The Armor of God // Feet Ready to share the Gospel of Peace // Pastor Josh Evans

Amen. Amen.

If you're grateful that Jesus saves, can you say Amen this morning? Listen, that's something to shout about. That's something to get excited about.

I tell you, I get excited about that. We can sing about it here today. I tell you, if you're new to our church, we do say welcome. We are so glad that you have chosen to worship with us this morning. Our worship team does a good job.

We call ourselves a blended type of service. You get a little bit of everything. If you don't like certain songs, I always say if you stick around long enough, you'll find one that you do like. I love the balance that they bring to that.

Listen, we've got people of all different ages in here today and people who like different things. I appreciate them leading us to the throne room. I want to echo what Pastor David said. I do want to thank you for being a part of our service. If this is your first time or the first time in a long time, we want to say thank you for being here. It's always my privilege every single week I meet somebody new.

That's what I try to do. If you are new today and just slipping in, I want to say welcome. We're really glad that you are here. We are thankful that you've chosen to worship with us here this morning. If you have your Bible, go to Ephesians Chapter 6.

Ephesians Chapter 6 today. I apologize. I always mention this because when I'm sitting where you're sitting and I notice things, I'm kind of like a little bit of ADD in me. I notice certain things. The storm that we experienced last night kind of messed up our TV up here. If you're out there today and you guys are like taking bets on your role, what happened to that TV, that's it. So you won if that's what you thought it was.

I'm the type that I need somebody to tell me why that's not working. So that's what it is. So just I apologize. So for all of you guys down here, you'll have to look at that one to follow along as some of you are taking notes and things like that. We began a brand new series a few weeks ago on the armor of God, on the armor of God.

And so we are only three weeks into this series. And here in Ephesians Chapter 6 where we find the different pieces of the armor of God, the Apostle Paul is concluding his writing to this church, this real church there at Ephesus. And as he's concluding, he's kind of taking everything that he's talked about and he's putting this in these final thoughts, telling them to be ready for the battle that they are facing. Now if you know anything about the book of Ephesians, the first three chapters of the book are all about the Gospel. And so it's a deep dive into the Gospel. In fact, Ephesians Chapter 2 is probably the best interpretation of what the Gospel does in a person's life as any other passage in the New Testament. And that is exactly what he's talking about in the first three chapters.

And then the last three chapters are all about, as the Gospel has changed your life, this is what it looks like to live out the Gospel in everyday life. And as he concludes that, he talks about a war that you and I are in. In other words, he says that you are in a battle right now. You're in a war, not with flesh and blood, but it is a war against the demonic, against the demonic. Like I said when we opened up this series, we don't like to talk about the demonic a whole lot, right, in church.

We get really nervous when we talk about that. And many of you have seen kind of what culture and Hollywood says about, you know, the devil and the enemy that we face. And we think, you know, that he's just some guy in a red suit and with a pitchfork and things like that. And I want you to know something about the enemy that you're facing because that is not who or the description that the Apostle Paul would give you.

In fact, culture has completely missed the mark of what the enemy is really like. In fact, the Scripture says that the enemy, the devil, disguises himself as this angel of light, this angel of light. Here's what that means is that the enemy, the devil, is willing to disguise himself however he can and try to get a foothold into your life and get your eyes off of Jesus and onto something else. It could be anything. It could be good things in your life.

It could be whatever. But here's what the devil is after. And this is kind of the big idea that drives the reason why we have to put on the armor of God is this, is that the devil is after our destruction. The enemy that we are facing, what he wants to see more than anything else is your destruction.

He wants to see you and your family completely destroyed. And because of that, the Apostle Paul gives us the strategy here in Ephesians chapter 6 to go to battle and to eventually win the war. Here's what he says in verse number 10 of Ephesians chapter 6. He says, finally, because of everything I've said up to this point, finally, my brothers, be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might, put on the whole armor of God. In fact, I think it's worth noting, put on all of it. Everything he's going to say, you need to put it on. There's not one thing, one piece of the armor that you can leave off to the side. We need all of that.

