Decades ago, early in the ministry, I was somewhat disillusioned.
Go ahead and go to Matthew 16. Disillusioned of what I kept hearing about what a local church was to do and to be and to function like, and it seemed like every year or two there was a new emphasis, as if the bride of Christ was to change, were to put on a different form and structure and image for the community, and I thought, well, if the book's 2,000 years old, why do we keep reinventing what the church is like, what it's supposed to do, and just dug into the scriptures and from church history because there's nothing new. If we can't find what we're teaching and preaching and believing in church history, we're of all men most arrogant to think that after 2,000 years of scholarship, we're the first ones to find something.
Now, we do forget a lot of things, and for decades, even maybe centuries, wouldn't be too far of a stretch. We have forgotten some of the things about what a local church is, how it's to function, how it's to be structured, etc. But I found a lot of wealth in our early Baptist forefathers, and I realized very early on, studying church history and studying the Word, that our original founding Baptist men from England and you might say Europe and early America, they would not recognize most Baptist churches today.
They wouldn't join most of them. And I thought, why can't we get back to that? Sometimes people ask me, you trying to build a great church down there in Muscle Shoals? And my response will always be, no, I'm trying to build a true church. Now, you never arrive at that, but if you're not striving to be a true church, what are you striving to be?
A cool, a clever, a creative, a contemporary? We have all of these amplifiers in front of the word church. Where did we get the right to put our own modifiers in front of church? It's not our church, it's His.
And He's spent a lot of work to flow through men and give us the divine God for the church. Now, I've got about an hour and a half sermon here, and I'm gonna try to squeeze it into about 40 minutes, so I'll gleam over some areas. But Brother Nate, this morning I'll be preaching to you particularly, and everyone else, because we all need it afresh.
Not to correct you. Matter of fact, if I didn't believe you are in principle not in line with these things, we wouldn't be ordaining you today. But to reaffirm in your heart what a biblical church is and looks like, to carry you on and to encourage you in this pursuit of planting a church for God's glory in Manchester, New Hampshire. Matthew chapter 16, we'll begin in verse 13.
We'll hurriedly rush through this if we can. Now, when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, He was asking His disciples, who do people say that the Son of Man is? And they said, well, some say you're John the Baptist, and others Elijah, but still others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.
They had a high esteem, humanly speaking, or who Jesus was. Verse 15, but He said to them, but who do you say that I am? Here's Simon Peter.
It's a grand slam home run. Peter answered, you're the Christ, the Son of the living God. Verse 17, and Jesus said to him, well blessed are you Simon Barjoni, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father who's in heaven.
Jesus says, now Peter, humanly you couldn't come to that conclusion, but God has enabled you to see and grasp the truth. Verse 18, I say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock, the rock of the truth, you quoted to me in verse 17, I will build my church. Now, He didn't say, you will build my church, and He did not say, I will build your church. He said, I will build my church.
You gotta get an Amen right there. We're to get in on the work with Him, and the gates of Hades, the ram of death, can't even overpower it. We're the church of the departed, and the glorified church when we lead this life. And then go down to verse 21, if you will, because Peter's about to, after he hit that grand slam home run, he's about to strike out. From that time, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, here it is, and be killed. That's the way he's gonna build his church.
Be killed and be raised up on the third day. Well, Peter didn't think the Lord's way of getting this job done was adequate, so Peter says in verse 22, Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, God forbid it, Lord, this shall never happen to you. Peter all roused up his emotions, and his human sentimentality doesn't humbly receive Christ's truth. He wants to bring his emotions to bear of what he thinks is best. 23, Jesus is gonna have none of that, but he, Jesus, turned and said to Peter, get behind me, Satan.
That's not a mild rebuke. Get behind me, Satan, you are a stumbling block to me, for you are not setting your mind on God's interest, but man's. So Peter has a problem here. He wants to build Christ's church. He just says, I think I'm creative and clever and wise enough to do it my way.
You don't get to do that. So Jesus rebukes him. He even says he's Satan. He didn't mean he was actually Satan.
He means you're acting like you're in league with Satan right now, because if Satan can get anything done on earth to advance his cause, it's to pervert the church, to counterfeit the church, to corrupt the church. So Peter had the right profession back up in verses 13 through 18, thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God. That's how all this is gonna get done.
But he had the wrong program. Instead of God looking to you and your word, we're gonna do it our way. That's what Peter says to Jesus.
Jesus, if you'll just step aside, we understand modern man. We can get it done our way. So he was enthusiastic about building God's church.
Ecclesia is the word for church. God's called out ones. Go around the world and build his called-out ones all over the world. But we're not gonna do it your way. We're not gonna follow Scripture.
