Mike Treneer's Message

[아브라함]

Park's Letter(136) 2010. 10. 30

주안에서 사랑하는 문대헌 형제 부부에게

“너희 중에 있는 하나님의 양 무리를 치되 부득이함으로 하지 말고 오직 하나님의 뜻을 좇아 자원함으로 하며 더러운 이를 위하여 하지 말고 오직 즐거운 뜻으로 하며 맡기운 자들에게 주장하는 자세를 하지 말고 오직 양 무리의 본이 되라 그리하면 목자장이 나타나실 때에 시들지 아니하는 영광의 면류관을 얻으리라”(벧전5:2-4)

하나님의 변함없는 성실하심을 따라 금년에도 어김없이 찾아오는 가을의 아름다움이 새삼 새롭게 느껴집니다. 단풍의 아름다움을 감탄하면서 세월의 흐름을 되새겨 봅니다. 젊은 날에는 형형색색의 아름다운 단풍도 별로 감동이 되지 않았었는데, 이제야 그토록 아름다움이 느껴지는지요! 아마 나이를 들면서 정서적 변화임을 새삼 실감합니다. 고국에는 참으로 아름다운 가을의 계절입니다. 지난 한 달도 주님의 은혜 가운데 잘 지내셨는지요? 분주하였던 한 달을 마무리하면서 여러분을 생각하며 또한 편지를 보냅니다.

주님의 은혜와 평강이 각 가정에 함께 하시기를 기도합니다. 항상 주님의 풍성한 은혜 속에서 감사와 기쁨과 만족을 누리며, 주님의 평강이 우리를 보호하여 주실 때 우리는 참으로 복되고 능력 있는 삶을 살아갈 수 있습니다. 형통한 삶의 비결은 주님의 은혜와 평강가운데 거하는 것입니다. 그것은 주님과의 친밀하고 풍성한 교제를 통하여 이루어집니다. 믿음의 연륜이 깊어질수록 우리가 더욱 노력해야 할 것은 주님과의 친밀한 교제를 발전시켜 나가는 것입니다. “나의 힘이 되신 여호와여 내가 주를 사랑하나이다 여호와는 나의 반석이시요 나의 요새시요 나를 건지시는 자시요 나의 하나님이시요 나의 피할 바위시요 나의 방패시요 나의 구원의 뿔이시요 나의 산성이시로다”(시18:1-2) 이 영역에 날마다 큰 진보가 있기를 권면하며 기도합니다.

주님께서는 우리를 주님의 양들을 돌보는 목자(Shepherd)로 부르셨습니다. 목자의 중요한 책무는 주님께서 맡겨주신 양들을 잘 돌보는(shepherding) 일입니다. 그렇게 하기 위해서는 베드로는 몇 가지 지침을 제시하고 있습니다. (1) 억지로 하거나 마지못해서가 아니라, 기꺼이 하고자 하는 자원함으로 (2) 무슨 이익을 얻기 위해서가 아니라, 주님을 섬기듯 즐거운 마음과 열성으로 (3) 양들을 지배하려 들지 말고, 항상 본이 되는 삶을 살아가라고 권면하고 있습니다. 결과는 우리 목자들의 으뜸이 되시는 주님께서 다시 오실 때에 결코 변하거나 시들지 않는 영광의 면류관을 주실 것이라고 약속하고 있습니다. 여기에서 중요한 것은 목자는 자신이 돌보는 양들의 인정, 칭찬, 감사, 찬사, 존경 등에 신경을 쓸 것이 아니라 동일하게 우리와 동일한 목자이면서 목자장이신 예수 그리스도의 인정, 칭찬, 위로와 상급에 소망을 두어야 한다는 것입니다. 양들의 상태는 언제든지 변할 수 있습니다. 때로는 격려와 기쁨도 되지만 무척 실망스러울 때도 있습니다. 양들의 상태에 따라 목자는 일희일비할 수도 있으며, 때론 쉽게 낙심할 수도 있습니다. 그러므로 우리는 양들을 바라보지 말고 양들을 맡겨주신 목자장이신 예수 그리스도를 바라보며 소망가운데 목자로서 책무를 성실하게 수행하는 것이 중요합니다. 어제나 오늘이나 변함 없는 주님께서는 목자들에게 약속하신 영광의 면류관을 주실 것입니다. 주님의 귀한 양들을 보내주시고 돌보는 목자의 귀중한 책무를 허락하여 주신 주님께 감사와 존귀를 드립니다. 주님의 날에 받게 될 상급의 소망을 인하여 또한 감사를 드립니다.

이번 달에는 말레시아에서 아시아 지역의 young staff들을 대상으로, Mike Treneer 회장께서 수양회 중에 나눈 메시지 초록을 첨부합니다. 개인의 삶과 사역에 귀한 참고자료가 되기를 원합니다. 우리의 부르심과 비전과 나아가야 할 분명한 방향이 더욱 새롭게 되기를 원합니다. 주님의 충만한 사랑과 위로와 소망이 각 가정에 함께 하시기를 기도하며 축복합니다.

주님의 풍성한 은혜 안에서, 박 남 규 부부 서신

Mike Treneer – Message 1

AP Men’s Next Generation Leader’s Retreat

16‐19 July 2010, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Leadership For The Advance Of The Gospel

Advancing The Gospel With Power

1 Thessalonians 1:1‐2:13

Our Navigator Calling:

To advance the Gospel of Jesus and His Kingdom into the nations through spiritual generations of laborers living and discipling among the lost

As Navigators, we are deeply committed to the advance of the Gospel into the nations. We long to see more and more people gripped by the wonderful love of our creator God. The love expressed in the sending of His Son, Jesus, to live among us and to redeem us from our lost, fallen state and from the brokenness of our lost world.

We long to see the Gospel advancing through the lives of ordinary men and women as they embrace God’s love and become laborers, workers for the Kingdom, carriers of the Good News into their nations.

As Navigators, we think generationally. We want to help people respond to Jesus in a way that enables them to carry His love into their worlds, their natural networks of friends and family, and beyond. We want to “reproduce reproducers,” as Dawson Trotman used to say, with the result that we see spiritual generations of laborers rippling out from us, carrying the love of Jesus.

A beautiful expression‎ of this vision is our theme passage for this conference.

Paul, Silas, and Timothy had brought the Gospel to the town of Thessalonica in the Roman Province of Macedonia. In the months and years that followed, they had the joy of hearing how the Gospel was multiplying outwards from the believers in Thessalonica. Spiritual generations of laborers carried the Gospel to those around them. The Thessalonian believers became a model for believers everywhere as the Lord’s message rang out from them.

This is what we want to see happening in all the places we represent. This is what God has called us to and what He has called us to together in these days to think and pray about. First Thessalonians is a good place for us to go to learn how this happens.

Introduction

1 Thessalonians: Paul’s Example

In His letter Paul goes to some lengths to describe the way he, Silas, and Timothy had brought the Gospel to the Thessalonians, and how they had begun to disciple those who came to faith.

How did Paul live out his calling to advance the Gospel?

First Thessalonians gives us some very helpful insight into how Paul understood his calling. And, therefore, how he understood the commission Jesus had given his followers to make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:18‐20).

We will look over these four talks at this letter in four parts:

 Advancing the Gospel with Power (1 Thessalonians 1:1‐2:13)

 Advancing the Gospel with Vision (1 Thessalonians 2:6‐3:13)

 Advancing the Gospel by Discipling (1 Thessalonians 4:1‐5:11)

 Advancing the Gospel Together in Dependence on God (1 Thessalonians 5:11‐28)

Advancing The Gospel With Power

As Paul describes his ministry among the Thessalonians he writes:

...our gospel came to you not simply with words, but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction. You know how we lived among you for your sake. (1 Thessalonians 1:5, NIV)

What does it look like to advance the Gospel with the power of the Holy Spirit? Is the power of the Holy Spirit evident in our efforts or are we simply doing things in our own human strength, relying on human means?

In 1989 I was at a conference in Manila in the Philippines. At that time we were living in Africa and seeing great blessing in the Navigator ministries as they spread and grew into more and more African countries. But I was becoming increasingly worn out with the constant travel and the many challenges. At the conference in Manila, I began to go down with malaria. I felt exhausted, discouraged, and overwhelmed with my own weakness and failure. Then one evening I heard a message on Acts 1:8:

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. (Acts 1:8)

The speaker asked us if we were trying to take the Good News of Jesus to the nations in our own strength or with the power of the Holy Spirit? That night I went for a long walk by the harbor, pouring my heart out to the Lord and re‐surrendering to the filling of the Holy Spirit. Asking Him to fill me and anoint my ministry. I had often noticed how much Luke, as he writes his Gospel and the Book of Acts, stresses the power of the Spirit. So I resolved to study Luke’s two books in a fresh way. During the year that followed, I read and re‐read Luke and Acts many times. I was deeply impressed by Luke’s continued focus on the power and working of the Holy Spirit in Jesus’ ministry and in the ministry of Jesus’ Apostles.

Look, for example, at Luke 4:

Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert.... (Luke 4:1, NIV)

Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit.... (Luke 4:14)

...he found the place where it is written: 18“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me....” (Luke 4:17‐18)

As Navigators we value “the leading and empowering of the Holy Spirit.” Let’s make sure that this is a reality in our lives and ministries.

So let us ask:

How is Paul living out his calling to advance the Gospel in the Spirit’s power?

So that we can better learn: how can we advance the Gospel in the power of the Spirit?

What spiritual “weapons” did Paul use to battle for the lives and eternal destinies of men and women?

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. 4The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. (2 Corinthians 10:3‐4)

What spiritual weapons did Paul and his companions use as they ministered in the Spirit’s power in Thessalonica? Read 1 Thessalonians 1:1‐2:13 with this question in mind.

