We Do Whatever It Takes to Reach All People

Well, Luke 15, if you have your Bibles and want to welcome all of you at the Summit Church and our friends, many of you are gathered in homes all across the triangle. Some of you are individual.

Maybe you're sitting at a computer screen or you're watching by yourself. And of course, we've got friends that are joining us literally all over the globe. And so I want to say welcome to all of you. I'm joined here by a wonderful group of people that is part of this little, I guess you could call it a home gathering. I've got three different families here, and it probably looks similar. Similar to the gathering that some of you were in. Some of you parents say, well, except these kids look like they're so well behaved and my kids are running around the room and they're swinging off the light fixtures.

Yeah, I get it. These kids are awesome. They got their Bibles. They got their notebooks out. In fact, are you guys, are y'all drawing a picture? Are you taking notes or are you drawing a picture of me?

I'm feeling like there's probably going to be some pictures, but hey, whatever. If you got a pen, you got something to take notes on, it'd be a great time to do this. We are in a series called Be the Movement. In which we are looking at the core values that define the mission of the Summit Church. These are not new values for us, of course. They're fresh articulations of the biblical values that have guided us now for going on about two decades. These are values that we believe should not only define our church, we believe they also ought to define our lives. They are the essence, we believe, of what it means to follow Jesus. They are literally anchored in Jesus's life and ministry and in the lives of the apostles who followed him.

I want you to know these values, to embody these values really at the core of who you are and I want you to live them out. Before I get to that, let me just say one word about this season that we're in as a church. You know, we have said for a while that our mission at the Summit Church is to be a movement of disciple-making disciples in Raleigh-Durham and around the world. That gathers in, you know, several hundreds and several thousands on the weekend for a large religious show. We want to be a group of disciple-making disciples who carry the gospel with you everywhere that you go.

Well, this season has given us, you realize, a chance to actually take some huge leaps forward in that. Because we're in a season where we just can't come together as several thousand people in big locations. So we've called on you to lead smaller gatherings of the church in your home. Hear me, the church needs to still gather. We always say that not gathering is not an option for Christians and we say that nobody should worship alone. Well, this means that that's an opportunity for multiple leaders in our congregation to rise up and lead in the movement, in their homes and in their neighborhoods, perhaps even in their workplaces. We, as Summit Church, are going to supply you with materials, things like Summit Online, which you're participating in right now, but you, you get to lead the movement. You know, a while back, I made a statement to our church that, that I explained that we needed a new standard for success for our members, what we counted as maturity. It was a quote from a guy named Francis Chan.

Here's how it went. He said, Long gone are the days when we should be content with a bunch of people who sing out loud, don't divorce and give to missions. I now want to know I can drop off any member, any member of my church in a city and that person could grow in Jesus, make disciples and help start a church. We want to know that if your job is to grow, if God sent you to Dubai and there were no churches there, that you would be capable of helping start a church and making disciples there. You see, that's what God wants for his people. That's Jesus's vision for you as a disciple.

And like I said, we got a chance right now in this season to actually do that in some very unique ways. And I want you to know that we're going to be doing a church group to lead in this mission like never before. A lot of you are going to end up discovering leadership gifts that you didn't even know that you had, that you really could be a part of a movement and you could be a church leader. So I want you to go to summitchurch.com slash gather. I want you to do that today to find out how you can lead one of these groups or how you can be involved. Now, if you're already doing this, you're already hosting a home gathering and people already together and you're gathered together and your, your, your living room looks like this one right here. I still want you to go to summitschurch.com slash gather.

right here. I still want you to go to summitchurch.com slash gather and formally let us know that you're doing that you say why do I need to formally let you know it's not so we can track you it's so we can we can supply you with resources, some suggestions, best practices of how these work best so we can resource you so that we can connect a pastor with you so that a pastor can just be helped really just to serve you. So if you're already doing this, just take a moment go to summit church comm slash gather, let us know and that will allow us to partner with you in this and to really help facilitate you be in the movement. Okay.