We're gonna do it our way. And when you, Brother Nate or anybody else, purpose to build the church according to your wisdom, what you have is your wisdom, your creativity. And most pitiful of all, rather, what you're left with is your power, which is pitiful.
And so you end up chasing one thing after another, one creative thing after another, one niche after another, one clever thing after another to keep people interested, and you end up just in your power keeping it going. I'm gonna tell you something. I've been here now going on 45 years, and I'm telling you that won't last 45 years.
You're just not that good, but I'm telling you something else. Jesus will last 45 years, 55 years, 155 years, even 2,000 plus years. A newspaper editor said recently, just when we need the church the most, it has become just like us. We're not supposed to fit in.
We're not supposed to be relevant. We're to be true and righteous and biblical, always full of love and compassion. We ought to be the most compassionate, the kindest, the most winsome and loving people in the community, but we're not gonna follow their agenda. We're gonna follow our Lord's agenda. Too many people see the congregation of the church today as just a little cleaner version of the world, and that's what so many congregations have become.
Just that. A little cleaner version of worldliness. We do not need psychology, and we do not need sociology. We do not need a study on demographics to somehow design our church. A super popular speaker and preacher a long time ago, not too awful long ago, a few couple three decades ago, wrote a book about the church, and it just caught fire and everything. He said the thing you've got to do is go out in your community and survey the average person in your community and find out what they like and dislike and what their preferences are and design the church so that he likes it. I thought we were designing the church so that Jesus likes it. They said that won't work.
Been working for 45 years here. Paul said in Acts chapter 20 verse 27 to the Ephesian elders, he said, I have purposed to share with you the whole counsel of God. Brother Nate or anyone else, if you're purposing to give your people the whole truth of God's Word, you don't have time to chase after other things.
That's going to take all of your energy. So decades ago, I put together this purpose statement from my study of church history, but primarily from Scripture. Just what would a church look like if we just were biblical and that's where the wheel illustration came from.
If we just organized and structured things just from the Scriptures, these basic functions, these basic structures would be there. Did y'all put that up? Did the wheel make it up there?
There it is, the old wheel. Now we're always tweaking it because we're never perfect and no illustration is ever perfect of biblical truth, but it's helpful. Brother Nate, I would charge you with all of my heart to make that the priority and the structure of what you want to do in New Hampshire. And these things, if not directly commanded in Scripture, are extensively exemplified in Scripture. And if you'll do those things well, you won't have time for anything else much. Doesn't mean you can't do other things, I don't mean that. I mean you have to have a Bible study in Starbucks, all church planners have to do that.
I mean that tongue-in-cheek. You know, we have a Bible study in Starbucks. Wow, God works in Starbucks. Now that's not wrong, do that, but the preaching of the Word is more important than even the Bible study in Starbucks. And build your church on these things.
I'll just be able to glean over it because of our time, but let's get right to it. So we put together for our church this purpose statement years ago. The purpose of Grace Life Church of the Shoals is to, number one, glorify God. You're gonna glorify God by obediently. Okay, if we obey him in a broad manner, what are we gonna be about? Making and equipping disciples of Christ, or planting New Testament churches. Where are we gonna do that?
Both in the Shoals and throughout the world, or locally and globally. Was this really gonna work? Well, the last statement's the key. By the power of the Holy Spirit. If the Holy Spirit does not bless this, we're sunk. You don't know how many times early at our Reformation, I didn't say it out loud, but in my heart I would pray, Lord, this isn't gonna work.
And I just thought, well, if it doesn't work, I'll just die on the truth. Shipped right on God and stranded on omnipotence. Let's take it apart a phrase at a time. Let's first of all talk about the first statement, to glorify God. Hallmark our foundational verse for our church, because I think this verse is something of a summary of overall biblical theology.
I don't mean it's an absolute complete summary, I said something of a summary. Ephesians 3 21. To him be glory, notice here, in the church and on a horizontal plane and in Christ Jesus, to all generations forever and ever.
Amen. To him be glory in the church, because see folks, the church is the premier work of the premier person. The premier person is Jesus, and the premier work of Jesus is building his local churches. He didn't say go out there and start Gideon's. I love Gideon's, we support them, but that's secondary.
They may come and go. He didn't say go out there and start fellowship of Christian athletes. I thank God for that ministry. We encourage them and help them, but that will come and go, but the church remains.
So don't get caught up on something secondary unless you're first doing everything you can for that which is primary. The premier work of the premier person is Jesus building his church, that he might be glorified through it. Now why must he be glorified? In one way, and this isn't original to me in any way, but the church is a theater, if you will. We project the truth of our God to the world.
