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Voddie Baucham - Planting Solid Family Integrated Churches · Voddie Baucham Sermons

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Speaker 1: Thank you. Well, it has been good this weekend, has
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Speaker 1: it not? But I told you it would be like
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Speaker 1: trying to take a drink from a fire hydrant before
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Speaker 1: we began. But sometimes we need to do that. Sometimes
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Speaker 1: we need to do that and just get as much
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Speaker 1: as we can and let the rest just sort of
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Speaker 1: drench us. And I pray that you have been drenched
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Speaker 1: over the course of these years. this day and a
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Speaker 1: half that we've been together. It's been a lot of
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Speaker 1: information and we want to end up or finish up
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Speaker 1: with what this weekend is all about. And this weekend
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Speaker 1: is all about launching healthy family integrated churches. That is
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Speaker 1: our desire to launch healthy family integrated churches. That's what
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Speaker 1: we want to see. And we hope that you have
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Speaker 1: come to understand what we mean when we use that term,
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Speaker 1: family integrated church. We hope that there is no longer
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Speaker 1: this confusion out there about what it is to which
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Speaker 1: we refer when we say the family integrated church. But
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Speaker 1: just because people are family integrated doesn't mean that everything
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Speaker 1: that they are doing is healthy. And so I just
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Speaker 1: want to paint a picture for you this afternoon, in
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Speaker 1: our last session today, of what it is that we
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Speaker 1: mean and what it is that we're aiming for. So
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Speaker 1: if you'll open your Bibles with me to the book
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Speaker 1: of Matthew. Matthew chapter 28. Matthew chapter 28. Let's begin
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Speaker 1: at verse 16. Look at what is often referred to
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Speaker 1: here as the Great Commission. Matthew chapter 28, beginning at
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Speaker 1: verse 18. Because I believe a healthy church is a
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Speaker 1: Great Commission church. Amen? It would be difficult to talk
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Speaker 1: about a church having any kind of real health without
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Speaker 1: talking about a church that takes very seriously this mandate
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Speaker 1: in the Great Commission. Not a suggestion. This is a
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Speaker 1: mandate for the church. This is who we are as
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Speaker 1: the church. Beginning at verse 16. Now the 11 disciples
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Speaker 1: went to Galilee. to the mountain to which Jesus had
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Speaker 1: directed them. And when they saw him, they worshipped him,
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Speaker 1: but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them,
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Speaker 1: All authority in heaven and on earth has been given
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Speaker 1: to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations,
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Speaker 1: baptizing them in the name of the Father and of
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Speaker 1: the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to
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Speaker 1: observe all that I have commanded you and behold, I
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Speaker 1: am with you always to the end of the age. Amen. Hallelujah.
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Speaker 1: Praise the Lord. I believe there are elements here that
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Speaker 1: must be present if our churches are to be healthy.
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Speaker 1: And first and foremost, we are talking about planting churches,
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Speaker 1: not reactionary cloisters of individuals who are hiding from the world,
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Speaker 1: but churches, not individuals who don't know how to play
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Speaker 1: and get along well with others, but churches. Not individuals
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Speaker 1: who believe that they've got everything together and the rest
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Speaker 1: of the world is messed up, but churches. We're talking
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Speaker 1: about planting churches. And what does that look like? First
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Speaker 1: and foremost, in this Great Commission, what we see is
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Speaker 1: the church is about the worship of the Lord Jesus Christ.
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Speaker 1: When these 11 gather together with the resurrected Jesus, the
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Speaker 1: first thing we see there in those first couple of
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Speaker 1: verses is that when they identify the Lord, they worship him.
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Speaker 1: And so we are talking about planting bodies of believers
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Speaker 1: who see the Lord and worship the Lord. We are
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Speaker 1: talking about bodies of believers that are passionate about setting
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Speaker 1: their mind's attention and heart's affection on the Lord and
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Speaker 1: about praising him for who he is and what he
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Speaker 1: has done, to paraphrase Bruce Leaf Blatt. That's what we're about,
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Speaker 1: the worship of the one true God. That's why we gather.
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Speaker 1: We don't worship the family. We don't even worship the church.
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Speaker 1: We worship Christ. That is whom we worship. That is
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Speaker 1: why we exist. We exist corporately to exalt the Lord
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Speaker 1: Jesus Christ. In our families, we exalt the Lord Jesus Christ.
