Sermon: Going Forward

As I said, a little bit of a different service because we have ordination and installations tonight. So a short homily tonight and then, uh, we will have two different charges tonight. Uh, pastor Kevin will give a charge to uh, the new officers and then Rudy Miller, David Young will give a charge to the congregation. Uh, so shorter little homily tonight on Acts chapter six, what I wanna do is look at verses seven through 15 in light of what we're doing this evening.

Let me pray before we open God's word together.

Father, we do pray that this word would not return void, that it would accomplish its purposes, your purposes. In our midst, we pray that it'd be used for the upbuilding of the body and do pray that you would receive the glory and the honor and the praise. Christ's name, amen. X chapter six verses seven through 15. This is a holy iner, sufficient word of God and the word of God continued to increase and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in

Jerusalem and a great many of the priests became obedient to the faith. And Stephen, full of grace and power was doing great wonders and signs among the people and some of those who belonged to the synagogue of the freedmen as it was called, and of the Ians and of the Alexandrians and those from Salic Asia rose up and disputed with Stephen, but they could not withstand the wisdom and the spirit with which he was speaking.

Then they secretly instigated men who said, we have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God and they stirred up the people and the elders and the scribes and they came upon him and seized him, brought him before the council and they set up false witnesses who said, this man never ceases to speak words against this holy place in the law, but we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place, will change the customs

that Moses delivered to us and gazing at him. All who sat in the council saw that his face was like the face of an angel. The grass withers and the flower fades. The word of God is forever. Thanks be to God. Amen. Verse seven, it should stir you. I hope it stirs you. And the word of God continued to increase and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem. The great many of the priests became obedient to the faith.

I hope it stirs you Because as a Christian it it is the fruit of the mission of the church that you and I are to be about. That's the fruit. If you go all the way back to Acts chapter one, verse eight, and we could go even prior to that, of course Matthew 28, and you have this great mission that is given to the church. It's very clear that we are to testify to who Christ is and that we are to make disciples. That's the mission of the church and it's clear

and evident that Stephen understood his life to be about the mission of the church. He, he was not content to stay holed up within the confines of the church. It's fascinating. He is ordained as a deacon to serve the widows in particular of the church and to serve the mercy, the mercy needs of the church. And yet what we're told in verse eight is that he was doing wonders and signs among the people. He was obviously compelled to go out among the people

he understood there is salvation and no one else. There is no other name given among men by which we must be saved and he wanted people to encounter this Christ. He wanted to see disciples made so he was out among the people. That's the mission, mission of the church, to declare Christ to, to make disciples. We've been given not only the mission but a ministry in this mission as it has been said, the Lord has chosen to use change, people to change people.

He has chosen to use people, you and I to accomplish his mission in this world. I remember watching a mom with a daughter one time. The mom was making a a picture of tea on the counter and the daughter was looking up at her with her wide eyes and I remember watching the mother pick up that child and put the child in her arms and allowing the child to stir the tea and what I especially remember is the child's laughter,

just laughing hysterically so happy. She was so happy to do that, which the mother could have done without her, but she got to participate and the mother had her do that, which she didn't need any help for because she just loved her daughter. It's one of the amazing things of all of creation is that what God can do by himself of himself, he chooses to use you and I to participate in that. We get to be involved in the the great work

of all the universe I've seen his sons and daughters brought to him. We get to participate in that ministry that he has given. He gave his church a mission. He granted us a ministry and let us consider the means of the ministry. Notice the means in verse seven and the word of God continued to increase. Notice what they say about Stephen in verse 10. They could not withstand the wisdom and the spirit with which he was speaking.

What was he speaking? He was speaking the word as his evidence by the charges that are brought against him. He's accused of saying that Jesus will destroy the temple and that he will change the custom of the law. It is clear these are the same charges that were brought against Christ. Stephen was proclaiming the words of Christ. He wasn't simply preaching, he was preaching the word of God, the Word of Christ.

God calls us to the mission and to the ministry, but it is always by his means. It's always by the word of God that the kingdom of God goes forward always. It's how he's chosen to work. We though we participate in this, we are only secondary means. The primary means is always his word. Now he speaks his word often through us,

but the word is the primary means.

It is the word of Christ that we are to bring to bear.

So Greg and Steve and Chris as you do ministry midst of his church, as officers we're to bring the word to bear as we as members of the congregation, as we do ministry, we are to bring the word to bear. When we come alongside a friend, it's not just sweet soothing words we are to say when we're sitting down to council. It's not just what makes sense when we're challenging one another. It's not just saying a hard thing When

we're preaching and teaching, it's not the wisdom of the world. It's not these things that affect his purposes in the world. It's his word. We bring his word to bear. That's the means.

This is why the church above all else is an organism of the word. How they call on him and whom they have not believed and how are they to believe in him of whom they have not heard and how are they to hear without someone preaching,

replying, relying upon the word. It takes a great deal. Trust. Trust in God takes faith

where we don't take things into our own hands, that we trust that he will work as he's always worked

and is the means of the ministry of the mission. Now note the message as we alluded to, Stephen was proclaiming Christ in verse 14. For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and will change the customs that Moses delivered to us. It is Christ that's at the center of our proclamation. He's the message. It is in him alone that sinners receive forgiveness of sins. It's in him alone that we are reconciled to a holy God.

