Pastor Matt: A few weeks ago, I asked you a question. I asked you, “What do you want your life to be all about?” My prayer over these last few weeks since I asked you that question is that you have had some time to think, pray, and reflect on what you want your life to be about. That same Sunday I shared with you what I want my life to be about. That’s being all in. A key verse for me personally, as I think about that and want to stay motivated, comes from Acts chapter 13. It says in Acts 13:36, “For David, after he served the purpose of God in his own generation, fell asleep and was laid with his fathers…” What that simply means is after David served his purpose his life was over.
Today, we are going to wrap up and finish up our series called, All In...Holding Nothing Back. Today’s the last week of the series, and it’s really a continuation of the discussion that we started last week. Last week, we talked about the fact that before we can be all in we’ve got to first be in. So what does it take to be in? There’s two foundational decisions that we have to make to be in. The first and most important decision is to become a follower of Jesus Christ. Then right after that, the very next decision that we have, the very next step of obedience after becoming a follower of Jesus, is to get baptized. That’s what we took a look at last week. After we’ve decided to be in, now we can talk about what it is to be all in.
Today, I want to talk with you about three opportunities that each one of us have to express the fact that we’re all in. Today’s message is designed to do two main things. I want to summarize these three opportunities for you. I am going to let you know right now that we are not going to be going into great detail on any one of these three opportunities. In fact, really to do each one of these opportunities justice, it would really require an entire message series. We’ve done a series on each of these opportunities in the past here at Hope Church, and we’ll do a series on them again in the future. The first goal of my time here today is just to summarize what these opportunities are for you.
Then the second goal of our time is to give you an opportunity to make a commitment to go all in. I told you right at the very beginning of the series that I’m going to call you forward. I’m going to invite you to go all in, and that’s what we’re going to do today at the end of our time. We’re going to look at what the all-in commitment is, and then I want to give you an opportunity to make the all-in commitment. So, let’s take a look at these three opportunities. Again, they are going to be in summary form.
The first opportunity is to commit to be actively engaged in the local church. As we read the Scriptures, it’s pretty clear that there’s more going on in life. There’s more going on in the world around us than what we can just see, perceive, and understand with our mere human brains. God is doing so much more than what we can see in any one given moment. He’s actually using the church to accomplish His purposes that He has in this world. In fact, the nature of the church is best understood when we take a look at the different examples that are used, the different ways the church is talked about and illustrated in the Bible. In fact, what we discover is that the church is kind of like a multi-faceted jewel. It’s that multi-faceted jewel that God uses to accomplish His purposes in the world today.
We’ve got a picture of a multi-faceted jewel here for you on the screen. You can see the different facets of this jewel. If you were to turn it slightly in the light, it would look different. You can see different facets of this jewel. That’s what the church is like. So, I want to give you a quick summary of what the church is all about. I’ve listed these in your handout, and I’ve listed them with verse references so you can check them out later. You can dig in further if you’d like to. Again, this is just a summary. So, what’s the church all about? First, the church is the people of God. What does that mean? That means that we exist for Him. The church is also a colony of heaven, which means we operate by heaven’s ways, not by the ways of this world but actually by heaven’s ways.
The church is also the temple of God. We live intentionally for him. We are the body of Christ, and that means that we work together to be unified in the Lord Jesus. Then, we’re also a spiritual army, and what an army does is it anticipates victories and problems and also acknowledges that there is a real enemy that is battling against us. So as we gather together, there is so much more going on than just a social club. We’re actually God’s people coming together to worship Him as the body of believers. We are being salt and light. We are being a witness to the world around us of God’s love, His power, His forgiveness, and His faithfulness to His people.
Other groups may get together and have meetings, but we are doing so much more than that. We are God’s people. We are God’s redeemed people who come together and proclaim what God’s Son has done in us, through us, and for us. We get to proclaim that message of redemption to the rest of the world around us. We are God’s people living in God’s ways, being unified to accomplish God’s purposes on this earth and in our own generation, as we’re all here together at this time in this day and age. As we come together as a church, there’s actually several benefits that we find in ourselves in our own lives. I want to share some of those benefits with you, but I’ve left a spot on the handout for you to fill in how church has been a benefit to you. How has it helped you in your own walk with Jesus?
