I haven't said that for a year. Give me a thumbs up if you are smiling though, all right? Just so I know that you're alive. Okay, that's good. I never know, I never know. To be totally honest, I never know if anyone's even asleep. Like this is the year that if you're like a narcoleptic person, like you just fall asleep everywhere, this is fine, I would never know. Every once in a while, just give me a thumbs up and I know that you're tracking with me, all right?
We're gonna be in Mark chapter 6 today, Mark chapter 6. We're continuing our series on Mark and our mini series in January on mission.
We've been talking about how the Christian life, just like we described in the Freddie video, Christian life, we often feel like, hey, we should just chill out, not do much of anything. That seems most natural to us. But in reality, biblically, it is unnatural. What is more natural biblically is to be on mission, to be moving on mission as God has created us. And we're gonna continue to see that from Mark chapter 6 beginning in verse 7.
This is God's word. And Jesus called the 12 and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. He charged them to take nothing for their journey except a staff, no bread, no bag, no money in their belts, but to wear sandals and not put on two tunics. And he said to them, whenever you enter a house, stay there until you depart from there, and if any place will not receive you and they will not listen to you, when you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them.' So they went out and proclaimed that people should repent, and they cast out many demons and anointed with oil many who were sick and healed them. This is God's Word.
Father, I pray that you would be with us, meet us in the preaching of your Word today. God, help us, give us ears We're curious to hear what you want us to hear today. In your name, amen. Amen.
Well, when I— a number of years ago, I joined the worship team here at church. And I was a young musician. I was in my teens. You know, I'd never really played with a band before. And one of the— your favorite things as a musician is, you know, if you're playing the piano or something, when there's some space in between lines of singing, right? 'Cause that's like your time to shine. Like the rest of the time it's, you know, the vocalist, hey great, whatever vocalist, you're doing great, whatever. But you're kind of waiting for that little pause or the turnaround or whatever, and then you just go to town. And I was learning to improvise, you know, and play in and around the melodies that were being sung. And I remember in one particular song, we had a pastor who was a worship leader and he was teaching me to play with the band. And I remember, you know, in the turnaround or there's a musical interlude and I'm playing and I remember him kind of looking at me and because, you know, singing is done. Here's the music part. And I'm like, you know, I'm just like, I'm going off. I'm exploring new key signatures. I'm exploring new meters. And I remember him kind of saying, Okay, hey Ricky, just some input here. We still need to be playing this song. This is the song we're doing. And so, and I realized what he was saying, he said that with a smile, but I realized what he was saying is like, this is the song we're trying to play, you're off playing some other song. Your playing is not trying to play the song that we're all trying to play. You're off on your own playing something else.
6 · Applies the musical metaphor to the contemporary situation, diagnosing the problem: Christians are pursuing different passionate causes rather than the unified mission Christ gave, especially evident during the pandemic
And what we're talking about today is this big question of what is our mission as Christians? Because here's what happens so often. I think this year especially, all Christians will have things that they are passionate about, things that make them sort of come alive. And maybe for you in the last year, it's like, you know, telling everybody on Facebook what they should be doing related to masks and safety. And so you're just like, yeah, you know, and that's what I'm passionate about. Or maybe it's a justice thing. Like, yeah, my thing is I'm gonna tell everybody about this justice thing and how they're supposed to advocate. Or maybe it's a political thing, or maybe it's, you know, I don't know, something else. Everybody should be eating healthier in the pandemic, whatever it is. And what happens is, if we're not careful, Christians can kind of show up in the church spiritually together. And you got one person that's going like, doopa, doopa, doopa, doo doo, and the other person's over here going, you know, and. And everybody is playing their own song.
7 · States the sermon's main thesis: the unified mission of all Christians is to declare and demonstrate the good news about Christ, which unites believers despite their diverse backgrounds
And so the question today is, what is the song that we are trying to play, right? Jesus helps us by uniting people with very different interests, very different backgrounds, very different experiences, even very different defaults, and shows us this is what your life should be about. This is what you are called together to do. So here's the big idea today: being a Christian— this is the song, all right— being a Christian means giving our lives to declare and demonstrate the good news about Christ. That's the song. The good news about Christ. Declaring that, demonstrating that. That is what we are here to do.