Paul’s Means Of Advancing The Gospel With The Spirit’s Power

The power of prayer (1 Thessalonians 1:2)

The power of God’s Word (1 Thessalonians 2:13)

The power of example (1 Thessalonians 1:5‐6)

The power of love (1 Thessalonians 2:8)

I.The Power Of Prayer

The first spiritual weapon Paul refers to is prayer:

We always thank God for all of you, mentioning you in our prayers (1 Thessalonians 1:2)

A.God gives the growth, so prayer must be the first principle of advancing the Gospel

In describing his ministry among the Corinthians Paul writes, I planted the seed, Apollos watered it but God made it grow. (1 Corinthians 3:6)

As we seek to “live and disciple among the lost” and to help others do the same, we are totally dependent on God to work in lives.

Jesus, in describing the work of the new birth, said: Flesh gives birth to flesh but the Spirit gives birth to spirit…The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. (John 3:6‐8)

When we pray for people, we focus the power of the Spirit of God on their lives. The illustration of focusing the sun’s rays with a magnifying glass so that a piece of paper can catch fire.

B.Model of Paul’s prayers

Paul’s letters are full of the things he prayed for people.

We can take his prayers as an example, memorize them, and pray them for our friends.

Illustration of Claire writing the prayers on cards and writing the names of her friends on the back and praying these things into the lives of her friends.

1. Ephesians 1:15‐23; 3:14‐21

2. Philippians 1:9‐11

3. Colossians 1:9‐12

4. 2 Thessalonians 1:11‐12

What strikes you as we read these things that Paul was praying for those he was discipling?

II.The Power Of God’s Word

In the last verse of the passage we read, 1 Thessalonians 2:13, Paul describes the power of God’s Word: and we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is at work in you who believe.

Paul’s ministry to the Thessalonians was not just with words, but it was with words and those words were the Word of God. Our Gospel came to you.... (1 Thessalonians 1:5)

Over and over in this passage Paul refers to the way he and Silas and Timothy shared the Gospel. ...we preached the Gospel of God to you. (1 Thessalonians 2:2,4,9)

And Paul understood the power of God’s word in his ministry: ...when you received the word of God...you accepted it...which is at work in you who believe. (1 Thessalonians 2:13)

In his parables Jesus told us that the Kingdom of heaven is like a man scattering seed on the ground…and that seed is the Word of God.

Jesus was quite clear that in his teaching he was carefully sharing the Word of God (see John 12:47‐50). If this was so important to Jesus, how much more is it important for us? Our words do not have the life giving power of God’s word.

Refer to our Vision Statement, paragraph 3: “They are marked by a deep engagement with and obedience to the Scriptures as the word of God.”

The sword of the Spirit…is the word of God. (Ephesians 6:17) So if we want to minister in the power of the Spirit, let us be committed and skilled in using the Spirit’s sword.

So:

A. Share the Gospel

And:

B. Teach the Word of God:

1.Carefully, with conviction and honesty

Acts 14:1 describes Paul and Barnabas sharing the Word of God in Iconium in this way: They so spoke that a great number believed. What do you think it was about the way they spoke? (See 1 Corinthians 2:1‐5, 2 Corinthians 4:2)

Luke 24 describes Jesus talking with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us? (Luke 24:32)

2.Large groups, small groups, one‐to‐one

Jesus and Paul were powerful teachers of the Word of God in every situation they found themselves in.

Look at Paul’s exhortation to Timothy in 2 Timothy 4:1‐2.

My commitment and prayer often as a young believer (Psalm 119:46‐48).

Commit yourselves to be men of the Word of God...men with God’s Word in your heart and in your mouth.

III.The Power Of Example

However deeply committed Paul was to sharing the Word of God and however deeply he was persuaded of its life giving power, Paul is quite clear that he did not just minister to them with words: ...You know how we lived among you for your sake. You became imitators of us and of the Lord.... (I Thessalonians 1:5‐6)

Paul and his companions also lived among those they were discipling, so that the power of their prayers and the power of the Word of God was supported by the power of their example.

In His prayer in John 17, in which Jesus talks to His Father in the presence of His disciples about the way He discipled them, He says: I revealed you to those you gave me…. How did Jesus reveal God to them? John recalls how he saw the glory of God in John 1:14: The Word became flesh and we saw it.

Look how Paul stresses the importance of their lives among the Thessalonians: You are witnesses...of how holy, righteous and blameless we were among you who believed.

(I Thessalonians 2:10)

A.We must “live among” those we disciple so that our lives can be seen and imitated

B.Let people see how we appropriate and extend grace

The example of our lives is not about us being perfect. It is about letting people into our lives, so they can see what it means to appropriate God’s grace and how to extend that grace to others.

A friend of mine used to say:

C.The most widely read translation of the Bible is “the translation into daily living”

The forth great spiritual weapon Paul uses is:

IV.The Power Of Love

Paul writes: We loved you so much that we were delighted to share with you not only the Gospel of God but our lives as well, because you had become so dear to us. (1 Thessalonians 2:8)

The fruit of the Spirit is love, and this fruit of the Spirit of God in our lives is a powerful spiritual force through which God reaches out to bless the lives of those around us.

As human beings we all have a deep need for love. It is a universal human language and people can tell whether you love them. As God has put the need for love in every human heart and as He works the fruit of His Spirit in us, the love that God pours into our hearts by His Spirit reaches out to meet the need for love in those around us. It is a powerful, spiritual magnet drawing people to Jesus’ Spirit in us.

Someone recently sent me this poem:

Not merely in the words you say,

Not only by your deeds expressed,

But in the most unconscious way

Is Christ confessed.

The warmth that fills your friendly smile,

The light upon your peaceful brow,

And Oh! I felt his presence when

You laughed just now.

To me, ‘twas not the truth you taught,

To you so clear, to me still dim,

But when you came you brought

A sense of Him.

And from your eyes He beckons me

And from your heart His love is shed,

Till I lose sight of you and see

Jesus instead.

Adapted from a poem by Beatrice Clelland

Our first and most important Core Value is “the passion to know, love and become like Jesus.” And this is vital if we are to represent Him and bring His message of love to those around us.

The compassion and the love of Jesus are clear throughout the Gospels, drawing men and women, rich and poor, young and old, powerful and weak to Him.

And this is the love that His Spirit is working in us to draw others to Him through us.

A.Friendships built on genuine love (Philippians 1:6‐8)

See how Paul expresses his relationships with his friends in Philippi in Philippians 1: I have you in my heart…God can testify how I long for you all with the affection of Christ. Such friendships of love are the best possible basis for reaching and discipling those around us.

B.Deep, personal involvement in the lives of those you disciple (1 Thessalonians 2:7,11‐12)

Such loving friendships also draw us into deep personal involvement in the lives of people. Paul expresses this in terms of the deeply committed caring relationship of a mother and a father for their children.

So in summary:

 The power of prayer

 The power of God’s Word

 The power of example

 The power of love

Notice that in this context Paul began with the proclaiming of the Word. Relationships of love and the commitment to pray for the Thessalonians believers came as they responded to God’s Word. But in different contexts, we might begin with the relationships and with prayer and move toward sharing God’s Word. The order in which we use these spiritual weapons will vary from one context to another, but we should be consciously using all these spiritual means as we seek to advance the Gospel with the Spirit’s power.

Mike Treneer – Message 2

AP Men’s Next Generation Leader’s Retreat

16‐19 July 2010, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Leadership For The Advance Of The Gospel

Advancing The Gospel With Vision

1 Thessalonians 2:6 ‐ 3:13

I.Introduction

A.Power without vision

As we looked at the beginning of chapter 1 and 2, we thought about the Gospel first coming to Thessalonica. We thought about advancing the Gospel with power. Power is important and we talked about the Holy Spirit being unleashed in our ministry. But power needs with it vision to be effective. The rhinoceros is known for being immensely powerful but having poor vision. As a result, they can end up charging trees and other such things. We don’t want to be like the rhinoceros―just focused on the power of God. We also need the vision of God―a sense of purpose and direction.

A friend of mine, used to use this illustration. Imagine yourself in a small seaside town, a bay, and you’re standing, watching, and into the bay comes a speedboat. Can you imagine the boat coming in, roaring around? Everybody is looking at the speedboat―the noise, the excitement, the speedboat zips around. There’s lots of waves and splash, and then five minutes later the speedboat pulls out of the bay. And five minutes after that everything is back to normal. No change. Then you look up and on the hillside is a farmer planting seed. No one’s been noticing the farmer, but six months later there’s a harvest. As we think about our ministry, we have to ask ourselves the question, Are we going to be speedboat people―lots of excitement, lots of noise, lots of energy, but no lasting change―or are we going to be farmers?

B.Apple‐seed illustration

When people ask me about our vision, what do we do as Navigators, I like to use the illustration of the seeds in an apple. How many seeds are there in an apple? And how many apples are there in a seed? These two questions illustrate two different ways of thinking about the advance of the Gospel.

 How many seeds in an apple? How many people in the group? How many people in the ministry? How many people came to the meeting? How many people in the church? How many people came to Christ?

 How many apples in the seed? Well, it depends on what happens to the seed! In most seeds there are no apples because they end up in the trash. But if one seed is taken, planted, nurtured, and it grows to maturity as an apple tree, there could be hundreds, even thousands of apples from that one seed. And if some of the seeds from some of those apples are taken, and similarly cared for, planted, and nurtured, there could be millions of apples from a single seed. But it depends on what happens to the seed.

