Sermon Transcript

Welcome to 2016! How many of you are excited that 2015 is over!? You’re thinking, “That was not the greatest year in history!” No. That was not a good year for a lot of us. Some of you are ready for a new year, so the first Sunday of the new year is always an opportunity to reset. That’s the title of the message today; we’re going to “Reset” our discipleship.

Let me invite you to open your Bibles to Colossians chapter 1. As you’re doing that, let me give you a little update: Throughout the month of December we let you know that there was an opportunity to give toward capital needs around here, above and beyond your regular giving.

Look at what our church did! Those of you who have a heart for our church, you gave over eighty-six-thousand dollars, so that’s going to enable us to do some things around here. Thank you, thank you for so many of you who give so sacrificially. It’s your faithfulness to the Lord, in giving to the Lord that enables His work to be done in His way in His church.

I have five children and there are times that the children have issues with their technology, and I have a wife who is actually allergic to technology—so there are times that she brings me her computer or her cell phone or something that’s not working. They know that “Dad will fix it,” because “Dad has a degree in technology.” Did you know that? You’re not impressed. You shouldn’t be—it was from 1989! Which means my 1989 technology degree was obsolete in 1991, okay?

Anyway, there is one piece of information I got (with four years of college to learn this). “Turn it off and turn it back on.” That tends to fix ninety percent of the problems. But the ten percent it doesn’t fix, there’s one more little secret: you can always find the factory reset, right? Now, you have to be brave to do that, because you wonder, “What information am I going to lose?”

I actually had to do that yesterday; my phone was slow and it was bogging down. I could go in and play with it, or I could just gulp real hard and hit the factory reset. When you do that, everything goes back to the way the manufacturer designed it to work from the beginning, before you started fiddling with all the options. Well, that’s what we’re going to do in the month of January. . .we’re going to talk about resetting our discipleship.

Next week, we’re going to talk about resetting our stewardship. Let me let you know that, coming up on the third Sunday in January, Dr. Thomas White, the President of Cedarville University, will be here bringing God’s Word. I want you to mark your calendar—special day—everybody at church. I want you to hear from my new friend, Dr. Thomas White. Then in the fourth weekend of January, we’re going to start a brand-new series through the book of Joshua. That will take us all the way up to the summer. So that’s what’s ahead.

Before we do all that, we need to reset the manufacturer’s settings here. I want to give you fair warning—I’m not even preaching today, I’m just kind of talking to the family. This is just kind of a family chat.

We’re going to answer four questions. The answers to those four questions should sound very familiar to you if you are part of us. Do you know the difference between “us” and “them?” If you’re a person who thinks of Harvest Bible Chapel and talks of Harvest Bible Chapel as “they” and “them,” you’re not yet part of “us.” This is a great Sunday for you to be here, because I’m going to kind of give you an overview of what we’re trying to do around here.

I’m going to answers four questions:

What are we doing? We’re coming to church, but what actually is it that we’re doing? We’re going to see that answer here from the Scripture in a minute. How are we going to get that done; how are we doing it? Why are we doing that? Where are we going to get the strength to do that?

We’re going to find all of those answers from the Scriptures in just a minute, and I’m just going to tell you, there’s going to be an echo in here. This message will echo everything you’ve probably heard me say as long as you’ve been coming to church. If I do my job right, I’m not going to tell you anything new, because all we’re doing is resetting to what we’ve always been about—and what we’re going after in the new year—it’s the same thing we went after in the years prior.

First of all, let me just tell you this: Harvest Bible Chapel is not a perfect church! If you’re looking for a perfect church, you’ll have to keep looking. If you happen to find one, don’t join it—you’ll ruin it! There is no such thing as a perfect church! Let me tell you what Harvest is: Harvest is a good church.