8 · Introduces the sermon's structure with two main questions and restates the first question using the controlling metaphor
So two questions today. Again, the first, we're already in, but I'm gonna restate it, is what is the mission? Or put it another way, what is the song that we're trying to play?
9 · Expounds the text's context by highlighting that despite numerous pressing social needs in the first century (injustice, political strife, poverty), Jesus gave the disciples a singular, all-encompassing mission, creating tension with our impulse to make those needs our primary focus
Now, here's what's interesting. In Mark chapter 6, when Jesus sends out his disciples to be about this mission he's given them, it is an all-encompassing mission. Nobody's taking their hobby on this trip. There's one thing and one thing alone that they are doing as disciples. Now, that's interesting because in the first century, there was a lot of needs in the world around them, right? If we think, hey, in 21st century America, we've got injustice, oh, let me introduce you to first century Roman Empire, right, with corrupt tax collectors that are just extorting people essentially for their own gain. Or you think, man, there's a lot of political strife in America in the 21st century. Yeah, political strife in the first century Rome, they just stabbed people, man. They just, like, assassinated people. It was crazy. You think there's poverty in 21st century America? I mean, there were people literally just dying in the street in first century Rome. And the problem is that we could wonder— we see all these needs and we think, well, maybe that should be the song. Maybe that should be the focus. Maybe that should be the thing we give ourselves to.
10 · Provides historical background on Simon the Zealot, explaining his deep involvement in a revolutionary political movement aimed at overthrowing Roman rule, establishing the intensity of his former passion
And I wanna give you just one example of one of the disciples because I think it's so instructive for us when we think about this question, what is the mission? What is the song we're singing? And that is one of the disciples, one of the 12 here, is Simon the Zealot. Now, one of the most interesting things about Simon the Zealot is that the most notable thing about him was not his relationship to his brother, like some of the other disciples, or his relationship even to his father. It was his political activist affiliation with the Zealots. Now, Zealot is where we get the word zealous, you know, in English, or a zealot is somebody sold out for a cause. The Zealots were a group of first-century activists seeking the overthrow of the Roman government in Israel, okay? So this group is dedicated to overthrowing the shackles of the Roman government in that area. There were no casual zealots. You weren't just kind of like, yeah, I'll show up to a meeting every once in a while. I'm kind of a zealot, you know. Or like, hey, your membership has lapsed, Fred. Like, oh, I'll go to another meeting to get it active again. You know, I gave my $20 dues. No, zealots were like meeting underground, plotting. They were going into towns. They were standing on soapboxes. They were trying to rile people up. And some of these movements ended up becoming violent. People taking up arms, people fighting in the streets. I mean, this is the group that Simon was part of.
11 · Analyzes the moral complexity of Simon's former cause, acknowledging that unlike Matthew's tax collecting, the Zealot cause had legitimate elements (opposing injustice, seeking freedom), but argues Jesus offered something greater
Now, the issue is this: was the cause of the zealots all bad, right? You think Matthew the tax collector, probably like 90% of his life that Jesus called him away from, not good, right? Not good. Don't do any of those things. None of them. No, just come follow me. But the zealot thing where you're like, well, look, what you're trying to— overthrow a corrupt empire, you're trying to stand against injustice, you're trying to free people, you're trying to take back the land that God gave his people, like, is that bad? Now, in some ways, it wasn't a bad cause, right? But Jesus, and this is the key, Jesus gave him a greater cause, okay?
12 · Articulates the transformation in Simon's allegiance: from pursuing a temporary political kingdom to proclaiming the eternal kingdom of Jesus, whose reign surpasses any earthly political solution in both duration and scope
Simon became sold out and zealous not simply for the overthrow of a bad king in Israel, but rather zealous for a new eternal king named Jesus who would rule and reign on the throne forever. Simon was won over progressively to thinking, 'Okay, wait a minute. If I— even if I succeed, if I get a better king on the throne, get Herod out of there, get this guy up there, how long is that going to last? A few years? 20 years?' But if, man, if Jesus is king, if we put Jesus on the throne, he rules and reigns eternally, he's bringing his kingdom, like everything changes.