One approach focuses on immediate, visible numbers, immediate visible success. The other focuses on the potential of each person brought to their full maturity and fruitfulness in Christ. I like to say that’s our Navigator ministry. It’s about what happens to the seed. We’re not about how many seeds are in the apple? We’re about the potential of individual seed and about helping seeds to grow to maturity so they become apple trees.

II.Long‐Term Vision For Our Fruit

In this letter we see that Paul had this vision. He saw the potential of the lives of these men and women in Thessalonica. He was committed to nurturing the seed he had planted, to see “apple trees” bearing fruit for years to come.

A.Paul had a long‐term concern for their well being and a long‐term vision for their lives

Look how Paul expresses this commitment:

...our intense longing...made every effort to see you...[you are] our hope, our joy, [our] crown.... (1 Thessalonians 2:17‐19)

Paul had a commitment to the fruit of his ministry. We also need a long‐term vision for the fruit of our ministry. I think if we were Timothy watching how Paul worked, we would have caught this vision. We would have seen that Paul wasn’t just like a speedboat roaring into Thessalonica and disappearing―out of sight and out of mind. But Paul was more like a farmer, planting seed and committed to nurturing it, to watering it, to following up, to discipling, to see long‐term generational fruit. Paul had a long‐term concern for their well being and a long‐term vision for their lives.

When you read I Thessalonians 2:17‐19, who are the people who come to your mind? Who are you investing in with this long‐term perspective, with this vision for the potential of their lives?

Ultimately our Navigator ministry is going to grow and develop as we are using the spiritual weapons that God has put into our hands to invest in the lives of men and women with this long‐term vision for their growth to maturity and fruitfulness.

Night and day we pray earnestly...and supply what is lacking in your faith. (1 Thessalonians 3:10)

B.Vision for them to stand firm

For now we really live, since you are standing firm in the Lord.

(1 Thessalonians 3:8)

Paul’s vision was for them to stand firm. Paul’s life was given to seeing these people established in their faith, standing firm in the Lord.

C.Vision for their lives to overflow to others

But he wasn’t just praying for them to stand firm. He was also praying for their lives to overflow to others.

May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else.... (1 Thessalonians 3:12)

I think that’s a beautiful picture of Paul’s vision for these Thessalonian believers. He had a vision for them to stand firm. Then he had a vision for their lives to overflow to those around them.

D.If those he discipled did not continue through to maturity and fruitfulness, Paul felt his ministry was in vain.

This passage makes it quite clear that in Paul’s long‐term vision for the fruit of his ministry, if those he discipled didn’t continue to maturity and fruitfulness, Paul felt his ministry was in vain. Look at verse 5 here:

For this reason, when I could stand it no longer, I sent to find out about your faith. I was afraid that in some way the tempter might have tempted you and our efforts might have been useless. (1 Thessalonians 3:5)

When Paul went to a place like Thessalonica, we’ve seen what he did, but what was in his mind? What was he asking for? What was he praying for? What was he longing to see happen? He was longing to see people respond to the good news of Jesus in a way that was evident, that the joy in their lives was inspired and brought about by a work of the Holy Spirit. But Paul had a long‐term view. He was thinking long‐term. He was wanting to see apple trees growing up, that would produce apples into the future, and to see a community develop with people that would produce more seeds and more apples. Paul had a long‐term vision for the fruit of his ministry.

E.Paul’s ministry was focused on bringing others to:

1. Their full maturity and potential in Christ

2. The overflow of their lives to others

3. Spiritual generations

We saw in 1 Thessalonians 1:7‐8 how that was actually happening with the Thessalonians. Their lives were overflowing so effectively that Paul was able to say, “we don’t need to go to the places around you because they’re already hearing the good news. It’s sounding out from you to them.” That was part of Paul’s vision. That was part of his commitment. Paul was laying foundations for generations. He was looking for multiplying movements of the Gospel, for spiritual generations of laborers.

F.Paul was laying foundations for generations

You get a similar picture in Philippians. If you look at Philippians 2:14‐16. It is clear that Paul felt his ministry was for nothing if these people he invested in didn’t shine like stars in the place where God had put them, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. And if they weren’t holding out the Word of life so that there was an ongoing, generational ministry. Paul was laying the foundations for generations.

Judges 2:10. The book of Judges is one of the most distressing and discouraging books of the Bible. Four hundred years of apostasy. The tragic irony of the book of Judges is that it follows the book of Joshua, which is a book of victory. There’s this tremendous period of victory in the experience of the people of God, followed by this tremendous, devastating, and discouraging defeat. What happens? Why? Have you ever asked yourself that question?

This is what the writer of Judges says. Judges 2, verses 8‐10: Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of a hundred and ten. So he had a good run. You can’t blame it on his lack of endurance. 9And they buried him in the land of his inheritance, at Timnath Heres in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. And then it says this: After that whole generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation grew up, who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. Staggering! How on earth did that happen? Joshua’s generation, was engaged with occupying the land, and the power of God was at work through them in staggering ways! But somehow they lost the long‐term vision. They didn’t lead with a generational vision. Power without vision! They failed to invest in the next generation. It was not a failure of power. It was a failure of vision.

“We are always one generation away from extinction.” Joshua and his generation who had experienced all the mighty working of God failed to pass the baton to the next generation. They ran a good race but they failed to pass the baton. Did you watch the Olympics? The Jamaican women’s sprint relay team included the three fastest women in the 100 meters final and the winner of the 200 meters. But they failed to win the relay not because they didn’t run well but because they didn’t pass the baton. We also could run awesome races and fail to pass the baton.

Can you feel and see the tension in Paul? The passion in Paul to make sure the baton is passed? I’m not going to give up until I see that the baton is passed, that you’ve got the baton, and that you’re going to pass it on. That’s what it takes to lay the foundations for generations. And we must keep that clear in our head.

I’ve watched missionary families pay a huge price to be somewhere―the struggle, the life and challenges, trying to do ministry here and there―but fail to leave a foundational generation. Then the missionaries leave and it’s like the speedboat. Five minutes later, everything is back to normal. We need to learn from Paul his passion, his vision.

III.Our Navigator Calling

Wherever we are ministering―whether we’re simply thinking of the ministry within our own home and family with our own kids, whether we’re thinking about the friends that we’re reaching out to at the moment with the Gospel in our own natural networks, whether we’re thinking about the people next door that we’re thinking trying to reach, or whether we’re in a different culture where God has sent us to plant and lay the foundations of The Navigator ministry―as Navigators, we’re always consciously laying foundations for generations. We’re believing God for foundational people who will go on and grow to maturity and, like that apple seed, grow to become an apple tree. We’re caring for and nurturing people, discipling them, committed to people long‐term to see that growth to maturity. Because our Calling is “to advance the Gospel of Jesus and His kingdom into the nations through spiritual generations of laborers”. So we’re always seeing these people that we’re investing in as a foundation for future generations.

IV.Our Navigator Vision

That is the key to seeing our vision realized:

To see a vital movement of the Gospel...workers for the Kingdom next door to everywhere

V.Expressions of Paul’s Vision

How did Paul give expression‎ to this long‐term vision, this passion to see people grow to maturity to see spiritual generations, this commitment to lay the foundations for generations?

A.Personal involvement and care

I think the first thing I see is his personal involvement and care. If you want that seed to grow into an apple tree, you’d better care for it. You’d better make sure it’s well planted; you’d better nurture it; you’d better water it. And you can see in these passages we are looking at, in chapter two and three, that individual care. Paul uses this illustration of parenting.

We were gentle among you, like a mother caring for her little children...you know that we dealt with each of you as a father with his own children.... (1 Thessalonians 2:7, 11‐12)

For you know that we dealt with each of you as a father deals with his own children, 12encouraging, comforting and urging you to live lives worthy of God, who calls you into his kingdom and glory.

Our daughter Anna has just given birth to a second little girl. She knows that it takes focused attention to nurture these young lives. The day that she brought little Isabelle home from the hospital, she and Matt noticed Isabelle had stopped breathing and that she was turning blue. They quickly resuscitated her and took her to the hospital. They were told it was mucus still in the baby’s lungs from the birth. They could have lost her! They stayed up watching her 24 hrs a day for the next two days until the danger was passed. That is the commitment of parenting. Their other daughter, Claire, is two―old enough to get into lots of mischief, very adventurous, very quick on her feet, but not yet able to fully understand instructions. So one of Anna’s big prayers for herself as a mother, is that in caring for her new little baby, she doesn’t lose her focus on what happens to Claire. I had friends in Nairobi who went walking in a park with their two little girls and lost one of the girls. And it was 24 hours before they found her. Can you imagine what they went through?

The illustration that Paul uses is a powerful one. You cannot afford to lose focus. Paul was committed to caring for these believers. He was committed to their growth to maturity in a way that led him to focus as parents with a child.

1. Each person is unique, special (Ephesians 2:10)

Ephesians 2:10 is one of my motivating Scriptures as I think about helping people.

We look at someone and we see in them the potential. One of the great joys of our work is to focus in that kind of way. To look at a person and see the potential of their lives and imagine what God has formed them to be and to give myself, to give my energy to helping that person grow to their full potential. To unlock in them―through the spiritual means God has given us, through the power of prayer and through friendships characterized by love, and through my life‐on‐life investment with them, and through the Word of God―to see the person’s life and potential flourish. So that they become all that God wants them to be.

2. The dignity and value of every person

I love our Value Statement: “The dignity and value of every person.” The dignity and worth of every person. We believe in that! Part of what we see with Paul here is an expression‎ of that commitment to care individually.

