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The Wake-Up Call
Calling All Apostles, Prophets, and Evangelists
00:20:52
We need these gifts in order for the body of Christ to be built up in order for the love of God to be manifest through the people of God that the world may come to know Jesus.
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Foreign. Sower nation. It is Tuesday, April 28th. Is that right? Yes, it's April 28th. This month. January, February, March. The fourth month is almost over. And you know what? We're not. We're still churning deep into the letter to the Ephesians. I've been loving this with you all. Thank you for joining me. We're going to begin today. Even though it's Taco Tuesday. We're going to begin today. Just like we begin every day, waking up to Jesus. He's here. Just become attuned to that. He's not near. He's here. He's with you. He's with me. And he's bringing us together with a lot of other people. There's a big we here, y'. All. Big y'. All. So we're doing discipleship together, and I want you to keep inviting others to do it with us. We got a field team announcement today in the. In the PS and the email. I want you to join that field team, guys. I want you out there sewing this invitation for others to join us. All right? Wake up, sleeper. Rise from the dead and Christ will shine on you. Praying Jesus, I belong to you. I lift up my heart to you. I set my mind on you. I fix my eyes on you. I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice. Jesus, we belong to you. And we're praying in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Well, if you join me in that prayer, and you meant it. We're consecrated unto him today. And so let us dive deep and engage God's Word. Today's entry is entitled Calling All Apostles, Prophets and Evangelists. Our text, Ephesians 4, chapter verse 4, chapter 4, verse 1113. This is a marvelous classic text. You're going to love it. Hear now the word of the Lord. The gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity to the measure of the full stature of Christ, the Word of the Lord. Now consider this. This text fascinates as much for what it says as for what it doesn't say. Were we to look across the spectrum at today's growing churches, we might think the text says something more like the following. The gifts he gave were that some would be senior ministers, some lead past pastors, some associate pastors, some youth ministers, Some recreational activities directors, some children's pastors, some worship leaders and some choir directors to run the church, keep people coming back, learn the newest worship songs, move on toward tithing, go on occasional mission trips, learn as much about the Bible as possible, and participate in as many varied church activities, committees and building campaigns as their schedules will permit. I know, I know that's not generous, and I repent of my cynicism and apologize for any offense to my many friends who are faithfully serving local churches in these ways. I'm one of you, but I was thinking. I'm a senior minister. No, hang on. I'm a. I'm a lead pastor. No, I'm a solo pastor. I'm the only employee. I know. I got friends out there in that as well. I believe, though, and most of these friends would agree we are missing the point of Ephesians 4. These texts I read, the gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ. My friend Alan Hirsch and many of his friends have worked so diligently over the past 20 years or so to expose the richness of the wisdom of Ephesians, chapter 4, verses 1 16, and to see it actualized across the global church. Their work is of profound importance and has enormous theological substance and practical outworking. They approach this text as the genetic code of the Body of Christ. The point is that Jesus Christ, the Lord of the Church through the person of the Holy Spirit, is now and until his return, gifting the Church all over the world with this five fold ministry of apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds and teachers. They call it a pest. It's an acronym. The truth is, we cannot rise up into the fullness of the Body of Christ without them. Why do I say this? Look at verse 12. To equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the Body of Christ. Everyone who claims the name of Jesus Christ is called to this ministry of building up the body of Christ. Many of you reading are now serving in these five dimensions of equipping leadership. Some of you are entrusted with these gifts in unique capacities as leaders in the church. Because the Church has not understood and appropriated this text over the past hundred years or more, we find ourselves with an overabundance of shepherds and teachers and something of a dearth of apostles, prophets and evangelists. They call them the apes. A P E apostle, prophet, evangelist. Scratch that thought. Scratch the whole thought. The Lord is indeed giving us these gifts and always has been. We have been asleep to their presence, or worse, averse to their offerings. They get exiled to places like the Evangelism Committee where they bang their heads against the wall for years while the fire within them slowly burns down to embers. In fact, our friend, my good friend, Dr. Timothy Tennant, who has written frequently for the Wake Up Call, raises this concern about our leadership being out of balance. He raises it as one of the most adaptive challenges facing the church and facing seminaries today. These seminaries are mostly trained, engineered to train more and more shepherds, pastors and teachers, and far less attuned to raising up apostles, prophets and evangelists. It's another reason I'm thankful for him and his leadership, his years of leadership at Asbury Theological Seminary. He was such a gift to this school, my school. I mean, I just. Thank you. Tim, if you're listening. And Julie, thank you. Thank you for all you did for us and so many. It was your generous boldness that even launched Seedbed. You believed in it and this mission that we have to sow for a great awakening and made it a gift to the church. Thank you. Well, there's good news. The Holy Spirit loves embers. The Spirit of God loves to breathe on the burned down embers of these apostles and prophets and evangelists who've, like I said, maybe beat their heads against a wall and maybe burned down to the embers. Now, the Holy Spirit loves embers. But let's remember the point. It comes in verse 13 and the following. Until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ. This