Our Call to the Work of Missions

I do want to call your attention to one of the songs that we have just sung, "Facing a Task Unfinished." It's an old song that's been reworked. It's very powerful. It's got a very rich history. I would encourage you to track one of those or a copy of that down, "Facing a Task Unfinished." It's been part of my prayer life and my preparation for going to the Philippines starting tomorrow. And it's a call to missions, a call to take the gospel around the world. As a matter of fact, I was sharing that copy of that song with one of the young men in our church a few weeks ago. I appreciate you singing that one for us, Keith.

Well, go ahead and take your Bible and turn with me to two places this morning. I know you have your Bible already marked in Revelation 5 from our scripture reading earlier, starting in verse 9. We will cover verse 9 and 10. And then go ahead and turn to Matthew, Matthew chapter 28 starting in verse 16. We are all very familiar with that passage of scripture because of how many times we have been there in that Great Commission passage. We will start off in Matthew 26 and then towards the end of the message we'll transition to Revelation chapter 5.

And most of you know that this morning we are moving along in our series called "The Ten Pillars of the Church." We've been in this journey together for quite some time. I said at the beginning of this series that it's been quite some time, a little too long since we've covered this material. Sometimes it's a difficult balance as to know when to repeat teaching. But this is a very important time in the life of our church. Brother Keith and I both feel that serious about this teaching. Now I want to remind you of something I've said several times throughout the series.

If you've not kept up with these messages, if you've missed one or two, maybe because of sickness or work, I would say to you that you very much need to catch up with this teaching. This is very, very important teaching in the life of our church. This is who we are. I'll repeat that. This teaching is who we are. Therefore it determines what we do and it determines what we do not do. What I mean by that is throughout the days and years to come, we will see what we do. We will see what we do not do and it is traced back to this particular teaching, this teaching on the Ten Pillars of the Church. Now I want to look back at what we've covered.

I'll look back at what we've looked at so far. Several times I have called the first four of the Ten Pillars the Big Four. I call them the Big Four. That is the church. The first pillar is the church. Then the second is the gospel. And then the third is the Word of God or the Bible, whatever language you want to use. And then the fourth is salvation or saving grace or conversion. Any of that language is accurate. Those are the Big Four. To me these are the most important. I have said this many times, if we blow it in these four areas, these four teachings, we really shipwreck the whole church.

And then next we covered pillar number five which is church membership. Now I want to encourage you if you've not listened to church membership, you really need to. You need to see our position and our direction with church membership because it affects so many in the life of the church. And then we have covered number six prayer and number seven evangelism. Now remember how I grouped prayer and evangelism and then missions which is what we're looking at this morning. Remember that I group these and I call these teachings our responsibility. These are the things we are responsible to do, not just simply to believe.

This is where we roll up our sleeves, if I can use that language. This is where we get our hands dirty. This is where we are busy. This is where we work up a spiritual and even a physical sweat. I know I've used this language and I repeat it because it really does speak to where we are. Our children should know that we believe in prayer, that we believe in evangelism, that we believe in missions because they look up and they see us busy doing this work. Now this morning, I think it's obvious you know we are transitioning moving on to pillar number eight which is missions. Pillar number eight which is missions.

Now with evangelism, I said something that might have stuck in your mind. I said last week or the week before that I'm not preached on evangelism specifically very much, but that's not the case with missions. I have preached on missions in some manner quite a bit here at Nola Baptist Church. As a matter of fact, back in February and March of 2017, we were in that running series, Messages from the Pastors Heart and we had three messages on the work of missions. If you are new here at Nola, I would encourage you to go to the church website and listen to those.

If you miss that series, maybe it's a little rusty in your mind and your heart, go back and listen to those. I know in my own study this week and the week before, I went back and looked at that material because I want that to be fresh in my mind. So this morning we are jumping into our responsibility of missions. Now the title of our message this morning is very similar to our title with evangelism and that is our call to the work of missions. Our call to the work of missions. Few weeks ago when we looked at evangelism, it was our call to the work of evangelism.

And I use that language on purpose because these two messages are very much related to one another. Now in exploring this subject of missions this morning, we are going to look at three questions. I would encourage you to write these down. They are easy for you to write down as we transition and move through the message. The first question is, do we see this calling? Do we see this calling? Then our second question is, is there ignorance in the church today? Is there ignorance in the church today? And then our third question, do we see the great need? Do we see this great need? Now I will go ahead and clue you in on something.