All right. The first of our four values was number one, we prioritize the gospel above all, which is what we looked at last time, for Jesus and the apostles, we saw the gospel was a message of first importance, which meant that that all other agendas, right, no matter how good and worthy and important they are, they all take a distant second place to the gospel. The second value number two, what we're going to look at today is we do whatever it takes to reach all people.

We do whatever it takes to reach all people. Again, Luke 15. I've got your Bible, Jesus is going to tell three stories in this chapter that are absolutely gripping. These stories show you how God feels about people who are separated from him, how he feels about you, if you were separated from him. Three parables that really all make the exact same point, each increasing in intensity. Hey, you ever wonder you ever wonder how God feels about you?

Well, these three stories will tell you exactly how. First, Jesus tells a story about a shepherd with 100 sheep when he discovers that that one is missing. The shepherd doesn't say, well, I got 99 more, a 1% attrition rate isn't bad. No, he is so distraught over the one lost that he stows the 99 in a safe place and he goes out all night searching for the one. That's how God feels about you.

He doesn't look at the size of the summit church and say, well, that's a lot of people. No, he cares for you. He cares that you are lost.

He wants you. The second story is about a woman who loses a valuable coin. This time, it's not one out of 100 that's lost. It's one out of 10. And we're to assume by that, that that means that it represents a 10th of her life savings.

And so this woman spends an entire day tearing her house apart, looking under all the cushions and ripping up the carpet to see if it slipped under there, just trying to find it. Now, obviously, you wouldn't do that for a penny. You wouldn't do that for something that wasn't valuable.

You would only do something like that for something that is very valuable to you. And the point is lost people are valuable to God, and He is searching for them. And the third parable, in the third parable, the value of the lost object increases once again, this time it is a lost son. The son rejects his father. It's what we call the story of the prodigal son. The son shames the father, and he runs away with his inheritance to a far country. The striking thing in this parable is that the father, rather than disowning his son or harboring anger toward him, this father stands at the door of their house, the door of their property, every day looking out toward the far country where his son has run away to, longing for his son to come home. And when that son comes home, the father can hardly contain himself.

He casts aside all dignity and runs to embrace him. He just can't, he just can't be happy without his son. Is there anybody you love so much that when they're not happy, you can't be happy.

And when they're separated from you, you can't be, you can't, you can't be happy. That's how God feels about, about you. The point is, listen, lost people matter to God. Lost people matter to God. In fact, let the extreme weight of Jesus's words here in Luke 15, let them, let them, let them settle in on you. Verse four, what man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he lost one of them, doesn't leave the ninety and nine in the open country and go after the one that is lost until he finds it.

When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors saying to them, rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost. Just so I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven. Verse seven, over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. There is more joy in heaven over one lost person being reclaimed than over the faithfulness of the ninety-nine.

Summit, I want you to think about that for a minute. There is literally nothing that we can do with the ninety-nine that brings Jesus as much joy as rescuing that one. Yes, we care about the ninety-nine. Yeah, we want to minister to you, the ninety-nine. We want to take you deeper into the gospel.

That's going to be our third value. Make disciples, not just converts. But get this, nothing we can do with the ninety-nine brings Jesus as much joy as rescuing the one. Here's how we say that at the Summit Church.

We say value two. We will do whatever it takes to reach all people. I'm going to show you now, I want you to say goodbye to Luke fifteen. Once you go to first Corinthians nine, which is three or four books, you know, to the right of that in your Bible. And I want to show you how the apostle Paul embodied this priority. And then I want to talk about what it means specifically for our church. So first Corinthians nine, if you can turn there, I'm going to read beginning in verse nineteen.

Here's how it goes, right? For though Paul says, I am free from all. I'm a free man. I've made myself actually a servant to all.

The ESV doesn't do a great translation there because the actual word that he uses is slave. I am totally owned by something else. Nothing, nothing's really mine anymore. And what is it that Paul says he is owned by? He says, I am owned by my desire to win more of them to the Jews. I became as a Jew in order to win Jews to those under the law became as one under the law, though not myself being under the law, of course, because I've been freed by the gospel, but I did it so that I could win those under the law to those outside the law. I became as one outside the law, not of course, being outside the law of God, but under the law of Christ. Why did I do that? So that I could win those outside the law to the weak.