Why? So that you may be able to stand against the wiles and the attacks of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. So then he goes on and he says, hey, here's how you stand. Stand, having your loins girt about with truth.

We looked at that. That's the belt of truth. The word of God is what needs to determine what is true in your life. It doesn't need to be what's on Facebook, right? Many of us get our truth on Facebook, and I'll tell you this, not everything you see on Facebook is true. I know that's mind boggling to you and mind blowing, all right?

It's not, okay? But that's not where truth needs to come from. Truth needs to come from the only thing that we can take to the bank as certain and true, and that's the word of God. And the reason it's true is because it never changes, right?

It never changes. The Lord is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and so we have to get our truth from scripture. So he says put on this belt of truth, and then he says put on the breastplate of righteousness. That's what we looked at last week, and remember, it's worth noting that you can't put on that breastplate of righteousness on your own.

In fact, the scripture says that there's nothing in us, righteous or worthy, so we had to have him come as our intercessor, Jesus, the only righteous one, to live a righteous life so that he could impute and give us righteousness into our life. And then we come to verse number 15, which is where we're gonna kinda part today, and it says this, also having your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. The word here, shod, in the King James Version, it literally means to bind, to bind. In other words, what Paul is encouraging the church to do is to bind or tie or lace up your feet with the gospel of peace.

The word preparation here has the idea and the intent, there in the Greek, of being ready. So you could say this today, which is really where our big idea is, is that we need to have our feet ready to share the gospel of peace. We need to have our feet ready and bound and laced up, ready to share the gospel of peace.

Now the gospel means good news or good herald, and I want you to know up front, it's not just good advice for you, it's not just good advice for the world, it is good news, it has to be shared, it has to be proclaimed. And what Paul is saying is that we need, as Christians, as Christ followers, we need to be ready, be ready, be prepared to share the gospel of peace. Paul is saying that in the fight that we face, the battle, you can overcome and fight the enemy by having your feet ready to share the gospel. You see, every one of the pieces of the armor that we are to put on, every piece of this armor, it's either a defense or it is a weapon to defeat the enemy.

It's either a defense from the enemy or it is a weapon that we use in battle to defeat the enemy. And so Paul is telling us a way that we can defeat the enemy in our own life and in our neighbor's life and in the people around us' life is we need, as the church, to be ready to share the gospel of peace with the world around us. And so in order to do this, I think it's important for us to understand what the gospel of peace is today. If we need to be ready to share this, what does this mean for us to be ready to share this gospel of peace? We have to look first at the message of the gospel. If you have just a moment, if you can flip back just a few pages to 1 Corinthians, 1 Corinthians chapter number 15. I want you to see this, 1 Corinthians 15. I think this is one of the best descriptions of the gospel that we have and there's so many good ones and the apostle Paul does such a marvelous job at really giving us a clear message of the gospel. But if we're gonna share something that matters to us and it should matter because it changed your life, then you need to know what the gospel is and how it is the hope of the world. For us, when you have good news in your life, which is what the gospel means, when you have good news, what do you wanna do with it? You wanna tell somebody, right?

Something good happens to you, you wanna tell them. For example, Friday night here at Union Grove Christian School, we had some volleyball and soccer games. And one thing that is important for me, I always like to go to all the games, but this past week was especially important and here's why, is we were playing the team or the school that I grew up going to and that I graduated from. And if you know anything about that, that's the team you wanna beat more than anything else. Like look, I love those guys over there but I really wanna demolish them. I don't even want the game to be close, I wanna destroy them. And I know that sounds terrible but that is what it is and so when they come, I always have that game like circled on my calendar because I know I'm gonna see a lot of people.

And when you know a lot of the people on the opposing team, it gets competitive and you wanna beat them. And so Friday night, we ended up and I celebrate this and I mean, I know we're here to worship the Lord, but listen, we can rejoice in the fact that we swept the team that I went to and played for growing up. Can we clap for that?