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Speaker 1: It is about coming together as worshipers. It is about
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Speaker 1: being worshipers. And it is about establishing communities of worshipers
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Speaker 1: who will exalt the Lord Jesus Christ. In our very
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Speaker 1: vision statement, what is our vision? To be a kingdom-minded, Christ-exalting,
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Speaker 1: multi-generational community of faith. To exalt the Lord Jesus Christ.
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Speaker 1: That's what it's all about. You know, we have all
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Speaker 1: these things out here, all these people talking about different
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Speaker 1: types of churches and seeker sensitive and seeker driven and
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Speaker 1: all this sort of stuff. And, you know, and we
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Speaker 1: are very much, we are very much a seeker driven church.
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Speaker 1: I don't know if you realize that or not, but
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Speaker 1: Grace Family Baptist Church is very much and passionately a
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Speaker 1: seeker driven church. The only difference is we believe God's
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Speaker 1: the only seeker that there is. Romans chapter 3 makes
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Speaker 1: it clear there is no man who seeks God. But
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Speaker 1: Jesus makes it clear that the Father seeks those who
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Speaker 1: will worship him. So if God's seeking worshipers, we are
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Speaker 1: a seeker-driven church. We are driven to be those whom
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Speaker 1: the Father seeks. Amen? We are driven to call together
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Speaker 1: those whom the Father seeks. Which means that we are
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Speaker 1: about establishing worshiping churches. Churches who worship the Lord Jesus Christ,
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Speaker 1: who exalt him above all else. First and foremost, that's
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Speaker 1: what we're about establishing. And not compromising on that issue.
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Speaker 1: Begins there. Secondly, we're about establishing churches that are obedient
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Speaker 1: to the commands and mandates of the Lord Jesus Christ.
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Speaker 1: Look at what it says here. All authority in heaven
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Speaker 1: and on earth is given to me. All authority in
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Speaker 1: heaven and on earth is given to me. Christ has
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Speaker 1: authority in the church. Christ. Our traditions don't have the
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Speaker 1: authority in the church. Christ does. Amen? Our pastors don't
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Speaker 1: have the authority in the church. Christ does. There is
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Speaker 1: one head of the church, and that head of the
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Speaker 1: church is Christ. Which means when we do church, we
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Speaker 1: had better do church according to what Christ teaches. Listen,
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Speaker 1: listen to me as I say this. We are not
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Speaker 1: family integrated because we've looked at the data and determined
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Speaker 1: that it's a more efficient way to do church. That's
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Speaker 1: not what we're saying here. And there are some who
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Speaker 1: come at it from that perspective and they go, well, yes,
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Speaker 1: when you look at the data and the number of
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Speaker 1: young people that we're losing, it's clear by the data
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Speaker 1: that something that we're doing is amiss. And certainly if
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Speaker 1: you have something else that you believe will get us
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Speaker 1: better data, no, we do not believe in the family
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Speaker 1: integrated model because of data. We believe Christ meant what
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Speaker 1: he said when he said, I will build my church today.
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Speaker 1: And we believe he's given us instructions as to what
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Speaker 1: the church is supposed to be built like. You know,
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Speaker 1: Pastor Matt talks frequently about this idea of being grateful
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Speaker 1: for having a background in construction. Because when you have
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Speaker 1: a background as a construction superintendent, here's your life. Somebody
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Speaker 1: gives you a blueprint, year and a half later, that
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Speaker 1: thing is standing up somewhere. Amen? That's what we're trying
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Speaker 1: to be here. We're trying to be construction superintendents here.
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Speaker 1: We got a blueprint. We are not architects of the church. Amen?
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Speaker 1: That's not our job. This is not an architectural firm.
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Speaker 1: We're laborers. Amen? God says, boy, go pick that up
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Speaker 1: and put it over there. We go pick that up
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Speaker 1: and we go put it over there. God says, you
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Speaker 1: hammer this right here. We go hammer that right there.
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Speaker 1: God says, right here, you need to dig me a hole.
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Speaker 1: We say, how wide, how deep, Lord Jesus. Amen? That's
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Speaker 1: who we are. And so we're not coming to the
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Speaker 1: God of the universe, to the head of the church,
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Speaker 1: and saying, you know, Jesus, according to the data, we
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Speaker 1: believe that it'd help you if you think like that.
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Speaker 1: That's not the type of church that we're interested in.