That's what we're for. And as we project the truth of who our God is to the world, then God is held in awe. God is honored. God is seen for who he is.
God is, i.e., glorified as we make much of him, as he is truly manifested and people see the difference. People should look at Grace Life Church of the Shoals and Grace Life Church of New Hampshire, Manchester, New Hampshire, and they should look at it, and they didn't say, Nate and Selina didn't do this. God must be doing this here. God is transforming these. We see God in this.
It's bigger than anything we can come up with. Just some sub points to back up how the church is all about Christ and his glory. The church is Christ-prized purchase, Acts 20-28.
We are purchased with his own blood. Secondly, the church is Christ-building, Matthew 16-18. Upon this rock I will build my church. 1 Peter 2-5 says we are living stones built up into a spiritual house. We are his prized purchase. We are his building. And then thirdly, the church is Christ-body, Colossians 1-18.
He is also head of the body, the church. You see, your body exists to serve and glorify your head. I like to use this illustration when you when you watch the Olympic Games on TV. You see one of those runners, and he does so well, and his body's going so fast, and as he finishes the tape, I mean the guy can't even breathe, and they've already got a microphone on him.
Have y'all noticed that? And they go up to that guy, they take that microphone, and they point it at the legs, and they say, legs, you ran a good race. Legs, you ran so fast. Legs, you're so athletic. How did you do it, legs?
They don't do that at all. They put the microphone at the head. The body brought glory to the head. And that's why we're his body. We're here to walk out the truth of Jesus in our lives, and particularly in our fellowship and in our ministry as a local church. So we are his prized purchase. We are his building. We are his body, and we are his bride. Most precious of all, we are his bride. Ephesians 5 23, for the husband is head of the wife, as Christ also is head of the church. Revelation 21 9, then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven plagues came and spoke to me saying, come here and I will show you the bride, the wife of the lamb.
That's the church. Now when a woman is one, a bride is one by the groom, she becomes his glory. She becomes an extension of him. She is a completion of him, and so are we of Christ. She now has chosen this man. She takes his name, and his convictions are now her convictions.
His values are now her values. She reflects him to the world, because you're one flesh. This whole modern concept that it's something of a partnership with two headships is not of God, it's of Satan.
It's a monstrosity, because an organism without a head is dead, and an organism with two heads is a monstrosity. And so we can't be a head over here saying, here's what the church ought to do, like Peter was trying to do, and then let Jesus be a co-head with us. Blasphemy! We're his bride, he's the head. That's why the husband has such an honored position in the marriage and in the home, because he's a reflection of the honored position of Christ. So we are his prized purchase, we are Christ's building, we are Christ's body, we are Christ's bride. The church exists to serve and to bring glory to him.
Can your church, can our church, can Grace Life Church of Manchester, New Hampshire be seen as a body that glorifies God? How are we gonna get that done then? How are we gonna get that? How are we gonna glorify him? Well, number one is by obedience. By obediently. You see, we bring Christ, the glory he deserves in his church, through a total commitment to obedience to his will for the church. In other words, before you do anything else in the church, make sure you have exhausted what the scripture says is the work of the church. And again, that's why the will is the will. It reminds us of the things which are commanded in Scripture and reminds us of the things that are extensively exemplified in Scripture.
And we want to do those things well first. Now, some people would argue, I don't want to chase this very far. Well, that's not prescriptive. That's descriptive in Scripture. Well, if the Word is sufficient for all faith and practice, then that which is described has a lot of prescription within it.
So don't think, well, we just set all that aside. Well, I mean, if it's just descriptive and it has no authority for us, then why do we even care about it? There you become the authority to pick and choose what parts of Scripture are inspired. But we want to be found obedient. God does not really need us to be any, quote, smarter in our church work, but more obedient to the work of the church. And the Bible is a thoroughly sufficient manual on the church. We just need to obey it. We don't need to go out and study the Boomers or the Busters or Generation X or the Lost Generation or Generation C or Generation X, Generation Y, Generation Z, or the Alpha Generation.
That's all I could find. There's a bunch of them out there. And it's humorous to me that you have all these unique special groups now.
They all have unique propensities, and there's something to that. But for us as Christians, it doesn't really matter. You're sinners who are lost. You're sheep without a shepherd. You need the same gospel, the same truth in every generation. We don't have to make it clever. What is all this nonsense about not obeying what the Word says? Because we're trying to dress Jesus up so the modern culture will be attracted to him.
Attracted to him, I should say. How foolish. Too often today when a family chooses a church, they're choosing just another form of family recreation. Who's got the biggest program for this and the biggest program for that?