We need to, it's a good thing. All right, and I get really excited and you know, it's kind of, it brings me such great joy afterwards. You know, the games are over and they're kind of, you know, waiting for their kids to get out of the locker room and I'm walking around and I'm just like on cloud nine. I'm like, how you guys been, you know? And they don't wanna talk to me at all because we just like, you know, drove them straight into the ground for lack of a better way of putting it, all right? And we beat them.

I'm a little competitive, by the way, if you didn't know that about me. And so we beat them. Here's what I did. You know, I gathered up my family. I get in the car to go home and the first thing I wanted to do because that was a big deal to me. I was like, man, we sweat faith.

I was so excited about it. And I get in my car, first thing I did, I called my dad. Every time good news happens in my life, I called my dad. And I called my dad and he's like at a birthday party. He can't really hear me, believe it or not.

I know you think that's hard to believe that anyone can not hear me. And so, but I called my dad. I was like, dad, I was like, I need you to step out.

He's like, I'm at this birthday party. No, this is big. I need you to step away for just a moment. I need to tell you this. And I told him, I was like, you'll never believe, man.

We sweat faith tonight. And he got excited. I got excited. Here's the point is that good news has to be shared. Good news has to be shared. When something good happens into your life, it needs to be shared because it's only good news if somebody else hears about it. It's only good news if somebody else hears about it. Who would have cared if we had a sweat faith Friday night if nobody heard about it?

I wish I had the guts to just post all about it on Facebook, but I'm not that guy, okay? And so, but listen, here's the thing. It's like this is good news, and so we have to share it. And here, Paul is saying that if we want to go on the offense against the enemy and the devil as he's trying to attack us, and we got these, you know, wiles of the devil, these different attacks that he's trying to throw our way, one of the ways that we can defend ourselves and go on the attack is by having our feet ready to go and to share the gospel of peace. And for us to understand that, we got to understand the message of the gospel. And I want you to see this, verse number one of 1 Corinthians chapter 15.

It says this, and there's a few things I want to bring out here today. The first thing is this, is that the gospel changes our standing with God. And I understand that for some of you, you might think, man, he's kind of hammered on the gospel a lot lately and everything. But here's what I was taught, is that there is no sermon if the gospel is not mentioned in the sermon, okay? And so we're going to spend a few moments looking at the gospel, why it's important, because it's the only hope of the world. But when we think about the gospel being ready to share this, I want you to remember, and the reason why this is important in us sharing it, it changes a person's standing with God. Verse number one, 1 Corinthians 15 says, Moreover, brethren, or brothers, I declare unto you the gospel, this is Paul writing, the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand. The word stand there means, it carries on the idea of being secure.

It has the idea of being secure. You see, what the gospel does and why this is important for you to share with the people that live next to you, or the people that live in your neighborhood, or your family, or your children, or your extended family, or the people you work with, and things like that, here's why it's important for you to share it. You have the hope of the world, and you should be grateful in that. But if you truly understand what the gospel did for you, it'll help us to put on our feet ready to go out and share the gospel with our neighbors and the people around us. It's because it changes our standing before God. You see, when you and I were born into this world, we were born into one category, one family, and that was the sinner's family. Every single person, the pastor standing in front of you, I was born into the same family like everybody in here.

There wasn't one person that was born into a different family, it doesn't matter. Listen, we were all born into one family named sinners. And because of our sin, your sin, my sin, all of our sin, here's what that did, with a holy, righteous God in heaven, the judge of all the world, it destroyed our relationship with him.

It destroyed the relationship that he designed for you to have with him, it's now been destroyed. And the scripture says there's not enough good in you to ever reconcile your relationship with the Father. So the gospel, which is the truth that Jesus came and died for you, lived a righteous life for you, and resurrected for you, something that you could never do, and offered this free gift of salvation for all to who are willing to believe, that, once you trust in that, it changes our standing with God.