Harvest is a good church because it’s giving itself to good things that God has initiated. And because, I believe, we’ve given ourselves to those things, I believe that’s why Harvest is also a growing church. But we fail in so many ways. As the one whom God has called to lead this effort as the senior pastor, I see—probably better than anybody else—the ways that we fail.

We fail in our planning, we fail in our communication, we fail in our execution—but listen, by God’s grace we will not fail in our humility, we will not fail in our urgency, we will not fail in our passion, we will not fail in our worship—because this church is all about him. It’s not about a senior pastor, it’s not about a movement, it’s not about a building, it’s not about money. It is all about him! So, I want you to see it from God’s Word.

Let’s read in Colossians 1:28 and 29. We’re only going to look at two verses today, right here: “Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.”

So here’s the first question:

1. Reset: What are we doing?

We find the answer right here in verse 28: We are proclaiming him! Him, we proclaim! Even as I answer these four questions, I’m attempting to model for you what we are doing. We like to get our eyes on the page. I preach from the English Standard Version of the Bible. It’s really helpful if you have that same translation, because I’m looking at words—you’re looking at the same words.

What’s the first word of verse 28? “Him!” Now, how many of you remember back to seventh grade? How many of you would like to forget seventh grade? There was a very important piece of information you got in your English class; it was about pronouns. The word “him” is a pronoun in the English language. And every pronoun has a what? Does anybody know? Did you hear all of the homeschoolers? Tell us! Every pronoun has an…antecedent…right! That points back to a noun, in this case a proper noun.

Let me ask you this question: What do you think the antecedent is to the pronoun “him” in verse 28? What is the antecedent? Let’s all say it together: Jesus! That was a very low-confidence answer you gave me there, so would you like another run at that? What is the antecedent to the pronoun “him” in verse 28? [Congregation responds “Jesus!”]

Jesus Christ! It is all about him, and it is him we proclaim. Every time we gather, we gather to get our eyes off ourselves and on him! We are here to talk about him; we are here to invite him into our presence; we are here to meet with him; we are here to exalt him, worship him, glorify him, and to obey—who?—him. It’s all about him at Harvest Bible Chapel. It is always about him. It is only about him! That’s why we gather.

It reminds of a verse over in Romans 11:36: “For from him and through him and to him are all things.” How many things are not about him? According to that verse, zero. It’s all about him. . .everything you experience is from him; everything you want to do is through him; everything you do is an offering to him. If we lived our lives that way, we would be mature believers. If our churches were always and only committed to doing things that were from him and through him and to him, we would get the blessing from him.

And notice this [the rest of the verse], “To Him be glory forever!” The word “glory” has, at its root, the word “weight.” It means “weightiness.” When we come together, what we are doing is we are giving up glory to him and we are believing that his glory will come down and meet with us. It’s all about the manifest presence of God!

There’s a word that we like to use when we describe Harvest Bible Chapel. What kind of church are we? One word sums it up: we are a “vertical” church. What does that mean? That means that we are not interested in silly, horizontal, self-help platitudes, smiley-face preacher, shot-in-the-arm encourage you, “hope you have a better week.” We are here to glorify God, get our eyes off of ourselves and our felt needs, and get our eyes on the manufacturer, so that he gets the glory. That’s what we’re going after!

We’re a vertical church. Do you know what that means? It really doesn’t matter who comes to church as long as he comes to church! And it really doesn’t matter who doesn’t come to church as long as he comes to church! And if he comes to church, we won’t have any problem getting enough people in the chairs that we set up—because we long to be with our Maker, our God.

Our desire is that he would come! So every sermon is about him. Every song is about him! Every small group is about him, everything happening in the children’s ministry is about him, every smiling-faced parking lot attendant that is telling you where to go, where to park, is doing it for him. (The question is; will you park for him? “I want to park over here. . .”) Everything we’re doing is for him: every volunteer. . .every time we go serve at Project Warm or go down to Hope Ministries, or serve a meal or fix a meal or counsel someone, it is always and only and exclusively about him.

