly, the body of Christ functions
as it's designed to function.
So we need you to commit to contribute, not just to consume, because for
us to be the church effectively, we need everybody working together
as God has equipped us to work.
1 Peter 4.
10 puts it this way, he says, As each has received a gift.
Notice, each.
As each person, each Christian has received a gift, use it
to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace.
God's varied grace.
There are all kinds of different gifts.
You think about this, it's gonna be even smaller, right?
Just trust me, there's words that are English up there on the screen.
And they come from the Bible.
These are the gifts that we find in the Bible, okay?
The gifts, and I would say they're more category, categories.
Yup.
Categories.
Wrong emphasis on the wrong syllable.
Category.
There are categories of gifts that we find in the Bible.
Gifts of wisdom.
Gifts of knowledge.
Gifts of faith.
Gifts of healing.
Gifts of miracles.
Gifts of prophecy.
Gifts of discernment.
Gifts of tongues.
Gifts of interpretation of tongues.
Gifts of apostleship.
Gifts of teaching.
Gifts of administration.
Gifts of helping.
Gifts of exhortation.
Gifts of evangelism.
Gifts of hospitality.
Gifts of mercy.
Gifts of leadership and gifts of giving.
Now, some of those we believe are no longer in operation.
That's a different sermon.
But these are categories.
of the way that God has equipped his church to be able to serve the church.
And why do I say they're categories?
I say they're categories because of this.
Notice the gift of hospitality is up there.
Maybe you're, whatever you picture of hospitality, having
somebody over for dinner, right?
You've got the gift of that.
You make a welcoming, welcoming place.
You enjoy that.
You're warm.
You're friendly.
You're generous.
Part of the gifts of hospitality.
Now, Now, you may take that gift of hospitality and that may be realized
in the service of the church through you serving on our welcome team or our
hospitality team and making coffee for the bride of Christ in the morning.
You say, is making coffee a spiritual gift?
Yes.
Chapter and verse.
It's not there.
But it's an expression of the gift of hospitality, which is a way for
you to serve the body of Christ.
Gifts of service, you setting up chairs, you tearing down chairs.
These are all ways that you can serve.
And so all that to say, if you're looking at that list going,
well, I don't know that I have anything specific on that list.
That's not an exhaustive list.
There are other ways that God uses your giftedness, your strengths to be
able to serve and build up the body of Christ, which is the point of the gifts.
And so here's the phrase that I want you to think about.
We're after this.
We're after you serving the body of Christ in whatever your
role of maximum effectiveness.
Okay.
We want everybody in the church, every Christian in the church, serving the bride
in the role of maximum effectiveness.
You say, okay, how do I determine what that is for me?
Here's some questions, some diagnostic questions for you to think about
diagnosing and understanding where you will be most effective in the church.
Number one, what are your strengths?
A lot of times your strengths coincide with the gifts that God has given you.
So what are your strengths?
But second, and just as important, what are the needs that exist in the church?
If, if you feel like, man, my giftedness is I'm an excellent facilities manager.
I manage a facility and a facilities team so well.
That's great.
We don't have a facility.
That doesn't mean that you can't be maximally effective
still in the bride of Christ.
Because you can take the gifts that you have as a facilities
manager and begin to bring them into our set up and teardown team.
And say, let me help in organizing that and in executing these things, right?
So what needs exist in the church?
And then third, where might you maximize your usefulness to the body?
Maybe you're out there and you've had preaching and teaching experience.
Right now, where we're at as a church plant, with the ministries
that we have, we have, we don't have a lot of opportunities or
options for preaching and teaching.
That may change as we continue to grow and add a second service and things like
that with Sunday school class or whatever.
That may change down the road.
Right now, those opportunities are limited.
That doesn't mean that you're not able to be maximally
useful to the bride of Christ.
It may just look different than what you would say.
This is my primary gifting.
Okay, great But what are your other gifts that God has provided for you?
Where else can you serve?
And then finally, what's your availability?
What's your availability?
What can you do?
These are good questions to diagnose how you can be maximally effective in
serving the bride of christ Committing to contribute not just to consume saying
i've got something to bring to the table.
I'm going to do that I preached on this same idea during our pre launch meetings.
In fact, it was the first sermon that I preached from this room.
I preached on being useful to the bride, being, being somebody
that's serving the church.
And I gave the illustration of Lego.
Lego is, is, is frustrating because they always put extra pieces in
the bag to cause you to second guess while you're building it.
Did I miss something?
And yet, if you've built enough Lego, you know that there are always
extra pieces in the bag, right?
There's no extra pieces in the bag when it comes to the body of Christ.
Every piece has a place.
We want you to be able to figure out where that place is.
Church, we're doing a lot for a church plant, but there's more we want to do.
There are ministries that we have percolating that we're going, man,
we want to pull the trigger on this, but we just need more people.
