The Mission | Rock Point Church x Mission Essex | Full Service

But this morning, I wanna start with a story. I don't know whether you've heard of the story of a family of hillbillies who were traveling across the country looking for work at the time of the Great Depression. One day, they they drove their battered car through a city in the Midwest,

and none of them had ever seen a big city before. And mom was particularly keen to investigate. In particular, she she wanted to see inside a modern, expensive, posh hotel. So she asked dad whether he could park outside what looked like the biggest and best hotel in town. And she took her son, and they went inside,

and they were staggered by the splendor of the foyer. They'd never seen anything like it before. But then their eyes were drawn to a strange cubicle at the end of the foyer. And as they looked, they saw the doors automatically open into this cubicle, and they watched, and a a gnarled, old, decrepit man with a walking stick

hobbled his way into the cubicle, and the doors miraculously closed. Well, they stood there watching, and a minute later, the doors glided open again, and out sprung a handsome, young, well groomed man who literally rippled with muscles. Well, at this point, mom's eyes were like saucers.

And she grabbed hold of her son, and without taking her eyes off the elevator, she said, son, go and get your father.

Now I start with that silly story because, well, like those people, it's perfectly possible for us to get the wrong end of the stick about something, to be confused and jump to the wrong conclusions. And actually, in my experience, sadly, that is true about the church

and the mission of the church in particular. I I sometimes ask people, what do you think the mission of the church is? What what's its purpose? What's it exist for? And I invariably get lots of different answers. I get answers like, its purpose is to provide weekend worship services like this.

Its priority should be to to look after my children. It exists, the church, to serve the community or exists to transform society and change the nation to make it more moral and ethical and just. Now let me say, all those things are good. But I think they somewhat miss the mark when it comes to the mission of the church

as we see it in the book of Acts. Now the thing is with Acts, it's describing the start of the church. And and as such, there's a lot in it that's unique and we can't see repeated today. But there's also a lot that we can learn from that early church as it establishes its priorities, priorities that are in line with God's

timeless purposes, priorities that we, as local churches, should stick with still today. And you might wanna know what are those priorities? Well, in short, the priorities of the church are to reach, build,

and send. That that's the big idea of today's sermon. The mission of the church is to reach, build, and send. Now I could have taken you to a number of passages in the book of Acts to just see that coming off the pages. But I want to take you to Acts 11 and a few verses in Acts 13 where we see the church in Antioch

described. It's the start of a new church, and I think you'll see reach, build, send is built into its DNA from the very start.

So let's unpack those one by one. We're gonna start with reach. And by reach, I mean churches. Churches should prioritize reaching out to the world with the gospel. Let's go back to the very beginning of Antioch church's life, Chapter 11 verse 19. I'm gonna read from verses 19 to 21. We read, meanwhile,

the believers who had been scattered during the persecution after Stephen's death traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch Of Syria. They preached the word of God, but only to Jews. However, some of the believers who went to Antioch from Cyprus and Cyrene began preaching to the Gentiles about the Lord Jesus.

The power of the Lord was with them, and a large number of these Gentiles believed and turned to the Lord. At verse 19 there, Luke takes us back to the persecution of Christians in Jerusalem following Stephen's martyrdom and the resulting scattering of believers. That must have been a very difficult time

for the young church. Imagine, persecution severe enough that you had to flee the city of Jerusalem, fearing for your life, running miles, hundreds of miles. But amazingly, God used their suffering to reach the world with the gospel because these suffering believers went to places as far flung as Antioch. Antioch

was the third largest city in the world at this time after Rome and Alexandria. It was a multicultural place. It was a cosmopolitan place. It had an international port. And so if people became Christians in Antioch, well, they'd go on their boats and they'd go elsewhere, and so the gospel would spread across the world.

What I find though particularly inspiring about this story is that when those Christians turned up in Antioch, well, they must have been exhausted. They must have been scared. They'd been fleeing for their life. And well, if I'd been them, the temptation would have been, at this point, new place.

