Why We Exist, Part 2

How much of what you do can expand the glorious reputation of We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at We'll look more closely at Speaking of Satan and his hierarchy rulers and powers. And world forces of this darkness.

So you and I are light individually and collectively light in the midst of the world system under the influence of Satan and our world system is wandering around in the darkness of Sin. It is lost. It is entirely confused.

It was ironic to me in the midst of studying for this sermon that I got this past week's edition of Time magazine. Its front cover, if you saw it, it's it's red, completely red, and then all over the cover are question marks. All these question marks. And underneath each question mark is a little question. The headline at the top cover reads, is monogamy over?

Question mark. And the subtitle reads, 21 other questions about the way we live now. See the world is open about its questions. Are we open about the answers? I found it interesting. The question that provoked me, in fact there were several by the way, I read through the whole article, they they're dealing with questions, some important, some not so important, but one of the questions is related to public nudity and authors, you know, weigh in on why it's good or why it's bad.

Is there a is there a way to call offensive art, blasphemous art, you know, good? And they weigh in on that as polygamy to be accepted and authors weighed in on that on both sides, but the one question that really stood out to me on the front cover down near the bottom, and they didn't deal with it on the inside, but it is the question, what will we regret? Let me answer that. Everything.

Everything. Listen, the darker the world system, the more necessary and more distinctive in more dramatic and more different and more disliked your light will be. Culture's response, in fact, is gonna be like you shining a flashlight in someone's face. They're gonna tell you, turn off that light, get that light out of my eye. Our culture though, you know, it's so dark, what are we gonna do?

Look, let's stop crying in our soup for one thing. There's no better time to be light than in a dark place. God is as much on the throne today as he was in first century Rome, right? Yes, Satan is loose, but he's on a leash and that leash is held in the hand of our sovereign Lord and he has chosen us to be in this generation, in this location, in this world, in this country with this influence now to shine and to be salt. The church doesn't need freedom in order to be fruitful and I think it's important to remember, talk to our brothers and sisters in China where evangelical believers are now estimated to outnumber members of the Communist Party.

The church doesn't need approval from its culture in order to receive the approval of God and can I say the church is way off the mark when all it wants to do is receive the approval of man and not the approval of God. But just as in Rome, let's not play down the darkness. Let's not play down the darkness. We're not going to ignore it, but we do need to say that the issues of our generation are far greater than any political system can ever solve. It needs the gospel. The issues of our generation are deeper than any other false religion can ever hope to address. It needs the gospel. In fact, we need nothing less today than an awakening by means of the Spirit of God in the church first and foremost. And as the church stops living like the unbelieving man and stops pursuing life like the unbelieving man and stops seeking to fit into culture like the unbelieving man and gaining the approval of unbelieving man and we become salt and light and we understand what that's gonna mean and perhaps then God will choose to use us to deter some of the decay and dispel some of the darkness in the lives and arts of those who might believe by his grace. To this end we pray we offer no solution to the world or no answer if we exist for anything other than to exhibit spiritual reality and expose sinful corruption and expel satanic darkness and here's another number four we exist to expand the glorious reputation of God. Do you ever think about that when you get up in the morning that my mission today is to expand the glorious reputation of God?

Look at verse 16 of Matthew 5 the end of the paragraph. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven. So what are you shining?