To be honest with you, we will examine these three questions. We will examine this subject in many different ways in the future. Because missions is not something that you can just check the box and say we've got it. This is something we will come back to throughout the years. And I look forward to not just the teaching, but to where this teaching will take us. So let's jump right into our first question, which is, do we see this great calling? Now to explore this question, we need to go to this great commissioned passage. Let's go to Matthew 28 starting in verse 16. We'll read on down to verse 20.

We know this context is Jesus and the disciples. He's there in Galilee. We believe there are other Christians there. So it's a greater crowd than just the 11 and Jesus. The 11 disciples proceeded to Galilee to the mountain which Jesus had designated. And when he saw them, they worshiped him and some were doubtful. And Jesus came up and he spoke to them saying, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.

Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you and lo, I am with you always even till the end of the age. Now it's obvious for you, for me, we have before us this great commissioned passage. Most of your Bible translations that you have have a title above verse 16. Now we are very familiar with this passage and we will stay familiar with this passage. If there ever comes a day when we are unfamiliar with this teaching, we are in sin.

As a matter of fact, two weeks ago we studied evangelism from this passage. Now I want to help us answer this question in three ways, three observations and they come right out of this passage in Matthew 28. Now the first observation is this. You must see there is an authority, there is an authority in this calling. What does he say? All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Now the King James Version, it reads power, but it is best understood from the original language as authority. Now here we must see who is giving this command and that is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.

Now those of us who have been here for quite a while and we have been in this study in the Gospel of John, we know who this person Jesus is. We have a proper Christology. This is Jesus the Christ, the Son of God, God Himself. Now I like how John MacArthur describes this authority. Anytime I give you a quotation, it just means there is someone who can put this in a way in which it should grab us. That's what John MacArthur says.

It was in light of his absolute sovereign authority that Jesus commanded, "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations." There is a transitional word here, "therefore," and I'm quoting, "Because I am sovereign Lord of the universe," Jesus was saying, "I have both the authority to command you and to be my witnesses and the power to enable you to obey the command." So what we see is this authority, but we need to see that there are all sorts of powers and authority within the world. We know that. Kings and queens have authority. Government has authority, but there is no authority like Christ.

Christ is the supreme and sovereign authority. So we see there is an authority in this calling. The second observation we have is there is action in this calling. There is action. What does he say? "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations." Now this word "make" here, and I refer you, go back to your passage, "Go therefore and make," that word "make," it is the dominant verb in the verses. Now there's a mistake a lot of people make here. Most people make the assumption that "Go" is the primary command here, but that is not the case. "Go" is better translated as you were going.

Many have made the mistake of emphasizing "Go" above and beyond the dominant command to make disciples. It is vitally important to see here that at the heart of this making is true saving faith and true Bible discipleship. Second disciples are born again into the kingdom of God. We've studied that intensively here. You cannot become a disciple unless you are first born again. And then second disciples are formed as Christ wants them to be. This is the lifelong process of sanctification. But notice, Christ is calling them to do what they cannot do. Well, that doesn't seem very fun, does it?

These men cannot do this, but He promises them to give them the power to do what they cannot do, and that is make disciples. So what do we see here? We have the authority in this calling. We have action in this calling. And then this third observation, there are people at the center of this calling. Go back to the verse, "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations." Notice that all of your translations read "all of the nations." The people within this, all nations, were not just the Jews. You've got to remember the context here. These are Jews that are sitting at the feet of Jesus. This was meant for Gentile as well.

Here Jesus is breaking down the seeming impenetrable wall between Jew and Gentile. Jesus broke down this wall all throughout His earthly ministry. He broke down this wall right here in this command. If we transition or continue in the Scriptures, we see that He broke down this wall when He poured out the Spirit of God on the Samaritans in Acts 8. And then He broke down this wall when He poured out the Holy Spirit on Gentiles in Acts 10. Simply all of the nations means all peoples, not just the Jews. So in summary, when we move away from the text, we need to see who this commission was given to. These are the church fathers.

That's who the apostles were. And this is the future church. This speaks to the future church as well. We need to see the purpose of this commission. And that is that the church might fulfill this goal. And I think the word goal is a very good word to use here. This should bring us to an understanding, all of us in the church. The primary goal, and I emphasize that word primary. The primary goal of the church is not to grow in numbers, although having more people born again is a great thing. It's not to grow in resources, although resources are good when they're used for the kingdom.