We have good programs, but that's not the primary thing here. Spurgeon even a long time ago saw this in England. Charles Haddon Spurgeon said the devil has seldom done a clever thing than hinting to the church that a part of their mission is to provide entertainment for the people with a view of winning them. Providing amusement for the people is nowhere spoken of in the scriptures as a function of the church. The need is Bible doctrine so understood and so felt that it sets men aflame.
I agree with Spurgeon. Jesus did in John 14 15, if you love me, be clever, creative, make my church interesting and entertaining. No, if you love me, just keep my commandments, he said. John 14 15. Acts 5 29, the early church leader said to those who persecuted them that they must quit preaching the gospel the way they're preaching it. They said, quote, we must obey God rather than men. In Romans 16 19, Paul wrote to commend the church at Rome and he says, quote, the report of your creativity, uniqueness, special style, no, the report of your obedience has reached to all.
Paul writes in Romans 16 19. So brothers and sisters, if we want to glorify God, Brother Nate Ware, if you want to glorify God, then obey him as to what his word says the church ought to be like, ought to be functioning like. The goal is obedience, not success.
Can I say that again? The goal is obedience, not success. If we had focused on success in my early tenure as your pastor, if we had focused on success and not obedience, we would have never known the success we have today in ministry. If Jesus had focused on success, he would have never gone to the cross. The more he said about the cross and the closer he got to the cross, the more his numbers declined.
People thought he was crazy. Peter said, you're not gonna go there and die, Jesus. And what did Jesus say when his central program for building his church was rejected by Peter? He said, you're acting like Satan.
So sir, you be sure of it. If you go out to, quote, plant a church and build a church or renovate a church or revitalize a church and you're gonna do it kind of with a slushy mixture of some scripture but also all kinds of creativity and ideas and philosophies of man, you're reminding Jesus of Satan when you do that. Exactly what Jesus meant. Well, if we're going to glorify God, we do it by obediently. Let's go to the third point, making and equipping disciples of Christ or planting churches, local New Testament churches.
Same. Those are all one thing. We want to make those different. When I was a new Christian, there was a real strong Bible study discipleship group emphasis going on. It was almost completely separated from local church life, and I got to be troubled about that even as a college student.
What's wrong with this? And what they would tell me over and over again is, no church is really serious about discipleship. No church is really serious about accountability and discipline and growing true disciples. And I thought, well then let's make it serious about it.
We don't need a plan B. We don't need to rework what God told us. Let's just make the church right instead of creating another thing that's not the church. And you've been brave enough and humble enough and, for me in my case, long-suffering enough in my immaturity years ago and my floundering and when I had to repent and change direction and learn more and do better.
You've honored my leadership and God's blessed it. Jesus said in Matthew 28 19, before he leaves the disciples part of the Great Commission, go therefore and make disciples, true followers of Jesus Christ. He did not say go and get decisions. He did not say go and get people to raise their hand and count them. He did not say go and get responses. He did not say go and see how many your numbers can rise as far as baptisms.
He said go and make disciples. There are so many man-made isms today. By an ism I mean something that's manufactured, a system we followed, and it's a system that's invented by man but not God.
It's a system that looks like the real thing for sure, but it's not the real thing. It's an illusion. We have decision-ism and believe-ism and response-ism, just pray this prayer. That's not a wrong thing to say, but you must never say to somebody, if you prayed that prayer you're done. Where's that in the Bible? Yes, pray a prayer and receive Christ, but we're to look for more than that. You can teach a very lost man full of Satan and wickedness to repeat a prayer.
It's not a magic superstitious formula. We're looking for a changed heart that shows they become, Jesus' words, a disciple, a follower of Jesus Christ. So we have decision-ism and believe-ism and response-ism and revival-ism, and they all make up not Christianity but a Christianity-ism. That's why Jesus said to the church in Sardis in Revelation chapter 3 verse 1, I know the deeds that you have a name, you have the outward counterfeit appearance, you have the name that you're alive, but you're dead. Boy, you look like you're doing great.
Your numbers are up. The world talks wonderful of you, church of Sardis. You've got a name that you're alive, but in reality you're not. You're not spiritually alive. My spirit's not with you. You're all of man.
You're dead. How many Baptist or evangelical churches in the world today would have a name that they're alive, but they're actually dead? Now, three quick things, as quick as I can make them under making and equipping disciples or establishing local New Testament churches, those are all the same thing. Three primary things, matter of fact, put the wheel up there again.
Would you do that, guys? Three things in the wheel that are represented by those spokes, obviously preaching the Word, well that would be four, spokes are three, preaching the Word, every member of ministry through small groups, local church-centered missions, our personalized strategic world missions, and then home life discipleship. That is, we don't just live it when we're inside the church, we take the truths that we learn at church home. Strive the living out at home, live it out in the workplace, live it out in the neighborhoods, live it out in the schools, etc. So I've organized it this way.