B.Strengthening and encouraging

We sent...to strengthen and encourage you in your faith. (1 Thessalonians 3:2)

1. Life is more difficult than we expect

It’s easy to talk about spiritual generations of laborers. But we all know, life is difficult. I don’t know if you noticed how much Paul says about persecution in this passage. At the beginning of Chapter 2 Paul describes the persecution they experienced in Philippi, and he talks about what happened to them when they got to Thessalonica. Then he talks, at the end of Chapter 2, about the Thessalonians entering into this aspect of the heritage of the people of God, our calling to suffering.

Life is more difficult than we expect. It’s more difficult for us. My life, as a follower of Christ, has been much more difficult than I anticipated as a young man at university. And I haven’t had a particularly tough life, I don’t think. But the temptations to give up, the discouragement, the trials, the problems, the pressures, the doubts, the internal struggles, struggles with failure and sin, my own disappointment in myself, my own disappointment with others around me. When we talk about calling people to enter the kingdom of God and calling people to become laborers, workers for the kingdom, we’re calling people to do something very, very difficult.

Remember Jesus, in the Upper Room, with those first disciples telling them, “in this world you will have trouble.”

So, to call people to be laborers for Christ, to help people to become workers for the kingdom and then not to be committed support them in all the difficulties that entails, that’s terrible. It just indicates that we have no grasp or conception of how difficult it is to be a laborer. And if we want to see spiritual generations of laborers, somehow, this commitment to engage with people with a long‐term view and to walk with people and to stick with people―we’ve got to be committed to that.

2. Laborers need encouragement all their lives

“Laborers need encouragement all their lives,” as Lorne Sanny used to say. And that’s certainly been my experience. I certainly could not do what I am doing without the support and commitment of people who strengthen and encourage me.

C.Inquiring about their faith

...I sent to find out about your faith. (1 Thessalonians 3:5)

One of the ways in which Paul demonstrated his commitment to them was to inquire about their faith. I Thessalonians 3 verse 5: For this reason, when I could stand it no longer, I sent to find out about your faith. I was afraid that in some way the tempter might have tempted you....

We have an enemy and we need the support of friends who will check up on us; and we need to be such friends, who take initiative to ask the hard questions, to ask how people are doing. We need to have a commitment to one another’s spiritual well being. We are in a ministry that believes in helping people grow to their full potential. We’re in a ministry that believes in people being laborers in the harvest. And we know that’s tough. Do we care for one another? Are we committed to asking one another, “how are you really doing”?―not in an overbearing, interrogating, legalistic, nasty kind of way. You don’t sense any of that with Paul. It was coming out of a deep, genuine, passionate love for these people to be their best.

Be sure you know the condition of your flocks. (Proverbs 27:23)

May God help us to be people who care enough to ask. Proverbs 27:23, talking about farming again, this time about flocks and herds, which Jesus loved to talk about. Flocks of sheep. Do you remember? Be sure you know the condition of your flocks..... It’s what Paul was living out here. Paul didn’t just minister to the people, go away, and hope for the best.

D.Developing fellow workers

...Timothy, who is our brother and God’s fellow worker in spreading the Gospel of Christ.... (1 Thessalonians 3:2)

1. Multiply our efforts by developing fellow workers

Perhaps as you reflect on what I’m saying here you think―“Mike, if God blesses our ministry, how on earth am we going to keep up? I’m doing a campus ministry and God is blessing me, and I’ve got 100 students in Bible study. Last year 20 graduated and we’re reaching 20 more freshmen this year. And the 20 who have graduated have gone where their jobs have carried them. How am I supposed to keep up with them all?”

I’m saying to you, if you are committed to a ministry that believes in spiritual generations, then you can’t live with “out of sight, out of mind.” You’ve got a commitment to those people. You’ve called them to be laborers in the harvest and you can’t just send them out there to sink or swim?

And you say, “Mike, how can I do that? There are too many!”

You know, we faced that dilemma in the pioneering of the work in Nigeria. God gave us a campus ministry in Zaria. We had some great young men and women that God gave us as a result of prayer, and getting people in the Scriptures, and living among them, and loving them. And then the first group graduated. Bernie and Jo Dodd and Chris and I were praying that God would give us foundational people, people who would be the foundation of generations. And here this group of maybe 15 or 20 people we’d been ministering to had been scattered. They literally scattered all over Nigeria―National Youth Service Corps, all Nigerian graduates were posted to rural communities for a period of one year after graduation.

We decided we had to stay in touch with these people. So we agreed that Bernie would stay ministering on the campus, and I would give the majority of my time traveling to these grads. Because we were counting on them to be foundational people. Because we believed in what God was going to do through their lives. And we knew that some of the biggest, toughest decisions of their lives would be made in the next year or two.

This was not an easy decision. It was costly. It required me being very mobile, spending a lot of time on Nigerian public transport, going to bus parks, trying to find a way to rural communities I’d never been to before. Sometimes getting there―because there were no telephones, no letters―and discovering that the person I’d gone to visit had gone away for the weekend. And I ended up spending time with their friends, sharing Christ with their friends, telling them, “Tell, Clem, when he gets back, about what we talked about.”

But do I regret investing that time and effort and energy in travelling to stay in touch? No. Because those men and women have become the foundations of many generations that have multiplied out all over Nigeria and all over Africa. But you say, how can you sustain that? What about the next group of graduates...and the next group of graduates... and the next group? What about sustaining the ministry at the campus at Zaria?

Well the only way, if this ministry is going to grow, is to do exactly what Paul did. Paul didn’t do this all on his own. You notice here he wasn’t able to go to Thessalonica. He was ministering in Athens and Corinth. So what did he do? How did he ensure this ministry continued to the Thessalonians? Well, he sent Timothy. We sent Timothy, who is our brother and God's fellow worker... (1 Thessalonians 2:3).

Where did Timothy come from? How did Timothy suddenly appear? How did he get into this? Well, we know the answer, because Luke tells us in the first few verses of Acts 16 how Paul met Timothy. He was part of the fruit of Paul’s ministry in Lystra, and Paul recruited Timothy to join him and to engage with him in Thessalonica. And Paul entrusted the follow through with the Thessalonians to Timothy.

The only way we’re going to keep pace with a growing, thriving ministry―if God is going to bless our ministry in the way we anticipate and are praying for―is to call others to join us as fellow workers. It’s a crucial part of our generational vision. And you and I cannot be shy about asking people to join us in this ministry.

I remember wrestling with this in the early part of the work in Nigeria, probably about five or six years in, when I began to talk with some of that foundation group. I remember conversations with people like Udobong Idemetor and Chris Oliobi. These were men who had huge career opportunities ahead of them. In some cases, they were the first people from their families to get an education. I remember wrestling with this. Can I really ask them to join us in this ministry? To pay the price that I’m paying? To get on the road and travel like this and be committed to ministering to their brothers and sisters in this way? And then I thought, can I afford not to, if I really believe in the advance of the Gospel?

I remember reading the story about Hudson Taylor and the planting of the Gospel in inland China. On his first furlough back to England, having seen the opportunities and the needs, he wrestled with whether he could call other people to join him. He had some premonition of what might be involved. One night Hudson paced up and down on a beach, wrestling with whether he could call other people to join him. He decided that if he really believed the Gospel that spoke about Jesus laying down his life by going to the Cross, then he could not NOT call people to join him. And many of the men and women who went back with Hudson Taylor to China did, in fact, give their lives in the Boxer Uprising in inland China.

As the ministry in Nigeria began to grow and the graduates began to scatter and multiply, the first place I turned to recruit fellow workers was to two young men I had discipled earlier in the UK. Clive Jeddere‐Fisher and James Sherwood. I asked them to pray about joining me to form a mobile team to follow the fruit of our ministry. Both said yes. Over the next 15 years these two men and their wives labored fruitfully alongside me in Nigeria and in Africa, helping scores of young men and women grow to maturity and fruitfulness. In 1990 Clive and his wife Else and one of their three children were killed in a car accident as they were pioneering the ministry in Tanzania. A couple of years later, James and his wife Barbara were attacked by Muslim extremists in the northern Nigerian town of Kaduna. James was shot in the face and Barbara was raped. They survived the ordeal and are still ministering in Africa, though James is terribly disfigured. Was I wrong to call these couples to minister with me?

We don’t know what happened to Timothy, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he ended up giving his life. Certainly, he gave his life in his living, to the advance of the Gospel.

Brothers, we cannot be shy about multiplying our efforts by calling others to colabor with us. We must look for the Timothys and Tituses, and the Epaphrases and the Tychicuses. We must multiply our efforts by calling people to this incredibly high Calling of advancing the Gospel of Christ and His Kingdom into the nations through spiritual generations of laborers living and discipling among the lost.

SUMMARY

Our Calling calls us to minister with a generational vision, with a long‐term view, to make sure that we pass the baton well, to lay the foundations for generations. So we must make sure that we’re investing in people, that we’re focusing on helping people to grow to full maturity, that we’re engaged with them over the long‐term, and that we’re calling some to be fellow workers with us. May God help us to be faithful to this Calling...to minister not just with power but also with vision.

Mike Treneer – Message 3

AP Men’s Next Generation Leader’s Retreat

16‐19 July 2010, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Leadership For The Advance Of The Gospel

Advancing The Gospel By Discipling In Depth

1 Thessalonians 4:1 – 5:11

I. Introduction

Our Navigator Calling is “to advance the Gospel of Jesus and His Kingdom into the nations through spiritual generations of laborers living and discipling among the lost.” That word “discipling” is a very important word. It reminds us of Matthew 28:18‐20 and the Great Commission that Jesus gave to His first disciples: Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.

Teaching is a vital part of discipling. In fact, older English translations of Matthew 28:18 translate it simply, Go therefore and teach all nations.... So as we look at this teaching part of Paul’s letter, we are looking at Advancing the Gospel by Discipling.