Here's a clue. What are you shining to the world? Your good works. Your good work. You know what good works include? It includes working so well doing such a good job that your supervisor or that secretary or CEO sees the work you do and says wow that's good. We think of good works as somehow related to what we do in here. The world doesn't care how many times we meet. The world doesn't care how many verses you memorize, how many times you got up early in the morning to pray or read. It's not it's not interested nor will it ever see that but it does see your work that is good. What kind of worker are you? See Paul wrote to the Corinthian believers whatever you do do all to the glory of God whatever you do whatever you whatever you do do all to the glory of God. First Corinthians 10 31 that means the way you write that term paper student that means the way you teach that class teacher that means the way you keep house and manage that family housewife that means the way you deliver that report the way you show up the way you stay late no matter what it is I mean it might even be the way you grill that hamburger that cookout I inspect it weekly and you're doing a great job by the way if you're part of that crew whatever whatever do we do we get that whatever you do can expand the glorious reputation of God your good work do you dress good do you talk good do you invest good what do you do your good works build a bridge of credibility over which you carry the gospel of God if you don't do good work just just please don't tell them where you go to church in fact don't tell me belong to Christ right you build a bridge and if you're good and dedicated and diligent and honest and pure and wholesome and humble and kind and you explain to them you're doing all of that not so much because of them but because you belong to a father who is in heaven or over the heavens as it were they're gonna say you know what I'd like to know more about him and that kind of bridge gives you the credibility where ultimately God's glorious reputation has expanded the individual members of the church have to resurrect a 500 year old Reformation doctrine we've talked about before called vocational that gives us our word vocation vocational means sacred calling sacred calling over the years that had been lost prior to the Reformation and in many ways has been lost today because when people think of a sacred vocation they think of what I'm doing yes even you got the sacred job I'm doing all the other stuff no Martin Luther that converted Roman Catholic monk who wrote this resurrects this idea of Ocasio which Calvin and Luther and others visa all resurrected he said that this way all our work in the field I mean he's talking to farmers all our work in the field in the garden in the city in the home in government these are the masks of God behind which he is hidden yet does all things he even wrote it this way and I quote God himself is milking the cows through the vocational of the milkmaid sacred Paul told the Colossians believers the very same thing do your work heartily as unto the Lord rather than for men knowing that from the Lord you will receive your reward it is the Lord Christ whom you serve Colossians 3 verse 23 and verse 24 in other words you literally demonstrate the glory of God in your diligence at work do you work good are you a good worker good works of course expand to doing things for others that are kind or compassion or the good this carries the idea of Shalom it's a wonderful concept and we've got to change a little bit of our vocabulary the ideas of Jews bringing Shalom peace into Babylon where they were exiled Babylon of all places was to experience the goodness of Jewish labor and effort and investment like Daniel and his pagan court was benefited by his integrity the Prophet Jeremiah tells the Jewish exiles as they're heading into Babylon that they are to seek the peace of Babylon the prosperity of Babylon and to pray to the Lord for Jeremiah chapter 29 verse 7 and in that paragraph you discover that they are told to build houses and grow gardens get married raise families whatever they do it is it is the bringing of Shalom into that city that wasn't simply by the way to plant trees and grow gardens you know because Babylon needed some shade Babylonians liked fresh vegetables that really wasn't the core of it Shalom was building houses and planting good gardens and raising families and the core purpose was the fact that God's people were effectively bringing into a fallen corrupt culture a faithful presence and testimony of integrity which was so remarkably different from the Babylonians that the glory of God would be revealed people around would see how they lived and to this day see how you take care of all your things see how you take care of your money and how you manage your household and see how you prioritize your time and they can tell if you're different one author wrote that these Jews in Babylon were to live and we today as God's people placed in deposited in our culture and yet in there reflecting in our daily practices our distinctive identity as believers in Christ and the darker culture becomes the easier it becomes for us to be distinctive let me say the same thing a little differently this is number five we're turning the last lap here number five we exist to exemplify spiritual passion and purpose here's the principle in the form of a question what is it about your life and mine that if under close observation would lead someone to believe or come to the conclusion that we have a different kind of passion we have a different kind of purpose than everybody else is there something different is there something compelling us is there something that we believe is so compelling is there something that we believe is so interesting that we live it and communicate it is the gospel compelling enough you know we can talk about you know the latest athletic event or the diet or the automobile or the house or whatever it is the job and and and we all circulate in that world but is there anything beyond that that that is compelling to us that is interesting to us because the world picks that up they can smell it and sense it Harnack the German church historian wrote that the early church advanced so dramatically in the first century because every member believed they were informal missionaries and when the church is first created understand you've got 3,000 believers soon six and seven eight thousand believers surrounded by millions of unbelievers oh what are we going to do now everyone sensed this compelling interest we call them tent makers I like that term or marketplace ministers good term love that vocabulary I think we we need to go ahead and change the way we think and talk in our last discussion together I suggested that we needed to change our terminology so that we didn't talk about being members but owners now obviously the owner of the church is Christ he said I've come to build my church however he gave us to one another and we talked about why we belong and I can't rehearse it for the sake