First of all, disciples are made and equipped through the faithful preaching of the Word and the power of the Spirit. I can't say that enough. We don't have time to belabor that.
Nothing is to compete with that. Brother Nate, you will have to fight over and over and over again to put aside good things, people who need you, people who are hurting. There will be times when you have to do what I call purposeful neglect. I will have to set that aside to get ready to preach. You will do more people more good by the preaching of the Word than your personal ministry. Only a mature church can grasp that. I remember the story of Spurgeon who was getting ready to preach on Sunday and his housemaid came and knocked on the door and said, Mr. Spurgeon, somebody's here to see you. He said, well I'm studying to get ready for Sunday, I can't meet with anyone right now. The guy knocked again and the maid told him that. He knocked back again and said, you tell Mr. Spurgeon that a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ is here to see him.
Spurgeon said, would you go tell him that I'm meeting with this master right now and I can't not be seeing servants. Well, Spurgeon had a way with words, obviously, but that kind of conviction that whatever else I do, I must be ready for Sunday. In the early years of me taking over a quite large church here and trying to reform it to biblical health, I may spend 40, 50, 60 hours just in the busy administrative work, the visiting, the counseling, but I would start serious study on Friday and not recommending that.
It's just what I inherited and I would get 20 to 25 hours in my study before Sunday night ended because that's what it took in those days. You can't start secluding yourself off like you've been in the pull of the ministry for 40 years. You'll have to care for people, love people. You must begin to teach them the centrality, the foundation of preaching and slowly teach them to wean you off. Matter of fact, I've had people come to me many times and say, pastor, I'm glad we took this off of you and that off of you because man, you preach better when you don't have those other concerns and burdens. And you built your way there, but make sure you're teaching. I mean from day one they're learning that the hub of the will of this ministry is the preaching of the Word.
And by what? You will lose some people over that, but you'll only lose the right ones. Make your tone sweet, your concern real, but make sure they understand this is Jesus' church and this is the way he builds it. Romans chapter 10, and we could just go many, many places, but Romans 10, 14, and 15 says, how will then they call upon him and whom they've not believed, how will they believe in him and whom they've not heard, and how will they hear without a preacher?
How will they hear without a preacher? Caruso is the word there. Caruso is a word that means a herald, and in those days they knew exactly what that meant. He was a public crier.
You know, the guy that would not cry out at midnight or whatever it is, here's the time and here's what's going on, it's snowing or whatever. He had to be loud and authoritative. There's something to preaching. Too often today we mix preaching up with teaching. Let me say this, every preacher must be a good teacher, but not all teaching is preaching. There's an unction and a spiritual authority that you carry in preaching that is very unique. First Timothy chapter 3, verses 16 through chapter 4, verse 18, where Paul is giving that strong admonition to his young understudy Timothy about his pastor work. He says, preach the word, preach the word, be instant in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and instruction. Because Nathan, you got to have a lot of patience because a lot of people don't get it the first time.
I'm not so good at it anymore, but in our early couple of decades, I just repeated everything that's in the wheel over and over. Every time it came out of the next position, I'd remind them again, this is why we do personalized world missions. This is why we do every member minister through small groups, because this is what this text is telling us. This is the way we can get this done following the biblical example of how to get it done.
Now there will be people who say, well that will not work today, but they've always said that will not work today. Isn't that what they said in Corinthians when Paul said they call it the foolishness of preaching? What a foolish way to reach modern man. 2,000 years ago, the sophisticated elitist of Corinth said that won't work.
That is foolish. And Paul said, well, very well. To you, it's foolish, but to us, it's the power of God. Be mindful, brother Nate, that there's always a difference between using scripture and a sermon and quote, preaching the Word, end of quote. We don't want to just use the scriptures to back up our points. We want to preach what the text says and make application to our lives. Well, disciples are made and equipped, churches are planted, boy my time is short, by the faithful preaching of the Word and the power of the Spirit, and then secondly, by every member ministry through small groups.
Now I'm gonna just run through this hopefully like a tornado. In Exodus 18, Jethro, Moses' father-in-law says, Jethro, Moses, the thing you're doing is not good. Moses, you can't keep leading the people this way. Everybody's coming to you, Moses.
Everyone, they're just lined up, and you're taking care of all the needs in the congregation of Israel. Moses, you've got to change. You're gonna wear them out, and you're gonna wear out yourselves.