The primary goal of the church is not just to build strong families, although we need and we desire strong families. The primary goal is not to build strong young people for the future of the church, although that's one of our goals here. The primary goal of the church is to fulfill the great commission. And every good goal, the ones mentioned and others that we can pull out of the scripture, every good goal is to be attained so that we can fulfill this primary goal, which is what? Reaching the goal of reaching the world. This is the ultimate goal. Might say, "Pastor, how can you prove that?" You just study the New Testament church.

That was their primary goal. Now an application for you, for us, we need to have our goals prioritized. Oh, we cannot seek after a goal that minimizes the primary goal. We must see that every goal that we have in the life of the church is to fulfill this primary goal of reaching the nations. We need strong young people today. We pray and labor over our children and our teenagers. And our prayer is that God would reach them with the gospel and grow them up to love the Lord so they can be used in the kingdom. And one of the goals is that some of them would be used to do what? To go around the world.

And we need to see how our goals need to be prioritized. And I'm afraid there are a lot of people in the life of the church that just get these goals out of order, out of order, out of order. And oh, if we get our goals out of order, guess what? We can mean sin. Let's move on. Let's notice our second question. Our second question. Now here, with this second question, we'll refer to many, many passages. And the question is, is there ignorance in the church today? Is there ignorance in the church today? Now I might be a little more polite if I were to put this question like this. Is there a lack of awareness in the church today?

You know we're supposed to be polite, are we not? Especially politically correct today. Now personally, I think we should stick with the word ignorance. And not just stick with the word, we should use that word and apply that word. It might be offensive, but it is the truth. There are many, many who are ignorant concerning the depth and the breadth of God's heart concerning missions. Concerning missions. Now I want us to see the depth and the breadth of God's heart concerning missions by going real quickly from Genesis to the Gospels and even into the New Testament church. Now there are several observations that I want to make here.

First I want us to see that God expected world missions from the beginning. World missions was in the heart of God from the beginning. Some of you may be surprised to see this, but world missions begins in the book of Genesis. It begins in the book of Genesis. We see this mission's heart of God when we look at the covenant that God made with Abraham. Now the covenant with Abraham, God brought that about in Genesis chapter 12. But Genesis 12, 3 reads, and this is God, "I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all of the families of the earth shall be blessed." That is a mission statement.

Then in Genesis 22 starting in verse 15, "In your offspring shall all of the nations of the earth be blessed because you have obeyed my voice." So those are allusions to the mission's heart of God. They're in the covenant that God made with Abraham. And then we see this in the Exodus account when God called the Jews out of Egyptian slavery. We're familiar with that story. There were many Egyptians who abandoned their gods, little G, and they abandoned their gods to follow the one true God. Then there were other foreign peoples and races besides the Egyptians who did this as well. Now that might surprise many.

In Exodus 12, verse 38, "A mixed multitude also went up with them, and very much livestock both flocks and herds." See, there were all sorts of people who left their gods to identify with the one true God and Israel. God said in Exodus that he intended Israel to be a kingdom of priests to the nations. Exodus 19, 6, "And you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel. Then we see this mission's heart of God when Gentiles in the Old Testament came to know the one true God and worship the one true God. I'll give you a couple examples. Rahab the harlot.

Remember the prostitute Rahab there in Jericho? She received the spies sent out by Joshua. They went to spy out the land. She hid those spies in her house and hid those spies from her own countrymen. And she was saved with all of her family when the Israelites destroyed the city. And ultimately Rahab became an ancestor of the Messiah who was Jesus. We see that in the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew 1, 5. And then another example, Ruth the Moabiteus. She became the wife of Boaz who was an ancestor of King David and an ancestor of Jesus. She is one of the four women named in the genealogy of Jesus in the book of Matthew.

We also see God's missional heart in other Old Testament passages. Psalm 22 verse 27, Isaiah 49, 6. There are many, many more. The book of Psalms and Isaiah and Daniel and Hosea and Malachi have many passages dealing with the missional heart of God. And we see this even in the construction of the temple, in the construction of the Jewish temple. There was the court for the Gentiles. And this shows us that God desired the Jews to evangelize the Gentiles. But in Jesus' day, they had done such a poor job that the temple court, the court of the Gentiles, it was filled with money changers. It was filled with animals.