A.Instruct and urge

Finally brothers, we instructed you how to live in order to please God, as in fact you are living. Now we ask and urge you in the Lord Jesus to do this more and more. For you know what instructions we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus.

1 Thessalonians 4:1‐2 NIV

Two words in this passage help us think about Paul’s discipling: instruct (teach) and urge (encourage, exhort). Discipling people involves both instructing or teaching people the great truths of the Gospel. It also involves urging them, encouraging them to live in the light of these truths.

B.Disciple in depth

Paul didn’t leave the discipling of the Thessalonians and their understanding of the faith to chance. He intentionally discipled and he discipled people in depth. He was consciously laying strong, deep foundations in the faith of these foundational people.

This passage naturally divides into three sections as you look at the content.

 Urge to godly living 1 Thessalonians 4:3‐12

 Instruct for understanding1 Thessalonians 4:13‐5:5

 Urge to godly living 1 Thessalonians 5:6‐11

II. Disciple: Urge To Godly Living

...Now we ask you and urge you in the Lord Jesus.... (1 Thessalonians 4:1)

Yet we urge you, brothers.... (1 Thessalonians 4:10)

Discipling involves urging people to godly living...urging people to put into practice what they know.

A.The use of the words parakaleo, parakleesis and parakleetos in the New Testament

The word, translated “urge” here is the Greek word parakaleo, often also translated encourage or exhort. Parakaleo, in a literal sense in Greek, is of someone being called alongside: kaleo – to call and para – alongside. “To call alongside” or “to call from alongside.” It’s the idea of the alongsider, the person who walks alongside you, encourages you, exhorts you, and is there to help you.

I think one of the best pictures of this is Jesus in Luke 24. The two disciples were discouraged and Luke says, Jesus himself drew near and went with them (Luke 24:15). He listened to them. He said, What’s this discussion that you are having together, looking sad? They said to Him, Are you a late stranger to Jerusalem who doesn’t know the things that have been going on there in these days? He said, What things? And He drew them out with his questions. He’s there alongside them, giving them the gift of His presence, walking with them. Then just at the right time, He opens the Scriptures to them: And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he explained to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself. Later as they recalled the conversation they said, Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures? (Luke 24:32)

This idea of being alongside people is the idea in this word parakaleo and the words derived from it. So parakaleo to encourage, parakleesis encouragement, what encouragers give. And parakleetos is the encourager. We’ll look at some different ways in which they’re used to get a flavor of what they mean.

 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor [parakleetos] to be with you forever― (John 14:16)

 Then they returned to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, strengthening the disciples and encouraging [parakaleo] them to remain true to the faith.... (Acts 14:21‐22)

 He travelled through that area, speaking many words of encouragement [parakleesis] to the people, and finally arrived in Greece…. (Acts 20:2)

 But God, who comforts the downcast, comforted us by the coming of Titus. (2 Corinthians 7:6)

 Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices.... (Romans 12:1)

 Just before dawn Paul urged them all to eat. “For the last fourteen days,” he said, “you have been in constant suspense and have gone without food―you haven't eaten anything. Now I urge you to take some food. You need it to survive....” (Acts 27:3334)

B.The ministry of encouragement

1. Discipling includes this ministry of encouragement. To walk alongside someone in such a way as to counsel, encourage, comfort, exhort, and urge so that they find the courage to persevere.

2. “Labourers need encouragement all their lives.” (Lorne Sanny)

3. ...Jonathan went to David at Horesh and helped him find strength in God. (1 Samuel 23:16)

David was fleeing from Saul. He was at a low point in his life. Jonathan, Saul’s son, at great risk to his own life, went to David at Horesh and helped him find strength in God. He put courage into David, to strengthen him. May God make us Jonathans. How can you be a Jonathan to people around you?

4. Nine times Paul uses this alongsider word (parakaleo) to describe the discipling of the Thessalonians: 1 Thessalonians 2:3,12; 3:2,7; 4:1,10,18; 5:11,14

For you know that we dealt with each of you as a father deals with his own children, encouraging, comforting and urging you to live lives worthy of God, who calls you into his kingdom and glory. (1 Thessalonians 2:11‐12)

C.Paul urges them to:

1. Holy lives―family life (1 Thessalonians 4:3‐8)

The first aspect of their lives in which Paul is urging them is sexual purity. You might think of it as the holy life or family life.

We’re talking about laying the foundations of generations. How many ministries have been destroyed from within because of moral failure, because of failure in marriage, because of people giving into sexual temptation? I can think of Navigator ministries that have been blown apart because of failure in this area.

This is not an area we can afford to neglect as we disciple people. But one of the challenges that we have in discipling people is to walk alongside them in this part of their lives. What are the temptations they face? How can we help them? How can we remind people of what’s at stake? Where can we be of practical encouragement and help? I’m deeply thankful that when I first came around The Navigators, the people who discipled me early on, especially my friend George, were willing to walk alongside me in this area of my life. To ask the hard questions, to get involved, to give me practical ideas, to open up his own life with me in this area.

2. Loving lives―community life (1 Thessalonians 4:9‐10)

The second big area it hits on is the relational dynamic―their relationships, their love for one another. You might call it community life.

Another thing that destroys ministries is relational conflict. I’ve seen places where we’ve laid the foundations, local people have inherited the ministry, things are moving along, they’re gifted people, and then things begin to fall apart because of relational failure. Because people haven’t learned to love one another. So Paul says, we’ve talked about this. You’re learning, you’re doing great, but I am not going to take this for granted. I am urging you more and more. I’m going to keep reminding you of this commitment. I’m going to keep walking alongside you in this area.

3. Productive lives―working life (1 Thessalonians 4:11‐12)

Then the third big area he touches on is their work: working with their hands, not being dependent on others, living productive lives, winning respect from people by the way they work. It’s very practical, and it’s very important.

When I was ministering in the UK, it never occurred to me to think of this as an aspect of discipling people. But when we began ministering in Africa, I saw that for most young people in Africa, the biggest challenge they face is how to live productively in a way that’s honest and with integrity and that wins people’s respect. This is a huge issue in most parts of the world. Walking alongside people in their working lives and helping them figure out what it looks like to be a follower of Jesus in that context is a vital part of Paul’s understanding of discipling. Almost all his letters address this issue in some way. See for example 2 Thessalonians 3:6‐10 and Acts 20:34‐35.

You yourselves know that these hands of mine ministered to my own needs and those of my companions, he says. We showed you that by such toiling, one should help the weak, remembering the words of the Lord Jesus... “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

Paul modeled living productively and giving, because he knew how important this was in the discipling process. Ultimately, the Gospel is not going to go forward unless people live productive lives, winning the respect of outsiders and giving to advance the Gospel. This is a critical part of our discipling, just as it was for Paul.

So discipling in depth involves urging people to live godly lives in these practical aspects of life.

But discipling also involves:

III. Disciple: Instruct For Depth Of Understanding

Finally, brothers , we instructed you how to live...you know what instructions we gave you.... (1 Thessalonians 4:1‐2)

Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant.... (1 Thessalonians 4:13)

In 1 Thessalonians 4:1‐2, Paul talks about instructing. He talks about the instructions we gave you. And chapter 4:13, Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant.... Instruction addresses ignorance, it addresses understanding, it addresses what we know, and what we deeply believe about the world in which we live and about ourselves and about God. So we need to instruct those we disciple for depth of understanding.

A.Paul teaches them about:

1. The second coming of Jesus

I Thessalonians 4:13‐5:10, Paul teaches them about the second coming of Jesus. But he is not just giving them facts to increase their knowledge―though that’s part of it. But the purpose behind Paul’s teaching is assurance of salvation and the implications for the way we live.

Notice the facts that Paul teaches them in this passage.

 Jesus Himself will come back from heaven.

 It will happen suddenly when people don’t expect it.

 There’s going to be a loud command. There’s going to be a voice of the archangel. You’re not going to be able to miss this. The trumpet call of God.

 When He comes, He’s going to bring with Him those who have already fallen asleep.

 The dead are those who have fallen asleep. Note Jesus’ comment about Lazarus in John 11, Lazarus has fallen asleep and about the little girl in Mark 5, The child is not dead but asleep. To Jesus, dying for believers is falling asleep.

B.Paul teaches them with a purpose:

1. Assurance of salvation

What are some of the things you observe here about assurance? How does Paul teach assurance of salvation in this passage?

 We’ll be with the Lord forever.

 He’s telling them not to grieve like the rest of men who have no hope.

 We have hope because we know that Jesus died and rose again.

 We are sons of the light, we belong to the day.

 God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.

2. The implications for the way we live

What about implications for the way we live?

 Be ready, be alert.

 Don’t grieve like people who have no hope.

 Be self‐controlled.

 Put on faith and love as a breastplate. Let’s put on the hope of salvation as a helmet to protect our heads.

 Encourage one another.

Paul roots his teaching in the great truths of the faith. He roots it in Jesus, in the second coming of Jesus, and the death and resurrection of Jesus. Then he explains what it all means for their assurance of salvation. Then he helps them see the implications for the way we live. It’s a great illustration of discipling people by teaching, by instructing.

C.Paul teaches them about assurance of salvation:

1. The implications of the Gospel for our relationship with God and our eternal destiny

So, Paul’s teaching them about assurance of salvation, the implications of the Gospel for our relationship with God and our eternal destiny.

2. The implications for our identity (self understanding) and for the way we live

You are not sons of the darkness, you are sons of the light.

3. Paul’s letters: Romans and Ephesians

You know, Paul’s letters are full of this kind of teaching. Particularly, Romans and Ephesians are one long exposition of the doctrine of the assurance of salvation and exploring the implications for the way we live. You can go to Ephesians 1 and teach assurance of salvation out of Ephesians 1, 2 and 3 and then follow through into 4, 5, and 6 in terms of the implications. You can do the same in Romans.