I became weak that I might win the week. I have become all things to all people that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel that I may share with them and its blessings.

Verse 24. Do you not know that in a race, all the runners run, but only one actually receives the prize. So run to run that you may be this one who wins that prize. Paul says that for him, winning people to Jesus is similar to running a race. You know, in a race, if you've ever run in a race, you you lay aside anything that doesn't help you win right. You have a right. If you're running a five K or a cross country event, you got a right to wear a backpack or football helmet that fancy new pair of cowboy boots that you love so much.

You got a right to wear all of that, but if you care about winning, you're not going to wear any of those things. In fact, you're going to lay them aside. Paul says I will lay aside anything that keeps me from bringing more people to Jesus.

I've made myself. He says a slave. I made myself a slave to the mission, which means nothing I have really belongs to me anymore.

It's all been surrendered to the goal of the mission. Interestingly, all the context of 1st Corinthians nine when Paul writes that is Paul is explaining why he won't defend himself against certain attacks that have been made on his character. You know how much it bothers you when somebody attacks you and you want to like then you know they're wrong and you're you want to get out and you want to defend yourself right. Paul says I got a right to defend myself. I have the right to defend myself, but I just don't see how that will help the gospels advance in your lives.

So I'm going to lay down that right to defend myself. You see verse fifteen when he says, but I've made no use of any of those rights that I had even defending my reputation is going to come second to the gospels advance in people's lives. Whether it helps him reach more people is Paul's grid y'all for everything again. We express that here at the summit church by just saying this we do whatever it takes to reach all people. I want to explain like I said what that looks like practically here at the summit church, but before I do can we just stop really wherever you are for a minute and can we meditate on? Can we marvel at the love of God for lost people? The love of God for us because ultimately it's the love of God that drives him to be like that and drives us to be like this toward our community and what's helped me this week is reflecting on the fact that that I was the one who was lost when Jesus came for me. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to put first John three one on the screen.

It's a great verse about the love of God. I want us to read it together and then here's what I want you to do. I want you to go around the room and I want you just to say the name of the person who was instrumental in helping you find Jesus and just the year that it happened for me.

It would be Lynn and Carol Greer my parents 1988. That's an example. Okay. So let's read first John three one together and then you do that there around the room by the way if you're joining us on our YouTube channel now you can just hit pause right right here. After we read this verse, you can take whatever time you need for people to say that and then you you unpause it and we'll be here when you when you come back. In fact, let's all read this together right now.

First John three one everybody together in our homes see what kind of love the father has given to us that we should be called children of God and so we are now again everybody just go around the room state the name of the person that was influential in helping you find Jesus and the year that it happened and if it helps you can pause until you're done with that and then come back. So let's talk about what this means for the Summit Church. Okay. Let me give you a few things here. Number one. It means that our mission to the lost trumps the comfort of our members.

Our mission to the lost will always trump the comfort of our members. Early on here at the Summit Church, we decided to set aside our preferences in order to reach people. One of the stories that I love to tell about this involves a beloved Saint who unfortunately just went home to be with Jesus just a few weeks ago. His name is David Baber. He's one of our elders here at the church for many years. When I first came to the Summit Church in 2002, I'd started a basketball ministry and a gym that we owned at the time and groups of local guys from the neighborhood would come to play every Monday night and and I noticed that they all knew each other well. They all had nicknames for each other that corresponded to what they were good at in basketball. One of the guys they called it money because he never missed a three-pointer. Another guy they called streak because he just was so fast at cutting into the lane and and the nickname that they had for me was no don't shoot. I know I wish I were kidding but that is the that is the gospel truth.