is about growing up into the fullness of God. Remember this from the prayer in Ephesians 3. Remember our earlier conversation about the second half of the Gospel. The puzzle is coming together. Are you seeing how the pieces fit? We need these gifts in order for the body of Christ to be built up, in order for the love of God to be manifest through the people of God that the world may come to know Jesus. Let's pray. Abba. Father, we thank you for your son Jesus, who is not only himself the church's greatest gift, but he gifts the church with every good gift that it might by his spirit build itself upon. Give us an openness to the way you would gift us for this ministry. It's why we're praying in your name, Jesus. Amen. Few journal prompts for today for your reflection. How do you compare and contrast the present day church organization as we know it with Ephesians 4, verses 11 to 13, our text for today. Number two, do you gravitate toward one of the fivefold gifts? And what shape does that take in you? And then number three, how do you see your own maturity and fullness impacted by the presence or absence of these gifts at work in your own church history? Well, man, there's a lot, lot to chew on right there. And I don't know, some of you may be thinking, well, I'm not a, a pastor or a teacher. I'm not an apostle or a prophet or an evangelist. And, and, and I'm not suggesting that fits into one of these offices, one of these sort of job descriptions, but they are. There is such a thing as an apostle and a prophet and an evangelist and a pastor and a teacher. But these are also categories, and they're not just sort of for the ordained. The whole church can flow into and through and out of one or more of these categories. It's kind of like how you're wired. Are you wired in the sort of shepherding work, the teaching work, the sort of apostolic work which actually is about moving the borders and boundaries of church way beyond itself into new territories, even in your little town or your city? Not necessarily another country, could be another country or a prophet. Are you exercising the gift of prophecy and moving in the ability to speak and encourage as empowered by the Holy Spirit in all kinds of situations and circumstances inside the church and beyond it. Or an evangelist. And this is a person, it's not just a person who's going to go preach a crusade or something like that. It could be that, but it could be that the Lord has given you a sense of calling and burden for your neighborhood or your fill in the blank, your work. And there's this giftedness, this sense of empoweredness, this sense of motivation in you to want to share the gospel first in your life, second in your, in your words, in your relationships. Well, that's enough from me on this. Today Dad's with me. We're going to sing one of the great songs of the church today. And I'll hand it over now.
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All right.
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Saints of God and singers of love. That's what we are, isn't it? We're singers of love most of the time. Most of the time. He said, well, we're going to sing a standard. One of the standard hymns today. What is it, dad?
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Trust and obey.
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What's the number?
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It's 334.
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334. And we might Sing the first verse and the last verse. It's going to be Taco Tuesday all day long today. And by the way, if you're in the Savannah, Georgia region, we're coming up on the great. The great Taco Tuesday of all Taco Tuesdays this year. May 5th, Cinco de Mayo. 5th of May is on a Tuesday. And we're going to be on the Wake Up Call Taco tour to Savannah, Georgia. We had our first one out there in Savannah, and now we're going to have our second one out there. And if anybody out there would like us to come to where you are or a place close by, let us know and we'll see what we can do. But we get together, we sing hymns, we tell stories, we pray, and we eat tacos. We're going to be in Savannah, Georgia, at Good Shepherd Church on May 5 this year. So if you're in the Metroplex, come join us. How far is that Savannah? It's a far piece from here. We're going to have to fly out there, but our good friends out there are going to host us, and we're looking forward to it. Okay, we're going to sing. You ready?
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Yeah. When we walk with the Lord in the light of his word what a glory he sheds on our way While we do his good will he abides with us still and with all who will trust and obey Trust and obey for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey Not a burden we bear Not a sorrow we share but our toil he doth richly repay Not a greedy or a loss Not a frown or a cross but is blessed if we trust and obey Trust and obey for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey
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let's sing the last verse then.
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In fellowship sweet we will sin at his feet or we'll walk by his side and the way what he says we will do where he says we will go Never fear Only trust and obey Trust and obey for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey
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Amen.
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Yeah, we got all that one.
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Well, gang, it's Tuesday, and we're probably still behind from Monday, and we need to linger a minute with the Lord this morning and just. I encourage you, just say Jesus. Is there anything you want me to know about today? Are there any people that you want to bring into my awareness that you'd like for me to reach out to and just get still? Get your pencil. He'll bring people to mind. He'll remind you of people, right?
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And they're out there.
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They're. They're out there. And we're going to trust and obey. That's what we're doing today. That's. That's the assignment. So get your seeds for The Awakening. I'm J.D. walt.
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And I'm David.
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Walt.
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And we'll see you on the fields.