And it was filled with Jewish trade associated with worship in the temple. Basically they had ignored the Gentiles and they had squeezed them out. And from Genesis to Malachi, we see that God had a heart for the nations and it was His desire that His chosen people would take the message of the one true God to them. Then the second observation, still exploring this question of ignorance. Jesus then exemplified this missional heart of God in His ministry. Now if we're not careful, in dealing with the Great Commission, if we're not careful, we will think that Jesus dropped this teaching out of the blue in the laps of the disciples.

That's not the case. All throughout Jesus' earthly ministry, He was taking the gospel to the Jews and the Gentiles alike right before their eyes. I'll give you one of the greatest examples and it's one of my favorite. John chapter 4. Oh, what does the scripture say? The scripture says Jesus had to go to Samaria. Oh, I believe that was more than just a geographical route. There was something in the heart of God that He wanted to do through His Son Jesus there in Samaria. And what goes on in the story? The disciples go to town to buy food.

Jesus sits at the well with the Samaritan woman and He brings salvation to her and then He ultimately stays two days with the Samaritans. Oh, but what does He say in verse 35 to the disciples? They had come back. They were surprised. He was talking with the Samaritan and a woman. They didn't want to be there. And what does He say? Look, lift up your eyes and see the fields are white under harvest. Oh, but that wasn't in their heart. They wanted out of Samaria.

So from the beginning of this ministry to the end, Jesus interacts with the Gentiles and He carries His disciples into contact with Gentile peoples and He calls their attention to the need of salvation for the Gentiles. So what am I trying to show you here? This has just been a broad brush. God has been concerned with world missions since Genesis 12. It's obvious. From Genesis 12 on, we see world missions unfolding. Now we must see that Old Testament missions was merely a prototype of New Testament missions.

The full-blown plan of missions would have its beginning in Jesus' ministry and then it would be carried out until its fullest form through the ministry of the apostles and the New Testament church. Jesus simply fleshes out in His ministry what was in the heart of the Father all along. Jesus' command here in Matthew 28 was nothing new to the disciples if they were paying attention. But we know that they struggled to pay attention. We know they struggled to grasp all of this teaching. And if we understand God's heart for missions as seen in His Word from Genesis to Revelation, then the Great Commission should not be surprising to us as well.

But in application, I want us to see that many in the church are far more ignorant of the truths here than we know. Many. First, many people have no idea that that is the heart of God in the Old Testament. I believe many are ignorant. They don't know. They are clueless to the heart of God when it comes to missions. At best, they think that it's an advent right here in Matthew 28. No. We had this heart all along. And we desperately need to communicate that from the pulpit today. And then second, in most churches, I've used this language before.

I believe that the court of the Gentiles is crowded out with all kinds of religious, if I can use this language, junk. If you know your Bible, go back with me in your mind. Remember what was taking place in the court of Gentiles in Jesus' day? It was filled up with money changers and the sale of animals and all kinds of Jewish commerce associated with worship. So those Jews looked at all of that commerce and they said, "That's a part of worship." And all along, the Gentiles were squeezed out. I believe lost sinners are squeezed out of lots of churches today. Lots of churches focus on me, on self, on us.

Lots of churches spend all of their money on self. Lots of churches pour all of their resources on us. Lots of churches are not missions-minded and they can care less if the Gentiles are coming in to worship. And then third, this is an application. A lot of Christians in the church, even some of us here, can be just like the apostles. They're reluctant to understand that God wants to take the gospel to the Samaritans. Old people, we've got to know how the Jews viewed the Samaritans. They were half-breed Jews. Oh, it was terrible to be a Gentile, but it was even worse to be a Samaritan. Why? Those were half-breeds.

Go back and study your Old Testament and see where the Samaritans came from. And not only were they half-breed Jews, but they had tweaked the worship of the one true God, see? And they viewed them as dogs. They rejected them. And if you know your geography, many times when Jews had to travel, they would take the long route to go around some area. Why? They hated them. That's why when the disciples came back on the scene in John 4, they were shocked. What? I don't even want to be in some area. And God desires us to do what? To go to those peoples. Let's move on. Let's notice our third question.

Our third question, and that is, do we see this great need? Do we see this great need? Now to explore this question, we're going to be in Revelation 5 starting in verse 9. Revelation 5 verse 9 and verse 10. Let's go back to that verse together. And they sang a new song saying, "Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals. For you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation." Verse 10, "And you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on earth." "Raine on earth." Now we must see chronologically that this is a new song.