There's another guy whose name was Air and they called him that because he was so he could just jump like crazy and he and I guess very unexpectedly. We struck up a friendship and I ended up marrying he and his fiance, but make a long story short over the over the course of several months was able to lead him to faith in Christ. He'd come from a pretty a pretty difficult background and so I got to baptize him in our church and he was up in the baptistry and y'all as far as I know as far as I can remember, it was the first African American that we baptized in the Summit Church and I stood up there and we're in that old property of Homestead Heights Baptist Church and y'all he gave the most incredible testimony about coming to faith in Christ and it was hardly a dry eye in the whole place and I baptized him and after the service, David Baber came up to me and he said, he said, son because they all called me son back in those days. He said, son says, you know that a lot of people are complaining about these changes you're making in our church and I said, yes, sir. He said, you know, I got some questions about some of these changes we're making too and I kind of smiled and I wondered I wondered where he was going with and and then I looked at him and I could see he had a big old tear welling up in his eye and his his his voice got really shaky and he pointed toward the baptistry and he said, but son, if that's what we're gonna get right there, you can count me in for all these changes and that's sort of embodied a spirit of people at the Summit Church that's that that just said whatever it takes, we'll we'll let whatever needs to change change if it helps us reach more people for Jesus.

I want you to know some especially those of you that are are new or here that where we are we are where we are because of a group of people, a group of saints that were willing to make themselves uncomfortable for the sake of reaching others. Sadly, you know this the countryside of America is dotted with churches who won't do that. Their members their members don't wanna change because change is uncomfortable and so they sit on furniture that was designed in the 1940s. They listen to music that was popular in the 1950s. They listen to a pastor who was dressed like he got stuck in the 1960s. I heard one guy say, he says, you know, if the 1950s ever come back, a lot of our Baptist churches are totally gonna be ready, right? Some of you by the way, you might have grown up in a church like this and so you know how hard it is to get them to change anything, right?

The organ, the the order of service, the handbills. Anybody grow up in a place with with the handbills and lord help us if somebody's gonna try to bring in a drum set and that'd be tantamount to setting up an altar to Satan. The sad truth is that many of these churches have prioritized maintaining their traditions over reaching their grandchildren and listen, I know it's easy for us to sit here and and feel smug because oh, we're so modern and contemporary but and it's true by the way, this is an amazing church but you realize how easy it is for that spirit to creep back in. How willing are you and I to put up with things that we don't like in church for the sake of reaching somebody else?

How comfortable are you with being uncomfortable? Let me make this real for a minute, okay? Paul's illustration in 1st Corinthians nine that we're looking at his illustration for how he applied this principle was to have Timothy his traveling companion circumcised, right? And if you like what is circumcision?

You just ask whoever's leading your home gathering and they'll be happy to explain it to you, okay? But for Jews being circumcised was the thing you did to show respect to your heritage. Well, Timothy had a Jewish mom but a Gentile dad and so Timothy had never been circumcised. Well, that had become a huge obstacle as a problem for a lot of Jews they were trying to reach because it was a stumbling block because they thought that that meant Timothy was disrespecting his heritage and Paul says, listen, according to the gospel, he doesn't need to be circumcised, right?

He's free. So, in order to remove any obstacle for the gospel, Paul had Timothy, a grown man, get circumcised. I want you to keep that in the back of your mind as the standard for being uncomfortable in church.

I feel like Timothy would say to a lot of us, please do not bellyache that the music is not exactly to your liking and I feel like we would hear him say that and be ashamed. We believe that we should always be pushing the envelope here. We just want to get comfortable like I'm saying with being uncomfortable.

We want to do things innovatively or sometimes when it feels risky. I love how a pastor friend of mine, a guy named Craig Rochelle says that he said, to reach people that nobody else is reaching, you gotta be willing to do what nobody else is doing. This is why, by the way, we chose to pursue multi-site all those many years ago. Just to be clear, multi-site is a big headache for everybody, but we figure that it was easier for us to reach more people in the triangle if lost people had a facility that they could come to within a 15 mile drive of their homes. I always say that I'm flattered that you drive 45 minutes to come to our church.