Every seat is set up so that someone can sit in it to encounter him! That is why we do what we do. Hebrews 12 reminds us of this, “Consider him!” The word “consider” means to “think deeply; contemplate” him! What should we contemplate about him? Hebrews 12:3, “Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.”

So often. people come—and you’re even here this morning, many of you—stumbling in; you barely made it, you got kicked in the teeth all week long, you’re hurting, you’re suffering, you got a raw deal; some of you were abused, you were lied against, stolen from, slandered, cheated. . .and you come in here feeling like, “I just got knocked in the teeth all week long!” What is going to help you walk out of here recovered?

It is not “considering yourself,” it is not considering who hurt you. What does the Scripture say? Get your eyes off yourself and your situation and consider him! Compare what he went through to what you’re going through. And pretty soon you don’t feel so much like a victim. So, consider him! Think about him, get your eyes on him, and pretty soon your situation seems petty compared to what he has done in love for you! So, everything we do is to get you to worship and to glorify and honor and observe and obey him!

That’s the first word of the text (that’s why we’ve only got two verses today!). The passage says, “Him, we”—what’s the next word?—“proclaim.” (Colossians 1:28 ESV) What are we doing? We are proclaiming him! So what does it mean to “proclaim?” It means to “herald,” it means to “announce,” it means to “communicate” with three things around here: we communicate with urgency, with simplicity and with clarity. . .things about him.

How’s your urgency? Are you sensing any urgency in me this morning? Do you sense any urgency when Micah is leading worship? James MacDonald described Micah as “a wrestler who leads worship.” He’s pretty urgent about what is going on! We’re going after Him!

Urgency means there is a passion in my soul for God to come and meet with us! We’re not here to give you helpful advice, we’re not here to fill your mind full of intellectual knowledge. This is not a boring lecture, trying to get information into you. . .this is truth that is proclaimed about Jesus for the purpose of your soul’s transformation. It is truth heralded to persuade you to believe, to worship and to obey. You’ve got to do it!!

Not only urgency, but simplicity. . .Simplicity simply is helping us understand in concise, conceivable terms what to do next. If I do my job right, hopefully you’ll understand where you are on the map of your journey, and you’ll understand where God wants you to go in your journey, and the next step you need to take to get there.

And so, when we talk—and when we explain the Scripture—we try to do it in simple terms. Do you know who my target audience is when I’m up here (can I give away my trade secrets)? I am talking to a nineteen-year-old college freshman. Nineteen-year-old college freshmen need things simple (I see you over there!), and if I can hit that target, probably the rest of us are going to be onboard with that, okay?

“Simple.” That means when we talk about the gospel. . .I’ve given my life to the explanation, the application and the illustration of God’s Word. I want to put it on a level that you can understand. So when we talk about the gospel, we talk about it in ways that I can understand. So, what is the gospel? The gospel is simply this: God is holy, I am sinful. Jesus is the Savior. I must repent and believe. What must I repent of? My sin. I’m a dirty rotten sinner. So are you. The fact that Jesus died on a cross in my place as a substitute for my sin ought to rock my world in such a way that I surrender my life to him. Is that simple enough?

Now, listen. Some of you have all of those words memorized and you yawned your way through it. Your problem is not simplicity—your problem is urgency. Are you urgently wrapping your life around those truths so that they impact you on a daily basis?

And then, with “clarity.” So, we must get the gospel right—the power is in the clarity—but we also must get the gospel out. So we talk about doctrinal precision, but we talk about passionate execution of the Great Commission—getting it to the places where it needs to go.

So when we talk about the difference between justification and sanctification, even though those are multisyllabic words that may not sound like they have a whole lot of clarity, we talk about the difference. Because it’s very important that we understand the difference.