This song is not being sung in heaven now. It is in the future. This song is in the future. This song is sung upon the completion of redemption. Now you might say, "Pastor, the redemptive work of Christ is complete." Yes, but the redemptive work of man is not. We're contained by time, and so we must see that. This song is distinguished from all other songs sung in heaven before the work of redemption is completed. Job chapter 38 teaches us that there were angelic choirs that celebrated when the foundations of the earth were laid. But this song, in Revelation 5, it cannot be sung until the redemption of man is complete.

In other words, when the last soul is saved, then the song can be sung. Now there are a couple of observations I want to make here. This will help us with this question of seeing the need. First, we must see that the work of redemption is not complete. I've said that, but it needs to be stated. Matthew 24, verse 14 helps us here. Notice what Matthew says. In this gospel of the kingdom, we'll be proclaimed throughout the world or the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. And then second, we must see that this work of redemption is for the many. The work of redemption is for the many.

Go back to that or listen to this Matthew 24, 14 passage again. And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the world or the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come. Now we must see here that the purpose of the substitutionary death of Christ on the cross was to provide salvation for the nations. The cross was not only for us, but it was for other people as well. When this was written, now get this in your mind, when these passages were written, we were the other peoples because we are Gentiles. Now let me break down these peoples here. This term from every tribe. This term for every tribe.

Now this word tribe here, it means a comparatively small division or class of people associated together. It refers to a family or a race, those having a common ancestor or ancestry. I remember when I went to India in 2014, they were a tribal. They are a tribal people. And we came in contact with tribes of people. They had a common ancestry. And this language for every language in tongue. This is a people speaking all languages. The word here would seem to denote a division of the human family larger than a tribe, but smaller than a nation. See it's just getting larger. And then this term from every people.

This word properly denotes a people considered as a mass made up of smaller divisions as an association of smaller bodies or as a multitude of such bodies united together. And then the term from every nation. This is a larger body. This is a people in a wider sense as we would see a nation. So it goes from smaller to larger. So here we see that this gospel, the gospel of Christ, the substitutionary death of Christ on the cross, that message is to be taken to all the peoples of the earth. From the smallest division to the strangest of languages, Christ intended His church to take His gospel to them.

What did Jesus say in John 4 to those disciples? Look around you. Look around you at the harvest. Now an application for us, I want to give you a friendly but very firm warning here. Oh, people make this mistake so often we must not allow ourselves to have an us and them or an us and others mindset. Oh, if any of that thinking ever creeps in, we are just like the Jews. What did they do? Us, Jews, God chosen people, them, those other people. You'd be shocked at how many people have that thinking. They look at other languages. They look at other skin tones. They look at other cultures. They look at other nations. And it's us, them, us, others.

I was reminded of how this is thought of properly in one of our small group Bible studies, the one in our home a few weeks ago. We were talking about the subject of race. And one of the men there in the Bible study spoke up and said, "There's only one human race and we all bleed red." In the time of Jesus and in His ministry, we must see that we are or were the other peoples. Now listen, I am so thankful that the New Testament church fathers and the church fathers throughout the centuries had this right and they took the gospel to the others because when they took the gospel to the others, they reached our forefathers.

Now the last time I preached or back in that series, Messages from the Pastors Heart, I referred to a good resource. I'm going to give you this resource again. I would encourage you to make the purchase. If you have trouble with that, we can help you with that. But there is a missions organization. It's called Operation World. Operation World. It was founded by a missionary named Patrick Johnstone. He began to compile information about unreached people groups around the world. But by his own testimony, he said that in the 1990s, we were really able to have a more accurate count of peoples because of technology.

Now because of technology, we can get a wide variety of accurate information together in a very, very short amount of time. Now Operation World, they teach that some 3,500 people groups are still unreached. Now when you can access their information, they have a book that gives you information on nations and peoples. It's very, very informative. But one of the things that they have is they have a map, a world map. And it's designed to teach you where the reached peoples are. Matter of fact, I gave my map to one of the young men in our church.

But when you look at the Operation World map, you see that most all of the unreached people groups are in what's called the 1040 window. This is where many Christians shirk back because it is one of the most dangerous places on the face of the earth. Because most of it is Muslim. What am I trying to show you? These types of resources can help us see, see, see the great need. And most of us are just alike. We need to be able to see it and touch it and feel it, not just hear it. And I would encourage you to purchase that information, the Operation World book that will help you.