I remember one time, I’d been preaching at Nairobi Baptist Church when we were living in Kenya. During Sunday lunch after the service, I had a phone call from a young woman who was so depressed and desperate she had decided to take her own life. But she had come to hear me speak and wanted to talk to me about what I’d said. She wouldn’t give me her name. She didn’t want to meet Chris or me. She just wanted to talk on the phone before she killed herself. I asked her why she was thinking of taking this drastic step. And she poured out this terrible, terrible story of abuse and mess. She’d cheated in her exams at college, but her lecturer allowed her to pass them because she slept with him. It was a whole big mess. She just felt her life was a complete disaster and there was no future. She was very fearful.

I was praying as I was listening to all this stuff and thinking, what can I do, Lord? I asked her if she had a Bible. Yes she had a Bible. And I said, would you just promise me two things: Before you do anything, would you read the last part of Romans 8 and would you read the first part of Ephesians 1? And then I prayed with her over the phone. Two days later she phoned me back. She wanted to know how could she be sure that these things that Paul wrote really applied to her? How could that really be true, that God loved her and that God cared about her? And so we talked through the Gospel a bit more.

Then I asked her to read Psalm 139 and phone me back in a few days. We went on like this for several weeks. The phone calls became less frequent. She still wouldn’t tell me anything about herself, wouldn’t tell me her name, wouldn’t meet with us. We talked through different things about her life. She was looking for a job. She felt so guilty about having graduated the way she had and a whole lot of other things. I just kept pointing her to assurance passages, passages that teach assurance of salvation. And this went on for about 18 months. Every now and then I would get a phone call. It finally ended up with her telling me she’d got a job in another city. By then things were going quite well for her. She was having regular quiet times, she had got an apartment with a Christian roommate, and was obviously growing spiritually.

After that the phone calls stopped for a while. Then one day, about 2‐1/2 years later, she phoned to tell me how she was doing and she said, “Oh, by the way, my name is Beth.” After that I didn’t hear from her again until the last Sunday before we finally left Nairobi. I was speaking at Nairobi Baptist church, and I was at the door shaking hands with people after the service. A young woman came up and shook my hand and said, “I’m Beth.”

The power of God’s Word. If we can help people to find assurance of their relationship with God in his Word, it’s a huge foundation stone in their lives. It is a major part of discipling people to cope with the challenges of life. Teaching people the Gospel, the Good News, and explaining it to them in terms of the implications for them and their eternal future, their self understanding and the implications for the way they live and the choices they make.

I’ve noticed over my lifetime that people who really have assurance of salvation, who have a deep understanding of the Gospel, God’s love expressed in the death and resurrection of Jesus and have hope based on the Gospel, are people whose foundations are strong and who generally make good choices. Even if they fail, as we all do at times, they are generally able to pick themselves up, appropriate grace and move on and put things right.

Think of it as the teaching of the Gospel― not just a simplified or reduced Gospel―but the Gospel in its fullness. Certainly the Gospel can be simplified. It can be understood by a child, but the Gospel is not simple. Someone has said that the Gospel is like a pool that a child can paddle in with safety and an ocean that a theologian can drown in with ease. We need to be committed to helping people understand the simplicity of the Gospel but also committed to help people explore the depths of the Gospel.

There was a day in my life when I first understood the Gospel. It was a conversation one evening and someone opened the Bible and explained the Gospel to me, using the Bridge to Life illustration. It was as though a light went on for me. Suddenly I understood God’s grace in a way that enabled me and allowed me and motivated me to respond and to accept Christ, to appropriate His gift of salvation. But did I understand the Gospel fully? No. Do I understand the Gospel now fully? No. There are still things that I’m learning and understanding about the Gospel and that will be a life‐long journey.

Discipling is helping people unpack the Gospel through life, helping people to understand the Gospel in all its depth and breadth and implications, so that they can enter into all the fullness of who we are and the hope we have in Jesus. That’s what Paul is doing in Romans. That’s what he’s doing in Ephesians. That’s what he’s doing here in 1 Thessalonians as he teaches them about assurance of salvation and the second coming of Jesus.

...we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. (1 Thessalonians 4:14)

...we will be with the Lord forever. (1 Thessalonians 4:17)

You are all sons of the light.... (1 Thessalonians 5:5)

D.Paul roots his teaching in:

1. The teaching of Jesus―by the authority of the Lord Jesus (1 Thessalonians 4:2) …according to the Lord’s own word.... (1 Thessalonians 4:15)

Notice that Paul roots his teaching in the teachings of Jesus. And we want to root our teaching in the teaching of Jesus in the Bible. We want to teach the Bible to people. That’s been an historic strength of The Navigators. We want to help people to be deep in the Bible. We need to make sure that our disciples are Bible‐literate, that they know the Bible, that they know their way around this book, know what Jesus taught and said, that they read the Bible, study the Bible, memorize important passages from the Bible.

2. The death and resurrection of Jesus―We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so… (1 Thessalonians 4:14)

Paul is teaching the death and resurrection of Jesus. It’s interesting to just go through the letter and see how many times Paul mentions Jesus’ death, Jesus’ resurrection, and Jesus’ second coming. We want to make sure that our teaching is not some sort of self‐help manual―like a lot of Christian books today. We want to root people’s self understanding, their discipleship, and their convictions in the facts of the Gospel, in the life and teaching of Jesus, in the death of Jesus, in the resurrection of Jesus, in the second coming of Jesus.

3. The second coming of Jesus―For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven....(1 Thessalonians 4:16)

E.Paul teaches implications for the way we live:

1. So then…let us be alert and self controlled. (1 Thessalonians 5:6)

2. ...putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. (1 Thessalonians 5:8)

3. He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with Him. (1 Thessalonians 5:10)

F.Discipling is teaching

1. Jesus taught! (Mark 10:1)

So, discipling is teaching. Now we saw yesterday that discipling is alongsiding people, encourage, walking with them. But discipling is also teaching. These two things belong together. Jesus taught. You cannot miss that as you read through the Gospels. Whatever else Jesus did, He taught, He taught―every opportunity He had. Mark 10:1 Jesus then left that place and went into the region of Judea and across the Jordan. Again crowds of people came to him, and as was his custom, he taught them.

Jesus was always teaching. He never missed an opportunity. We’re disciplers. We also should never miss an opportunity to teach the truth of Scripture, to explain, to take people further in their understanding.

2. All of Paul’s letters, even the most personal, have significant teaching

3. Don’t confuse “teaching” with a particular method

Teach the Bible. Be prepared in season and out of season, correct, rebuke and encourage―with great patience and careful instruction. 3 For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 4 They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. (2 Timothy 4:3‐4, NIV)

But don’t confuse teaching with a particular method. I think that’s one of the blocks we face. The church, over the centuries, has developed a pattern of teaching from pulpits and lining people up in rows to listen. That has it’s place. But I don’t think that’s the most effective form of teaching. I think there are many ways of getting people into the Bible. Small groups can be very effective, where people study the Scripture, and discuss it together, and talk about how it applies to life.

And we know the power of meeting one‐to‐one to study and memorize the Bible and discuss how to live it out.

G.Jesus’ example―use variety

1. Different contexts

Jesus is a tremendous teacher. If you look at His earthly ministry, you see the variety of Jesus’ teaching. Different contexts.

2. Different styles

You see Jesus debating with the Pharisees and scribes in Jerusalem in a passage like John 8. And then you see Jesus teaching the crowds in Galilee in a passage like Matthew 13.

3. Life‐based

You notice that Jesus’ teaching was life‐based. It wasn’t abstract, class‐room theology. He was engaging with people in their life context.

4. Attractive, kind

Teaching must be attractive and kind. I noticed this in 2 Timothy recently. In 2 Timothy 2:15, Paul talks about rightly handling the word of truth. Then he goes on to say, And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. 25Those who oppose him he must gently instruct.... (2 Timothy 2:24‐25)

Sometimes the people who are most concerned about rightly handling the Word of truth are the least kind, most argumentative people. But rightly handling the Word of truth involves being kind and patient and thoughtful.

5. Large groups, small groups, individuals

We see Jesus engaging with all these different groupings.

H.Turn your wisdom into teaching (Ecclesiastes 12:9‐12):

Ecclesiastes was a great teacher. Ecclesiastes 12:9: Not only was the Teacher wise, but also he imparted knowledge to the people. He pondered and searched out and set in order many proverbs.

In our lives there is a huge amount of life experience and wisdom. But you can be a wise person and be totally unable to communicate that wisdom to others. The genius of Ecclesiastes was that he was able to take his life’s wisdom and distill it and pass it on. He was able to impart it.

Discipling is about taking what you know, life’s wisdom and experience from your own walk with God, and distilling it in such a way that you can pass it on.

We need to identify our life’s lessons in such a way that we can pass them on.

1. Organize (vs. 9)

He pondered and searched out and set in order. He organized his thinking.

2. Eval‎uate (vs. 10)

And he eval‎uated...what were the best words? What was the best way to communicate this?

3. Clarify (vs. 11)

The words of the wise are like goads, their collected sayings like firmly embedded nail.... (Ecclesiastes 12:11 NIV) What do nails and goads have in common? They’re sharp. They have a point. Sometimes you can listen to people teaching and you’re not sure what the point was. Good teaching is sharp. Goads prick to action. Nails stick, they hold things in place. Good teaching should prick and stick. It should motivate and be memorable.

4. Simplify (vs. 12)

Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body. Don’t overcomplicate things. Simple memorable truths and good illustrations.

One of the reasons why the Bridge to Life and the Wheel Illustrations are so helpful to so many people is because they are simple, clear, and focused on the big important things. They are motivating, and they stick in the mind.