Let's make sure that what happened in Jerusalem doesn't happen here. So the temptation would be keep your head down. Don't talk about Jesus. Don't omit you're a Christian. Retreat into the ghetto. But did the Christians do that? No. They turned up, and they met their neighbors.

They introduced themselves to their new work colleagues. And what they did is they continued to speak to about Jesus even though they'd been suffering before. So the suffering, despite that, they carried on speaking. They didn't also just do an easy job. They didn't just speak to people like them. No. We're told here

that they spoke of Jesus to Jews, people like them, and Gentiles. In other words, they were crossing the biggest cultural barriers of their day. They were prepared to risk hostility in order to tell people about Jesus. And we're told that God used their words to reach a large number of people. And so a church was born,

the church at Antioch. And, of course, God doesn't always bless our speaking with a large number of conversions. Throughout history, there have been many faithful Christians who have spoken about Jesus, pointed to him, and they've had almost no response whatsoever.

But that doesn't mean that those Christians over the years have done anything necessarily wrong. The word translated power in verse 21 literally means hand. So we're being told that the hand of the lord was with the Christians in Antioch as they spoke about Jesus. And, you know, the hand of the lord

will always be with any Christian as they seek to reach out and point people to Jesus. And that's because back at the beginning of Acts in chapter one verse eight, we're taught that the spread of the gospel is integral to God's agenda for the church. And so that means that as we reach out, we can be confident.

Whatever the initial response might be, the Lord hand will be with us. He will be using us and working through us by his spirit whether or not we can see the results, whether or not people respond as we want them to respond. And all of this is why evangelism needs to be at the very heart of any church's existence.

So when a when a new church starts up, a new church goes to a new part of town, what they are not to do is to go, okay. Any Christians who are living in this part of town, leave your churches and come to ours. No. Churches aren't about transfer growth. Churches are about going to a new part of town

and pointing people to Jesus who don't yet know him. It's about seeking to reach the lost, unbelievers, with the best news in the world of Jesus who changes everything. And as a church grows, it needs not to lose that heart.

Many churches sort of reach the lost as a priority at the beginning, but then, well, somehow, subtly, they move on to just looking after the Christians and keeping them comfortable. But, no, after ten years, after twenty years, churches as old like Rock Point, evangelism, reaching out still needs to be a priority.

Personally, the most encouraging statistic about Dan Remission, the church I serve in The UK, is that about 25% of the church have become Christians at the church. That's a fantastically encouraging number for me. But I dare to pray that that percentage will increase, not decrease, as the years roll on.

Okay. So we've established that a church should be reaching out. What does that really look like? Does it just mean that the professionals, people like Bill Bush, stand here at the front and they talk about Jesus, and then people become Christians? No. You know, the really, really inspiring thing about Antioch is that,

actually, it was ordinary believers, people like you and me who reached out to talk about Jesus. I don't know whether you noticed, but in verse 20, Luke doesn't home in on any apostle or well known leader. In fact, he doesn't name anyone at all. He just says that the people reaching out were some believers, ordinary,

everyday people, not the who's who of famous Christianity, people who'd ended up in the city of Antioch by force of circumstance but then plucked up the courage to speak. Now I'm sure they weren't all brilliant communicators. Bill Bush is a brilliant communicator, isn't he? If you've ever been cornered

in a conversation with him, you can know how how good a communicator he goes in because he goes on and on and on. And you can't get a word in edgeways. I remember the very first time I spoke, he didn't draw breath for twenty minutes.

But we don't all have to be able to speak as well as him. No. Many of these ordinary Christians in Antioch will be people who were nervous, who stumbled, who were hesitant. But somehow or another, they plucked up the courage to make the most of the opportunity, and they told their neighbors about Jesus.