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Speaker 1: And so what we're talking about here is not pragmatism.
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Speaker 1: This is not pragmatic utilitarianism. We haven't come to something
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Speaker 1: that we believe just works better. Now, we believe it
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Speaker 1: does work better, but we believe it works better because
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Speaker 1: it's in accordance with scriptural mandates. We can't get around
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Speaker 1: Deuteronomy 6. We can't get around Psalm 78. We can't
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Speaker 1: get around the whole book of Proverbs. We can't get
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Speaker 1: around Ephesians 6. We can't get around the mandate of
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Speaker 1: God for multigenerational vision and discipleship happening through the home.
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Speaker 1: We can't get around it. And so we build in
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Speaker 1: accordance with the word. We're about building churches that worship
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Speaker 1: the Lord Jesus Christ. And we're about building churches that
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Speaker 1: are committed to functioning according to the authority of Jesus Christ,
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Speaker 1: who is the head of the church. Our desire is
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Speaker 1: to do it his way. Semper Reformanda. Everything, everything is
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Speaker 1: always on the table. We're wrong about something. Bless God,
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Speaker 1: let's fix it, and let's go and do it better.
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Speaker 1: We dug a hole and the hole wasn't wide enough,
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Speaker 1: let's dig it a little bit wider. Wasn't deep enough,
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Speaker 1: let's dig it a little bit deeper. We do not
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Speaker 1: sit there and say, well, you know, we've always worked
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Speaker 1: with holes this size. If you can't say amen, you
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Speaker 1: ought to say ouch, okay? That is not the attitude.
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Speaker 1: And here's what's interesting. There are a lot of people,
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Speaker 1: and I've had the privilege of having a lot of
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Speaker 1: discussions about this in a lot of areas and have
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Speaker 1: people blogging and writing and, you know, interacting in journals
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Speaker 1: and books and all this sort of stuff. And I
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Speaker 1: hear this a lot, you know. Although we wouldn't necessarily
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Speaker 1: agree with this over here, we do see merit in blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
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Speaker 1: Here's what I'm waiting for. They've misused this text. They're
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Speaker 1: logically inconsistent here. No. What we get is, well, I
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Speaker 1: understand what you're saying. I think maybe there's still a
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Speaker 1: place for this or still a place for that. Hey,
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Speaker 1: fine if you believe that. I just need three things
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Speaker 1: from you. Book, chapter, verse. You just give me those
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Speaker 1: three things. If you want to disagree, just give me book.
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Speaker 1: Just give me chapter. Just give me two things.
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Speaker 1: Nothing. Nothing.
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Speaker 1: And we're not trying to be contrarians here. We are
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Speaker 1: acknowledging our own limitations. We can't do this. We cannot.
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Speaker 1: So we are utterly dependent upon the Lord. We are
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Speaker 1: utterly dependent upon his word. And we're just simple enough
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Speaker 1: to believe that if God thought enough of it to
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Speaker 1: put it in the book, then he probably intended for
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Speaker 1: us to build what we build based upon his blueprint.
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Speaker 1: We're that simple-minded. And we don't apologize for that. We don't.
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Speaker 1: And if there are areas where we haven't seen it
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Speaker 1: fully and don't understand it, a lot of areas we're
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Speaker 1: still working through. But how do we work through those areas?
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Speaker 1: By polling our people? No. We work through those areas
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Speaker 1: by digging into the Scriptures. Scriptures. Because Jesus said all
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Speaker 1: authority in heaven and on earth is given to him.
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Speaker 1: All authority in heaven and on earth is given to him.
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Speaker 1: I don't know about you. Hard for me to find
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Speaker 1: someplace that doesn't fall under the category of heaven and earth. Amen?
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Speaker 1: And in case you were wondering and in case you
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Speaker 1: thought you could find a loophole in that, it's Colossians
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Speaker 1: chapter 1. Just mess you all the way up, you know.
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Speaker 1: Colossians chapter 1. He made all things. In heaven, on earth, thrones, dominions, rulers, authorities,
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Speaker 1: all things were made by him and for him. He's
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Speaker 1: the head of the body, the church, firstborn from the dead. Why?
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Speaker 1: So that he might come to have preeminence in everything. Amen?
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Speaker 1: He's even preeminent over the grave. So this is about Christ.