III. Laying Foundations For Life And Ministry

An illustration that helps me.

Discipling, laying the foundations for life and ministry. Six tiers:

• Convictions―out of our convictions comes our...

• Walk with God. Out of our walk with God comes our...

• Character. Those are the hidden foundations of our lives, that people don’t see. Then out of our character comes...

• Living life. Out of the way we live comes our...

• Gospel influence. Out of that comes the...

• Impact on the communities in which we live.

You can imagine what happens to people’s lives when those underground foundations are shallow and weak. As people go through life, living life becomes more demanding and more complicated. Sometimes people rise into leadership, they have great influence, but if the foundations are weak.... We all know about people’s lives cracking up, because those hidden foundations―the convictions, the walk with God, the character are just inadequate to bear the weight.

Another outline that I’ve found very helpful in discipling.

A.Tell them why

B.Show them how

C.Get them started

D.Keep them going

E.Encourage them to pass it on

F.Repetition is key!

Instructing: Tell them why and show them how.

Urging:Get them started, keep them going, and encourage them to pass it on.

There’s no point in urging people to do what you haven’t taught them to do or haven’t shown them how to do.

Discipling involves both these things: it involves urging people so they’re putting into practice what they’ve learn in their lives, walk alongside them to help them in that. And it involves instructing them for depth of understanding. And that’s exactly what we see Paul doing in this letter.

Mike Treneer – Message 4

AP Men’s Next Generation Leader’s Retreat

16‐19 July 2010, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Leadership For The Advance Of The Gospel

Advancing The Gospel Together In Dependence On God

1 Thessalonians 5:11 ‐ 28

I. Introduction

As we think together about how Paul understood and how he went about advancing the Gospel we have reflected on:

 Advancing the Gospel with power

 Advancing the Gospel with vision

 Advancing the Gospel by discipling

In this final part of his letter, notice how Paul points them to one another and how he points them to the Lord

A.Paul points them to one another

Therefore encourage one another and build each other up… (1 Thessalonians 5:11‐15)

B.Paul points them to the Lord

…The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it.... (1 Thessalonians 5:16‐28)

First:

II. Paul Points Them To One Another

Therefore encourage one another and build each other up… (1 Thessalonians 5:11‐15)

A.Paul deliberately points the Thessalonians to one another

Paul deliberately points the Thessalonians to one another. It’s a pattern in Paul’s ministry. People need community to flourish. We’re not designed to function on our own. Think of coals in a fire. What happens when you pull a coal out of the fire? It just dies. And that’s true of us as believers, we need one another to keep the fire of faith burning brightly.

I remember as a young Christian going through a very bad time in my spiritual growth. I was drifting away from the Lord, neglecting my spiritual life. I remember going to my friend George who was discipling me and telling him, “George, I’m going to pull out of the Bible study group. I feel like a hypocrite. If my faith was real, I would be doing better. I should be able to stand on my own spiritually.”

He took me to 1 Corinthians 12, which is the passage where Paul talks about the Body. We’re members of the Body. He said, “Mike, what would happen if you said to your finger, ‘Finger, you’ve got to prove you’re a real finger by standing on your own, I’m going to cut you off and see how you do as a lone finger, to prove you’re genuine”?

What would happen to your finger? It would just die and rot, because fingers are designed to be part of the body. So my friend George pointed out to me the error in my thinking. He said, “Mike, the reason you haven’t been doing well is because you’ve been away and you haven’t been in fellowship with other believers. You weren’t connected with others. You weren’t with friends who were supporting and encouraging and challenging you. The answer is not to pull away from the friends you have, but to commit more deeply and strongly to those supportive relationships.” Can you imagine the direction my life would have taken if George hadn’t discipled me in that area and pointed that out to me? As believers, we are designed to operate as part of a body in community. It’s critical to our spiritual health.

B.People need community to flourish

C.Jesus’ emphasis―love and serve one another (John 13‐17)

You think about Jesus teaching his disciples in that Upper Room as he prepared them for his departure John 13‐17. He knows the challenges ahead of them as he leaves them to be His representatives in the world. What are the big things He emphasizes with them? What’s the main thrust? It’s not strategy for ministry. It’s not leadership principles. Its their love for one another. A new commandment I give, that you love one another. That you love as I have loved you. The old commandment was what? That you love others as you love yourself. But Jesus raises the bar, gives us a new commandment. Love one another as I have loved you. Jesus was pointing them to one another. Jesus washed their feet and told them, I have given you an example that you should do as I have done to you, serving one another. Jesus knew that their commitment to one another was critical, absolutely critical, to their continuing, to their lives and their ability to advance the Gospel. They needed the teaching. They needed the assurances. They also needed one another. Jesus intentionally built a strong sense of community among his disciples.

 Build community

Build commitment to one another

How do we do that? Well the first thing is to….

 Model partnership

Paul, Silas and Timothy

All through this letter he writes “...we...our...”

Paul, Silas, and Timothy―To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace and peace to you. 2We always thank God for all of you, mentioning you in our prayers. 3We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. 4For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you, 5because our gospel came to you.... 1 Thessalonians 1:1‐5 (NIV).

In this letter, we see Paul not only urging and connecting the Thessalonians with one another, intentionally building community, but we see him modeling it with Paul and Silas and Timothy. This is all about modeling teamwork. When Paul addressed with the Thessalonians their relationships with one another, they’d already seen something. They’d seen a picture of what those commitments looked like in the relationship between Paul and Silas and Timothy.

I’ve seen situations in which we’ve tried to plant Navigator ministries in countries, but the pioneering team could not get on with one another. If they’re not demonstrating this kind of teamwork but each doing their own independent thing, they are not going to build a foundation generation with the necessary commitment to one another.

This applies to any ministry team. If we’re not modeling loving commitment and support for one another, then we’re not going to produce fruit that carries in it this seed of love and of community and of commitment to one another. We’re going to end up with disciples and laborers who are isolated from one another. We know enough at this point in our history as a Navigator movement, that lone laborers don’t make it. So model partnership. That’s what Paul and Silas and Timothy did.

And build community...commitment to one another.

III. Build Community Locally

A.Teach “one anothering” (1 Thessalonians 5:11)

See how Paul helps the Thessalonians in this. Verse 11: Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. I describe this as teaching “one‐anothering.” I think there are over 50 passages in the New Testament that use that phrase “one another”―serve one another in love, greet one another with a holy kiss, love one another, forgive one another, encourage one another, submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. Building community, first and foremost is about learning to “one‐another.” Living out those biblical “one‐anothers” is foundational. And people need to be taught, and they need to be reminded and encouraged.

A lot of what I do as I travel around the Navigator world, is to teach “one‐another‐ing.” We struggle with this because of our fallen humanity. So helping people to forgive one another, to serve and love one another, to be patient with one another, to be kind to one another … this is a significant Gospel issue. Whatever environment you’re in, thinking consciously about how you can live out these “one‐anothers” is very, very important.

B.Develop/appoint local leaders who: (1 Thessalonians 5:12)

1. Work hard among you

2. Are over you in the Lord

3. Who admonish you

Then the next thing he addresses is this issue of local leaders. Now we ask you, brothers, to respect those who work hard among you, who are over you in the Lord and who admonish you.

It’s quite clear as you read Paul’s letters and as you follow Paul’s journey through Acts, that one of the things Paul did in building local community and helping people to commit to one another, was that he appointed elders. Titus chapter 1, This is why I left you in Crete so that you may complete what is left unfinished and appoint elders in every place.

Paul uses different words in different places to describe that local leadership―sometimes elders, sometimes the word we translate bishops. And, interestingly, he uses different words for the appointing of them. So I don’t think there’s a “one size fits all,” approach to local leadership. Each situation will be different but it’s clear that developing, identifying, and appointing local leaders was one of the things Paul did in each place. So there were, in Thessalonica, people who were working hard among the Thessalonians; who were, in some sense, over them in the Lord; and who had a role to admonish and encourage.

In our work, one of the things that we also need to do, right from early stages in a work, is pray that God will give us local leaders. Not that the work is all about leaders. The work needs the body. All the gifts need to be there. We don’t want to focus just on leaders and neglect the group and the community. But within that community, within that body, we want to trust God for and try to identify and develop leaders.

C.Teach respect for leaders (1 Thessalonians 5:13)

And then, we need to teach respect for leaders. That’s also part of building community. Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work, Paul says.

Teaching people to respect leadership may not be so difficult in Asian cultures but especially in Western and in Latin American cultures there’s a discomfort about the idea of leadership and respect for leadership. But it’s important. It’s hard for community to function well without leaders who care and lead, and respect for those leaders is important.

D.Teach the basics of relational health (1 Thessalonians 5:13‐15)

And Paul doesn’t stop there. He goes on and teaches what I’ve called the basics of relational health. You know enough about community to know some of the problems in communities and relationships. So notice these five points:

1. Live in peace with each other

That’s pretty big. We could spend a lot of time talking about how you do that.

2. Warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak

Not everybody needs the same treatment. Within the community some people need warning, some people need encouraging, some people need helping, some people need one thing at one time and another at another time. In building community we need to learn sensitivity to what the person needs. For those of us who are in leadership roles, that’s really important because we often we tend to lead out of our preferred style. I like to warn people, so I warn everybody; I’m an encourager, so I encourage everybody; I’m a teacher, I teach everybody. But we need to understand that people have different needs.

3. Be patient with everyone

Why be patient with everyone? Because we’re all broken; we’re all a work in progress. Don’t give up on me yet, God hasn’t. Please be patient with me.

4. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong

This is a very big Gospel issue. Because we’ve been forgiven, we’re obligated to forgive. This is a central piece in Jesus’ teaching about relationships.