Justification is a point in time when God declares a guilty sinner innocent of all crimes. Justification puts me in right legal standing with God. That happens in a one-time act in my life. It is the beginning of sanctification. Sanctification is where I become a little more like Jesus every day—and He starts knocking off the rough edges of my life—and I start talking more like Jesus would have me to talk, and I start thinking more like Jesus would have me to think. It’s a lifelong process. Justification is a point; sanctification is a process.

If you have not had the point, you have not started the process. Some of you think you’re in the process, but you’ve never had the point. So it’s very important, with clarity, that you understand “my journey with Jesus starts when I repent and believe.” If you do not have a conversion story, you do not have a conversion. You’re just going through some religious exercise here this morning—packing away some religious information—and you don’t have a relationship with Jesus.

With urgency, I would urge you to repent of sin! Put yourself in right relationship with God, legally. Embrace the gospel that Jesus died on a cross in my place as a substitute for my sin—and begin the process of walking with Jesus so that you become a little bit more like Him every day. What are we doing? We are proclaiming Him!
Here’s the second question. . .

2. Reset: How are we doing it?

We could probably sit around and brainstorm—I could get a white board up here, we could kind of make some ideas—How do we want to do that? Or. . .or. . .or. . .oh, I know, let’s look at the Bible! Colossians 1:28, “. . .warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom…” Well, my goodness, there’s an answer to the question! How are we doing it? Two things: We are warning everyone and teaching everyone.

First of all, warning. What does it mean to warn? It means to wake people up, to sound the alarm. A couple of weeks ago I was in bed, crashed, a-sleep, it was about eleven o’clock. Now, I have five children on Christmas break. They like to stay up a lot later than Dad likes to stay up on Christmas break. I had earplugs in, because they’re in the other parts of the house banging, there’s music, there’s—I don’t know—they’re watching a movie, they have friends, they’re laughing and joking. So, earplugs for Dad. But then I heard something that even pierced through the earplugs. The fire alarm went off in the house. That got my attention!

I’m immediately thinking, “Which one of the children is on fire?” And “Which one of the other children lit that child on fire?” So it created a little bit of urgency in me. I jumped up out of bed and I ran out, and I smelled smoke. “Okay, there is a child on fire somewhere!”

I started going around, and it was actually up in my nineteen-year-old daughter’s room. There was a fire in her room! She had lit a candle and blown the candle out, which had created a little smoke in her room, which wafted up to the fire alarm and set the fire alarm off, waking up everybody in the house. It was a false alarm. It was a candle!

But, can I share with you what we are doing around here? We are sounding the alarm for people who have not yet repented of sin. If you are a person who will not obey God, if you are a person that with your stubborn self-will refuses to give control of your life to the lordship of Jesus, then do you understand that without being in right relationship with God, you will be on fire! For eternity! Hell is hot! Heaven is real! The Bible is true! And you are loved—but you are running out of time!

That’s how we warn people around here. There’s a sense of urgency and we’re here to sound the alarm. Jesus is coming! There’s never been a time when the coming of Jesus Christ was closer. There have never been more signs of his coming than there were in 2015. The nations are aligning themselves around Israel. There is a one-world global economy that is coming together. There is greater persecution of followers of Jesus and there is more of an abundance of false prophets. How many signs do you need to wake up!? Jesus is coming, and he’s coming soon! I don’t know when he’s coming, but I do know this: we are closer in 2016 than we were in 2015. How long will you wait? Our job is to warn everyone.

Not only that, our job is to teach everyone. Do you see it there in verse 28? “Teaching…” what is that? Well, that means that we want to give you practical application of God’s word in every component part of your life. Around here, there is a particular way that we communicate God’s word. Not every church does it this way.
As a matter of fact, some of the largest and most prominent churches in our country say that what I am doing right now (holding a Bible and pointing attention to God’s words—explaining those words and applying those words and trying to illustrate those words)—they would say, “You can’t grow a church that way!” Okay. Well, I don’t know what’s happening in your church—our church is kind of growin’!