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Speaker 1: And we are not asking you to think about what
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Speaker 1: we're saying and listen to what we're saying and join
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Speaker 1: us because we're persuasive. Please don't do that. Please don't
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Speaker 1: do that. Please don't do that. We are saying, we
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Speaker 1: are persuaded that this is what the scriptures teach and
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Speaker 1: what they teach clearly, not obscurely. But this is what
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Speaker 1: the scriptures teach clearly. The idea of discipleship in and
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Speaker 1: through homes, the scriptures teach clearly. Clearly, even the questions
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Speaker 1: that people ask, again, we're not going back to the text.
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Speaker 1: We're going to pure pragmatism. And it's fine because we,
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Speaker 1: I mean, these questions, I'm not saying they're illegitimate questions,
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Speaker 1: but we get the same questions from everybody. And the
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Speaker 1: question is, okay, I understand what you're saying, but what
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Speaker 1: about families in this situation? What about children in this situation?
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Speaker 1: What about, so here's what we've said. I understand the
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Speaker 1: text clearly. But I don't think God took this circumstance
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Speaker 1: into consideration. Ultimately, that's what we're saying. I can't argue
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Speaker 1: with you on the biblical merits of what you're saying. However,
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Speaker 1: I think that this circumstance over here, I think maybe
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Speaker 1: God missed the single mother with kids thing. I think
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Speaker 1: maybe God missed, you know, the unregenerate parents thing. I
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Speaker 1: think maybe God missed the, again, God didn't miss that.
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Speaker 1: God didn't miss that. Now, do we need to think
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Speaker 1: through those things? Absolutely. And as a church, we think
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Speaker 1: through those things. And we've got brochures out there talking
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Speaker 1: about many of those things. You know, the family integrated
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Speaker 1: church and the single adult. We've got that out there
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Speaker 1: because we've thought through that. But here's what we didn't do.
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Speaker 1: We didn't start with man and man's circumstance and then
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Speaker 1: build programs in the church. We started with the scripture
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Speaker 1: and the scriptural format and then tried to look at
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Speaker 1: how the scriptural format would address whatever circumstance comes up.
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Speaker 1: Huge difference between the two. Huge difference between the two.
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Speaker 1: We start with the scriptures and the scriptural mandates because
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Speaker 1: all authority is given to Christ in heaven and on earth.
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Speaker 1: And so we ascribe all worth to him and all
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Speaker 1: allegiance and obedience to him. And then once we do that,
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Speaker 1: look at what he says. Here's the kind of churches
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Speaker 1: that we're talking about. Go, therefore, make disciples of all nations,
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Speaker 1: baptizing them in the name of the Father and the
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Speaker 1: Son and the Holy Spirit. Again, you know, there are
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Speaker 1: folks at GFBC, and whether they've taken Greek or not,
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Speaker 1: all the folks at GFBC, if they're members, they know
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Speaker 1: this phrase. Let's say it together, GFBC family. Panta ta ethne.
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Speaker 1: Every people group. Why do all our folks know that phrase?
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Speaker 1: Because we refuse to be an inwardly focused church. Because
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Speaker 1: that's not the gospel. The gospel is reach every people group.
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Speaker 1: That's the gospel. We refuse to be a church with
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Speaker 1: a retreatist, defeatist mentality. We are not hiding from the world.
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Speaker 1: We believe we win when it's all said and done.
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Speaker 1: We've got nothing to hide from. And as I said earlier,
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Speaker 1: we definitely are not about retreating and running away. Because
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Speaker 1: I look at Ephesians chapter 6, all of the armor
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Speaker 1: is on the front. You run away, you're in trouble.
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Speaker 1: So we want to plant churches that are unapologetically evangelistic.
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Speaker 1: Unapologetically evangelistic. And let me clarify that because here's the thing,
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Speaker 1: you know, because evangelism has been so polluted over the
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Speaker 1: last couple of generations. So polluted. We don't know what
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Speaker 1: the gospel is. And because we don't know what the
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Speaker 1: gospel is, we don't know what evangelism is, you know.
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Speaker 1: And so we say we want to be unapologetically evangelistic.
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Speaker 1: And we think that that means every service has to
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Speaker 1: be three points in a poem, you know, three hymns.
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Speaker 1: Three points, a poem, an altar call. Every message has
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Speaker 1: to be that. You got churches full of unregenerate people
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Speaker 1: because of that. That's not evangelistic. Preach a 30-minute message
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Speaker 1: on tithing, and at the end of your 30-minute message
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Speaker 1: on tithing, there's a two-minute, you know, there's a void
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Speaker 1: in your heart. And if you will just A, B, C, acknowledge, believe, confess.