I really am. I'm honored by that, but I can promise you that the person that you just met in Starbucks or in your neighborhood who doesn't know Jesus that well is not going to drive 45 minutes to come hear a message that they don't really understand yet, right? So what we said is rather than build one big gargantuan six flags over Jesus kind of building, we said let's build slightly smaller gospel outposts all over the triangle and so we say to people stay where you are serve where you live. Let's be the church in that community.

Alright. That's why we did that even though it wasn't an ideal way to to set up a church and there are a lot of challenges to it. I hope that you and I will always feel a little bit uncomfortable at the Summit Church because the mission is not about meeting our needs. The mission is about reaching our neighbors. Number two being a church that that's willing to do whatever it takes to reach all people means number two we pursue with not just depth. I sometimes hear the criticism that we need to stop focusing on growing and instead focus on taking people deep and and I get that like I told you our third value is that we make disciples not just converts alright, but but you can see from Jesus' parable that there is literally nothing that we can do with the ninety-nine that brings Jesus as much joy as reaching the one, which means that in all our focus on taking people deep, which we're gonna do, we can never lose the priority of going after the one because nothing we can teach to the ninety-nine. Nothing we can do as the ninety-nine brings Jesus as much joy as restoring that one lost sheep as reclaiming that one lost prodigal son or prodigal daughter Charles Spurgeon, who was a nineteenth century preacher who was not known for his shallow sermons. He wasn't you know light and seeker friendly.

Here's what he said. If my hearers are not converted, I feel like I've wasted my time. I've lost the exercise of brain and heart. I feel as if I've lost my hope and lost my life unless I find for my Lord some of his blood once. I would sooner bring one sinner to Jesus Christ than unpack all the mysteries of the divine word for conversion is the thing that we're supposed to live for.

He's he's known throughout history as one of the deepest preachers that's ever ever been around, but he said the thing that drives me is seeing that one lost son or daughter be restored home. So yeah, we wanna continue to grow deep and we're gonna talk about that, but believers that grow deep without also growing wide are probably not as as deep in the gospel as they think because growing deep in the gospel always makes you reach wide for the gospel. We're not supposed to be in a stagnant a stagnant pond where you simply receive receive receive. We're supposed to be a river where gospel water flows through us to others.

That's number two. We are we're gonna pursue not just depth. We're gonna pursue width also number three number three. It means that we go after all peoples in our community, not just one kind. Do you notice that our statement specifically says we do whatever it takes to reach all people all there doesn't just mean as many as possible. It means all kinds of people.

I mean certainly we want to reach as many as possible. That's the whole point of the the story of the ninety-nine and the one every lost person matters to to God, but all there means means all kinds of people people from every walk of life from every socioeconomic strata from every ethnic group. When Jesus gave the great commission in Matthew 28, he told the apostles to go and make disciples from ethnic.

That's a Greek phrase that literally means all the people groups different tribes and different ethnicities and different language groups. That's why at the summit church we send out so many missionaries from the church by the way. Currently we have 276 members who are living overseas right now on a church planting team. We do that. We don't do that because everybody in the triangle is reached.

We don't do it because there's nothing left to do here. We do it because Jesus wants people from every tribe and tongue to be a part of his family right. That's also why we as a church try to reach all different kinds of people in the triangle itself and by the way the vision for doing that is not is not starting separate churches for each of the different kinds of people. The vision for that is one united church where different kinds of people come together in one united family in Christ. When Paul went to Corinth to plant a church, he didn't start a first Jewish Baptist on one side of town and first Gentile Baptist on the other side of town.

Even though honestly that probably would have been easier and everybody would have gotten along better. He planted one united church with everybody together and then he wrote letters like Corinthians to help the people get along with all the culture clash they experienced when they came in the church together. Now, why would Paul do that? Why not just start a Jewish church and a Gentile church? Well, he explains in the book of of Ephesians that the mystery and glory of the gospel would be revealed in a special way in a community, a family of people who have little in common in culture, but everything in common in Christ.