Where now, you were once guilty, right? We were once guilty in front of God because of our sin, we now are secure and considered righteous, not because of you, but because of Jesus with you, and your standing with him, you're now reconciled with the Father. Listen, if you're a Christian in here today, we should be excited about that, right? Some of you, I doubt that you're reconciled with the Father with the way you look at me sometimes on Sunday, I'm just gonna be honest with you, okay? And so listen, I just want you to know, this should excite us, this should make you pumped, this should be something that is good news in your life, so much to the point that you need to be ready to share it.

Just like me Friday night, when something good happened to me, I wanted to tell it, I couldn't keep quiet about it. This is what the apostle Paul's saying, the gospel changes our standing with God. We don't have a legal change in our standing with God. Ephesians chapter two talks about this.

He says, I mentioned this earlier, but we change from being a foreigner to now we're family. We change from being an enemy with God and now we're a friend of God. We were born into this world dead in our sins, now we're alive. We were born into this world as a sinner and now because of Jesus and the gospel, we leave as a saint and righteous. You see, the gospel is the only way any of that changes in your life.

It's the only way. Number two, the gospel's our only hope. Verse number two of 1 Corinthians 15, it says this, by which also by the gospel also ye are saved.

We sang about that today. Hallelujah, I'm saved, saved, saved. Listen, without the gospel, you cannot be saved. You cannot be saved. There is no hope outside of the gospel for your life. Let me remind you that you were not just drowning in a sea of sin in your life, trying to keep your head above water. No, the scripture, what it tells me about my life, I wasn't drowning trying to keep my head. I was completely dead submerged at the bottom of the sea when Jesus found me.

And I want you to know you were no different than that. You have no chance apart from the gospel. Number three, the gospel's all about Jesus.

It's not about you. The gospel's not a story of you trying to find your way to him. The gospel is a story all about him coming to find his way to you. The gospel's all about Jesus.

Here you see in verse number three of 1 Corinthians 15, for I, Paul, delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, talking about the gospel, how that Christ Jesus, he died for our sins according to the scripture, that he was buried. We know the story, that he rose again the third day according to the scripture. Then he was seen of Cephas, that's Peter, and of the 12. After that, he was seen of above 500 brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are falling asleep. After that, he was seen of James, then of all the apostles.

And last of all, he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time. Here's what the apostle Paul did right there. He gave us a clear picture that the gospel is simply Jesus in our place.

That's what Jesus did to take your sin away, and he doesn't mention anything about himself. He mentions all about Jesus. Let me tell you this, the gospel is all about him.

It's all about what he did for you. That's the gospel. It's like we've used this courtroom scene so many times, and that's really what it's like because there's so much legal standing between you and God. We were guilty, and now because of him, we are free. And when I think about that, I think about myself, like in my life, I've only had to go to court just a couple of times, not for anything bad, so don't get nervous, okay? It's just for speeding tickets. How many of you have had a speeding ticket? Be honest before everybody in here, raise your hand. Don't be scared and stuff. Some of you, you just lied. You're in a lot of trouble.

The altar's open at the end of the service. But here's the thing, it's like I have a real issue. I've done really good, and Abby, knock on wood somewhere around you if there's any around you, because I've done really good. I haven't had a ticket in a long time. But I have in my time of driving since I was 16 years old, I've had eight speeding tickets, eight of them. Pretty much every dime of money that I've made goes to a lawyer or something like that.

I just put it out there. It's gotten so bad, we should just budget for them at this point, every year. Here's the amount for lawyers and that kind of thing. But I've had a lot of speeding tickets. And most of the time, and by the way, you might think that I'm a pastor and that if I tell the officer that comes to my door, and I've tried everything in the book to get out of them.

I'll just tell you, I'm not above anything. If you got any ideas to try that helped you, let me know for next time. But I've tried everything. It's like, okay, this time, I can remember blue lights behind me. It's like, okay, I gotta muster up something in me. I'm not that emotional of a person, but I gotta muster up.

It's like, man, if I can get some tears, that'll help me, right? And so I've tried that. I've tried, man, I'm just busy. I pastor a church down the street, officer, just letting you know. I gotta throw it all in there, everything I can. And I never have good luck. I don't know what it is.

