February 26, 2012
Disciples Who Make Disciples: The Radical Experiment
- Matthew 28:16-20
- Rev. Scott Shelton
Last week, we finished a sermon series on Renewed by the Spirit, where we learned God’s Spirit is with us as we live out our faith. Next week, we begin a series called Countdown to the Cross, where we prepare for Christ’s sacrifice at Easter. Today we are celebrating the conclusion of the Radical Experiment.
An email was sent to some different groups in the church to ask for stories of those who took on the radical experiment. You saw some of those stories from ZPC’ers – I’ll be reading some here too. Here is a good first story from a woman:
“I decided to step out of my comfort zone and join a ministry that clothes and feeds the homeless called the Andy Project. So, two Saturday mornings a month I head downtown Indy. We mostly work the clothing lines. On a typical day, there are young families; men and women looking for clothes. Some of them might have specific requests for items. We have sorted all the clothes before we bring them, so we usually know if we’ll be able to meet those requests.
I’ve had the honor of praying with young moms; a grandma who has 7 grandchildren under her care because her daughter suddenly died and a dad who just lost his job and home. When the weather turned cold, I asked our own ZPC ministry “loose threads” if I could have some blankets. We’ve passed out so many blankets too many to count. One lady heard about Andy Project and the blankets so she started crocheting hats and scarves. I think what has been exciting is seeing others use their gifts to join this opportunity to serve those who are overlooked in our society.” Wow – simple yet profound service and radical faith.
What is loose threads you ask? Here’s another response: “Loose Threads, in addition to making quilts for the homeless, prays for a different country each week; using Operation World as our guide for needs and requests.
I don't feel as if we are living radical lives, but the book was a great catalyst to head in that direction.” That is heading in exactly the right direction.
Today’s scripture gets us into radical discipleship, and that ZPC focuses on in our mission statement.
Let’s read what is called, the Great Commission, Matthew 28:16-20.
This is Jesus’ command to his disciples before he ascended up to heaven.
“16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
So what does it means to be radical and what does it have to do with the Great Commission? Everything really. Being radical is living out God’s message as God’s people. It is doing that in such a way that we live very different than the world lives, with different priorities, and different choices, the way we spend our money and time, thus we are radical.
Now, our Master, his message, and his mission have not changed. But the methods do change. Jesus is our Master – he is not only the example for all Christians to follow – he is God incarnate – so that we follow him as our Master. His message does not change today. It is still radical as it was back then. The first shall be last. Put others before yourself. The greatest among will be your servant. If your money and possessions hold you back from God, sell all you have, give to the poor, and follow Jesus. A mission to make disciples – it has not changed. It is our mission at ZPC too. Here it is – let’s look at it.
Called together by God to make disciples and release them for service in our broken world.
It really follows the great commission – to be disciples who make disciples and serve in our broken world – the whole world – here at home and in other countries.
What’s a disciple look like? A disciple at ZPC looks something like this:
Six Marks:
A Heart for Christ Alone
A Mind Transformed by the Word
Arms of Love
Knees for Prayer
A Voice to Speak the Good News
A Spirit of Servanthood and Stewardship
These are so important to our church, that we have artist’s pictures of them high up in our gathering space.
They seem like easy enough concepts, right? To make disciples, here’s what a disciple looks like, right?
Easy to understand, But it takes courage to live out. Here are some responses we received that speak to that. One woman wrote, “My husband and I traveled to Romania last September. God nudged us during the Radical book to step out and take a mission trip. It was an amazing trip and we were blessed in so many ways!”
I am currently reading through the entire Bible...I will not finish it by March 1st, but will finish about four weeks after the one year mark. Life got in the way some, so I was not able to stay on track as I would have liked...” That is true for many of your, working on reading the Bible but not finished – keep going – don’t give up.
We must read God’s Word to understand his mission. Let’s go back again and look at the mission.
Jesus said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in[a] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
It’s also helpful to back up and see what the disciples did when they saw Jesus. It says in verse 17, they worshiped him, the Greek word “proskyneo”, literally they prostrate themselves in homage to Jesus. But verse 17 also says, some doubted. Possibly some doubted that this Jesus before them was really the resurrected Jesus they had seen killed.
Isn’t it like us? Most of the time, we worship, but sometimes we doubt. We want to worship Jesus, as the Son of God, someone we should spend time learning all his commands, treating him as our Lord and Leader. But sometimes we doubt. We doubt, do I really have to worship him – so that I live differently? Can’t I just live with some of the ways I want to keep living? Can’t I still be selfish and lazy in some ways? Sometimes we doubt.
Jesus said, all authority had been given to him. He is in charge. And he inspires and commissions his disciples to live for him all out; to make disciples. He is the Master, that has not changed. He gives us our mission, which has not changed.
And he promises us he will be with us. That’s good news – we could do not live this way without him. In fact, just as we learned in our last sermon series, God’s Holy Spirit empowers us to live out the grace that God has given us.
So what does the Radical Experiment have to do with this?