He said that exactly in the text. Jethro, his father-in-law, probably was caring for his daughter, to be honest, but who knows, but Jethro told Moses, look, what you're doing is not good, and if you'll do this the way I'm telling you, Moses, then it'll be good for you. You won't wear out. I want 45 years from now, Nate, for you still have the power and the convicting enthusiasm because you did it God's way, and you didn't wear yourself out. You were affected for the Lord for decades. And so Jethro told Moses, organize Israel into thousands, then into hundreds, and then into fifties, or into tens. That's a good description of small group ministries, and let good men kind of oversee those, and they'll be responsible for the everyday needs and care of the body, and they'll just bring the important stuff to you, Moses, and you go to God, and you get the Word of God, and you bring it to the people, but let them care and minister one to another. So even when you got 12 in attendance, whatever it is, you start bringing out the principle of small groups. So one day, as God blesses us, we're gonna organize into small groups where capable men and women are caring and shepherding others under the elders of the church. Luke chapter 6, we see Jesus picking a small group, which is the 12 disciples. Acts 2, Acts 5, Acts 20, we have in the early church organizing themselves in the large congregations, yes, but also into small groups, house to house, in smaller units. 2 Timothy 2, we see that Paul was to organize a small group of men to train for ministry in the local church, and on and on we could go. Titus chapter 2, separating the old men from the younger men, and the older ladies from the younger ladies, and the older ladies are to disciple the younger ladies.
How you gonna do that in a church of 900 like us, if you have some structure for it to happen? Matter of fact, when Paul talked about spiritual gifts in Romans and in 1st Corinthians, in 1st Corinthians, what is it? 12 7, he said, your spiritual gift, now listen to me, all of us have spiritual gifts given to us at conversion, your spiritual gift was given to you for the quote, common good, end of quote. Your gift is for everyone else and their gift is for you and everyone else. Because the body of Christ needs us caring and ministering and encouraging and having compassion and sometimes correcting one another.
How are you gonna get that to work? Am I just gonna throw you out there and say, now use your spiritual gift and care for each other this week? No, the Bible exemplifies, it shows forth how to get that done through this great emphasis of exemplifying organizing into smaller groups. And when Paul used that phrase for the common good, now listen to me, it actually means for what is most expedient.
What's expedient to get this done? If you don't have small groups, you're not gonna get it done. If you don't have a good biblical Christ honoring small group ministry, you, in effect, not allow but even cause your people, so many of them, to be neglected, uncared for, unministered to, unlooked after, and so many will fall through the cracks. God's wisdom is small groups done in the right way. And I know people come and say, well, we've seen small groups and they're carnal and they're worldly. Well, the small group's not the problem, it's the people leading them that's the problem.
A lot of churches are not solid, but it's not the fact that the church is to be thrown away, the church is to be made solid. And so Paul emphasizes these separate groups throughout Scripture. The Scripture gives us the exemplification of small groups all over the place. And we hear this every week, and Brother David, I would not be exaggerating to say there are thousands of ministries performed each week because our people are in small enough units to learn, be transparent, to bond together, to trust each other, and so they feel the freedom to care for each other.
You got to get fairly close to somebody for the freedom to care for them. And every week, report after report, testimony of the testimony of things the staff would never find out and never be able to care for. First of all, because there's too many of them, too many cares for us to get to, and secondly because we wouldn't know about them. We just get reports that those ministries are happening. And I'm convinced that greatly glorifies God. All men, Jesus said, will know you're my disciples by the love that you have one for another.
How you gonna exemplify that love if you don't have a structure that gets people together enough so that you feel like you can't exercise that love one for another? You can't just have a big congregation just throw you out there and expect that to happen. Number three, disciples are made and equipped through home life discipleship. That is, I just will mention this, that is we must be committed as heads of our households to take the doctrine and the truth and convictions, the repenting, the things we hold to home with us. It sloshes over to the home and then it sloshes over into the workplace, Brother Chad, then it sloshes over into the schools and the neighborhoods. We're never perfect at that, but we are to take home what we hear from the Word of God that's changed our lives and shown us how to live for the Lord Jesus Christ.
Well, number four, the purpose of your church should be to glorify God by obediently making and equipping disciples of Christ. Well, where are we gonna do that? Both locally and globally are in the shoals area for us to the ends of the world.
Off from Manchester, New Hampshire to the ends of the world. You know, from the very beginning, the church had a global calling before Jesus ascended up into heaven. The last thing he said, Acts 1-8, is you're gonna be my witnesses when the Holy Spirit's power comes upon you. You're gonna be my witnesses in Judea at the same times with the Greek means, at the same time in Judea, at the same time in Samaria, at the same time to the uttermost parts of the world.