What we’re doing around here is the application-oriented exposition of God’s word. Do you know what expositional preaching is? It’s when we open our Bibles, we walk through a text of Scripture and we listen for what God’s word has to say. The job of the preacher is not to be clever or cute. It’s to be clear, urgent, simple—and call you to an immediate response to repentance and faith.

The word “exposition” comes from the word “expose.” We want to expose ourselves to the book that God has written. God has self-disclosed his will and his ways to us through a book that we all have access to.
There’s a professor at the University of North Carolina, and he is doing what most professors of first-year college students do at secular universities. He’s trying to get them to disconnect from their presuppositions about the way the world works. Formerly, he called himself a Christian, but he’s given up that title and he says, “My number one goal in life is just to get you to get disconnected from the beliefs you brought in here, from whatever church you came from.”

So, he stands up and he asks the students a question: “How many of you believe that God has written a book—it’s called the Bible?” A lot of those students, courageously, will raise their hands. And then he says, “Of those of you who have raised your hands, how many of you read that book that God wrote every day?” Hands go down. Then he says this, “You know, you would think that if there was a God who had actually gone to the trouble to write a book, if you really believed God wrote a book, that you’d want to read it. You obviously don’t believe that God wrote a book. Case closed.”

I would present the question to you: Do you expose yourself to the book that God has written, or do you spend more time watching Netflix and listening to Taylor Swift lyrics than you do listening to what God has said for your life? Do you really believe it?

We’re here to warn, and we’re here to teach you what God has said about his will and his ways for your life. So, we’re not interested in just creating an urgency. . .we’re interested in creating a practical application of God’s Word.

We want to teach husbands how to love and lead their wives. We want to teach wives how to respect and follow the loving leadership of their husbands. We want to teach singles how to live sexually pure lives in anticipation of the day that God would bring marriage into their lives. We want to teach parents how to courageously discipline and instruct their children.

There’s a little word that works with little children—it’s a little word, it’s called: “No!” Parents need to learn how to teach their children, “You can’t always have everything you want. This is not going to be child-centered universe. This is not going to be a child-centered home.” We’re going to teach them how to control their appetites and their passions, because God has some things to say to children.

We’re here to teach children and teenagers and young adults to obey their parents and obey their authorities, as God raises them up in their lives. We’re here to teach people how to steward their financial resources well. I want to give you forewarning: Next week’s sermon is about money! There should be plenty of seats next week in church, okay? I just want to give you fair warning. We’re here to teach you. Not just how to give money, but how to make money and save money and steward money, because it’s all God’s money—it all belongs to him.

We’re here to teach you how to suffer well. We want to teach you how to die well. We want to teach you how to forgive when you’re hurt. We want to teach you how to care for, and to know and to love and to mentor and to counsel and to disciple the next generation of Christians.

We want to teach the older men to transfer what God has taught you to the younger men in our church, and to teach the older women to mentor the younger women in our church. We’re all teachers. I hope you understood the urgency of Pastor Nathan’s invitation to those three things: Meet and Greet (immediately following the service), Making Harvest My Home (next Sunday night) and then the next step for every member of Harvest Bible Chapel is that Uncommon Leadership event about which he informed you.

You think, “I’m not a leader, don’t want to be a leader,” “I’m already a leader, I don’t need that,” “I don’t know what he’s talking about.” Somebody leaned up to me during that announcement and asked, “Is that for me?” YES!! And, if you’re asking that. . .YES!! That is for you! This is how we disciple the people that God has given us to care for. That course, that time, is to equip us to be able to do that. That’s how we’re going to get it done.

We’re to warn everyone, we’re to teach everyone…eyes back on the page…with what? What’s our weapon? “With all wisdom.” Do you know what wisdom is? Wisdom has nothing to do with your intellect. Some of the smartest people live the most foolish lives. Wisdom is the lens that God gives your eyes to see with his perspective. Wisdom is applying the doctrinal truths of the Scripture to the most practical areas of my life. Without wisdom you don’t know how to answer the most important questions.