Here are some of the benefits that I’ve experienced and that many of us experience. The first is my church helps me center my life around God. God actually becomes more real in practical ways as we keep Him and put Him at the center of our lives. In fact, that’s what we’re doing right now as we are focusing on God and His Word and intentionally setting aside some time for that. We are centering our lives on God at this very moment. Another one of the ways my church helps me is to connect me with other believers. We can meet people. We can make friends, and we actually get to have examples of what it means to walk wisely and what it means to walk in God’s ways, as we watch other people who are more spiritually mature than we are. This is also one of the reasons why we have groups here at Hope Church. In fact, we’re in the middle of group sign ups right now.
Groups are an opportunity for us to continue to be around God’s people, to encourage and strengthen one another as we seek to follow Jesus and live out His ways in our daily life. We connect with other believers. Another benefit is that my church helps me grow spiritually. We grow spiritually through teaching that occurs formally like we’re doing right now but also through the encouragement and the time that we spend with other believers and getting to watching people who are more spiritually mature than we are. Getting wise counsel from people who have been down the road before us to help us understand God’s Word and actually apply it to our lives and grow spiritually.
My church helps me give something back. Did you know that every single follower of Jesus has at least one spiritual gift? It’s a gift that is given to followers of Jesus by the Holy Spirit the moment that we become a follower of Jesus. God intends that we use that gift to bless His people and help build up the body of the church. In fact, this is one of the reasons why we have so many different teams and opportunities to serve here at Hope Church. It takes a lot to make Hope Church go, and we need a lot of help. We need everyone’s gifts being thrown into the mix and working together so that we can do what God has called us to do. People find a way to contribute using the gifts that God has given them using other talents that God has given them, as well, to contribute to the overall mission of the church and to give back.
Another way that the church benefits me personally is it helps me share God’s message. I get to team with others to reach out. I have a place to hear God’s Word myself but also have a place that I can invite people to so that they themselves can hear God’s Word. This is why back in January we launched the 4+2+6 initiative, where we want to invite four people to join us for something. We want to share our testimony with two people and share the gospel. As we have rebooted that now about mid-year, we’re calling it 2+1+3 because we’re part way through the year. This is one of the reasons why we have this initiative because we want to share God’s message with the rest of the world through sharing it with those that are around us.
I said the church is like a multi-faceted jewel, and the local church is an expression of that multi-faceted jewel. But also when you think about a jewel, there’s another kind of a jewel. There’s a jewel in the rough. I’ve got a picture of that on the screen now. That jewel in the rough is not quite like the one we see in the jewelry store. That’s not quite like the one that we want to be on a ring or on some other piece of jewelry. It’s got rough edges. It doesn’t look like the multi-faceted jewel, but we all have rough edges. You do, if you didn’t know that. You have some rough edges. I’ve got rough edges. In fact, the collective “we” as Hope Church have got rough edges. Here’s the thing. Over time as we commit to the community, as we commit to do life God’s way together, you get some of those rough edges worn off, and so do I.
In fact, we all participate in having some of those rough edges be worn off of each other. That’s part of God’s process of transformation. As you’re being transformed, you’re helping others be transformed as we live together in community. So, the first opportunity that we have is to commit to be actively engaged in a local church. My invitation to you is to make Hope Church your local church. Since March, it’s been an interesting time since most of the country went into lockdown or stay-at-home or whatever it was called in the different areas around the country. From that moment forward, the local church and its engagement has looked a little bit different because God’s people weren’t able to gather on Sunday mornings in the way that we have been used to.
During that time as we were engaging in online church from home, it became really easy to visit all kinds of other churches. Maybe there were some famous pastors or preachers that you had heard of in other cities. You live here in Fort Worth, and you can’t go to their church. But now, you could visit it online. If you love in Fort Worth, Texas, if you live in the Tarrant County area, I want to invite you to make Hope Church your church. A great next step for you to explore Hope further is to participate in our Start Here experience. Through Start Here, you can learn more about who we are as a church, how to connect at a deeper level, and then there’s some key steps that everyone needs to be taking in their own spiritual journey as they move forward with Jesus. So, that’s opportunity number one.