It just expands out each time. So when you start reaching your Jerusalem, you also should have a heart to reach the world. I'd say from the very beginning, you might have eight people there, but you're gonna say we're gonna have a world vision for this church, that God might multiply us to impact the whole world. And by the way, we're already connected with an anchored-in-truth family of churches that are just like us that want to do the same thing, so we'll have a ton of help to get this done.
Because you kind of know already what it takes to put a guy on the field as a church planter. You can't do that by yourself as a church, not for decades maybe, but you can do it in partnership. But tell your people, get that in their hearts, that we want to be so biblical God might use us as a model for others to reproduce local churches all over the world. In John 8-12, Jesus said, I'm the light of the world. In John 4-42, Jesus said, I'm the Savior of the world. In John 3-16, Jesus, God so loved the world. In 1 John 2-2, his propitiation is for our sins and also those of the whole world. And our church ministry should have on our hearts what is on the hearts of our God, and that's the world.
He has his elect all over the world. Remember Spurgeon's statement? Spurgeon said, if the elect had a yellow stripe down their back, then we could just go around jerking up shirttails and say who to evangelize. But we don't know who they are, so we evangelize everyone. Amen? We preach and witness and tell everyone to repent, and that is the merit of the faith. If they'll repent and believe, God will save them.
That's how you find the elect. Witness to everybody, preach to everybody, urge all to come. The early church began with a world missions commitment. Going to all the world and make disciples. Mark 16-15, Matthew 28, 18-20. Going to all the world and make disciples. Luke 24-47, that repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be proclaimed to all the nations. John 20-21, peace be with you as the Father sent me, so I send you.
Where did he come? He came to the earth for all the world. So it's a global calling from the very beginning. That's the heart of God. And the early church began with a world missions outreach.
Sorry I'm rushing, but we want to get home sometime today. The church at Antioch had just gotten started from the mother church, the local church at Jerusalem, and about the first thing they did was seek the Lord in prayer, and about the first thing God did was say, set apart your two best, Paul and Barnabas, and send them out to preach the gospel and plant more churches. Brother Nate, from the very earliest days, you'd say, we want to be sending men out to plant churches and do God's work for the glory of God. And they must have done a good job, because Paul had been out there at it and preaching. He'd come back to Antioch and report, not to a missions board, to a local church. The local church is the center of God's purposes and God's glory.
He comes back and he reports he and Barnabas to the local church at Antioch. We say that in Acts chapter 13 and tells them how God's saving people everywhere. And we know that they did a good job, because the enemies of the church hired a lawyer named Tertullius to accuse them before Governor Felix. And here's what Tertullius's accusation was against Paul and his disciples. Quote, Acts 24-5, they have stirred up dissension throughout the inhabited earth. These guys from a little church in Antioch had taken this word of Jesus to the whole world. Don't you hope our enemies someday, that we've heard of these folks in muscle shows, and they've taken the gospel of Jesus to the whole world? I hope that's what our enemies think of us.
John 12, 19, the Pharisees in criticizing the early church says the whole world has gone after him. How are we gonna get that done? How are we gonna glorify God by obediently making and whipping disciples of Christ, planting local New Testament churches, both in our immediate area and around the world? How are we gonna get that done? Well, you're not. It's gonna take God to do that by the power of the Holy Spirit.
We must. Brother Nate, it was a reference marker, a reference point in my whole ministry when I went from studying hard, preaching the Word. Nobody could ever say I wasn't an exegete. Nobody could say I wasn't preaching the Word. Nobody would say I didn't have passion about it. But in my heart, you may not get this for a while, but it's gonna come back to you one day. But in my heart, I wasn't relying on it because I'm a strategist. I can organize things, put them together, make them go. I could do that, though, as a lost man.
But that doesn't mean anything. And God had to bring me to a place. He did that through a lot of persecution, actually.
Well, about all the energy I had left was to prepare to preach and get up and preach on Sunday, and I was wiped out emotionally because of all the warfare and the difficulties I was dealing with. And it's as if the Lord spoke to me audibly, not audibly, but it's louder than that. He spoke to me one day and said, I've got you right where I want you. Now you're depending on the preaching of the Word by the power of the Spirit to transform boys and girls, men and women, senior adults' hearts.
Then they will love what you're about. So it's by the power of the Holy Spirit. It's kind of mysterious, isn't it? Only one person that I can remember, Dr. Seal, I was taught a lot of good things, and I thank God for them, but only one person, older preacher, Jackie Shelton, Pleasant Grove Baptist Church in Moulton, Alabama, sat me down one day and tried to describe to me and encouraged me that it's not just having revival service, it's not just getting people to respond, the Holy Spirit of God must have changed their lives. And a light went off. You know, it's one of those things you know, but then all of a sudden you know you know.