Questions like: What is real? What is true? What is right? What is important? If you’re fuzzy and unclear on all those different things, your life is probably filled with chaos and you have trouble sleeping at night. But if you have filled your life with wisdom, do you know you have the ability to see law, history, politics, justice, beauty, goodness, art, entertainment all through the lens of God’s perspective? And you understand the world was made to work as it is governed by the wisdom of God.

So we’re to teach and warn with all wisdom. And then, there’s a word that appears in this verse three different times. Did you pick up on that? Did you see that three different times? What is the word? Do you see it? “Everyone…” Do you know what that means? We’re doing this together. A church is a place where the family gathers together, but it’s a real hard sell today to get people to understand that everyone has a responsibility in the church.

Some people, a lot of people, people that go to church here see church like a grocery store. When the cupboard is bare and there’s a little rumbly-tumbly in the belly, you go to the store and you stock up—until there’s another time when you’re out of groceries—and then you come back. Listen, Harvest is not a grocery store! It’s not the place you come to get your spiritual groceries.

Some people look at church like it’s a restaurant. It’s a place you go and you expect great service. You expect a well-prepared meal and you expect a fair price. So, “If it tastes good, people make me feel happy, and I don’t have to pay too much for it, I’ll go back.” Harvest is not a restaurant, even though I work really hard to prepare a “meal” for you every week. My goal is to get you to feed yourself, okay? And then to feed others. Harvest is not a grocery store; it is not a restaurant.

Some people go to church like it’s a theater, and they want to see a good story. You want to have your emotions moved, you want there to be great special effects! You’re going to be sadly disappointed if you come expecting to see that at Harvest.

Some people come to church as if it’s a school and you want to learn something! You want to have your intellect challenged! Um, as long as I’m teaching, you’re not gonna have a whole lot of your intellect challenged, because I’ve got my own limitations in that!

So, if church is not a school, if it’s not a theater, if it’s not a restaurant, if it’s not a grocery store…what is it? Can I let you know? It’s a home! We have not designed this place to be something you come to. We have designed this place to be something you launch from. This is not something you tack onto the end of your week. This is the most important part, and the front end of your week.

The people who gather here – we’ve designed it to be a home where you come into the inner part of the home, the family room. And you’re loved and you’re known and you’re prayed for and you’re cared for, and you have somebody to cry with and somebody to encourage you. And every now and then, somebody to knock you in the head and say, “Get with the program! You’re not acting like a family!” Right?

For some of you, if you’re new—maybe this is your first time and are thinking, “Man, I don’t know what I’m getting today, but I’m not coming back.” I want you to let you know, if you’re just kind of standing there on the front porch, just kind of window shopping, just kind of looking in – kind of kicking the tires to see if you might want to go a little further – we want to invite you in, because our goal is that no one would be left behind. Everyone, we together, must lock arms and do something that we can’t do as individuals. So, everyone is valued. Everyone is important. Everyone is gifted. Everyone is needed.

And, then, I want you to know—not only how we’re to do it, but this:

3. Reset: Why are we doing it?

Let me go back to this verse that I skipped a minute ago. In Scripture, 1 Thessalonians 5:14 tells us there are three kinds of people in the church: “We urge you [because we’re all about urgency], brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.” Now, anybody that serves in any level of ministry—you lead a small group, you serve in children’s ministry or youth ministry, you try to mentor some men, if you’re a parent—everybody understands that there are different categories and different levels of maturity in people.

Notice this verse. It talks about idle people. That word is a military term—it means to be unruly or out-of-step. Did you ever see a military march or a marching band? Everybody’s marching in the same direction, with the proper beat, on the same pace, moving at the same pace. That word means to be out of step with where everybody else is going.