13 · Applies Simon's transformation to show how his pursuit of justice and freedom was not abandoned but redirected and elevated through proclaiming Jesus, who ultimately accomplishes those goals eternally
And so what happens is the song of Simon's life, as it were, no longer was just, hey, freedom and, you know, promote freedom, stop injustice. That song found its expression in proclaiming Jesus, the one who, will ultimately end all injustice and the one who will ultimately bring freedom in a way that no one else on this earth can. Right, you tracking that? Does that make sense? So Simon became not just Simon the Zealot, but Simon the Christ follower, Simon the Christ proclaimer.
14 · Direct pastoral address expressing concern that contemporary Christians are prioritizing various causes—even good ones—over the gospel as their life's central proclamation
And one of my concerns, guys, for us as Christians in this season is that we are feeling the pressure to take up other songs, even songs that might not be bad songs, and make that the melody that we're giving our lives to, make that the song we're going all in on proclaiming, and not seeing that we have a greater song, a better song to sing.
15 · Establishes the hierarchical relationship between good civic duties and the gospel: civic engagement is good but cannot save souls, therefore the gospel must remain our ultimate aim as the best thing we can offer
Look, things like fulfilling your duty as a citizen are good, okay? Serving jury duty, doing that justly, voting, trying to, you know, go to a meeting to figure out who's gonna be on the school board, those are not bad things. Those, in many ways, are good things. But they will not save anyone's eternal soul, right? Seeking to promote good things cannot be the ultimate aim of our life because we are here to promote the best thing, which is the rule and reign of Jesus Christ that has broken into this world and offers sinners a chance for salvation, offers the hopeless a chance for hope, offers the broken a chance for restoration, right? That is the thing that we are here to proclaim.
16 · Hypothetical dramatization of Simon's transformed message in the towns, showing how his revolutionary passion was redirected toward proclaiming Jesus as the better king rather than political overthrow
That's why Simon is, instead of marching into these towns and saying, 'Let me tell you about the cause of activism, of zealotry, let's overthrow the Roman Empire,' he's like, 'Nah, man.' Like, Simon, I thought you were that guy pushing the zealots, right? And he's like, 'Yeah, man, I'm pushing something else now,' right? Weren't you trying to get the king off the throne? Oh, that's true, and he is. Let me tell you about a better king, right? This is what Simon is doing.
17 · Reiterates the sermon's main claim about the mission and signals a structural shift to detailed exposition of what declaring and demonstrating the gospel means
So then what is the mission? What is the song he's there to proclaim? Well, we stated it last week, but I want to unpack it just a bit more today. It's declaring and demonstrating the good news about Jesus. That is the cause. That is the song. Let's break that down.
18 · Expounds the declaration aspect of mission by explaining that the disciples' call to repentance echoes Jesus' Mark 1 proclamation: turn from sin and enter God's kingdom under Jesus' kingship
First, declaring. Now, when the disciples went into villages, Mark uses kind of a shorthand here. He says that they proclaimed that people should repent. But Mark is basically using that to refer back to Jesus' call in Mark 1, where he said, 'Hey, repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand.' What Jesus' message was is, 'Hey, you're walking one direction. You need to repent, turn around, turn away from sin, and join the kingdom of God.' of which I am King, bringing this rule and reign into the earth today.
19 · Defines the content of the declaration: human sinfulness, Jesus as Savior offering salvation, and Jesus as Lord worthy of total allegiance—the composite New Testament gospel message
So what were they declaring? Well, they would have been declaring, yep, people were sinners. They need to change. The way you're living your life is not working out for you. And then two things were key. First, Jesus is Savior, meaning Jesus offers salvation to the sinner. And Jesus is Lord. Jesus is worthy of all of your life's allegiance. And this is what's summed up in the New Testament as the gospel, the good Good news, right? This is what Simon is there to proclaim.
20 · Applies the disciples' example to all Christians: just as the apostles left legitimate vocations for a greater cause, every Christian shares the call to declare the gospel
And all of these disciples that had other things going on in their life, was it bad for Peter and his brother to be building a fishing business, to be successful and provide for their families? No, but they found a cause even greater than that. So here's the application. Every Christian, just like every apostle here, Every Christian is meant to declare the good news of Jesus, right?
21 · Clarifies the relationship between the unique authority of the twelve Apostles and the general Christian calling: while we don't possess apostolic authority, all believers are sent ones in the general sense of carrying the gospel
Apostle, that word literally means sent ones. Now, I'm not saying all of us are like the 12 apostles and we have all the authority of that. That's heresy, and don't believe that. So, but this is what the New Testament teaches. Although the capital A apostles are the only sent ones in that sense, all Christians are to be sort of lowercase sent ones. All Christians are sent out with the good news of Jesus.