of time but the effectiveness of any local church is based upon dependent upon its members having an ownership mentality so this isn't just a church or the church or this church this is your church this is our church this is how God is demonstrating and living in and through us the gospel of Christ uniquely to us we need to shift from thinking that we attend or we're even members to being owners I think we need to make another change in our vocabulary I think we don't need to think of ourselves so much as members as much as tent makers now the term tent maker originally comes out of the Apostle Paul's own life experiencing he's a tent maker he's a literal maker of tents he stitched together canvas his fingers would have been deeply calloused if you had met him he made tents and he used that industry when he could to support himself to pay the bills and then to subsidize what he wanted to do in traveling and delivering the gospel of Christ around his particular world acts chapter 18 so that term tent maker became a term for us and over the last many decades it's been used for someone who will leave this culture and take their particular skill as an engineer or a teacher or computer technician or a painter or whatever it might be to another culture and get a job in that field knowing fully well that that job is a front it's a front it's simply something you do that opens the door to influence people in that world you never think of your job in that situation is what you're living for that's totally foreign you're not living for that job you're living for that job to open the door into those people's lives that job pays the bill so you can do what you really want to live for here's what we got to change but you are tent makers here you don't have to go to China to be a tent maker where is it that the church and church members began to think that they live for their job that it wasn't anything more than God's special unique endowment and gifting and training to place you in an area where people live and that's all they live for they're scrambling to go up one more rung and you arrive and that job to you is nothing more than a front to gain you entrance in the lives of people who will never come here to hear the gospel beloved this is why we exist to exhibit spiritual reality to expose sinful corruption to expel satanic darkness to expand the glorious reputation of God to exemplify spiritual passion and purpose if you have a job in what we traditionally call the secular market now you understand what I mean your job is a sacred vocation but you work in what we would call the secular world in other words you're not working for a ministry you're not working in in a mission whose primary purpose is to promote the gospel and and you're gonna enter that rat race tomorrow right if you work in that kind of environment might be IBM I might be SAS I might be some mechanic shop at whatever if you work with one of those kinds of vacations and that kind of role and you belong to Jesus Christ I want you to stand if you're about on Monday morning to go back into that job and you belong to Christ Wow you know we talk about commissioning mission teams and we talk about commissioning missionaries and we talk about commissioning church planters I think we ought to commission you because in a very real sense you're on the front lines you're a tent maker your job is a front don't tell them out there that's true okay that's for us in here to know it's a front it isn't something you live for it is something where God has placed you to cross over that threshold and reach people at the gospel of Jesus Christ so I think we ought to commission you father I pray that you would give every one of them courage and tact and grace to know when to speak and how to speak and to whom to speak for every CEO or perhaps business owner or partner if they have the ability to determine what kind of music plays over the loudspeakers in that waiting room that they would put on Christian music and in that testify to your grace if they choose and have the power to choose the magazines that go out on the coffee tables where people will wait that they put Christian magazines out there literature that introduces people to the gospel that you allow them the creativity and the courage to accompany it to know that they are not there to just get another paycheck they are there as your ministers of the gospel of Christ we commissioned them together as a body and everyone said amen thank you so much for joining us today here on wisdom for the heart this was part two of a sermon called why we exist as Stephen continues through his series on the church entitled upon this rock Stephen is here in the studio with me today Stephen we live in a day and age when politics is on everyone's mind here in America it's getting close to an election what are you hearing from people what's on your heart on this topic well that's a good question I will tell you it is indeed on everybody's mind and I get a lot of questions should I even vote and I would say absolutely we have a tremendous privilege living in a free society as bad as we might think our culture or our society is I'd rather live here than anywhere else on the planet this is an amazing country and I love this country and and we ought to enjoy the benefits of the society we have by being good citizens as the Word of God encourages us in fact as good stewards of what God has given us it's our responsibility to engage with our culture one of the ways I engage is is voting when I look at the Apostle Paul for instance you know he exercised his right as a Roman citizen you remember when they were gonna beat him in prison and he said I don't think you're supposed to do that to a Roman citizen but I will add Paul didn't make it his life's mission to stop prisoners from being beaten he didn't say that the church's mission is to keep this from happening he understood that as a person he could exercise his rights but the mission of the church you know as we talked about today well why does the church exist why do we exist that's actually you know a bigger question Thank You Stephen and friends I want to make you aware of two resources that Stephen has available and that we want to make available to you today we have a new monthly magazine relatively new Stephen I guess we've been doing this since April right it still feels new but this month we published an issue on politics where you address some of these key issues regarding how the Christians should think yeah about politics and friends even though October is almost done we still have a few extra copies here in our office if you would like to receive one free of charge just give us a call today at eight six six forty eight Bible we want you to see this and have this resource let me give you that number one more time that's eight six six forty eight Bible or eight six six four eight two four two five three tomorrow at this same time Stephen's going to continue through this series on the church called upon this rock join us for that right here on wisdom for the hearts