They're just like, oh, man, that's great to hear. Let me go write you a ticket and I'll be right back. So I've had eight of them, eight speeding tickets in my lifetime. And there's been a few times where I've had to go to court and deal with it myself. But then there was a couple of times, like my really bad one was the night before I graduated high school. It was the night before graduation. And I was at this graduation party and I was late getting home and I knew I was past curfew. I only lived like 20 minutes from this person's house. I was past curfew.

And here's what's amazing. And if you haven't figured this out yet, for a 20 minute drive, you can go as fast as you want, 100 miles per hour. You ain't gonna save much time.

I hadn't learned that yet. I'm thinking, man, if I go like this fast, I'll save like 10 minutes of time. You can't do that in a 20 minute drive.

There's just no way around it. But I was going, I was on highway 220 in Ashboro and I was on highway 220. And I mean, it was late at night. Nobody was out except for an officer and myself.

And we're the only two. And I got clocked for going 82 and a 55. That's not a good ticket, okay? So I had to hire this lawyer. I just got all this like money for graduation, all went to the lawyer, every bit of it. And I hired this lawyer and they went in there and they went into the courtroom and I don't know what lawyers do, but they kind of weaseled themselves through and somehow they got me out of this thing. I don't understand the court system, but it worked for me in this time. And they got me out of everything.

And I'm like, really? So no points on my license, nothing else or whatever? Yeah, I mean, I had to spend for the lawyer, but it really helped my insurance didn't go up and all this kind of stuff. The lawyer came in and what they did was they vouched for me. I did not have to go to court.

They came in and they vouched for me. And because of the lawyer standing in there and arguing and vouching for me, I now was free. You see, here's what really happened for you in your life in the gospel is that you were guilty before the righteous judge, the judge of all mankind, the creator of all.

He is the righteous judge. And because of our sin, we were guilty and there wasn't enough money. There wasn't enough good things. There wasn't anything. You could stand in that courtroom on your own merit and you would still be guilty before the righteous judge.

There's nothing that you could do to change that. And so what Jesus did was Jesus came and through his death and through his resurrection, what he did was he gave you an opportunity that if you now trust in Jesus, he can be the intercessor between you and between the righteous judge. So now when the righteous judge looks at you because of the gospel, he doesn't see your sin.

He sees his son's righteousness and he sees Jesus' righteousness and he's the one that makes us in the presence of God move from being guilty to free. You see, that's the message of the gospel. That's the message of the gospel. It's our only hope and it's all about what Jesus did for you. The gospel, though, demands a response.

It demands a response. In verse number nine of 1 Corinthians 15, Paul's continuing this conversation about the gospel and he says, I'm the least of the apostles. I'm not even meet to be called an apostle.

Why? Because I persecuted the church of God. You remember Paul, he was a murderer.

He hated the name of Jesus and he got joy by persecuting the church before Jesus found him. And then in verse 10, but by the grace of God, and by the way, I don't care what your backstory is. We are only here for one reason and that's the grace of God here today.

That's what unifies us. He says, by the grace of God, I am what I am and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. Therefore, whether it were I or they, so we preach and so ye believed.

Here's the thing. The gospel's our only hope. The gospel's all about Jesus. The gospel is what saves you and it changes your standing before God but here's the thing. The gospel demands a response.

It demands a response. You say, do I have to do anything to accept the gospel? No, the gospel does not say do. The gospel says done. You see, what Jesus did, all we have to do is freely accept his free gift of salvation. The work has already been done by Jesus.

He did everything for us. All we have to do is decide whether or not we will believe it. That's what the apostle Paul says and so Paul's saying because of the battle that we're in, we need to have our feet ready to share the message of the gospel, the hope that you've experienced and I think it's important for us to look at the result of the gospel. What does the gospel do in our life?

What's the result? I've been changed and yes, it changed our standing. Yes, it's our only hope. Yes, it's about Jesus. We responded, all of that. I want you to see quickly the result of the gospel. Last week, we went back to the book of Isaiah and in fact, if you have just a moment, go to Isaiah, the Old Testament.

