Ed Stetzer – Session 2

Missional DNA



Acts 16:9 During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, "Come over to Macedonia and help us." After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.



Come over to Macedonia and help us.

• Come Over
  
  • What/where is our Macedonia? Forty times in the gospel of John refers to himself as "sent." We are a sent people, and so we are to GO. As the Father has sent me, I am sending you (John 20:21). John 3:16 leads to John 20:21. The NT is a book about a God who sends, who then sends his people on mission.
    
  • Paul had a vision for a people. We have to have a vision for a people, not a vision for a church. The how of church planting is going to be influenced by the who, when and where of church planting.
    
  • We have to bring Christ, not just a church. We are planting the gospel that gives birth to a church.
    
• Help
  
  • What does "help" mean? The most important help we can give people in our neighborhood is to help them understand that it's all about Jesus.
    
  • The answer can be found in the text. It was the preaching and the proclamation of the Gospel. It's at this point that Luke begins writing "we" instead of "they." It was at this point that he joined them in this "helping."
    
  • 2 Corinthians 5:11-21 Here we find words like persuade, compel, appeal, implore, reconcile, ambassador.
    
  • The totality of the Christian message is not that we can be saved from hell. It is much bigger than that. However, if at any point we remove a bloody Cross from our message, then what we are planting is not a church.
    
  • Francis Dubose, God Who Sends
    
  • If being missional is reduced to simply helping people with their physical needs, then this is not the complete help that they need.
    
  • We must BE, DO, & TELL the Gospel (good news). We must do all of these in a relevant way.
    
  • Relevance is a tool. The Gospel is the goal. We must not mix those two up. Relevance should never be our goal.
    
• Us
  
  • The "us" here refers to a lost world. Lost people matter to God.
    
  • Augustine: "My heart was restless until it had found its rest in Thee."
    
  • People have a God-shaped hole.
    
  • John Knox: "Give me Scotland or I die."
    

Ways to Determine Whether Relevance Has Become the Goal Rather than the Tool

1. When we focus on personal transformation and not gospel transformation. Gospel transformation will always include personal transformation. The same is not always true for personal transformation.
   
2. When our sermons are so practical that they do not contain the gospel. We should not preach any message that would not be true if Jesus had not died on the Cross. This is what separates us from Dr. Phil.
   
3. When we talk more about practical than we do about biblical. Do we believe that the Bible shape who we are?
   
4. When our outreach demeans those who are preaching the gospel.
   
5. When our approach makes us the hero rather than Jesus.
   
6. When personal evangelism is an oxymoron at our church.
   
7. When Invest and Invite never leads to Evangelize.
   
8. When attendance is a bigger value than conversion.
   
9. When the cross gets less focus than our church.
   
10. When not offending seekers is more important than telling the gospel.