22 · Provides concrete application: use the remaining pandemic season to develop gospel fluency and relational evangelism skills, with announcement of upcoming training opportunity
And let me encourage you, one of the things— one of the best things you could do in the last few months, God willing, of this time of restriction and quarantine is to spend time making sure you understand and can articulate the good news about Jesus. God willing, next month Vince is actually going to do kind of a class on this for people, helping people learn how to build relationships with people who don't know Jesus. And learn to talk about their faith in a meaningful way. But if you can't do that, man, get equipped to do that. This is the song that we're meant to sing, and make sure you sing it well.
23 · Introduces the second element of mission—demonstration—by explaining that Jesus gave disciples authority to perform miracles that were not random but intentionally demonstrated the reality of his message and kingdom
Next, not just declaring, but demonstrating, right? Jesus gives his disciples the authority to cast out demons and to anoint and heal the sick. This is in the pattern of what Jesus did, right? Jesus did not just come and proclaim a message. Demonstrated the reality of that message, and demonstrated the reality of his kingship with his miracles. Now, please don't think that miracles are just these random things that Jesus did, that Jesus walked around going, 'Oh, this would be cool. Watch me levitate a table. Watch me do—' I mean, there's a million things he could have done. Why did he choose the specific miracles? Why did he choose to perform those? Because, as we'll see, they are demonstrations of him and his salvation and his kingdom.
24 · Expounds specific miracles as theological demonstrations: leper cleansing pictures forgiveness, demon expulsion pictures spiritual freedom, resurrection pictures life from death—all illustrating aspects of kingdom salvation the disciples proclaimed
For example, you see a leper cleansed. That is a picture of a sinner stained by guilt that can be cleansed and restored and forgiven. Or you see a demoniac oppressed by demons that's freed, right? That's a picture of the, the spiritual bondage that all people are in and how Jesus frees people. Or you see a dead child restored to life is an illustration of Jesus bringing life from death, right? These are all demonstrations. And so Jesus gives the disciples, as it were, authority and power to do those two pictures, right, the freeing from spiritual bondage and restoring back to health as demonstrations of the message they're proclaiming, right? So they're showing up and saying, 'There's a new king. His name is Jesus. His rule and reign are better than any other.' And they're like, well, okay. And then the guy comes in with demons, he frees him, and he goes— and then they say, the kingdom is like this. Freedom from spiritual bondage. Somebody gets prayed for, they go from sick to health, right? The kingdom is like this. Restoration. That's what they are doing.
25 · Applies the demonstration principle to contemporary Christians: while lacking apostolic power, we demonstrate the kingdom both through occasional spectacular healings and more commonly through ordinary faithful living
So it is with us. Now, we don't have, again, the unique sort of apostolic power Jesus gave to these 12. But we still, across all the New Testament, have the call to demonstrate the reality of Jesus' kingship and salvation to those around us. Now, sometimes that is spectacular, right? We, in our church, we've prayed for people, they've been healed, it's been a testimony to the Lord and the power of the Lord as King and his kingdom coming into this world. We praise God for it. But more often, we demonstrate the kingdom of God in these unspectacular ways, right?
26 · Provides concrete examples of unspectacular kingdom demonstration: radical enemy love, faithful work under disagreeable bosses, loving parenting as a picture of God's fatherhood, and Christ-like spousal love as a gospel picture
Maybe in today's world, one of the most spectacular ways you can demonstrate the kingdom of God is by loving your enemies radically, because nobody in our world's doing that, right? Or working hard even when you disagree with your boss, right? Because you're working for Jesus. In other words, with your life, by parenting your kids in love, that's a picture of their heavenly Father, or loving your spouse as Christ loved the church as a picture of the gospel, right? These are demonstrations of the reality of what Jesus, who Jesus is and what he has done.
27 · Signals transition from first major question to second, with self-correction indicating a return to complete the first section's argument
So that's the first question: what is the mission? Second question: how then do we move on mission? Let me, let me just say, sorry, let me wrap that up this way, okay?