It's in him alone that we grow in the likeness of our God. It's in him alone that we can accomplish anything apart from You can do nothing. Jesus said. It's all centered upon Christ. We do not proclaim the Bible. We proclaim the Christ of the Bible. We don't even simply proclaim about Christ. We proclaim Christ. We want people by their interactions with us to encounter the living risen savior of the universe and that means

that he must be our message.

We can win people to the Bible. We can win people to this church. We can win people to conservative family values. We can win people to service. We can win people to community volunteerism, but that's not our message. Our message is Christ

so does Christ centeredness, which must mark the disciple and Christ centeredness, which must mark the church and Christ centeredness that must mark her officers.

Charles Spurgeon once famously stated this. He said, I believe that those sermons and we could broaden this and say those ministries which are fullest of Christ are the most likely to be blessed to the conversion of the hearers. Let your sermons expend it to ministries. Let your ministries be full of Christ from beginning to end crammed full of the gospel. As for myself brethren, I cannot preach anything else but Christ and his cross for I know else

and long ago, like the Apostle Paul, I determined not to know anything else, say Jesus Christ and him crucified. People have often asked me, he said, what is the secret of your success? I always answer that I have no other secret but this, that I have preached the gospel, not about the gospel, but the gospel, the full free glorious gospel of the living Christ who is the incarnation of the good news, and then he gives us admonition.

Preach Jesus Christ. Brethren always in everywhere and every time you preach, be sure to have much of Jesus Christ. In the sermon in your ministry, he tells a story. You remember the story of the old minister who heard a sermon by a young man and when he was asked by the preacher what he thought of it, he was rather slow to answer at last. He said, if I must tell you, I did not like it at all, there was no Christ in your sermon.

No answer the young man because I did not see that Christ was in the text. Oh said the old minister, do you not know that? From every little town and village in tiny Hamlet in England, there is a road leading to London. Whenever I get hold of a text, I say to myself, there is a road from here to Jesus Christ and I mean to keep on his track till I get to him. Well said the young man, but suppose you are preaching from a text

that says nothing about Christ, then I will go over hedge and ditch. But what I will get at him,

whatever ministry you are in,

whatever moment you are in in ministry, you say, ah, that wasn't the opportunity for Christ here. No you, you go over every hill in every ditch to get to Christ. You bring in Christ to bear and all that you are doing.

It's what it looks like. He's our message, the mission, the ministry, the means, the message. And finally, notice the manner. Verse eight, Stephen was full of grace and power. This is the manner in which we do our ministries. We proclaim the word of God in grace and in power, grace and power grace. Why? Because he is a recipient of grace. He's united with Christ. He's filled with the grace of Christ and so it is right

that he would pour out the grace of Christ.

Notice though that it is also in power.

This is Holy Spirit power.

My guess is all of us believe everything I have said thus far, and my guess is, is that we do our best. It seems like to me, all of us in this room, most of us in this room, we do our best to try and do all of those things,

but here's the key. Here's what I think we often miss, is that we're doing it in our power, our strength. What Steven is doing is he is extending grace and he is exercising power, but it is not his. It is not his strength. It's the Holy Spirit.

He says this multiple times about Stephen in this Acts six in verse three, the people were charged with finding men full of the spirit and full of wisdom of which Stephen is one. In verse five, Stephen is said to be a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit. And now in verse eight he's said, to be full of grace and power. Luke is underscoring that the power that is at work within Stephen, it's Holy Spirit power.

He's not doing it in his strength.

It often goes through my mind is pause words in Colossians 1 28 and 29. It says, himm, we proclaim again. The message is Christ. Here's the ministry proclamation, himm, we proclaim warning everyone, teaching everyone with all wisdom. Why in order that we might present, everyone mature in Christ disciples. And then he says, for this, I toil struggling. It's hard work, toil struggle for this. I toil struggling with all his

energy that he works within me, the ministry we are about, for the glory of God, for the glory of Christ must be done in the strength of Christ.

It's in him. It's by him. It's through him. We want to be a church that is busy about this mission, busy, about this ministry, busy about these means, the word busy, about the message of Christ and busy in the manner that he has stated spirit And in power, spirit's, power and in grace. It's a good thing for that to be true of its leaders as the leaders of a church goes, so a church goes, and by God's grace, we have had

wonderful leaders in this congregation for decades,

something that we have to keep at as a congregation. You have to keep encouraging your officers to in this congregation that we might continue to go forward to the glory of Christ. Let's pray. Father, we are thankful you have given us such a wonderful ministry in this world. You have given us such a wonderful mission, such a wonderful means, the living word, and we're thankful that you have given us such a wonderful Savior to proclaim

and we are thankful that you have not left us to do it in our strength, but you have given us your spirit. May we be men and women of such ministry and a church of such ministry. We pray all of this in the strong name of Christ Jesus. Amen.