Some of you are idle. You’re not in step and you’re not in line, you’re not moving at the same pace, you’re not moving in the same direction as the rest of us. And what do we say to you? We admonish you! The word “admonish” means to warn. We sound the alarm! It’s not going to go well for you if you’re not in line with what God is doing, connected to this body.

And then, we’re to encourage the fainthearted. The fainthearted are people who are exhausted. Maybe you’ve served here a long time. Maybe your attitude is, “It’s time for some of these young whippersnappers to step up and carry the weight.” Listen! Don’t stop serving! You’re fainthearted. We want to encourage you, to build you up, to cast a vision for the future.

Then the third category is weak. That means fragile. That could be some brand-new, baby Christians. Or maybe it’s your first step in embracing a leadership role, and we’re to help you – not to let you do it alone, but to give you the nutrients and the spiritual muscle to carry some responsibility around here.

And then, the last part says, “Be patient with them all.” Do you know what that means? They’re all jacked-up. We all have issues. We’re all broken and frail and we’re going to disappoint one another. So, if you’re at any level of ministry, if you step into church—please be patient! Be patient with the pastor, be patient with the staff, be patient with the elders, be patient with the small group people. We’re all a work in progress. Again, we’re not a perfect church, but we need to be a patient church as we endeavor to glorify the Lord. Why are we doing it?

This is the greatest part. Look back at the text, Colossians 1:28: “Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ.” Do you know what that says? There will be a day, at the end of our lives, when we will stand before God to offer him the completed work of our lives. It will not be great accomplishment that we will present to him. It will not be a list of things that we have built; it will not be our net worth that we present to him. We’ll all have the same net worth on that day. Zero. Because he’s the only One worthy of anything.

So what is it that we will present to him? It will be this: people, whose lives our lives have impacted. My life’s work is this collection of people, and on that day, I cannot wait to present to him a group of growing, maturing people who are constantly—with urgency and simplicity—doing and serving and worshipping Jesus with all their hearts!

I can’t wait! I can’t wait to say, “Jesus, I present to You the congregation that is Harvest Bible Chapel! Do You know these people? Let me tell you about some of these guys! I mean, do you know about Rich and Liz Carpenter? Let me tell you about these people!”

“I mean, they were newly married, and Liz was kind of in this legalistic religion, and she came to the church and she heard the gospel for the first time and she surrendered her life to Christ, and now they’re parenting and they’re loving one another—modeling marriage for the rest of us—and they’re serving at every level. Rich is discipling men. He knows the Word like nobody else in our church. I present to you, Lord Jesus, Rich and Liz Carpenter! Some of the most mature people! Liz played the harp on our evening of Christmas service and we were all filled with joy; she did it with such excellence! I present to You Liz Carpenter!”

I can’t wait to say, “Lord, can I present to You Leah Weaver? Do You know about this chick?” Leah, are you sixteen? Seventeen. Sorry—she’s been doing it since she was sixteen…fifteen…fourteen. I mean, “Leah, she witnesses to everything that moves. I mean, nobody gets past her without hearing about Jesus.” Alright? And there’s this whole collection of young people in our church who know Jesus because they heard about him from Leah Weaver. “Lord Jesus, I present to You—with all of her flaws—Leah Weaver!” And I can’t wait to see what’s going to happen in the next twenty or thirty years of her life!

And I could go on and on. As a matter of fact, this is the third service that I’ve preached [this weekend], and I’ve used a different example in every service. And I could go on and on and on. “And, Lord Jesus, I just want to present to You people who are mature.” That means growing and developing and taking their next steps toward Christ.

What does it mean to be a mature believer? It means this, Ephesians 4:14, “That we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. . .” No, we are grounded, we know what we believe; we know the source of that belief, and we love him and serve him with all of our heart.

Now, how do you measure maturity? Around here we have a way of doing it—we call this person a “quality disciple.” There’s a phrase that we use a lot around here: we are not interested in a “quantity of disciples.” It’s not about the numbers. We count—that’s why we fill out the Friendship Registry—we want to know who’s here and I need to know who I’m responsible to present before the Lord.