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Speaker 1: And Jesus was at me. Where was the gospel? It
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Speaker 1: was nowhere. It was nowhere. And so this two-minute flippant
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Speaker 1: presentation is what people are responding to. No wonder there
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Speaker 1: are so many unregenerate people in our churches who swear
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Speaker 1: to God that they're going to go to heaven when
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Speaker 1: they die. No fruit whatsoever in their life. Can't even
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Speaker 1: spell repentance, let alone exhibit repentance. But they think they're Christians.
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Speaker 1: That is not evangelism. It is not. It is not.
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Speaker 1: That's not what we're talking about when we talk about evangelism.
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Speaker 1: What are we talking about when we talk about evangelism? Well, interestingly,
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Speaker 1: he doesn't say go and make converts. He says go
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Speaker 1: and make disciples of Pantata ethne. Go and make disciples
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Speaker 1: of every people group. Huh. By the way, he clarifies
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Speaker 1: that in a few moments. How do you do that?
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Speaker 1: Teaching them to observe all the things that I've taught you.
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Speaker 1: So biblical evangelism is thorough teaching. and broad in its scope.
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Speaker 1: Biblical evangelism is not a sliver of the gospel. Biblical
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Speaker 1: evangelism is the whole counsel of God. That's biblical evangelism.
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Speaker 1: Biblical evangelism from Genesis to Revelation. Biblical evangelism is, if
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Speaker 1: we're way on the left side of the book, we're
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Speaker 1: talking about the God who created the world and why
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Speaker 1: he did it. Amen? If we're in the law, we're
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Speaker 1: talking about the law and the law as a teacher
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Speaker 1: to let us know that we need Jesus Christ. If
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Speaker 1: we're in the wisdom books, we're talking about principles that
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Speaker 1: we can apply only to the degree that we are
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Speaker 1: regenerate individuals. If we're talking about apocalyptic literature, we're talking
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Speaker 1: about God's ultimate victory in the end. Amen? Amen? If
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Speaker 1: we're in the New Testament, we're talking about the fulfillment
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Speaker 1: of all those things on the left side of the book.
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Speaker 1: It's the gospel. The gospel, the gospel, the gospel. So
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Speaker 1: many of our churches never touch the Old Testament. Why?
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Speaker 1: Because we have too narrow a definition of what the
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Speaker 1: gospel is. You can't preach the gospel from Genesis. You
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Speaker 1: can't preach the gospel. Amen, lights. You know, if you
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Speaker 1: can't find yourself over in Lamentations somewhere, and preach the gospel,
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Speaker 1: you probably don't really have a grasp on what the
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Speaker 1: gospel really is. We're making disciples. That's what we're about,
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Speaker 1: making disciples. There are people out there who are undiscipled people.
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Speaker 1: We're not about looking out, seeing how many people we
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Speaker 1: can get to make decisions. We're about how we can,
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Speaker 1: to the best of our ability, make disciples. It's one
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Speaker 1: of the reasons that we want to be a church-planting movement.
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Speaker 1: This disciple-making mechanism of the church, okay? And so we
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Speaker 1: want to be unapologetically evangelistic. That also means that we
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Speaker 1: look outwardly beyond ourselves, and that's uncomfortable for a lot
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Speaker 1: of family integrated churches, looking outwardly. And here's a question
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Speaker 1: that a lot of people ask, too, is they ask, man,
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Speaker 1: I understand that, but boy, what about that tension because
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Speaker 1: You guys are living by some principles that are different
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Speaker 1: than the principles that our culture lives by and aren't
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Speaker 1: people uncomfortable? Wow, what a novel idea that we are
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Speaker 1: actually peculiar enough for other people to be uncomfortable. Seems
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Speaker 1: like I've read something about that somewhere. Where did we
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Speaker 1: get the idea that lost people who are the enemies
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Speaker 1: of God should be able to come around those of
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Speaker 1: us who love God and not be able to distinguish
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Speaker 1: immediately a difference between them and us? Where'd that come from?