I remember that it I remember the first time I really grasped this and began to experience it for myself. I was about 18. It was my first night at university, and the university had allocated me to live with three other guys. We didn't know each other, never met.

We we arrived together. Our parents drop us off, and we're sat in a circle trying to introduce ourselves. And then one of the guys said, oh, I don't know. Just to help us get to know each other, why don't we just each tell us what the most important thing in our lives is?

At that moment, my heart began beating a little bit faster because I knew, oh, I'm gonna have to tell them that it's Jesus. You know, this is what my pastor had told me I'm gonna have to say.

Well, the first person went. He said, well, I wanna tell you that the most important thing in my life is drinking beer. Hey. And everyone went, hey. And I went, oh, no.

He moved around to the second person. And he said, well, I wanna tell you the most important thing in my life is is rugby. That's a British sport, in case you don't know. Rugby and then drinking beer afterwards. Yay. And I was like, oh, no.

I looked to the third person. He looked a little bit more relaxed, a little bit more laid back. I thought, oh, there's a bit of hope here. I turned to him. He said, well, the most important thing for me, guys, is the ladies. I'm a bit of a ladies' man. And I remember thinking, oh, no. It's my turn.

Sweat began to come off my brow as they all turned to me to see what I was going to say. I remember taking a deep breath and going, well, guys, the most important thing for me is go Jesus. Well, at that moment, time seemed to stop. Their mouths fell wide open, and they said nothing for what seemed like minutes.

It was probably eighty seconds. But then one of them one of them started to laugh. And the others joined in. And they laughed so hard that one of them fell off his chair. And then after a moment, he paused and he looked at me and he said, don't worry. We'll soon cure you of that.

I wanted the earth to open up and swallow me. It wasn't the response I'd been hoping for. This wasn't a comfortable experience. What was God doing? Why had he put me in this situation? But, hey, God doesn't promise comfort. These guys have been persecuted, but they still spoke.

A little bit of laughing is not persecution. And you know what? The wonderful thing is the hand of the Lord was with me because I was doing what I was called to do. And as I look back on that experience, well, within the year, all three of those guys had come to me and asked me to tell them more about Jesus.

And then even more amazingly, by the end of the year, all three of them had asked to come to church with me. And I brought them along and allowed a professional to tell them about Jesus in a way they could understand. That is what we are called to do. We're not all called to be Bill Bush,

but we are all called to be involved. When a church reaches out, it involves us all. That is our first priority. Reach out. Let's move on, though, because there's another priority, the second priority. And that priority is the priority to build. By which, I mean, build up the congregation spiritually.

And we're gonna carry on in Acts 11. Let me read verses 22 to 24. Verse 22, when the church at Jerusalem heard what had happened, they sent Barnabas to Antioch.

When he arrived and saw this evidence of God's blessing, he was filled with joy, and he encouraged the believers to stay true to the Lord. Barnabas was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and strong in faith, and many people were brought to the Lord.

Now I imagine the church in Antioch was very different from the one in Jerusalem. The number of converted Greeks might well have exceeded the number of converted Jews. And so for the first time in history, there was a mainly gentile congregation.

And so I don't think it's surprising that the apostles back in Jerusalem wanted to check this out. And so they they sent a man who could pastor and nurture this young, new, exciting church. And the man they chose was a man called Barnabas.

I don't know whether you know, but Barnabas wasn't his real name. It was his nickname. His real name was Joseph. But Barnabas means son of encouragement, and that became his nickname because it fitted his character. He was an encourager.

We can see that here in Antioch because as soon as he turns up in Antioch, he's excited about what God is doing. He throws himself into the ministry of encouraging the church members we're told to stay true to the Lord. In other words, he set about discipling them. And as this young congregation were discipled

and as they grew in the faith, so they evangelized more, and we're told yet more people came to Christ, verse 24. So an encouraging pastor, that was vital to that young church in Antioch, but let me say an encouraging pastor is still really important for a church today.