We need more people engaged, more people serving, more people jumping in, doing
the work of the ministry, committing to contribute to the work of the ministry.
I'll show my hands.
It's probably not long from now that we are looking at going to two services.
Probably within the next calendar year, certainly, we'll go to two services.
That's going to create a heavy tax on our need for more people
to serve the Bride of Christ.
And so, there are things that we anticipate doing, things that we want to
do, that we're going to need deep lines.
Now, outside of baseball, the second greatest sport that God has ever
created is the sport of hockey.
Okay?
And in hockey, hockey is a unique sport because in football, in
baseball and in basketball, there's, there's starters, right?
And those starters, those are the ones that are going to
play the majority of the game.
Especially think about football.
Your first line, they're the ones that are on the field the majority of the time,
unless it's a blowout or they get hurt.
Outside of that, they're going to be out there.
Nobody's subbing out Patrick Mahomes, because he needs a breather.
You want to get playing time for your backup when the game's on the line.
Your starters are the one out there.
Hockey's different.
Hockey has multiple lines.
And the lines all rotate on the ice and off the ice throughout the game.
The average shift for a hockey player is anywhere from one and
a half to two minutes on the ice.
That's as long as the superstars.
Conor McDavid, Austin Matthews, those guys.
Rupert Hintz.
The longest they're on the ice is about two minutes.
That's a long shift.
Okay?
And then what does he need?
He needs to rotate off.
And he needs somebody else to be on the ice in his spot.
That's it.
And that person that takes the ice in his spot, they're going to
trust that that person is going to do the job that needs to get done.
That person is going to contribute.
The only person there at the game to consume is the backup goalie.
And even then, sometimes he's got to get on the ice.
But he's the only one that's not rotating on the ice of the players.
Everybody else that's on that bench is going to be on the ice
multiple times throughout the game, contributing and not just consuming.
We want to be a church of hockey players.
Okay, hopefully a church of hockey players is like the greatest
team on ice, the Dallas Stars.
And if we do that, and if we're all in, then we will win.
But we need everybody, because we need deep lines, we need
excellent lines, we need quality lines serving the Bride of Christ.
So commit to contribute, not just to consume.
You have a place on one of our lines, and we want you to find out where
that maximum role of effectiveness is.
Finally, look back at verse six, the last part of it.
He says, Having gifts that differ according to the grace
given to us, let us use them.
Let's use them.
Let's get after it.
Okay.
First Peter 4.
10.
Again, as each has received a gift, use it to serve one another.
Our third point, final point this morning is this.
Commit to steward God's investment in you.
This is building off of the second point here.
Once you commit to say, I want to contribute.
then you need to understand you're, you're contributing not just because the
pastor stood up and preached a sermon that maybe made you feel a little bit
guilty for not, that's not my goal here.
And you're contributing not just because the need is there and
we're saying, Hey, we need you.
We do.
But ultimately you're contributing for this reason, because your
contribution to the body of Christ is an exercise of worship.
It's exalting Jesus.
It's giving him first place in your role in the church by saying, I'm all in.
I'm all in here, and I'm gonna jump in here.
In fact, again, 1 Peter 4, 10, as each has received a gift, he says, use it
to serve one another as good stewards.
A steward is one who uses something that someone gave them as it
was intended to be used, right?
You know this idea.
We're coming off of Christmas.
Parents, you bought a present or two for your kids, I assume.
You gave that to your kids.
And what if your kid said, Mom and Dad, thanks so much.
This is awesome.
I love it.
And then they, they never took it out of the box.
You would assume they weren't very, what rhymes with shmateful
starts with a gr, grateful, right?
Grateful.
You, you would be like, do you even like that thing?
Yeah, mom and dad.
I love it.
I'm so thankful.
You're such a generous mom and dad for giving me this gift that I have.
I'm so thankful.
And you know what?
I tell all my other friends, I have this gift, but you never use it.
Well, yeah.
Why?
Well, I don't know.
I don't know where I would start with trying to use that gift.
Some of us are doing that with the spiritual gift that God has given to you.
And if you want to show that you are thankful for the gift that God has given
you, then be a good steward of it by using it to serve the body of Christ.
Again, 1 Corinthians 12 addresses this, 1 Corinthians 12, 7 says, To each is
given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good, for the common good
of the bride, of the body of Christ.
All right, do me a favor.
Take your Bible over to Ephesians chapter four with me, Ephesians chapter four.
I want you to see this in action here.
Maybe you've been waiting for me to get to this text.
You're like, he's preaching a sermon on equipping and he hasn't even
used the main text on equipping.
Here you go.
Okay, Ephesians four.
Let's start in verse 11.
And He, God, gave the apostles, and the prophets, and the evangelists,
and the shepherds, and the teachers, notice, to equip the saints.
That's what we're talking about here.
To equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building
up the body of Christ.
Okay, this is what we've been preaching on.
This is what we've been talking about.
Until when?
Until we all attain to the unity of faith and the knowledge of the
Son of God to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness
of Christ, aka until Jesus comes back or you're in the ground, okay?
That's how long we need to be doing this.
That's how long we need to be serving, committed to the bride of
Christ, doing the work of ministry.
Until we all attain to the stature, the fullness of Christ.
Notice verse 14.
So that, with the result that.
The reason that we want to do this.
The reason why it's important for you to be stewarding the
gift that God has given you.
For you to be equipped.
To do the work of ministry in the church, the reason why here he goes so that we
may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by
every wind of doctrine by human cunning and craftiness and deceitful schemes.
Rather, here's what we want to be, and this is the product of us
doing this being all in together.
Rather speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into
him who is the head into Christ.
From whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with
which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow
so that it builds itself up in love.
When we steward.
The gifts that God has given us, His investment in you.
Then the church works the way that God has intended it to work.
Then when each part is working properly, then we will be growing up
in every way into Him who is the head.
In other words, then Christ is exalted.
Then Christ has first place over His bride.
When all of us are saying, I'm all in, so that the church is going to win.
When we are fully committed to the bride of Christ, then We are doing what
God has called us to do, then we will be a fruitful and effective church.
But if we got people that are saying, I'm not there, I'm,
I'm, I just don't have time.
I'm not in, I'm on the outside.
Man, we can't be everything that God is calling us to be as a church.
There you go.
And Pastor PJ, are you really after a thousand percent?
Are you, you want everybody in on this and everybody serving unashamedly?
One hundred percent?
Yes.
Well, no church is like that.
Okay.
And.
When, when, when Jesus said that we should be perfect as our Heavenly Father
is perfect, did He want our response to be, well, nobody's perfect, so I'm not
even going to try towards that goal?
No.
It may not be about perfection, but it certainly is about direction.
And that's what I want our church to be about, too.
Listen, I love you.
And if you are here and you're not involved in community group and
you're not serving, I love you.
I'm glad that you're here,
but I just, I don't want you to be comfortable here.
If I can be honest, because I think God has more for you.
I mean, here's, here's some needs that we have right now.
I highlighted some, did you notice there's some that are highlighted up there?
Do you see the ones that are yellow up there set up and tear down?
I mean, we, we always need more people to help with that.
Trailer drivers.
Is trailer driving, is that a spiritual gift?
Uh huh.
You're like, yeah, but an unbeliever can hook up a trailer to a hitch.
Amen, he can, but not for the glory of God.
You can, for the glory of God, and you can serve the bride of Christ.
These are all available for you, and if you go to our website and you
go to get connected, get involved, you can fill out a service form.
And just like I said, hey, I want people signed up and getting
in community group this week.
I want people signed up and getting serving this week, too.
And maybe you're out there, you're already serving.
You're going, I've got more bandwidth here.
Great.
We'll take you.
But really we want everybody, we want people to get back in.
You say, well, man, it's just a hard season for me right now.
Life is difficult.
I'm feeling overwhelmed.
There's a lot going on.
We get that.
We understand that there's going to be seasons for you to pull back
a little bit, but can I encourage you not to pull back completely?
Because I think serving actually helps you in the midst of those difficult seasons.
Here's why.
Serving gives you a sense of purpose.
Maybe you're struggling right now, you feel like you're floating, you
feel like some things that had a lot of purpose for you, your job,
or your marriage, or your parenting, those are not super clear right now.
Man, serving the bride of Christ is going to anchor you to a
sense of consistent purpose.
Second, it's going to take your focus off your circumstances.
As you serve the bride of Christ, your focus is not going to be on yourself.
And along those lines, third, it's going to put your focus on other people.
That's so good.
When we're hurting, to be able to think about how we can
come alongside other people.
Paul says in 2 Corinthians chapter 1, blessed be the God of all comfort
who comforts us in our affliction so that we can comfort other people.
And so for you to serve other people is going to be so good for you.
Fourth, it puts you in the path of relationships.
I mean, you are going to build good relationships by serving on teams
with people here at the church.
And you're going to need that in those seasons.
Whatever number we're on, it pleases the Lord.
It pleases the Lord for you to be engaged in serving his bride.
And finally, it bears fruit.
It bears fruit.
We want everybody in this church, again, we want everybody in this church
to steward God's investment in you, to steward God's investment in you.
So committing to us by getting connected, committing to contribute,
not just to consume and committing to steward God's investment in you.
As we close.
I want you to picture this.
Do you know what these are?
Trash cans.
Yes, they are trash cans.
Do you know where these trash cans are located?
Disneyland.
Right?
These trash cans are trash cans in Disneyland.
You say, why in the world do we have a picture of trash cans in Disneyland?