I want to show you one thing as we kind of wrap this thing up here today. Isaiah chapter 52, if you have just a moment. Isaiah chapter 52 and Isaiah is a prophetic book. In fact, the prophet Isaiah was prophesying during several different kings and his whole goal was to prophesy about coming judgment but also the safety that the Israelites would experience from their main enemy during that day, which was Babylon. And here in Isaiah chapter 52, we have a passage that's a prophetic passage that really parallels what the apostle Paul is saying here in the New Testament. It's mentioned in Romans chapter 10 but it's also mentioned in Ephesians chapter six when we talk about our feet being shod with the preparation of the gospel. Paul is playing on this Old Testament prophecy that we find here in Isaiah chapter 52 verse seven where it says this, how beautiful upon, I want you to get this.

Listen, if you mark in your Bible, mark this verse. You know, this is such a beautiful verse and this is Isaiah prophesying about the safety and the protection that God would give from the enemy and he says, how beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace, that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation, that saith unto Zion, thy God reigneth. You see, what Isaiah is saying is that the gospel, it's a prophetic thing about the coming savior of the world that would come and eventually make all the wrong right.

He would eventually make everything that is wrong, it would become right in the name of Jesus and it provides this and it demands us to go out and to take it to people and put the feet of the gospel on people because it brings good tidings. You say, what is the result of it? Three things I want to show you here from that passage. First is it brings peace. It brings peace. He says, you know, beautiful are the feet of him that goes out and publishes peace. When we think about peace, we talk about this. When you lose a loved one, you think about the peace, right, that we have. Listen, peace in scripture, there's two different types of peace that you experience in the name of Jesus.

The first piece is this, we experience an upward peace. Here's what that means, is that when you were born in this world, we talked about this, you were guilty before God. You were considered an enemy of God.

I know we don't like to preach about that, we don't like to say that a whole lot, but that's the truth. Every single one of us were born into this world, born into this world, into that family, enemies of God. And because of him, here's what's awesome, our hostile relationship with the father is now peaceful. That's what the gospel does.

That's what the gospel does, so you don't have to worry about the coming judgment, you don't have to worry about facing him because your relationship is now peace. That's why Romans 5, 21 says, therefore being justified by faith, we now have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. You see, that's an upward peace, but we also have a second peace that comes with a relationship with Jesus. That's an inward peace. The second one, we have this upward peace with the father, but we also have an inward peace. This is when Jesus says in John chapter 14, let not your heart be troubled. In other words, you don't have to be anxious for anything.

Why? Because we have an inner peace. Philippians chapter 4 says, it is a peace that passeth all understanding. It's a peace that can't be understood by those outside the faith.

You see, if you ever face somebody that's gone through the loss of a loved one, maybe tragically, and you have something like that, and you have people like, how in the world can you go on? There's only one answer for the child of God, and here's the reason, is we have an inward peace that goes with us, not because of us, but because of who we trusted in, Jesus Christ, and that gives us an inward peace to live for. Not only does the gospel provide peace, it provides goodness. Back in Isaiah chapter 52, he says, he bringeth beautifuler the feet of him that bringeth these good tidings of good.

I like what Carl Henry said. He said, it only means, the gospel only means good news if it gets there on time. You see, the gospel's good. Martin Luther said it this way.

He said that it wouldn't have mattered if Jesus died a thousand times if nobody ever heard about it. You see, the gospel's only good news if it gets somewhere on time, and the scripture says how beautiful are the feet of them that go out and publish the gospel and share the gospel with the world, but then it brings salvation. Ephesians 2, for by grace are ye saved through faith. Beautiful are the feet of them that publisheth salvation. You see, Paul is saying here in the New Testament that you can overcome the enemy's attacks by going on the offense with the gospel. By going on the offense with the gospel, in other words, you can fight and you can overthrow the enemy's work by standing in and sharing the gospel with those around you. How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace, that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation, that saith unto Zion, thy God reigneth.