28 · Returns to and extends the musical illustration, showing how individual instruments serving the same melody create beautiful harmony, whereas playing different songs creates discord—establishing the vision for unified mission
So the thing I needed to learn on this stage to play with the worship team, and the only reason Joe let me keep playing on the band, is I eventually learned the lesson. I eventually learned I can't be over here, even if I'm in the same key, wailing and playing my own song, and they're, you know, they're singing, 'Amazing grace,' and I'm over here, you know, that just, that's like, no, that's a different song. But here's what happens. When you hit the harmony for the melody, right, when you hit a chord that underlies this beautiful song, right, it actually adds to the beauty of the song. You can just have one person singing unaccompanied and it's beautiful. But man, you add a guitar, you add the drums, you add another vocalist in harmony, you add a keyboard player playing parts, and if all of them are working together to to promote this one melody. It is gorgeous.
29 · Applies the harmony metaphor to Christian life: pursuits like workplace justice or honoring marriage become beautiful when done as harmonies supporting the gospel melody, but destructive when they replace the gospel as the primary song
That is the task of our lives, right? In demonstrating the kingdom of God by promoting justice. Maybe your workplace, maybe you're a boss and you see injustice in your workplace, and you're like, I'm going to fix this. We're not going to allow this. We're not going to allow these kinds of comments. That is a harmony to the melody of the gospel. Or you're over here and you're like, man, this is wrong over here, the way that people are talking about their— spouses. I'm going to talk about my spouse this way. I'm going to promote something else. That's a beautiful harmony to the gospel melody. And in that way, I think we begin to find, man, these other things that even can be good, right? Right political activism, right promotion of justice, right vocational pursuits, all of these things, if they are done as harmonies to the gospel, it's beautiful and it rings out. But when any one of them threatens everything and becomes like, 'No, this is the song,' then we lose the melody altogether.
30 · Transitions to the second major section using the musical metaphor: shifts from defining the mission to explaining how to execute it well
Alright, second then, how do we play this thing well then? How do we move on mission? Well, here's how to play well. Here's my notes for us as a congregational band today.
31 · Expounds Jesus' travel instructions as cultivating urgency: the restriction to minimal possessions prevented time-wasting deliberation and communicated the time-sensitivity of Jesus' earthly ministry, requiring swift mission pursuit
First, we play with urgency. Now, the directions Jesus gives here about not taking extra money, not taking changes of clothes, They may seem weird, but one of the reasons they're there is they were to travel light. They were not to spend a lot of time picking their clothes out for the day, like, 'Oh, I'm going to proclaim the gospel in this city. Should I wear the blue or the red toga? I'm not, you know, I'm not in my feeling.' No, he's like, 'Just have one, wear it, it's fine. Just go, right?' With urgency. Why? Because Jesus is on the earth for this limited period of time, the urgency he's living with extends to the disciples. They are to speedily pursue the mission that God has gave them.
32 · Applies the urgency principle by exposing the universal human tendency to delay mission engagement until circumstances are ideal, calling listeners to go now rather than waiting for a future "when
And I think for all of us, we all— this is a word for all of us. We're all tempted to say, you know what, I'm going to get more involved in gospel work when my kids are older, when my job settles back down, when I'm in this place, when I'm retired, when I'm this, when I'm married, whatever it is. We're all tempted. There's always another when we get there. When we're there, then I'll start moving with urgency. And Christ would call us, I think, to go now.
33 · Expounds Jesus' instruction to stay in one house as cultivating focus: by prohibiting the ancient practice of social climbing through housing upgrades, Jesus kept disciples from being distracted by status-seeking and kept them mission-focused
Second, we pursue the mission with focus. Now, one of the practices of the ancient world that was kind of insidious is that teachers that would come into an area would sort of ascend the social ranks and they would, they would maybe start out staying with one person, but then a richer person would see them and go, 'Oh, I like this person,' so they'd invite them to stay with at their house. And then maybe another richer person above them, a governing official, would say, why don't you come stay with me? And so they would kind of work their way up in housing, up until the top, as high as they could get. And if you were staying with the biggest, wealthiest person in town, it's like, oh, they're the best teacher in town. Why? Because they're staying with that person, right? Jesus says, don't play those games. You don't be checking out people's— you know, well, what— this person— tell me about your situation. You have an attached bathroom here? OK, OK. You got a pool? Okay, well, how big is the pool? What's it like? Is there some sun chairs? I mean, what's the food situation? Like, Jesus says, no, you just go, you stay with whoever you stay with, you get on the mission. Stay focused.