I have to say I've loved getting to know some of your pastors here at Rock Point. I have found them personally very encouraging. But let me say, all of us who are pastors, wherever we serve, Rock Point here or in Essex in The UK, we need the prayers of the church. We need the prayers of people like you. Please pray

that we pastors might be like Barnabas, which we're told he was filled with the spirit so that he could encourage the church rather than be a hindrance to the church. I I wanna be an encouragement. I don't wanna be a hindrance.

The question is, of course, how can I be an encouragement? What is it that pastors should do to be an encouragement to people like you? And we're told that in the next few verses. Let me read on verses twenty five and twenty six. Then Barnabas went on to Tarsus to look for Saul.

When he found him, he brought him back to Antioch, and both of them stayed there with the church for a full year teaching large crowds of people. It was at Antioch that the believers were first called Christians. Barnabas believed that the most encouraging thing he could do for the church was what? It was to teach it.

In fact, teaching was so important that he thought he needed some help, so he went and got an assistant pastor. That was Saul. Saul became the apostle Paul, so he made a good choice there, didn't he? And for a full year, Barnabas and Saul taught people the word of God. They knew that that was really the only way to build up

and grow the church. That means the same. It's why the most important activity in any week, in any church, is when we gather together and open the bible together and hear God speak to us. That can be here, like like in this service, or it can be in small groups, or it can be in seminar groups, or on bible courses.

Anywhere where the bible is opened, we get to hear god speak to us because teaching is God's ordained method of spiritual growth. And this cause and effect can be seen in Antioch. The cause, teaching, the effect, spiritual growth. Because I don't know whether you noticed, but the believers, they were first called Christians in

Antioch. In other words, their lives were so distinctive. Their lives were so closely identified with Jesus that when observers were were wanting to come up with a word to describe these people, they came up with the word, ah, Christians, people who distinctively belong to Christ.

Look. As I said, I'm really enjoying my time here in The States. But let me say, if I'd been flown here blindfolded and didn't know where on earth I was, it really wouldn't have taken me very long to work out I was in The US. And that's because you lot are so obviously American. By which I mean,

hey, look, you all speak with a funny accent. And you speak the language English, but it's not the English I know. And, well, in the main, you're all relaxed, confident, cheerful, glass half full people as opposed to many of us Brits who are uptight and glass half empty type of people. So it's clear to me that you all belong

to America. But I wonder, is it equally clear that you belong to Christ? If I was there to come home with you and then go and speak to one of your non Christian neighbors who you knew and said, what's the word you'd use to describe your neighbor? What would they say? Would they mention something about being a follower of Jesus?

Would they say something positive in that regard? Or would they describe you in less positive and glowing terms? Look. One of the privileges I have as a pastor is to be able to be there for people at really important parts of their lives, births, weddings, funerals.

And I actually particularly find it a privilege taking people's funerals and after the service, talking to the friends and the work colleagues, particularly the unbelieving friends and work colleagues of the deceased. And I have to say, as a pastor, it is always inspiring

when those unbelieving friends or colleagues say to me something like, oh, it was clear that the Betty was a Christian. Everyone at work knew that she was a follower of Jesus. She was just so clear, so committed. I I sort of swell with pride at that point. Think, good on Betty. On the other hand, it's

a lot more discouraging, in fact, disheartening, when you speak to them after the service and they went, Do you know what? Until that service, I never knew Fred was a Christian. That one person said to me, I'd have never have guessed he was a Christian. And you say, oh, my. Never have guessed?

Of course, the worst one of all is when they say to you, oh, yeah. Yeah. They told me they were a Christian, but they behaved so badly, I couldn't believe it. Look. Here's the thing. When our time comes and it's our funeral, how do we make sure in those conversations after the service that people don't say that over us.