Opportunity number two is to serve others. There’s an interesting verse in Matthew 20:28. It says, “Even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” As followers of Jesus, we pattern our life off of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the One that we follow. Therefore, we do life like Jesus did, and a part of being a Christ-follower is a part of being a servant. So, we serve others. How do we do that? Here are some ways to serve others. One is you can contribute to the mission of my church. I just invited you to consider making Hope Church your church. One of the ways that we serve others is through the local church. Earlier, in fact, I mentioned the benefits that God has given followers of Christ, at least one spiritual gift. We have the opportunity to serve and to use those gifts given for building up God’s people within the local church.
Let’s take a look at Ephesians 4:11-16. It says, “And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds, and the teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ...when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.” This is part of God’s design for the church. It’s that the people of God would work together. Remember, one of the illustrations that we have of the church, of the multi-faceted elements, is the fact that the church is the body of Christ. Now in my physical body here, I’ve got a hand. I’ve got an arm. I’ve got a foot that you probably can’t see right now, but we have different parts to our body. In fact, a hand on the ground detached from the body is not much good at all, but we are a body. We’ve been given gifts that we can use within our local church.
My job, as your lead pastor, and the rest of the staff’s job that serve with me is not to do all of the ministry. As we saw in that verse, our job is to equip the saints, and that’s you if you’re a follower of Jesus, to do ministry. We’ve got a really big mission and a really big vision here at Hope Church of what we want to see done, and we need all the help we can get. Our mission as a church is to invite people to discover and experience God’s ways. One of the most exciting things for me is I think about the fact that right now in the community around us there are people who don’t even know that Hope Church exists. They don’t know that we are here. In fact, those that don’t know that we are here, at the same time, may not be a follower of Jesus. But, there are going to be those who are not followers of Jesus, who don’t yet know about Hope Church who one day, hear about Jesus and hear about Hope Church. Then they themselves, like so many of you, will be a part of helping us with that mission. They will help us invite people to discover and experience God’s ways.
One of the ways that we can serve is by contributing to our local church, but there are also other ways to serve so I want to share those with you. One is to look for ways to bless others each day. If you think about it, there’s actually an endless amount of opportunities to serve people throughout our day. We have our family and our own home, your spouse or your children or your brother or your sister or your roommates, people in your home. There’s opportunities to serve them each and every day. There’s our friends, our families, extended family, our neighbors, our coworkers, maybe classmates at school. Then, there are many opportunities throughout the day with people who we meet and we come across and we interact.
Before you get overwhelmed by the fact that there is an endless amount of opportunities to serve and bless others, I don’t want you to feel guilty. The truth is we can’t meet every need that exists. Every person that we see, who is in need or who could be blessed in the moment by our service, we just don’t have the resources or the capacity to do it to everyone. What’s really important, though, is this next point I have for you. We can serve those who God is initiating us and guiding us to take action. Look at Psalm 32:8. It says, “The Lord says, ‘I will guide you along the best pathway for your life. I will advise you and watch over you.’”
So, a key question for us to be asking is “How do I best respond in the moment?” There’s a moment that you see an opportunity to serve or bless someone, and you can actually turn that into a prayer. You can say, “Lord, I see this need. I see this opportunity. How do you want me to best respond in this moment?” Then, listen to what the Lord says. I’ve found over the years that as I have made that a prayer myself as I see different needs, sometimes the Lord says, “Matt, here’s what I want you to do. Here’s how I want you to meet that need.” There’s other times when I see a need, and I’m not able to meet that. God shows me that I had my eyes open and saw it, but His intention is not necessarily for me to meet that need. Again, we don’t have endless resources. We can’t meet every need that exists, but what’s important is that we ask the Lord how He wants us to be involved and obedient. And, we follow as He leads.
Here’s five ways to bless others. These may be some of the ways that God will lead you to bless others in the future. One way is to give of my time. Time is sort of this precious resource we have right now. We never have enough time, but sometimes, we can give of our time to someone. Just by listening to them or helping them with something very small and simple, that’s a huge way to bless them. Another one is by sharing a talent. If you have a certain talent or ability and you share that with someone else who doesn’t have that, that’s a way to bless them.