34 · Applies the focus principle by identifying sin, specifically pornography, as a primary mission distraction that has sapped kingdom focus from an entire generation of potential Christian leaders and workers
And this is a word for us as well. Two things can distract us so often. The first is sin. So many times sin saps our strength and our focus that should be going to the kingdom of God and the things of God. I remember with grief, a pastor friend of mine, just remarked that he believes that in the last 30 years we've lost a generation of missionaries, church planters, Christian business people, Christian entrepreneurs. We have lost a generation to the lure of pornography. That the focus that we should be giving to the kingdom of God is being frittered away 5, 10 minutes at a time and clouding our focus. We need to say no to the things of the world.
35 · Extends the focus principle to warn against letting even good things like family entertainment become mission-destroying distractions when pursued excessively, using humorous reference to series illustration
One of the things we need to say no to is allowing even good things to replace the best things of life, right? If you— you know, watching a family movie with the family for family night is not a bad thing. I love it. My kids love family movie night. But if you're like Freddie the Moose and you're lost in a haze of donuts and Netflix queues, right, you know, your floor is littered with donuts and Stop. You and Freddie, we'll get you in a recovery program. We'll get you back on mission this week. Contact the church office.
36 · Expounds the disciples' extensive inadequacies—lack of understanding, lack of trust, lack of sensitivity to priorities—establishing that they were sent despite being unprepared, not after becoming qualified
Third here, with weakness. We pursue the mission with weakness. Now, the disciples here are not a crack team of commandos. One commentator points out that these guys are a literal mess. They don't fully understand Jesus' teaching, according to Mark chapter 4. They don't fully trust his will or his power to protect them, according to Mark 4:28. They're not sensitive to what Jesus' ministry priorities are, as we see in Matthew and Mark 5. Yet they're sent out anyway.
37 · Applies the weakness principle by refuting the "need more training" excuse: if the woefully unprepared disciples were sent and were effective, our training objections are invalidated—sometimes we must simply go
And the commentator says this: Our plea that we need more training is met by the simple observation that the disciples needed more training, much more training, yet they were sent out and were effective. Sometimes we just gotta go.
38 · Provides cultural background on first-century representation: messengers carried the full authority of the sender and weren't mere delivery people but authorized agents whose rejection meant rejecting the sender
All right, next mark: with power. That weakness we feel is met with the power of Jesus. Now, in the first century, if you were a representative, say, of Caesar or of a king, say King Herod, if you were their representative, you weren't just a delivery person. You were given or endowed with the authority of the figure you represented. So if Herod sends you and says, 'Hey, these people aren't paying their taxes. Go tell them to pay their taxes,' you went and you just didn't say, 'Oh, here's the message. You wanna pay taxes. Okay, goodbye.' Like, you showed up and you're like, 'Hear me, hear me. Herod demands his taxes.' And they're like, 'But we don't have—' He's like, 'I don't wanna hear excuses. Bring the money out now.' Like, you had the authority, and to reject the messenger meant to reject the one who sent him.
39 · Establishes that disciples operated not on personal power or expertise but solely on Jesus' delegated authority—their weakness was the context in which Christ's power operated, connecting weakness and power as complementary mission realities
In the same way, Jesus sends out his disciples with his authority. Not because these disciples cannot cast demons out because Peter from Galilee is some spiritual warfare magic person. They only cast demons out because Jesus gave them the authority. The same way with healing. None of them are physicians. They're not healing based on their knowledge or experience. They're healing with the word and power of Christ who's given it to them. So here's a good thing. When we're on mission, we go in weakness, but we also go with power. And actually, we could say much more about the connection between those two things.
40 · Expounds the risk inherent in Jesus' mission instructions: total dependence on God for provision and protection, establishing risk-taking as normative for Christian life rather than exceptional
The last thing here is we go with risk. The mission Jesus gives his disciples involves risk. They must be wholly dependent on God for their well-being, for their shelter, for their meals, for their protection, right? To be sent means to take on risk. Christian life should feel risky. If your Christian life never feels risky, may I submit that you may be doing it wrong.