I'd have never have guessed. That is where the church comes in because the church's job is to open up the bible and teach you and let god grow you. It's really great that you're here this morning, but let me encourage you to keep regularly coming to church,

sitting under good bible teaching, letting god speak to you. The bible the bible is the sword of the spirit. Nothing else is. And so it is only through listening to this that the spirit will grow us and build us. And the spirit will change our desires and our character. And he will make us more like Jesus.

And he'll make us bolder to live for Jesus and speak of him. And so any good church will realize that and will invest in the teaching so that you guys can be built up. Two priorities so far. Reach reach out with the gospel of Jesus, ordinary people. Build

build up through opening God's word and teaching it and so transforming people. But then thirdly, the third priority is to send, by which I mean we are to send on resources elsewhere. I have to say, I personally find this the greatest challenge. It is clear that the young church in Antioch didn't hang around consolidating

or focusing in on themselves, but they very quickly and selflessly started sending their resources on to others. And in particular, we can see that they sent on two things. They sent on money and people. In in The UK, we'd say they sent on pounds and people. Bill said they sent on dollars and dudes. Whichever way translated,

it's the same thing. So in chapter 11 verses 27 to 30, we see the church sending on money. What they see, they they dig deep in their pockets and they send a financial gift to Christian brothers and sisters who they hear are in need,

even though they those Christian brothers and sisters live hundreds of miles away, and they'll probably never meet them in their lives. They heard they were about to have a famine, and so they wanted to help. Now it it's clear that the Christians in Antioch, they must have really grasped grace to be that generous

because it's only by grasping grace that we can be that selfless. When I say grasp grace, I mean grasping how generous God has been to us. Generous enough to send his only son to come to this earth to die for you and me even though we don't deserve it, but so we can be eternally rich and live with him forever.

It is as we grasp the immense grace that we have been shown that we will begin to want to show that generosity to others too. Generosity even to people who live many miles away and we might never meet. I wish I I wanna pause and just say how thankful I am for you guys at Rock Point. I was here a year ago, and even though

most of you don't know me, you've heard of missionetics vaguely, but you've never been there, Yet last year, it was clear that a number of you were moved by our need, our spiritual famine. In The UK and in our part of The UK, it's estimated that less than 1% of the population attend a bible believing church.

We are in a spiritual famine, but we're trying to do something about it, and it has been so encouraging that many of you also welcomed our church planting initiative such that last year you dug in your pockets and supported us financially. It was really humbling,

and I wanna just let you know it's made all the difference. So last year, we were looking particularly for two things. We were looking for for seats. We've just finished a new church building in our church plant, but we didn't have enough money for seats

so that people could sit in the service. And we made an appeal to you guys, and you came through with enough money, and we were able to purchase the seats such that now the building is open, and those seats are not just being used once on a Sunday morning,

but they're being used twice on a Sunday morning because we've grown and have to repeat the service twice, which is fantastic. Thank you.

We were also looking for an assistant pastor to help one of our pastors in one of our church plants further north in Essex. His church is growing rapidly, but it's particularly a congregation full of students and internationals

who don't have so much money. And so we were looking to be able to fund an assistant pastor to help him with work before it became overwhelming. And over this last year, the money has kept coming in such that we're now at the point

that you guys have provided enough money for that assistant so I'm gonna be able to go home and be able to appoint someone for that church. And that means yeah. Thank you.

And that means that we can keep rolling on with our planting initiative, and our sights are set for our next church plant that we're going to begin to plan for at the end of this year and on into another area of Essex where there isn't many bible believing churches. So it makes all the difference being generous.

Look. You guys don't personally benefit for it. You probably thought, oh, I could money could have been better used for ministries here. There's plenty of need. But God wants us to be helping one another. That's what we see in Acts. Those Christians helping Christians elsewhere, and that means

well, it means that ultimately there will be more people in heaven. That's what it's about. Eternity, not now. So

we see the church sends pounds, but it also sends people. And we can see that a little further on in Acts chapter 13

verses one to three. In between chapter 11 and chapter 13, Saul and Barnabas, they've they've taken this gift of money to Jerusalem personally. They've helped alleviate the need. And then by the beginning of chapter 13, they've come back to Antioch.