Another way is to invest my treasure. Maybe you have an opportunity to financially assist someone. Use part of your treasure and make an investment in them. Maybe it’s a really small investment, but it’s a way that you can invest your treasure. Another one is by encouraging with my talk. Who doesn’t want to be encouraged, right? When someone shares a bit of encouragement with you, I’m sure that is so encouraging and a blessing to you. But, you might have the opportunity, maybe after you’ve given someone some time and listened to them. You don’t just listen to them, but you encourage them then with your words.
Another way to bless others is to proclaim with my testimony. Those of us who are followers of Jesus have a testimony of Jesus. We know what Jesus has done in our lives. As we interact with others who maybe don’t know Jesus, we can share what a difference He has made in our lives, and we can ultimately share the gospel with them. So, our second opportunity to express our choice to be all in is to serve others. My invitation to you is to serve those who God brings into your life and contribute to the mission of Hope Church. As your next step, I want to invite you to consider joining a team and a group at Hope here this fall. Through teams and groups, you’ll have all kinds of opportunities to serve and bless others and then work together to serve and bless others. That’s our second opportunity.
The third opportunity is to share Christ. I think one of the most motivating verses for me when it comes to sharing Christ is Romans 10:13-15. It says, “For ‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’ But how can they call on him to save them unless they believe in him? And how can they believe in him if they have never heard about him? And how can they hear about him unless someone tells them? And how will anyone go and tell them without being sent?” In order for people to call on the name of the Lord, in order for people to pray to receive Christ as their Savior, it all backs up to the fact that they need to hear about Him to believe in Him. In order to hear about Him, they need to hear about Him from someone. The verse is talking about how anyone will go without being sent.
If you’re a follower of Jesus Christ, I want to make this really simple for you. Jesus told His followers to go—to “go and make disciples of all the nations.” If you are a follower of Jesus, He has already sent you simply by the fact that you are a follower of Jesus. It’s not an optional part. I talked a moment ago about spiritual gifts. There are those who have the gift of evangelism, and they appear to be so much better at it. It just comes naturally because it’s one of the spiritual gifts that they have, but let me be honest. Those of us who don’t have the spiritual gift of evangelism (and that’s not one of my gifts), we’re not off the hook. If we’re followers of Jesus, we are called to share Christ with others.
One of the simplest ways to share Christ with others is to see that God has me ______ for a purpose. Why did I leave a blank there? The blank is wherever you are. See that God has you at your job, at your house, at your school, in your neighborhood. Wherever that is, you fill in the blank with wherever God has you, but He’s got you in a lot of places at a lot of different times. Again, going back to Acts 13:36, “For David, after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation…” God has you and me in certain places at the time that He has us there because He has a purpose for us.He wants us to see that He has us there for a purpose, and one of those purposes is probably to share Christ with some others around us. Here’s the thing. He doesn’t have me at all the places that He has you. He doesn’t have you at all the places that He has me. This is where when we work together as the larger body of Christ, He has us in different places with the ability to reach out and share with different people.
You can also pray for opportunities to share. Pray generally that God would give you an opportunity to share Christ with someone. That’s a great prayer to pray every morning when you wake up. Lord, if you would bring someone across my path today that I can share Christ with. That’s a really simple, great prayer. Pray for specific people who you have in your life that you know are not followers of Jesus or you’re pretty sure that they’re not a follower of Jesus. Then, see the God-given opportunities. After you’ve prayed for opportunities, then see that God wants to bring those opportunities to you because God wants people to come back into relationship with Him through Jesus Christ. When we pray in God’s will for the things that are on God’s heart, God’s going to answer those prayers. First, we pray for the opportunity to share, but then we need to see the God-given opportunities when He gives them.
Finally, I want to encourage you and maybe challenge you to consider my witness to the world around me. Sometimes we get so caught up, and we get so worried about the actual act of presenting the gospel to someone that we totally forget about that our life is a witness, the way that we go about our daily lives. For those of you who are on your jobs, the way that you treat your coworkers, the way that you speak to them, the way that you respect your boss even if they’re not respectful— there's’ so much about our lives and the way that we live that’s really a witness to the world around us. Then, we’re praying for opportunities to actually share the gospel, but a big part of what we are to do as Christ-followers is to be a witness. It’s kind of hard if you’re the office jerk and nobody wants to talk to you. All they see you doing is belittling everyone around you. It’s kind of hard, in that moment when you’re like, “Hey, let me tell you about Jesus,” because you’ve lost credibility with them. Instead, let’s let our lives and the way that we live be a witness and be a point of curiosity.