It would reveal God's glory more than than a church where everybody look the same like the same things and and approached and approach social questions all the same way. By the way, did you notice that that in 1st Corinthians nine when Paul goes through all the different ways he's willing to adapt for the sake of the gospel to reach all people. Did you know that almost every single one of the examples that he used of how he was willing to adapt was cultural verse twenty, he says to the Jew to the Jew. He says I became like a Jew. I did Jewish things. I ate Jewish food. I resonated with Jewish questions. I entered into Jewish struggles. I wore Jewish clothes.

I made Timothy get circumcised. That's a cultural adaptation right to those under the law. He said I became like like one under the law. I respected the laws traditions.

I followed the law protocols. I adapted to the law community as much as possible, even though technically I was free in Christ to live outside the Jewish law again. That's cultural adaptation to those who are weak. He said Paul Paul, by the way, is most likely referring when he says those that are weak. He's talking about Jewish converts who are weak in their understanding that the gospel has released them from Jewish Old Testament laws like he discusses in Romans fourteen and Paul says I accommodated their weakness. I didn't make a big deal out of it, but I did my best not to offend them again. That's a cultural adaptation quite often you understand the thing that gets in the way of people in the triangle here in the gospel. It's cultural barriers.

The gap between us and many of our neighbors, Summit Church is often a cultural barrier. Jesus didn't just die for Republicans. He didn't just die for conservatives. He didn't just die for white people or middle class families with kids.

He died for all peoples at all stages of life and of all economic strata and to reach them. We have to be willing to lay aside parts of our culture. Sometimes we have to enter into somebody else's world and I'll tell you from experience. That's hard listen. It's really easy for us. I'll sit here and just kind of nod our heads and say.

Oh yes, and you know we affirm that, but it's hard when the rubber actually hits the road. Let me show you what I what I mean one of our members of color who attended a black church for most of his life told me that growing up in times like these, the church was the one place he could go for refuge. He was confident that everybody there would feel his pain share his anxieties his respective people just understood. He said in the church, he said was the one place where I could just let down my guard and just be the trauma that had been left by by slavery and Jim Crow laws. It created, he said a solidarity in the black community that served as a refuge and and and a time of trial or or fear. He said, he said so when something tragic would happen in the black community, he could expect that that we could be discussed at church because that shared pain and that shared fear was on everybody's mind. He said in choosing to come to a multi ethnic church, he said, especially one where the majority of the membership is white. He said I've given up that comfort because not everybody in the church understands right some in fact, he said seem primarily concerned to show me that my worry or my pain is not legitimate. He said I've chosen to be a part of of our community here because he believes in the vision of this church, he said, but it's it's hard.

I mean I think we can understand that here's the truth. We realize right he shouldn't have to be the only one who has to adapt for those of us who are in the white community. We too have to enter as much as we can into the culture of others to take on their burdens to to listen to them. It doesn't mean that their perspective is infallible and ours is wholly flawed and it does mean that we lay aside cultural preferences and perspectives and try to enter in with each other and to remove as many barriers as possible to lay aside whatever we can for the sake of the gospel right. So it's a race.

We're trying to win. It also means by the way that that all of us are are going to be muted on some of our perspectives to keep from to keep from causing unnecessary division in the body. But Romans fourteen listen listen Paul was willing to be quiet or muted on secondary convictions. He was fully convinced for right and that he thought were important because he thought the unity of the church and its evangelistic mission were more important than maintaining a uniformity of perspective in these other secondary things even though he thought like I said they were important.

Hear me listen everything everything to Paul was secondary behind bringing people to Jesus. Being willing to do whatever it takes to reach all people means removing any obstacle we can that gets in the way of gospel proclamation. We see a great example of this philosophy at work in the early church acts fifteen Jewish and Gentile believers were so divided over a cultural issue in Acts fifteen that they couldn't even worship together anymore. Then they come in and the Jews see the Gentiles and they kind of get all bowed up and the Gentiles see the Jews and they get bowed up and so Gentile churches that a Gentile leaders were experiencing a Jewish flight and vice versa right. The apostles knew that that this undermined Jesus's prayer for unity in the church a unity that Jesus said would demonstrate the the the truth of his message.