One year ago, about March 1st, we finished a book study as a church, on a book called Radical by David Platt. The book is challenging in many ways to get out of our seats, to get out of our comfort zones, and to think about and do something about taking Jesus to the world. At the end of the book, the author challenges the readers to take on a 5 part experiment. Those 5 parts were laid out as an encouragement and also a challenge to us one year ago, and they have been listed in the gathering space on the orange wall.
They are as follows:
Pray for the entire world
Read through the entire Word
Sacrifice your money for a specific purpose
Spend your time in another context
Commit your life to a multiplying community
These are really things that fit well with our mission statement at ZPC and what we have been trying to do with Worship, Word, and World.
How do we get Radical at ZPC?
Commit your life to a multiplying community - WORSHIP – here on Sundays; groups/mops/lifechanges/men’s groups/coffeshop, wherever.
Read through the entire – WORD – study here and on your own
Pray for the entire – WORLD – we did that in worship – and many on your own
Spend time in another context – WORLD – local and global - not just local, not just global. But both as we reach out in Jesus name
Sacrifice your money for a specific purpose – WORSHIP / WORLD – through our offerings, and through your sacrifices elsewhere.
Even though we have completed the one year Radical experiment, we still encourage you to live out the Radical message, really Jesus message – to go into all the world and make disciples – so that we can be disciples who makes disciples and release them for service in our broken world.
What has that looked like at ZPC?
You saw a video on ZPC’er reaching out in Dubai, and you prayed for ZPC’ers going to Romania, but you can be Christ’s hands and feet here at home too. Listen to these, stories, showing that we can spend time in another context, whether that’s global or local:
From a ZPC couple:
“Hard to believe it has been a year since we started on Radical study. We have both been reading God's word on a regular basis but neither of us quite finished in the time frame, we're close though. I have been volunteering on Friday once a month at Outreach, Inc. We both shop at the Goodwill and Salvation Army stores in the fall for coats, and hoodies for the kids at Outreach. My wife has encouraged several groups through work and others to also contribute in one way or another to Outreach.” – Wow!!!
Here’s another:
“We decided that we could and should not save more but spend more on mission projects. We financed a water purification project for a small village in Uganda. No more walking a mile to a well or drinking water out of a local lake that was also the village sewer. Words on the wall say, "From Jesus with Love". How cool is that!
I took on the Radical challenge – I did ok about praying for the world. I did read the Bible in a year, which I had not accomplished in many years. I got a head start on many of you and finished on Dec. 31, 2011. I was very excited. I’m reading it again in 2012. And…I found I did all of my other Bible prep for Sunday schools, for worship, for one2one, and still had time to read the Bible in a year.
My family found out that we could attempt to live out some of this as well – spend time in another context. Last summer we were invited to New Hampshire with the Rockingham Christian Church to do a Christian summer camp to reach out to neighborhood kids, many of whom don’t go to church and don’t know Jesus – but we got to share with them Jesus.
We also wanted to sacrifice some time and money for a specific purpose. In November, we heard about a need to provide a Christ-focused Christmas for some of the poorest of the poor in Mexico border towns in Reynosa and Miguel Aleman. We contacted some of our friends, and our kids’ friends, and our high school students here at ZPC, and collected nearly blankets, toys, including soccer balls, and stuffed animals for children. We had about 30 shipping boxes, that through God’s help, we got shipped to the border for free. The kids received those gifts hand delivered with the message that Jesus cared for them, he is the Son of God, and we celebrate his birth at Christmas. It was reaching out in a way that got our whole family involved.
One last story, from a woman at ZPC: “I spent the three days visiting orphanages, schools, churches & the future site of a school in a village outside Jacmel, Haiti. With routine power outages, I knew we were blessed with power when most went without power or running water. The Christian school opened in October with 66 children enrolled and 20+ being turned away. As a result the Thursday night Bible studies held on the property for years has seen a significant increase in attendance! …Two months after returning from Haiti, I was blessed with multiple interviews & ultimately a job after being unemployed for 19 months. The salary offer was good, yet I negotiated for more. With that feeling of God's hand in all that had transpired, I committed my increase in salary to the Haitian school.”
What next?
God has done some wonderful things at ZPC in its 29 year existence. God has used many of you to build up the church, yet we can still go so much deeper with God, as we are called together by God on this corner. And then we can do so much more as we dream together how we might take his message of good news into the world.
In a follow up book to Radical called Radical Together, David Platt says, “The gospel that saves us from work saves us to work.” Again, he says, the gospel that saves us from work saves us to work. What does that mean?
Well, Ephesians 2:8-10 says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
Here’s the deal. God saves us by grace – through faith. We can’t earn it. Praise God. We are his disciples when we take that step of faith. But God does not want us to stop there with just our fire insurance.
It’s about living for Jesus here and now. Paul says, you are God’s handiwork, created to do good works – which God prepared for you to do.
So…how do we live out the gospel, this vision, this mission here at ZPC going forward? It’s called VISION 2020, a strategic plan for our church for the next 8 years. We need your help. And so for the application of being Radical today, tell us your dreams and hopes for ZPC for the future.
Here is Kevin Schmidt to tell how you can help.