So we pay attention to numbers because every number has a name, and every name has a story, and every story is a story of maturity. Quality discipleship is what we’re interested in—not a quantity of disciples—but a quality of discipleship. So, how do you measure the maturity of a disciple?

First of all, a quality disciple worships Christ. You don’t just go through the motions, you don’t just come to church, but you are a true worshipper. Jesus said this in John 4:23 and 24, “The hour is coming, and [now is], when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

Do you see the reality in these verses? The Father is seeking true worshippers! He’s looking for them, he’s recruiting them, he’s calling them into a mature worship. So, around here, if you are a quality disciple, you are someone who is right at home in the gathered high-impact, window-rattling, earth-shattering, life-altering worship service that we do here on the weekends. And you’re so excited about getting around other worshippers, because they help you worship—and you’re there to help them worship.

It’s not about what’s happening up here on the platform. It’s not about how beautiful your voice is. Some of you are awful singers! And so, what we say around here is, “Whatever you lack in tonality, make up for in volume! Sing loud!” Let it be known that you’re going to sing your face off for Jesus, because He’s worthy of our worship!

The second thing a quality disciple does is he walks with Christ. Walking involves two legs. You will not walk far if you are missing a leg. So, around here, walking with Christ involves the individual component of your walk—which means you are in God’s word alone, by yourself—you are praying alone, by yourself—you are witnessing to people that need to know the gospel.

You have your own personal worship, what you do with your money, your personal obedience. . .that is walking with Christ. . .but we walk together in community (that’s the other leg. . .we can’t walk alone), so one of the first things we do around here when somebody plugs into Harvest is, we say, “You know what? We need to connect you to a small group of people so that you are loved and known and cared for and held accountable. That group of transparent, honest, encouraging believers helps us get further down the road than if we were just doing it ourselves.” And so, everyone—together, collectively—walking with Christ.

Then, thirdly, working for Christ. You have no idea that today there were hundreds of people serving you so that this church service could happen, unless you’re one of those who are working for Christ. And so I invite you to pick up some kingdom responsibility and say, “I’m going to be responsible for helping others walk and worship together with Christ.” That’s what a quality disciple does. That is the indication that you are a mature believer in Christ.

Here’s the last question, and we’ll be done:

4. Reset: Where will we find the strength to do it?

Because that sounds hard! It is hard! That’s why verse 29 (of Colossians 1) is there: “For this I toil, [it doesn’t say “play;” but “for this I toil.” That’s hard work!] struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.” Oh there’s another pronoun, very similar to the pronoun we used before. Who is this about? It’s about him. It’s his strength that he powerfully works within me.

We had an ice storm this past week. Did you enjoy that? How many of you lost power this past week? Listen, if you’re holding up your hand, I tricked you a little bit. You may have lost electricity, but if you lost power that was your fault. Because it is not about your power. The only way we can do this is in the power that he provides!

So, yes, there are times that I get exhausted. There are times I don’t want to do this anymore! “Can I just sit back and can I just listen to somebody preach instead of having to be the guy that I have to listen to myself?” There are times that we get exhausted. That is the time that we have to remember to plug into a power that is not our own and say, “Lord, I need You in this moment.”

There is work that God wants to get done. Notice, the power that he “powerfully works within me.” I want to ask you two questions as we close: What work does God want to do in you in 2016? Then, secondly, what work does God want to do through you in 2016?

Everyone has work that needs to be done, and everyone has work that God wants to do through you. So I want to invite you in. The band’s going to come out, and we’re going to go out of here just praising God and leaning into his strength. If you ever feel like you don’t have enough, can I just remind you this morning, His power is enough! So even as we begin a new year, a new journey, we want to reset our focus: What we’re doing, how we’re doing it, why we’re doing it, and the power that we’re going to rely on as we do it, and let’s follow him!