It's a prayer guide and even the map and use it in your prayer life, maybe use it in your home. As a matter of fact, they have a DVD that comes along with it that educates you. And it is very, very, very informative. Now I want to move away from these three questions. I call this the body of the message. And I want to deal with us thinking about our responsibility of missions. Thinking about this job of missions. We're here today as a church. We want to be where God wants us to be. Yes, less pastor. We want to be a missions minded church. Throughout the generations, we want to take the gospel around the world. I'm with you pastor. I'm in.

Just punch my ticket. Well in helping prepare us, I want to deal with some errors that I think are prevalent today. Now, many times I give lists like this and I always say the same thing. This is an incomplete list. I strongly encourage you to write these down and maybe you can add to the list. Maybe you come up with one and you come up to me and say, "Pastor, oh you should have mentioned this. I want to hear your heart." But I want us to identify errors that can be prevalent in the church today, even in our thinking, in our lives, and in our past today. And some of these errors could be right here in the pews of the Nola Baptist Church.

There are six errors. The first error, number one, is the error of ignorance. We've covered that. The error of ignorance. Some people in the life of the church, they simply do not know the heart of God in this matter. They do not know what God's Word teaches. Many people do not know God's missional heart from the Old Testament to the New. They do not understand that the command is for us even today. Now a question. Whose fault is that? If you're in ignorance here, if you've been ignorant maybe until this morning, who's fault is that? Now we're all responsible for studying God's Word, but I lay the blame on ministers' doorsteps.

I lay the blame on the lap of many pastors and preachers and teachers. See we must be faithful to preach the whole counsel of God's Word and to educate you in the life of the church according to missions. So there is the error of ignorance. A lot of people are just ignorant. The second error is the error of apathy. The error of apathy. There's some in the life of the church, they're just apathetic, take it or leave it when it comes to God's Word. You know at the heart of apathy it's nothing more than disobedience? See if you don't know you can't be apathetic. If you don't know you fall into the ignorant category.

And if you came in here ignorant this morning where you just got educated. Oh but if we're apathetic we're disobedient. That goes with any area of God's Word. There are many churches and many Christians and many ministers, they're apathetic to the call of world missions. And it's not apathy, it is disobedience. Isn't apathy just a nice word for disobedience? The second error? The error of procrastination. The error of procrastination. I don't know if you remember what our friend Ann Lacy said here. I don't remember which time it was in his several visits. But he made a statement about procrastination.

It stuck into my mind and I believe I'm quoting him accurately. Our friend Ann Lacy said, "Procrastination is a day in the calendar of a fool." Let that sink in. Procrastination is a day in the calendar of a fool. And if that is true, and I believe it is, then there are many, many foolish Christians, there are many foolish ministers, there are many foolish pastors, and there are many foolish churches. Because what? They are procrastinating in this Word. Well some might say, "Pastor was small church, don't have many resources." I guarantee you, we're all a lot bigger and have more resources than the church at any ought than the next error.

With this way of thinking, people think that missions are simply for someone else. "Oh, that's a good thing, Pastor, but that bigger church down the road, they can do it. We'll just pass the buck." See that's nothing more than disobedience. As a matter of fact, I think it's a more sinful form of disobedience. And oh, there are a lot of churches, they just pass the buck. That's for somebody else. And then the fifth error, and that is the error of simply giving. The error of simply giving. Some think that simply giving towards missions and endeavors is enough. Now let me pause here and say a couple of things.

First of all, for us Americans, giving is rather easy. None of us understand poverty. None of us have lived in poverty. Some of us have more than others, but oh, when we compare ourselves to people around the world, we are filthy rich. And you kind of have to go out of the country to see this. But for most of us, giving is easy. But you know there are some that think that if all they do is open that wallet and give, they've done missions. That's the error of simply giving. Now let me go to the other extreme. I know that there are many people in the life of the church that they can never get on a plane and go around the world.

So what are you saying, pastor? I'm saying that we can't have a heart where we just simply give. We have to be willing to do what God would call us to do. And if going is what God's called you to do, then go. But you know, I've known people that all they could do is give, and they gave out of little. See, God knows the heart. And it's important that we do what God leads us to do. But there's the error of simply giving. And then the sixth error is the error of poor leadership. The error of poor leadership. I'm talking spiritual leadership.