Here's the thing. When I was studying this, I was thinking about this, like several years ago, my sister-in-law spent time over in Guyana as a missionary, and so me and my wife had an opportunity to go to Guyana, and we went to Guyana, and we stayed there kind of in the jungle of Guyana and where she lived and also where my brother-in-law is actually from, and we went there, and we ministered for 10 different days. Well, one day, they wanted to do this hike, and they wanted to do this hike up to a mountain outside of Guyana that would also show you the surrounding and nearby countries that were right around it. It was just this beautiful thing. So they said, we're gonna do this, but it's okay. We're gonna grab this tractor, and it's gonna have a trailer on the back and everybody there that's there for the camp that we were doing, we'll all get on there together. So we jumped on this thing. There was like 40 of us standing on a trailer going through the middle of the woods. It was crazy, and it was wild. And so much to the point, it was like this long.

It was about three or four miles through the woods and that kind of thing. And so we finally get there, and then we have to hike a little bit further, something that the trailer couldn't get up to. And so we're all going up there. And for me, because I'm a spoiled American, and so for me, I'm just kind of like, man, when are we gonna get there?

All those local Guyanese kids are just like, man, this is great. Let's run it. And I'm like, no, that's fine.

You guys go, I'll catch up. And so we finally get to the top of this mountain, and we're up there, and I had the opportunity to, we sang some praise music, and I had an opportunity to preach up there. And I can remember, like as I was thinking about what I'm gonna say during the music, and I'm like looking around, you could see just all around.

Everywhere that I looked, we were on this mountain, and it just, you could see for, I mean, miles and miles and miles and miles. When I was reading this, I was thinking about that moment, when I'm up there and I'm just shouting the good news of the gospel to all of these young people who came from all these nearby places. And I was thinking, maybe this is what Isaiah meant.

Maybe this is just a glimpse into what Isaiah meant for all of us. And let me tell you this today. If you're a child of God, this is for you. This is for all of us in here today.

It's for every single one of us. The gospel is good news. It is good news for the entire world. It's an opportunity and an invitation. But listen, it's only good news.

Don't miss this. It's only good news if you and I publish it. If we publish it.

Think about a writer that loves to write. They have a story inside of them that they need to put down for the world to read. It's only good if they put it in writing and publish that for people to see it. That's what the gospel is. Some of you have been working with lost people for years and they don't know the gospel. They don't know the answer.

And they don't understand the hope. God's put you there for a reason. Publish it. Proclaim it. Testify of it.

The gospel is worthy of that. Shout it. Listen, you should be going. You're not here just to get a paycheck. You're not here for just whatever career path you're in.

No, you are here because of the gospel. Take it with you. Take it to the people who work in the cubicle next to you. Take it to the people who are in the classroom next to yours. Take it to your clients that you service and that you show up from time to time. Figure out a way and pray for opportunities for you to share the gospel, to publish the gospel.

It's only good news if it's published, if it's proclaimed. And Paul would say, how beautiful. How beautiful are the feet of them that are willing to share it. Listen, church, every single one of you, I've been here two years. Every single one of you have come up to me at some point and you're like, man, I want our church to grow.

I do too. But the only way that happens is if all of us, it's not just the pastoral staff, think about it. I work with them every day. I work with Christians, right? Many of you, you are leaving and you're going into your communities. You're going into your neighborhoods. You're going into your schools.

You're going into your work environments. There's people all around you who need the hope of Jesus. There's people all around you that if God decided to come back, even so come, like we talked about, if God decided to come back today, you know good and well that they're standing with God right now today is guilty. And you have the hope, the hope that changes someone's standing before an almighty God, the righteous judge. How dare us keep that to ourself.

How dare us keep that to ourself. Publish it, proclaim it, shout it. In closing, I want to just do something practical for you. Many of you have a phone nearby. Many of you might have a sheet of paper nearby or a pen or if you need to just do this as a mental note, I want to make this practical. Listen, I get sometimes, I get so excited about preaching to you.