In fact, I’ve talked to people in the past, and they’ve been sort of discouraged with their job. They’ve been in a new job, and they haven’t had any opportunities to share the gospel yet. They’re only three weeks into this job, but then as we talk more, this one person asked me, “Why are you always so happy?” Well, that’s because she noticed their witness. There was real joy and happiness, even in the midst of difficult circumstances. I want to read Matthew 5:16. It says, “In the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” Our witness, though our witness, people can see our light shine before others. Opportunity number three is to share Christ, and my invitation to you is to share Christ with those that God brings into your life and brings across your path. As you do that, I want to invite you to participate in 4+2+6 or 2+1+3, if you’re just joining us right now.
What are we talking about with this? If you’re just joining us right now with this, between now and the end of the year—December 31st—we want to invite you to invite two people to something. That can be inviting two people to join us for church, whether in person or online, or some other event. Maybe you invite them to an activity that your group is doing this fall. Just two people, invite them to something. Then, the one is one person, who you’re pretty sure or you know for certain that they are not a follower of Jesus. Share your personal story, your personal testimony with them, and share the gospel with them. That's what we’re talking about. That’s our invitation to you.
We all have three opportunities to express the fact that we’re all. We can commit to be actively engaged in the local church. We can serve others, and we can share Christ. Being all in, we’ve talked about already in the series. But, I want to sum it up for you right now for this last point. Being all in is a commitment of the heart. It’s to orient my life around the things of God, and then to keep taking next steps. That’s what being all in is about. As we do that, as we think about going all in, I want to remind you of our theme verse for this year, which is 1 Timothy 1:7-8a. It says, “For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline. So never be ashamed to tell others about our Lord.”
As we commit to go all in, the Holy SPirit gives us power. He gives us love; He gives us self-discipline. And, He gives us the courage to face our fears. In the moments when we are uncertain or we might be feeling timid, He gives us the courage we need, and He gives us that courage to live boldly for Christ. Maybe the opportunity before us is to share Christ with someone. I’ve shared with you that, as your lead pastor, I’m all in. I’ve talked about the fact that as a church we’re going all in. Now, I want to invite you to commit to go all in. Last week, we shared the All-In Commitment in the handout. I hope you had a chance to look at that and pray about it.
I want to read the All-In Commitment right now, and I want to give you the opportunity to respond, to say, “Yes! That’s me. I want to make that commitment.” The commitment is this: “I, ______, (fill in your own name...I, Matt…) commit to go ALL IN as a follower of Jesus. Starting where I presently am on my spiritual journey, I will hold nothing back from Jesus. By God’s grace and with His help, I surrender all of me to Him and will seek to discover His purposes for my life and spend my life living out those purposes one day at a time.” We live in a day and age right now where there seems to be more questions than there are answers. That can be frustrating at times, but here’s what I know for certain. Even in the middle of all of this uncertainty, here’s what I know for certain. It’s this. God is in control. God is working out His purposes in the world at this time and on His timetable. I know that Jesus Christ died for my sins. Because I have made Him my Lord and my Savior, I am forgiven, and now I get to be a part of what God is doing in this world.
I don’t have all the specific details. I don’t know how it’s all going to play out, but I choose, day-by-day, to live and walk by faith, not by sight, and to go all in wherever God is leading me in that moment. I want to give you the opportunity right now. I want to invite you to go all in. Let’s pray. Father, thank You that You didn’t give up on us. Thank You that while we were still sinners You made a way for us to have a right relationship with You. That way is through Your Son, Jesus Christ. Thank You that You went all in for us. The pain that You endured on the cross, the pain, the blood, the hardship—You went all in. You gave everything for us so that we could be made right with our Father, with our Creator, with the God of the universe. Thank You so much for that. I pray right now that as we consider our next steps, as we consider what You’re doing in our own lives, please give us courage. Please give us strength. Lead us; show us what our next step is, and then help us to take that next step. I ask this in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