So we all pray that for Brother Nate, that he'll have that same pilgrimage he'll just increasingly rely on. Because, do y'all know this? Y'all are very likable people. You really are. We like, we don't just love you, we like you.
We have to love you, but we like you. Selena, you're a wonderful gift to your husband. I mean, I'd join their church, probably there'll be a lot of people join their church because Selena is such an attractive person.
Her spirit, her commitment to Christ. But at the end of the day, you got to say, yes, but did the Word of God change them through the preaching? That's the only ones that'll stick with you long term.
That's the only ones that'll stay. I mean, you're gonna do things like to try to have a meaningful membership, not just a bloated membership role where everyone you've baptized and joined to the church has true biblical marks of regeneration, true conversion. You're gonna try to have loving, compassionate, but real accountability in your membership. You just can't live the way you want to and open, praise and sin and be a member of your church.
Very little of that going on today. With corrective church discipline. You see, the Bible teaches formal discipline, formative discipline and corrective discipline. But your formative discipline, your teaching and instruction has no power if you don't have corrective discipline.
They always go together. You're teaching them to have a glory of God focus that it's not about us, it's not about meeting men's needs, you'll meet more men's needs by focusing on God's glory than you will if you forget God's glory and focus on their needs. You're gonna be striving to do everything you do so that you might multiply and reproduce and spread the gospel to the ends of the earth and glorify God to the ends of the earth. You're gonna strive to build every member ministry through small groups.
And you know what? The experts will tell you that's not the way to design a church. Well, I'm not trying to design a church, I'm trying to build a true church in cooperation with my Lord.
So how are you gonna make it in Manchester, New Hampshire, doing these things? It'll take God to do that. God'll have to do it. And you've got to get to that place that we used to.
I'm shipwrecked on God, I'm stranded on omnipotence. If His way doesn't work, then let it be a failure. I'd rather you come home in five years and say, it's just not gonna work. But I did it right. You know what we'll say?
We'll patch you up, clean you up, love on you, encourage you, and we'll go again. Paul had closed doors like that where they wouldn't receive it. Jesus had some of those. I'm not expecting that to happen.
If it does, it does. I mean, we're not here, we're not waiting for just these great testimonies of all these numbers, necessarily. We want to know that you obeyed the truth.
Are y'all with me on this? If the Spirit of God uses the preaching of the Word to regenerate the hearts, transform the hearts of young people and men and women, boys and girls and senior adults, then they will desire what you are. They'll want what you're teaching and preaching, how you're building that church. And if they do not, if they are not transformed by the Spirit of God, they will not be attracted to it. You see, the church is a living organism. We breathe in the oxygen of true regenerate, born-again children of God, and we breathe out the carbon dioxide of false professors. And that happens a lot, and it happens a whole lot in the early stages of reforming a church.
Planting, maybe not as much, but you'll still have some of that. People will come in and join up with you, and they'll stay a while. As Spurgeon said, they'll come in un-humbled, they'll stay a while un-humbled, and they'll leave un-humbled. Because only true regeneration humbles the heart. And can I just say this, brother?
A lot of guys won't understand this. We believe in plurality of elders as much as anybody. I don't even run the elders meeting. It's a unanimity of men with equal authority in there. But until you get elders, you're the man.
And there will be times you'll probably have to get in your pulpit and say, look, I know there's a thousand ways to do things, but here at this church we're gonna do it this way. And if they can't respect that, because Paul tells at the end of 1st Corinthians that they're to honor the men who proved themselves in the work. They're to follow those kind of men. This is before they had elders. So there are times you just have to draw some parameters, because you'll see people, you'll show them the will, say we're gonna do these things well, and this guy wants to do, yeah, but let's do this, this, and this. They're okay people.
They're not necessarily evil. Then a lady will say, well, let's do this, this, and this. And what you have to say, over and over, we can do all of that through this structure. Let's get this right. Then we'll see if we can get to other things. Well, I've been trying to get this right for 44 years.
I still ain't finished. And so some people would just, you can't do ever, you can't, your job is not to have a cafe or let's say a serving line where everybody just picks and chooses what they want. That's not a church. It's to be a true church, and trust the Spirit of God will cause people to be drawn to the truth and what you are. So we must be compassionate and humble and continue to pray and reach out to everyone we can, but trust God to bring into this church those that he wants. Jesus said it very clearly, my sheep hear my voice. Your church has got to put out his voice, and they will be drawn. We must strive to love God and be tools in his hands to build his church according to his Word by his power and for his glory. Brother Nathan, for all of us here, if we give ourselves faithfully, even sacrificially, to build God's church, God's way, with God's power and for God's glory, then and only then can you be confident on that day when you stand before him and give an account that you'll hear him say, well done, good and faithful servant.