5. Always try to be kind to each other

I often say about the Navigator work, if we could just be patient and kind, a lot of our problems would go away and we would be much more effective at advancing the Gospel. It doesn’t sound like a big thing, but love, says Paul, is patient and kind. There’s a lot of things which love isn’t, according to Paul in 1 Corinthians 13, but two big things love is―love is patient and kind. So be kind to each other and to everyone else. May the Lord help us!

These are the things that Paul stresses as he tries to build community. And these are the things we need to teach as part of our discipling if we want to lay foundations for generations.

These are the kind of things addressed in

E.Our Navigator Relational Core Values

 The dignity and value of every person.

 Love and grace expressed among us in community.

 Families and relational networks in discipling the nations.

 Interdependent relationships in the Body of Christ in advancing the Gospel.

IV. Model Partnership

So we need to build community, and we need to model partnership. We need to recognize the importance of our different contributions and work effectively together to advance the Gospel.

Notice the different contributions that are involved in planting the Gospel in Thessalonica.

A.Pioneers: Paul, Silas, and Timothy plant the Gospel in Thessalonica

First, there’s the role of Pioneers: Paul, Silas, and Timothy plant the Gospel in Thessalonica. We need pioneers in the Navigator work.

B.Insiders: The Thessalonians are insiders in their own city and they live out and advance the Gospel in their natural context

Paul, Silas, and Timothy lived among the Thessalonians, but they weren’t insiders. They were outsiders. The Thessalonians are the insiders in their own city. They’re the ones who have got the natural networks of relationships, and family, and friends. And Paul’s strategy is to help them live as fruitful insiders in their own city, to advance the Gospel in their own natural context. And we thought about some of the ways Paul was trying to help them to do that.

C.Local leaders: Paul appoints local leaders, those who are over you in the Lord

In addition to pioneers and insiders, there are local leaders. Paul appoints those who are over you in the Lord. These local leaders were providing some sense of coordination and cohesion and connectedness to people locally. They’re insiders themselves, the local leaders, but they’ve got a role beyond just their own natural network of friends and contacts. They’ve got a role in caring for and encouraging the community of believers in their city.

D.Mobile alongsiders: Paul and Timothy stay in touch through visits and letters to strengthen and encourage

They are mobile alongsiders. As you read through Acts and the Epistles, you see Paul using Timothy, Titus, Tychicus, and others to travel to the different cities and provinces to encourage and strengthen, to connect and to help. They were providing a broad leadership through visits and letters.

We need all these different contributions as we are:

V. Laying Foundations For Generations

A.The importance of building a foundational generation of local insiders with deep commitments

1. To the Lord

2. To one another

3. To the advance of the Gospel

These are the three big, foundational commitments that are needed in that foundational generation of local insiders. They need to be committed to the Lord, they need to be committed to one another, and they need to be committed to the advance of the Gospel. Paul and Silas and Timothy come to Thessalonica, they are trying to plant the Gospel, plant a Gospel ministry there, they want to leave a foundation generation who are committed to the Lord, who are committed to one another, and who are committed to the advance of the Gospel. You can see it very, very clearly in this letter.

We are trying to do the same―to lay foundations for generations, to build a foundational generation of people with a deep commitment to the Lord, to one another and to the advance of the Gospel.

B.The challenge of building community

1. Context: what is appropriate?

We recognize the challenge of building community in different contexts. Our contexts may be very different from the Apostle Paul’s. In some contexts it can be difficult to see how and to see what is appropriate. When I was in the Middle East in March and talking with our Egyptian brothers about this, they were telling me how hard it is to build community among Muslim‐background believers, because it is hard for them to trust each other. In fact, one community was blown apart because it was infiltrated by a member of the secret police. What is appropriate in that context?

 Churched environments

In churched contexts the issue may be one of conflicting loyalties with many different expressions and existing local churches. What part do they play in providing community for the fruit of our ministry? Do we just lead people to Christ and feed them in to existing local churches? Do we have any part in creating community within the Navigator movement for those people? How does that work? Let’s not be afraid of conflicting loyalties. They are part of life. Better to help people to understand them and learn to live with them.

 Neutral environments

There are other situations which are neutral environments. There’s not a whole lot going on already and there’s a lot of freedom to develop community.

 Hostile environments

But there are situations that are actively hostile. I think the situation in Thessalonica seems to have been an actively hostile situation. Perhaps you are working in Muslim or Hindu contexts, or in some other totalitarian situations, where there’s active hostility against anything that looks like a community of believers. I recognize the challenge of these contexts. So please don’t hear me as being naive about the difficulties. But I will say this: Whatever the context, if we do not address the issue of community, we are not going to see long‐term generational ministry. I think the importance of community is written on every page of the New Testament. I strongly and deeply believe that we have got to somehow figure out how to build community in these different environments.

2. Identity: who are we?

Identity is a significant factor in building community. Who are we? How do we articulate who we are. Okay, there’s Lee and me and Brenda and Chung and Joshua, but who are we? Why are we together? Are we just a group of friends? That may work initially. But if we’re just a group of friends, what about when some others come to faith who aren’t part of our group of friends? How do they get drawn in and why?

In many parts of the world we can be “Navigators” and that works quite well. In other contexts that may not be so easy, but the issue of identity has to be addressed. It’s part of building community.

3. Purpose and vision: why are we together, for what?

And then purpose and vision: Why are we together? For what? I think that a very, very important part of building community is for people to understand why we’re together. What are we trying to accomplish? For us as Navigators that is always going to be the advance of the Gospel. Our purpose of being together is about the advance of the Gospel. That’s why we’re committing to one another.

So we model partnership and we build community so that we are advancing the Gospel together.

Then finally as he ends his letter,

VI. Paul Points The Thessalonians To The Lord

The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it. (1 Thessalonians 5:23‐24)

A.Paul deliberately points the Thessalonians to the Lord

We can do everything we can, but if people are not looking to God, we’re never going to be able to meet all their needs. We must follow Paul’s example, and help people to trust in God and to walk with Him.

B.People need confidence in their relationship with God

1. Teach and model Christ‐centered spiritual disciplines, characterized by joy, thankfulness and love, not drudgery and legalism (1 Thessalonians 5:16‐18...see also verses 26‐27)

He’s teaching what we would call the basics of the Christian life, the spiritual disciplines, the means of grace. But it has the flavor of joy, of thankfulness, of gratitude, of love―and not of drudgery or legalism. As we are leading others into a dependence on God and we’re trying to help people to develop a relationship with God that sustains them, we cannot neglect to teach the means of grace, to teach the spiritual disciplines, to teach the basics, to help people to engage in a way that’s exciting and enjoyable.

2. Teach and model the leading and empowering of the Spirit, with wisdom and discernment (1 Thessalonians 5:19‐22)

Encourage people to depend on the Spirit’s leading, to believe that God will lead them ,and that the Spirit is at work in them and among them. But test everything. Don’t be naive. Teach and model the leading and empowering of the Spirit, with wisdom and discernment.

3. Pray big, God‐confident prayers for them and with them (1 Thessalonians 5:23‐24)

And then pray big, God‐confident prayers for them and with them. That’s what Paul does through this letter. May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. I think we help to lead people into dependence on the Lord when we pray big prayers for them and with them.

4. Get them praying for you (1 Thessalonians 5:25)

Brothers, pray for us. You know, Paul’s letters are full of this, drawing them into praying for him.

5. Keep pointing them and trusting them to the grace of God (1 Thessalonians 5:28)

Paul’s letter begins with grace, verse 1, ...Grace and peace to you. And it ends with grace, The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

Leave people focused on God. Leave people believing and trusting that God’s going to help them.

To do that, we have to learn to depend on God in our own lives. And we have plenty of opportunity to do that. And we’ve got to learn to trust God for others. So that our initial response when we hear about their woes and worries is not panic, but prayer. Let’s take this to the Lord; I’m sure the Lord has a way through this. I’m sure He’s bigger than this. Then we point people to the Lord and help them to trust and rely on His grace.

C.Our Navigator Inner‐Life Core Values

As Navigators we have always been committed to spiritual disciplines that help us walk with God―spiritual disciplines that give practical expression‎ to our Core Values.

 The passion to know, love and become like Jesus Christ.

 The truth and sufficiency of the Scriptures for the whole of life.

 The transforming power of the Gospel.

 The leading and empowering of the Holy Spirit.

 Expectant faith and persevering prayer rooted in the promises of God.

SUMMARY

1 Thessalonians: how Paul was advancing the Gospel. Our Calling as Navigators, “To advance the Gospel of Jesus and His kingdom into the nations through spiritual generations of laborers living and discipling among the lost.” We express it in those words, but it’s not a new idea. This is what Paul and Timothy and Silas were doing in Thessalonica 2000 years ago. And by God’s grace and by a wonderful ministry of His Spirit, we have this letter preserved for us, so that we can get an insight into how they understood what it meant to advance the Gospel. Their context is very different from ours. But the principles and lessons are incredibly relevant and helpful to us.

 So may the Lord help us, in our different contexts, to draw on these principles for our own ministry so that we can advance the Gospel depending on the Spirit’s power.

 That we could advance the Gospel with vision, with clarity, with long‐term perspective for what we want to see happen in the lives of these people that God has called us to minster to.

 That we can advance the Gospel in our discipling efforts, laying strong foundations in the lives of people through our teaching and encouragement.

 And then, advancing the Gospel together, consciously relying on our different contributions and building our relationships with one another and in the people we minister to, intentionally building community.

 And then, advancing the Gospel in dependence on the Lord. Making sure that it all leaves us relying on His grace and looking to Him. He who calls you is faithful and He will do it. Amen.

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