I want this to be practical where every single person can apply something. I want to get you to write down three things today, okay? Write them down, put them in your phone, whatever. But I want you to think about it. The first thing I want you to write down is I want you to write down one person that you can share the gospel with this week. Could be a coworker, student, could be a friend, could be a family member, could be a neighbor. Write down one person that you need to publish the good news of the gospel with this week. I don't know who that might be, but I want you to write down somebody. Think about it. If you can't come up with somebody, hey, pray about it.

Let God lay somebody on your heart. It could be somebody at a gas station. It could be somebody at a restaurant, a waitress or something. It could be anybody, but I want you to think of one person that you can go out this week that you're going to share the gospel with. I want you to write it down.

I want you to write it down. The second thing, and this is personal, but I believe in this and it's kind of scary, especially if you put your own kids like I have, but I want you to write down one person that you pray would leave it all to give their lives to go somewhere to share the good news of the gospel. Write down one person. It could be anybody. It could be your kid. It could be a grandkid. It could be somebody in our church. I want you to write down and just pray today that God would call one person that would give their life maybe to go to a foreign field because this is the message of the gospel.

It's only good news. There are unreached people groups that don't even have the Bible in their language all across the world. Listen, we don't have a lot of time left. We got to get people who are willing to go and it's not because God isn't calling people.

It's because people are not saying yes to the call. I want you to pray about somebody that you would say, hey, God, if you want to call them, hey, I'm willing to give them over. Listen, parents, you should pray this for your kids. Don't be afraid of it.

Be excited about it. Pray it for your kids. Listen, what an honor. What an honor if your kid came to you one day and said, hey, I feel like God's calling me across the world to share the gospel. Who cares if they leave Davidson County? Who cares? It doesn't matter because in the grand scheme of things, I know it's sad that you won't live right next to them and that kind of thing.

I get all of that, but listen, what a good thing, how beautiful are the feet of them? That's what we should do as parents. Listen, I've been a youth pastor for long enough to know. I've seen so many parents get in the way of God calling a kid to something. I've seen it. Parents are like, man, you can't do that?

You're not going to make a lot of money. Listen, no, here's the proper response. If your kid ever says, I didn't mean to get hung up on this, but it's coming out, all right, and here's the thing. If your kid ever shows up to you and says, hey, I believe God might be calling me into full-time ministry or calling me to missions or something and I need to figure this thing out, here's the only proper response. How beautiful.

How beautiful are the feet of them? Listen, that's what we're called to do. So the first thing, write down one person you can share. Every single one of us, there's not a person in here exempt from what we preached about today.

Every one of you has been changed by the gospel. Write down one person you can share the gospel with. Second thing, write down one person that you pray God would call to leave everything and to share the good news. And then number three, maybe you don't know a whole lot of people that don't know Jesus.

Maybe you don't have a lot of people to write down for point number two. Then listen, pray and write down how you can give more to fund those to go around the world. It's missions giving. Give to missions, to forward in faith. Listen, we believe God has got a mission for us locally but also globally.

And the only way for us to do that is for every single one of us here to take on our own responsibility to give, to fund them, to fund them. Listen, I think it was John Piper, somebody said it this way, that every single Christian is called to missions in some way. You're called to go or it's two things. You're called to go or you're called to pay for those who go. Listen, that's what all of us should be called to do. Listen, that's what we're supposed to be called to do.

So I want you today, I want you to write down somebody who needs the gospel. And by the way, don't get nervous. Listen, it's not something that, I get nerves come into play. That's the enemy disguising himself as an angel of light to try to get you to stop what God's calling you to.

You see the point? That's what he wants you to do. He wants you to be scared. He wants you to feel like you can't do it. Listen, you can't do it on your own.

That's why we gotta be strong in the power of his might. But every single one of us, when we leave these doors today, here's what I want. I want all of you, every one of us together. I want us to lace up our feet, bind up our feet, ready to share the gospel with anybody who God brings into our life. Because that's a beautiful thing. It's beautiful. Let's proclaim him. Let's publish the good news around the world. Would you bow your heads with me?