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Speaker 1: We are a peculiar people. We are. People ought to
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Speaker 1: be shocked when they come among us. The sad thing is,
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Speaker 1: most people come to most of our churches, they don't
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Speaker 1: know who the Christians and non-Christians are because lifestyle-wise, it's
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Speaker 1: all the same. And so the gospel is not affecting
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Speaker 1: the way we live our lives. It's not affecting who
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Speaker 1: we are. It's not coming out of every poor person.
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Speaker 1: And every fiber of our beings. And so a lot
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Speaker 1: of times they hear the gospel from us and they go, wow,
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Speaker 1: you're a Christian? No distinction whatsoever. And do we want
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Speaker 1: to alienate people? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. But we ought
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Speaker 1: to look peculiar to them. Amen? We ought to. And
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Speaker 1: not just weird. Homeschool families are good at that part,
23:05
Speaker 1: you know. We can look weird to folks. That's okay.
23:08
Speaker 1: Nothing wrong with weird. Albert Einstein was weird. Praise God
23:12
Speaker 1: for weird people. Amen? Unapologetically evangelistic. Beyond that, committed to
23:25
Speaker 1: comprehensive discipleship. Committed to comprehensive discipleship. Look at what it
23:30
Speaker 1: says here. Teaching them to observe all that I have
23:34
Speaker 1: commanded you. teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you.
23:41
Speaker 1: Where on this planet can an individual be most completely
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Speaker 1: and comprehensively obedient to that command? At home. There's not
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Speaker 1: a person on this planet that I have the ability
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Speaker 1: to disciple to the degree that I can disciple my
24:06
Speaker 1: children Not a person on this planet. I'm responsible for
24:11
Speaker 1: every aspect of their lives. Does that mean that we
24:15
Speaker 1: don't disciple others? No. There are men in our church,
24:18
Speaker 1: some of them in this room, that I'm in a
24:21
Speaker 1: personal discipling relationship with right now. Praise God. However, I
24:28
Speaker 1: am not able to disciple them to the degree that
24:31
Speaker 1: I'm able to disciple those in my home. And as
24:34
Speaker 1: this discipleship happens, it is so that they can in
24:38
Speaker 1: turn go and disciple in their home. And as we
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Speaker 1: make disciples in our home, we multiply ourselves as followers
24:45
Speaker 1: of Christ. By the way, here is where the distinction
24:48
Speaker 1: comes in the family integrated model. I had somebody, I
24:53
Speaker 1: was on the phone with a guy. He called from,
24:55
Speaker 1: I don't know, somewhere in Kentucky or wherever. And he goes,
24:57
Speaker 1: I'm just wondering, do you alienate divorced people or single
25:02
Speaker 1: moms or You know, because you talk so much about family.
25:06
Speaker 1: And I said, well, where'd you get that idea? We're
25:08
Speaker 1: 18 months old. We've preached through Ephesians. We're finishing up
25:11
Speaker 1: in Mark. After that, we're going to preach through one
25:13
Speaker 1: of the books of the law. Some people actually think
25:17
Speaker 1: that what it means to be a family integrated church
25:19
Speaker 1: is you stand up every week and preach a message
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Speaker 1: on family. We preach the whole counsel of God. We
25:28
Speaker 1: don't just stand around and preach on family all the time.
25:30
Speaker 1: We're a church. Hello, we're a church. But the real
25:38
Speaker 1: distinction in the family integrated church comes here in this
25:40
Speaker 1: area of discipleship. We are persuaded that the Sunday school
25:46
Speaker 1: class can't hold a candle to the home and discipleship
25:49
Speaker 1: and catechism. We are persuaded that the youth group not
25:54
Speaker 1: only can't hold a candle to the family, but it's
25:56
Speaker 1: actually detrimental in many ways to discipleship and has proven
26:00
Speaker 1: so over the last 30 years. It's in this area
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Speaker 1: of comprehensive discipleship where the family integrated model really distinguishes itself.
26:14
Speaker 1: This is what we're talking about. Comprehensive discipleship. The whole
26:19
Speaker 1: counsel of God. The gospel for every aspect of life.
26:26
Speaker 1: It is not enough to walk a mile and pray
26:29
Speaker 1: a prayer. Jesus wants all of us to everything that
26:36
Speaker 1: we have, every area of our lives. And so, yes,
26:40
Speaker 1: we talk about child training. How am I going to
26:43
Speaker 1: be a disciple and not apply it to child training?