So the church leaders come together to try to work something out their solution. However, when we read it in Acts fifteen, their solution actually seems confusing because they basically say if you read Acts fifteen, they say the Gentiles should do two things. They should a they should avoid sexual immorality and be they should avoid eating things that died by strangulation, both of which were a regular part of of Gentile culture. Now the reason for the prohibition on sexual immorality. I think that's pretty that's clear enough right, but the but but but the other reason like don't eat something that's died by strangulation. That one seems kind of random right like of all the things in the law right and because that was part of the Hebrew law. That's the one you want to pick as being something really really important.

Don't eat something that died by choking. Was that really like that important? Let James, the leader of the Jewish segment of the church, let him explain the reasoning. He said here's why for from ancient generations, Moses has had in every city those who proclaim him.

Acts fifteen Twenty-one. In other words, there were a lot of Jews in every major city, lost Jews, Jews who needed to be reached for Jesus and the apostles knew that if these unsaved Jews came into the church and people there were eating strangled animals, then the Jews wouldn't be able to stomach being there. No pun intended right because of that they wouldn't hear the gospel because they couldn't be there. So he asked the Gentiles to refrain from doing things they had a right to do because it would keep unsaved Jews from hearing the gospel. James explains their overarching rationale right in in in Acts fifteen verse nineteen.

Here's how he explains it. We should not make it difficult for the Gentiles or the Jews who are turning to God. He asked both Jews and Gentiles to behave in ways to surrender things so that it would not make it difficult for unsaved members of the other group to find their way back to God. Both were gonna be a little bit uncomfortable.

Both would have to be willing to have their their fur rubbed the wrong way sometimes. But the gospel he said was worth it. Whatever it takes to reach more people for Jesus.

Summit family. I wish I could plaster James' phrase on every single one of our hearts and make it the headline of every single one of our Facebook pages. Do all you can to not make it hard for the Gentiles who are turning to God. Don't make it hard for our black friends to find God. Don't make it hard for Democrats. Don't make it hard for Republicans. Don't make it hard for white seekers or brown seekers or Asian seekers.

Don't make it hard for public school teachers or policemen. We have a gospel too precious and a mission too urgent to let anything stand in our way. For some of you, right, you're all into politics and social solutions and we should care about justice and righteousness in our society. But you let the particulars of your perspective create an obstacle for others to be here. Of course, we should be united in speaking out against injustice and united in speaking out for life, but our perspectives on the best solutions for these things or our convictions on which candidate would best get the job done. That should never get in the way of the one essential thing that we have to do and that is preaching the gospel. Hear me.

I know I sound like a broken record in this, but it's not that these things. It's not that these political these social things are unimportant. They are they are important. It's that the gospel we preach is that important and I'd say that for many of us that the ones of us that say constantly offended here on the verge of leaving. Perhaps the problem is not that the issues tempting you to leave are so important. It's that the greater mission of the gospel is not important enough to you.

Alright. So that's why we do what we do number four number four last one being a church that does whatever it takes to reach all people means number four. Our members take responsibility for the mission. Hey listen. Here's maybe the most important truth that you're going to hear this weekend doing whatever it takes to reach all people means that you you each of you takes responsibility for reaching people at the Summit Church.

We do something called who's your one and it's a challenge for every person to have at least one person in their life one bird. You know who yours is one person that you're praying for and asking God to help you reach out to to bring somebody to Jesus and we want you to tell us who that is so we can pray with you on it. Now when I talk like this people always say, well, I don't know evangelism is just not my gift.

I get nervous talking to people and you look like you could sell vacuum cleaners. You know door to door and that's probably true, but um but you know you're like it's just not my gift. Hey listen, Jesus said Matthew 419 follow me and I will make you a fisher of men. You know what that means it means when you accepted the call to follow Jesus, it means you also accepted the mission to reach people right that command to reach people.

