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pastorway

And He Himself gave some to be....evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ...
- Ephesians 4:11-12

THIS BLOG HAS MOVED TO www.timeintheword.org

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Location: The Hill Country of Texas

Pastor - Providence Reformed Baptist Church
Director - TIME in the Word Ministries

Sunday, February 05, 2006

Why Go?

I started a new sermon series this morning after finishing the 4 messages from Haggai and Ephesians that dealt with setting our vision for the new year. Now we are a month into that year. How will we implement this vision? How will we reach our goals?

The vision from Haggai is based on the command to Go, Bring, and Build. As we have applied it, we are the temple of the Holy Spirit, we are the Body of Christ, and we have been commanded and are expected to be building that Body up. We are to Go make disciples, Bring ourselves to the altar as a living sacrifice, and Build the church.

In fact we learned just last week that pastors have been given in order to equip the church for the work of the ministry (service) for the edification (building up) of the Body of Christ.

So now that we know what we are expected to do in building, what about the Go part of this mission? What does the Bible tell us that we are supposed to go do? Understanding these things shows us what God expects of us and has empowered us to accomplish for His glory.

We are told in the Scripture to go make disciples (Matt 28:19), to go invite people everywhere to come to Christ (Matt 22:9), to go preach the gospel of the Kingdom (Matt 10:7), and to go on to maturity in our spiritual lives (Heb 6:1). These are all active - GO and DO. Go make disciples, go invite, go preach, go on to maturity. And go labor in the field (John 4:35).

And it is in this going into the field of the world that we see the elements of the series we will examine in the coming weeks. This morning I introduced a series taken from an exposition through the Books of Jonah and Nahum. We started though in John 4:27-38, looking at why we are motivated to go. This series, titled Why Go? will take us through those thing that motivate us to obey the commands to GO that we find in the Scriptures.

We go because the harvest is coming (judgment and the end of the age - Matt 13:39; Rev 14:15-16). We go because the days are evil and we must redeem the time, as short as it may be! (Eph 5:15-16). We go because we are told that if we sow bountifully we will reap bountifully, but also that if we do not go and we sow sparingly then we will reap sparingly (2 Cor 9:6). And we go trusting while we do that God will give the increase (1 Cor 3:7).

Are you building up your church? Are you edifying the Body of Christ? Are you fulfilling these commands and going?

Why should we go into the fields? Listen here:

Go Labor in the Field.


~pastorway

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