26:45
Speaker 1: So yes, we talk about discipleship in the home. How
26:48
Speaker 1: are we not gonna do that? Yes, we talk about
26:50
Speaker 1: our children and their marriages. Why not? The Bible teaches
26:53
Speaker 1: us about that. Yes, we talk about education. Why not?
26:56
Speaker 1: The Bible teaches about that. Yes, we talk about all
26:59
Speaker 1: of these areas because we have not bought the lie
27:03
Speaker 1: that somehow the church can speak authoritatively to issues of salvation,
27:07
Speaker 1: but for everything else, you gotta go somewhere else. No.
27:12
Speaker 1: All Scripture says Is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, rebuking, correcting,
27:18
Speaker 1: and training in righteousness that the man of God may
27:20
Speaker 1: be adequate, equipped for every good work. His divine power
27:25
Speaker 1: has given us everything we need for life and godliness
27:28
Speaker 1: through our knowledge of him who called us by his
27:31
Speaker 1: own glory and excellence. Everything we need. Everything we need.
27:36
Speaker 1: Right there, the whole counsel of God. We don't just
27:39
Speaker 1: believe in the inerrancy of Scripture. We believe in the
27:41
Speaker 1: sufficiency of Scripture in all areas of life. And we
27:45
Speaker 1: do not apologize for helping people apply the Scriptures to
27:50
Speaker 1: all areas of life. People ask us a lot, well,
27:53
Speaker 1: do you offend people who have their kids in public schools?
27:57
Speaker 1: I hope so because I want them to get them out. Amen.
28:03
Speaker 1: I don't believe the Bible's silent on that issue. I
28:05
Speaker 1: really don't. I really don't. And I believe it would
28:09
Speaker 1: be sinful for me to know what I know about
28:12
Speaker 1: the influence of government education and the lives of young
28:15
Speaker 1: people raised in Christian homes and not scream it from
28:18
Speaker 1: the rooftops if I say I love people and if
28:22
Speaker 1: I intend to disciple them thoroughly. It would be criminal
28:25
Speaker 1: for me not to address that issue. Absolutely criminal. Comprehensive
28:33
Speaker 1: That's what we're about. And ultimately about planting churches, the
28:44
Speaker 1: success of which are finally dependent upon the blessing and
28:51
Speaker 1: help of Christ himself. Look at what he says. And behold,
28:55
Speaker 1: I'm with you always, even to the end of the age.
28:59
Speaker 1: I love that. Jesus says, Go do it. And right
29:06
Speaker 1: when we just sort of get ready to get full
29:07
Speaker 1: of ourselves, pull up our belt and, you know, get
29:13
Speaker 1: our shoulders all ready and, yeah, Jesus, I'm going to go.
29:16
Speaker 1: I got it, Jesus. I'm going to go do this
29:18
Speaker 1: for you. And Jesus says, no, boy, you can't do it. Well,
29:24
Speaker 1: you just told me to do it. Yeah, I told
29:26
Speaker 1: you to do it, but... It ought to be, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
29:30
Speaker 1: I'm with you always. Not low. Whoa, whoa. You're getting
29:33
Speaker 1: ready to go try to do this by yourself. I
29:35
Speaker 1: didn't tell you to go do this by yourself. I
29:37
Speaker 1: didn't tell you to go do this in the flesh.
29:38
Speaker 1: I didn't tell you to go do this based on
29:40
Speaker 1: your own organizational skills. I didn't tell you to go
29:42
Speaker 1: do this based on your own, you know, skills of
29:44
Speaker 1: rhetoric or oratory. I didn't tell you to go and
29:46
Speaker 1: do this based on the sheer magnetism of your personality. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Uh-uh.
29:52
Speaker 1: I am with you always, even to the end of
29:54
Speaker 1: the age. You cannot do this by yourself. So don't try.
30:02
Speaker 1: We desire to launch churches that are utterly dependent upon
30:08
Speaker 1: the power and the help of the Lord Jesus Christ
30:11
Speaker 1: because we can't do it. We cannot. So what we're
30:17
Speaker 1: interested in here is not coming up with a formula
30:20
Speaker 1: that won't fail. Some have asked, you know, if we had,
30:22
Speaker 1: you know, the blueprint for this, if we can put
30:25
Speaker 1: together all this stuff so people can go and do this. Boy,
30:28
Speaker 1: we really recoil when we even think about this for
30:31
Speaker 1: at least two reasons. One, we don't have all the answers,
30:35
Speaker 1: and we're doing the best we can with what we
30:37
Speaker 1: got here in our setting. And secondly, we don't want
30:42
Speaker 1: to rob people of the blessing that we've experienced by
30:45
Speaker 1: doing this and rolling up our sleeves. We're not interested
30:50
Speaker 1: in franchising. We really aren't. Mentoring, yes. Franchising, no. No.