A couple of reasons.
Disneyland is famous for a lot of reasons.
I would challenge the notion it's the happiest place on earth.
I can handle once a year at Disneyland.
And right now, I'm not missing it.
Okay?
Um, Teach them.
But Disneyland is famous for a lot of reasons.
One of the reasons it's famous is its cleanliness, right?
And part of that goes back to this.
When they bring people on staff at Disneyland, they teach them something.
They say this, everyone is a custodial cast member.
They'll ask the question when they gather together, hey, who
are the custodial cast members?
Those responsible for the upkeep and cleanliness of the grounds.
And the new hires are going, I don't know, I didn't get hired for that.
Until they find out that everybody responds, we all are.
All of us are custodial cast members.
And so what they do is they teach them the Disney scoop is what they call it.
And the Disney scoop is how they teach their various cast members where they're
a, whether they're a princess or they're walking around with a dustbin, how to
scoop down and pick up a piece of trash in motion and go to the nearest trash can.
Can, which by the way, all of them are 30 steps apart.
That's the longest you're going to walk to find a trash can in Disneyland.
It's 30 steps because they did the research and they found
out that's most effective.
And so they teach them to do the Disney scoop to pick up the trash
and to deposit in the trash can.
But they've conveyed the vision to the church body or not to the church body.
Hello.
Yep.
They've conveyed the vision to Disneyland there to say, hey,
all y'all need to buy into this.
And if we all buy into this, it's going to make us who we are.
And if they didn't get the buy in, Disneyland wouldn't be the place it is.
It wouldn't be nearly as pleasant a place for us to be.
And that's what I'm trying to say, church.
If we want to be a church where people walk in here and they say, Whoa, I've
never been to a place like this before.
If we will be this kind of a church, if we will commit in community and
relationships with each other, if we will commit to serving the bride of Christ,
to contributing, not just consuming, if we will commit to stewarding God's
investment in us, it is going to pay off.
And here's what it will look like.
Amen.
the spiritual vibrancy in our church will skyrocket.
People will come in here and they will hear, overhear biblical discussions
taking place after service as people are grabbing a cup of coffee.
They're going to show up and they're going to see people praying together
because it's part of the DNA.
It's part of the fabric of our relationships with each other.
We care about each other to that level.
They're going to show up and they're going to be in, in, in confronted
with accountability opportunities.
After they're here for a little bit, they're going to show up at a community
group and recognize that they're there to do more than just check a box.
So spiritual vibrancy.
Next, ownership.
You're going to walk in here and this is going to be a church where you're going
to be like, man, people, this is not just the pastors, this body, this community,
these people, they love this church.
There's a sense of belonging.
There's a sense of supporting each other.
There's a sense of meaningful relationships that I
see here in this church.
And, and man, I want to be a part of that.
It's also going to make us a church where our impact skyrockets.
We're going to start to see less burnout from people because we're going to
have deep lines like I talked about.
We're going to have a sense where people are excited and joyful to be
here and serve because they're going to know that this is a, an act of
stewardship, which is a joy for them.
And with that, we're going to have increased resources as a church
to go out and do more than what we've been able to do so far.
And so our impact is going to expand.
Our generosity is going to go through the roof.
We're going to be a generous church.
There's going to be a sense of investment.
Community groups are going to become a place of, of, of stewardship to take
place in our, our, our relationships.
But then that stewardship is going to overflow.
We're going to have not just increased resources to do more
ministry through the impact, but also just in people's generosity.
I get it, church.
You're going to be more likely to want to give to a church where you're seeing
God do things in the church than you are just out of obligation because it's
something that we're supposed to do.
I mean, if we will do these things and commit in this way, we're going
to see this church just blow up and my goal is not for us to be a
church with an abundance of wealth.
My goal is for us to be a church with an abundance of an impact.
And people's generosity goes a long way in that.
Our evangelism, that's going to skyrocket.
That's going to go through the roof.
We begin to commit and invest this way.
Then we are going to have more invitations for people to come to
church because we will love this place.
We're going to know what Spurgeon meant when he said the church
is the dearest place on earth.
We're going to be like, you have to come to my church.
You have to be around these people.
Our community groups, they will become on ramps.
You're going to say, Hey, come to my community group, get to know
our people in our group here.
We're going to have deepened faith, which is going to lead
to more of an organic witness.
And then finally, Our joy is going to go up to our joy in being a part
of this body is going to be tangible.
We will have purpose.
We will have family and we will have celebration together.
And that's where I think we can be.
And it's within striking distance.
This is not impossible at all.
None of these things that we're calling you to are impossible.
If you commit to us by getting connected, commit to contribute, not just to consume,
And commit to steward God's investment in you.
These things are going to take place.
The church that's all in that way is a church, undoubtedly, that's going to win.
We stand with me as I pray.