And you think at that point, oh, great. They've they're back. They're reunited with their church. They can enjoy a time of settled ministry and growth, and it's gonna be fantastic, but God has other ideas. Let me read. Acts thirteen one. Among the prophets and teachers of the church at Antioch Of Syria were Barnabas,

Simeon called the black man, Lucius from Cyrene, Manion, the childhood companion of king Herod Antipas, and Saul. One day, as these men were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, appoint Barnabas and Saul for the special work to which I have called them.

So after more fasting and prayer, the men laid their hands on them and sent them on their way. Do you notice that in the absence of Saul and Barnabas, the church had grown by the beginning of chapter 13. There's a large staff team, which is fantastic. I think it's really interesting to note the unity that is reflected in this

staff team of pastors and teachers and prophets because you can tell quite a lot from their names. Their names reveal a lot about them. For example, the names of these guys reveal that they included Jewish and Gentile believers, black and white men, ordinary average Joes, and even one who might have had a royal blood.

That is what the gospel does. It takes people who are very different, maybe even divided in the normal course of life, and unites them together in the cause of Jesus. And that it means that even Americans and Brits can be united, which is wonderful. But then, surprisingly, God didn't allow this culturally

rich and exciting new team to stay together for very long because he calls upon Barnabas and Saul to be sent on to start new churches elsewhere. Now I think it's really significant to note that on the the 22 occasions in Acts when we hear the direct voice of God speaking, in the overwhelming majority of times, he is

sending people out. For example, back in Acts chapter five verse 20, God says to the apostles, go. Stand in the temple courts and tell people about Jesus. And then in chapter eight verse 26, he told Philip to go south to the road, the desert road. That's where he met the Ethiopian. And in 09/15, he told Ananias, go.

This man is my chosen instrument to carry my name to the Gentiles. In chapter ten twenty, when talking to Simon Peter, he says, get up and go downstairs. Do not hesitate to go with the three men, for I have sent them. And now here in chapter 13, God is setting apart Barnabas and Saul in order to go and start new churches

elsewhere. And so here, we're reminded of the the expansive purposes of god. Things are never to stand still. It's always to be changing, always to be going and pushing out and expanding horizons. And that's exactly what we see here. So so he sent people to Antioch. They established a church,

and then people began to disciple it. And after a period of discipleship, he is sending people from that church, arguably their best people. You can imagine, can't you, the church thinking, not Barnabas and Saul, our two star preachers. Why send them? But, no, he sends them. And amazingly, the church doesn't fight it.

The church doesn't grumble. I'm sure they wanted the money and the people for themselves, but they embraced the purposes of God. Of course, you guys know what that's like. Any church that plants churches experiences the cost of losing dollars and dudes to that new place down the road. Last year, that was the echoes, wasn't it?

And you really did give up a great deal. I can imagine some of you thinking, why on earth are we sending so many people to Echoes, thousands of people, with all of their money? Surely, aren't we going to be harming ourselves by doing something like Echoes? I can understand that you might be thinking like that because

I sometimes think like that in Essex. As I've just said, we're in the early stages of considering our next church plant, which will sort of begin to roll out at the end of this year, and I'm already painfully aware of the cost of doing it.

As I look around look, our numbers are are small fry compared to Echo's and what you guys are doing, but as I look around, I can still think, I know we're probably going to lose yet again some of our best people to this new church plant. How are we going to cope? And, of course, that is what God calls us to do. God's

ways are never easy. People had to suffer and be persecuted in the early church. But God's ways can be trusted. He knows what he's doing. When he calls the church to sacrifice money and people, he will ensure that they're not self harming. And we see that here in Acts. The early church is tremendously generous, always giving.