30:58
Speaker 1: There is an incredible blessing that has been derived by
31:01
Speaker 1: this church through this process of rolling up sleeves, getting
31:08
Speaker 1: sweaty and bloody and dirty as we dig through what
31:12
Speaker 1: it means for us to be a biblically functioning church
31:16
Speaker 1: in our current setting and circumstances. And we want to
31:21
Speaker 1: help people do that. We really do. We don't just
31:24
Speaker 1: want to franchise because there's things that you're going to
31:27
Speaker 1: be better at than we are. And if all you
31:30
Speaker 1: do is take what we got and then just go
31:31
Speaker 1: duplicate it somewhere, that's what the Willow Creek Network is
31:34
Speaker 1: all about. The Saddleback Network is all about. That's what's
31:36
Speaker 1: happening there. That's why you have a bunch of echoes
31:39
Speaker 1: and no voices. Everybody's doing the exact same thing the
31:44
Speaker 1: exact same way. All echoes and no voices. We are
31:47
Speaker 1: not arrogant enough to believe that we're the only voices.
31:51
Speaker 1: We're not. You have a voice. A calling from Almighty
31:57
Speaker 1: God We would love to partner with you, to come
32:01
Speaker 1: alongside you, to sweat with you. But we're not at
32:07
Speaker 1: all interested in just stamping out cookie cutters that look
32:12
Speaker 1: exactly like what we're doing. We're really not. We're really not. Regardless,
32:18
Speaker 1: you're from a different theological background than we are. Bless God.
32:22
Speaker 1: Go for it. In your theological context, you're in a
32:26
Speaker 1: different socioeconomic setting than we are, hey, go for it.
32:32
Speaker 1: Flesh it out in your context. You're in a different
32:35
Speaker 1: cultural setting than we are. Go for it. Flesh it
32:38
Speaker 1: out in your context. We love to walk with you
32:41
Speaker 1: principally as you go through and do this. We've tried
32:44
Speaker 1: to do that in some of the things that we've written.
32:46
Speaker 1: You know, some of the things out here on this
32:47
Speaker 1: table over here, there are things that we've produced as
32:50
Speaker 1: we've tried to go through this. But we've tried to
32:52
Speaker 1: stay on the level of principle, okay? We've really tried
32:56
Speaker 1: to stay on the level of principle as we've done this. Why?
33:00
Speaker 1: Because every one of us has to be dependent not
33:03
Speaker 1: on a system but on a Savior. It's Jesus. He
33:10
Speaker 1: builds the church. And as soon as we give you
33:13
Speaker 1: a manual, there'll be something that we figured out we
33:16
Speaker 1: could do better and your manual's messed up. Amen? Something
33:19
Speaker 1: you figured out you could do better. Whatever. Whatever. So
33:26
Speaker 1: this is what we're interested in. By the way, see
33:29
Speaker 1: if this sounds familiar according to this passage of Scripture.
33:32
Speaker 1: You know our vision statement, okay? Vision statement is what
33:34
Speaker 1: we see ourselves becoming, a kingdom-minded, Christ-exalting, multi-generational community of faith.
33:39
Speaker 1: Our mission statement is how we become that vision. Our
33:43
Speaker 1: mission statement, proclaiming the supremacy of Christ to all men
33:47
Speaker 1: with a view toward biblical conversion and comprehensive discipleship. Anybody
33:50
Speaker 1: want to guess where we get that from? This passage
33:54
Speaker 1: of Scripture right here. That passage of scripture right there.
34:00
Speaker 1: That's it. That's it. Not all sophisticated. That passage of
34:09
Speaker 1: scripture right there. We don't have to be smarter than God.
34:12
Speaker 1: We can't anyway. We don't have to be original. In fact,
34:18
Speaker 1: if you are truly original, then that means you're not biblical. Amen?
34:24
Speaker 1: So stop seeking originality. Originality is sinful. When we're talking
34:29
Speaker 1: about the church and planting the church. Uh-uh. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
34:34
Speaker 1: Don't be original. Be biblical. Be biblical.