Many churches have pastors and ministers who do not do the work to lead the church, to be intentional, to be biblical, and to be healthy in the area of mission's work. Many churches are just led poorly. They're led poorly. And I've seen it, and I've been a part of it, and I have been a victim of poor leadership. Now as I begin to bring the message to a close, I want to ask you to write down four words. Four words. Very simple. We used these three words the last time we studied missions. It was the third sermon, or excuse me, the second sermon when we were in that series, Messages from the Pastors Heart.

Now I'm going to add to this list of words. The first word is command. The word command. This Great Commission passage is a command, folks. There's no way you can cut it. There's no way you can slice it. There's no way you can read it any other way. This is a command. And when we have a command from God's Word to the church, we accept it. This is a command. But the second word is goal. Goal. I've said this word quite a few times. This is the ultimate goal of the church. Not that we ever attain that goal, but we're always pressing on for that goal. This should be our goal.

You might say, "Pastor, we're small church." It doesn't matter how small we are. It doesn't matter what our resources are. This should be our goal. The third word is worship. This speaks to the heart of why we do any of these things. Our heart should be for worship. And if you come and say, "Pastor, I cannot go. I never will be able to go, but I'm going to write a small check or give a few dollars out of what little I have, and I do it because I love Jesus." Oh, that's worship. Or if God were to lead you to say, "Pastor, I've got many resources. I've got the time. I can go here. I can go there.

I'm going to do what God leads me to do." That is worship. And then the fourth word is participation. Participation. We should all desire to participate. Remember that example of the church at Antioch? Oh, in the book of Acts. What do we see with the church of Antioch? That's Paul and Barnabas. That's their home church. And there is the home base for the missionary journeys. And what do we see? Paul and Barnabas go out in those great missionary journeys, but it was the whole church that participated in this work. There was the sending, and then there was the going.

Everyone in the body of Christ there at Antioch, they were participating in the work. And again, we're all called to participate in different ways. But then one more word. The word calling. I use this word calling when we studied the subject of evangelism when we looked at Antioch. Remember that personal calling? Remember that experiential, mystical, supernatural calling? Paul and Barnabas? They're in Antioch and they're praying and they're worshiping and they're fasting. They're just having church. And the Spirit of God comes and brings about this calling work in them.

The Spirit of God said, "Set apart Saul, set apart Paul, set apart Barnabas for this work." And Paul and Barnabas knew the call, and then the church at Antioch knew this call, and then they laid hands on them. They prayed and fasted, and they sent them out. You realize that Paul and Barnabas were called? And the church at Antioch, they were called? They were all called. I gotta believe people in that church would raise their hands and say, "Pastor, I'm not called to go, but I'm called to send." It was a calling. It was a personal calling. Antioch received that calling and it was not a calling that God gave the church at Ephesus. See?

It was a command. It's our goal. It's our worship, a part of our worship. We participate and it becomes this personal calling. Now, a question. Why do I get on an airplane in the morning and fly from Jackson to Atlanta, and then I have a 14-hour flight to Tokyo, and then I catch another flight to Manila? It's part of this work. Now, I don't know if you realize it. It just so happened in our study of the Ten Pillars that missions fail right before I go, and right before we are engaging in this work. Now, briefly before we close, you know that we are engaging to partner with a group of churches that desire to do healthy biblical missions work.

Why have we worked so hard to lead us to this place? It's because Brother Keith and I as elders in the life of the church want to lead you and want to lead us to participate in biblical missions, healthy missions, accountable missions, partnering with people to do this work. Now, Pastor, what are you going to do? There's a strong church there in Manila, pastored by a strong man named Timateo, and he's bringing in churches, pastors from other areas of the Philippines, and we're going there to train, we're going there to teach, and we're going there to teach on the church. And listen, 99% of what I'm teaching is what God's done here.

And in your accepting of what God is doing here, you're embracing of what God is doing here. We're all taking that together, and I'm taking that over there, and I'm teaching, and I'm encouraging, and I know by faith God will encourage the church in the Philippines and a pastor or two in the Philippines through what He is doing here. I find that hard in the heart of Paul, the Apostle Paul, as he's writing to the church at Rome, Romans chapter 1, verse 15, 13, 14, 15, right in there. What does he say? "Oh, I want to come see you. I want a great harvest among you.

I want to preach the gospel to you, and I want you to do a work in me." Now, I'm paraphrasing. You see what Paul's heart was? I want to work in you, and I want you to work in me. And that's why I go. That's why I do. And that's why we do what we do in the area of missions. Now, what's the title of the sermon? Again, our call, I like that word call. God's calling. He's working. Our call to the work of missions. Let's pray.