It's not harmed. In fact, as we read through Acts, what we see is that the work flourishes and gains pace. And, actually, the gospel spreads like wildfire right through the Roman Empire. And if we were to follow the pattern laid down here, if we see ourselves as sending organizations rather than grasping organizations,

then we'll find ourselves caught up in God's exciting, ever expanding work in this world, and it will find it an immense privilege. So there we are. The mission of the Church, reach, build, send. Earlier this week, I was asked how I saw the church. Did I see the church as a cruise liner whose mess whose whose purpose

was just to keep passengers comfortable. No.

Did I see the church as a battleship who threw salvos out at the enemy, the world?

No. Did I see the church as a lifeboat, going out uncomfortably in stormy waters, searching, searching, searching for the lost and rescuing as many as possible. Of course, the bible pictures the church as a lifeboat. You know, the lifeboat's not as comfortable as a cruise liner. Always moving,

always organizing yourself for the lost, always having to think about other people who aren't even members of your church yet, not yourself. A cruise liner, well, you know, you can call up to Deck 5 for your cocktail, and all will be well in the world. But now a lifeboat, it's stormy. It's choppy. It's all about others.

And a lifeboat, it's it's not as headline grabbing

as the battleship. Some of the salvos you can throw out to the world, well, they can sound impressive, but actually what God calls us to do, what his mission for the church is to be a lifeboat because that is what makes all the difference in eternity. The book of Acts ends with Paul in Rome, but he's under house arrest,

and he's guarded by soldiers. I have to say it feels like a bit of an anticlimax after an exciting book where the gospel has spread like wildfire, new churches have been started here, there, and everywhere, and then suddenly, Paul's confined to one house.

It's not a very comfortable situation for him. It's not a very headline grabbing ministry at this point. But in God's goodness, the Lord's hand was still with him, and he provides a pattern for us to follow. Because, you know, despite the limitations of Paul, he was allowed visitors, and those visitors came each day,

and he was able to tell them about Jesus. And when those visitors went home, when he still had someone to talk to because there was a Roman guard, talk about a captive audience. And the implication at the end of Acts is that some of those visitors and some of those guards, they'll have become Christians,

and they'll have gone home, and they will have told their friends about Jesus. They will have told their friends about Jesus. Who would have told their friends about Jesus? And so on. And that is the pattern that we're being told to follow for Christians, for churches, for new church plants to reach, build, send.

You know, if Acts was a film, I like to think it would end with the camera focused on Paul just speaking about Jesus. Nothing else. Nothing glamorous. Speaking. Speaking. But then as the credits begin to roll, I'd like to imagine the camera pulling back. And as you those people who were with Paul spread out across the city,

you see more and more voices joining Paul, pointing people to Jesus. And then over time, well, it spreads beyond the city, and the camera pulls back across the whole country of Italy. And there are more and more voices speaking of Jesus. And then back to the continent of Europe and England and America

and a multitude of voices speaking about Jesus. And then Arizona, Phoenix, Queen Creek, Rock Point, all talking about Jesus. But the question I wanna leave you with is will you join those voices as they reach, build, send? Will you be part of God's mission to reach the world?

Will you open yourself up to being part of the exciting purposes of God as he reaches the whole world for Christ? I pray you will. And let's pray about that now. Let's pray. Dear heavenly father, we thank you so much. They don't leave us to guess about what the mission of the church is, but you've given us the book of Acts.

You've given us the example of churches like Antioch that make it clear that the pattern for mission is to reach, build, and send for Jesus. We thank you, heavenly father, for those people who reached us. We thank you, heavenly father, for those people who've taught us your word. But we pray now, heavenly father,

that you might work in us to give us the courage to make the most of the opportunities you give us. We pray that in this next week, we might be those who are bolder for Jesus and that we might have the great privilege of being caught up in your amazing work that makes all the difference in eternity.

And we pray this for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen. Thank you guys for joining us for our online service. You can stay connected all week long on rockpoint.ao in our social media. We'll see you next week.