It's called the Great Commission. That's not a special gifting for some. It's a mandate for all and Jesus promised that when he brought you to himself, whatever your personality was extrovert introvert, whether you're a one or a nine or a three or a seven or a 48.2 on the Enneagram scale, he was going to use you and reaching people you say. Well, I don't know how though I don't know how to share Christ. Okay. Well, a couple things I'll say to you well first you should learn we're going to provide several opportunities for you to grow in those this fall.

You're like well. I don't think I can if you can learn to order drinks at Starbucks with all those complex things you can learn to share the gospel and some of those tools by the way are are on our website right now. You should go right now.

Summit Church.com and check some of them out right so first you need to learn the second. I would also say how hard actually is it if you were trapped on the top of a burning building and just when you were about to give up hope into this burning building suddenly the door flies open and there's a firefighter who breaks open the door and puts you over his shoulder and carries you ten flights of stairs down to safety puts you down on the sidewalk goes back in for somebody else and somebody walks by and says. Hey, what just happened? You may not know the guy's name. You may not be able to explain how it happened, but you could say I was going to die and that guy saved me in the meantime while you're learning all your Bible verses and you're learning the right questions and all the right terms to use you can still point people to Jesus. You can invite them to join you on the weekend for a service or how about this tell them your story right now on the front page of our website. There's a tool for helping you write and tell your story with God in less than 3 minutes, meaning you can figure out how to share your story in less than 3 minutes.

Go check that out and learn to write your story. Okay. We're a church that does whatever it takes to reach all people. It leaves me with two questions.

I want to ask all of you number one. Have you met Jesus? See this is Jesus's heart for you.

Jesus left the ninety-nine for you. He couldn't be happy without you. He stands at the gate of heaven every day looking out after you.

He can't be happy until you are restored to him. Are you ready to come home right? If so, then right now, could you just bow your head?

Let's all bow our heads at all of our home gatherings or wherever you are. If you need to trust Christ, you could right now say to him, Lord Jesus, I'm ready to come home. I surrender to you. I receive your offer to save me. Thank you Jesus for saving me. Amen.

Amen. If you if you pray that with me, I want you to text your decision right now to 33933. I just text that five digit 33933 and just text the word Jesus and we'll know what you mean by that. Okay.

That's my first question. Do you know Jesus? Do you know that you know Jesus? Number two is do you have a one? Do you have a one?

I referred to that. Somebody that you're praying for. If so, I want you to go to summitchurch.com slash one where you'll find some resources there for how you can can share the gospel with your one and how to begin to take the next steps in them.

You can also let us know about your one. That way we can help pray for you and resource you if if that'd be helpful to you. Okay. Listen, I know some of you. This is such an unusual time. You're like I'm not even sure how to reach out to people because I mean being under quarantine.

How do you do that? I want you to hear an awesome story of a summit member who is leveraging this time. This moment to be able to to reach people for Jesus as an example of whatever it takes. Well, about a year ago, we went to the HOA and just asked for them to send out a group email basically to everybody in the neighborhood and invite them to a driveway type gathering. So we simply opened up our driveway and garage.

Everybody brought different drinks and snacks and we just started talking with people and and getting to know people. We for a lot of years did not do anything like this when God gave us the opportunity to move into this neighborhood. We really felt that he was calling us there for a specific reason during COVID. Now people are really finding that there's such a thirst for seeing people live and face to face. So we see an increased interest that had a foundation laid before that. A lot of our neighbors now at this point will come to us with prayer requests and and different things.

It's been a sweet thing to watch. You know we we end every service with Summit You Are Sent. Well, what exactly does that mean? If we're sent, where are we sent? We're certainly sent to our neighbors and so we've been convicted by that more than anything and so I would say consider what You Are Sent means to you on any given week. There's no perfect solution.

You're going to make mistakes and it's going to feel a little uncomfortable and that is really okay. The richness that we get back out of it. Yes. Far surpasses any extra little effort or burden that we have had and we're hoping to see people's lives changed through that.