41 · Applies the risk principle to pandemic context by diagnosing two extremes: risk-avoidance as virtue and risk-taking as virtue, both of which wrongly assign moral value to risk posture apart from Jesus' direction
We, in this, in the middle of this pandemic, there's so many statistics and things about risk. Right, like the risk of this, risk of doing that, risk of this, and here's sort of, we developed into two extremes. One is all risk is bad, right, you never wanna take any risk, like, well that's a, you know, leaving my house for 2 minutes to get the paper is risk, is that a risk? It's possible, I mean, I don't know, who knows what could happen between you and the paper. And that's kind of one set, the other set is, you know what, Whatever to all of this. We're gonna take every risk. Almost like a bizarre delight in doing risky things. Yeah, we're not supposed to do that? Well, that's what we're gonna do. And almost like assigning virtue to one or the other and saying avoiding all risk and staying safe at all costs is Christian and right, or taking every risk and skydiving while you're sharing the gospel without a parachute, hoping that the other person you're evangelizing will give you theirs. That's godly, right? You're just like, I don't think so. That just seems foolish, right?
42 · Resolves the risk tension with biblical principle: risk is neither inherently virtuous nor vicious but right when taken under Jesus' wisdom and direction for kingdom purposes, calling for discernment rather than ideological risk posture
And so what do we learn in this passage? We learn that risk is right when done for the right reasons under the wisdom and direction of Jesus, right? There are times we're going to have to take risks, guys, in our lives. And we don't want to either grow enamored with taking risks in this pandemic or avoid all risks in this pandemic, but rather to say, okay, Lord, what do you want me to do? Jesus is calling them to take these risks, therefore they are willing to follow, right?
43 · Synthesizes the five mission marks by revealing their Christological foundation: Jesus modeled all of them in his own mission (urgency, focus, weakness, power, risk), establishing that discipleship means following Christ's pattern
And let me just say this. It might feel like these are all scattered kind of pieces of advice, but let me just boil it down to this. What Jesus is calling his disciples to do is what he has done for them. What Jesus is calling them to do on mission is what he has modeled toward them on mission, right? So many of these marks, he came with urgency for them. He came with focus, saying no to distractions and sin and other things. He remained focused for them. He came in weakness, taking on human flesh, later humbling himself even to the point of death on a cross. And yet he also came with power And he came at great risk. He risked everything. He laid down his life for these disciples.
44 · Applies the Christological foundation using the series running metaphor: Jesus doesn't send disciples where he hasn't gone but runs ahead, calling them to follow his lead rather than pioneering alone
And so it's not as though Jesus is kind of pushing his disciples out front and saying, this is kind of scary, dangerous work. You do that. I don't want to— I'm going to stay over here. I'm going to have a sandwich. You guys let me know how it goes. No, he is out front leading them on. To use our illustration of running this month, he is running way out in front of them, and he calls He calls them, hey, come on, let's go. Let's go. Stop sitting around. Let's go. Let's roll. All right?
45 · Begins conclusion by contrasting the world's discord (everyone playing different songs) with the church's calling to unified mission around the gospel, which produces unmatched power and unity
So let me close with this encouragement, OK? When we as a church unite around this mission of declaring and demonstrating the good news about Jesus, there is a power and unity that is unmatched in this world. Church, we live in a world in which everybody out there is playing a different song and it's just a madhouse. But we as the people of God should always be singing one note.
46 · Closes with historical example of William Tyndale being criticized for single-minded gospel focus, embracing that same criticism as the church's aspiration: let it be said of us that everything harmonizes around Jesus
There was a— one of the merchants who was criticizing William Tyndale said this of him disparagingly. He's always singing one note, right? Perhaps disparagingly it could be said of us as Christians, they're always singing one song. And they add different chords and different things, it all seems to be about Jesus. And we say, exactly.
47 · Closing prayer asking God to make the church a unified, gospel-centered congregation that demonstrates and declares Jesus faithfully, following the pattern of how Christ came to us
Would you stand and let's pray. Father, I pray that we as a church, Lord, in this, even at a time of division and difficulty in our world, that we would be a one-song congregation, that we would be one-song families, God, that the desire to lift high the name of Jesus, to demonstrate and declare the good news about Jesus to a world that desperately needs it, God, may that be the predominant thing that we give our lives to. And I pray that we would do it faithfully, we would do it well, We would do it following you, Lord, that we would be sent out on mission the way that you came to us. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.