Inspire Others to Follow Jesus

Great to see you guys today. Sometimes people observe things and they come and they let various members of our staff know, and they don't realize that other people have already let us know. So I want to make sure you're aware. Somebody told me on their way into 9:30 service that the heat in the parking lot is broken. And we do know that we have a part on backorder and it should be here by June.

So just want you to know that it's. It's on our radar. Okay. Over the last couple of weeks, we've kicked off 2026 by. By trying to unpack our mission as a church.

And so our mission really unfolds in three very simple sentences. We've just been going one sentence per week. Two weeks ago, we talked about our desire to love God through a life of worship. And if you were here, you know that we said we worship God by surrendering our entire lives to him and by loving what he loves, which is people. So last week we talked about our desire to grow together as disciples of Christ, because following Jesus Christ is a team sport, and that means that we have to live in community and as a faith community.

Our third objective, what I want to talk about this morning, is our desire to inspire others to follow Jesus. So obviously, we should talk about mascots.

Most schools you've noticed have they go for really strong, bold mascots. It's where we get Wildcats and Panthers and Lions and Tigers and Bears. Right. You guys are more awake than the 9:30 crowd was. But Christian colleges sometimes play by the same rules.

So both Johnson University, where our daughter Kira is currently a student, and Hope International University in California are the Royals. But it's not entirely clear what a royal is. So Johnson's logo actually has a lion in it. At Great Lakes Christian College in Michigan, it's the Crusaders. At Kentucky Christian University, it's the Knights.

At the former Cincinnati Christian University where I did my grad work, it was the Eagles. And at the former St. Louis Christian College where both of my parents attended, it was the Soldiers. Now, there are other Christian colleges that choose mascots, and they go for biblical imagery because they want to convey a sense of mission. And that's a good thing. But sometimes at a mascot level, the results can be unconventional.

For example, Central Christian College of the Bible in Missouri is the Saints. That seems to work okay for the city of New Orleans, but the former Lincoln Christian University in Illinois was the preachers.

Pretty intimidating. My alma mater, Ozark Christian College in Joplin, Missouri, is the Ambassadors, also not the Most fearsome option. So what is an ambassador anyway? And why would Ozark choose that mascot? Well, a quick Google search will tell you that an ambassador is a diplomatic official who represents their home country in another nation.

But unless you're an Ozark alum or you're a student in a government class or you watch a ton of world news, you probably don't hear the word ambassador very often. And yet, even though it's a word we seldom use, I would suggest that we often function as ambassadors without even realizing it, because we all have certain things that we like, and we want other people to like those things, too. In a few days, my wife and I are headed to the Dominican Republic, where we're gonna do some snorkeling, which is one of our favorite things. I love to talk about snorkeling. Many of you know that I'm fascinated by filmmakers like James Cameron and George Lucas.

These are guys that have these visions in their heads that require the creation of new technology in order to bring those stories to the screen. Right now on Disney, there's this docuseries called Light and Magic that is all about Industrial Light and Magic, the special effects house that George Lucas established to create the technology necessary to make Star wars and a host of other films. I am loving watching that series, and I'm happy to talk about Star wars or Avatar anytime. You know, my wife may be the world's foremost ambassador for golden retrievers. You know, I enjoy woodworking, and some of my favorite tools are made by a company called Kreg.

And I would be happy to tell you about how my Kreg jigs simplify so many projects. If you're an IU fan, I'll bet you've been an especially loud and obnoxious ambassador for them recently, right? And we probably all know certain people who are have appointed themselves Facebook ambassadors for maybe a product they sell or a weight loss strategy or a political viewpoint, and it seems to be the only thing they talk about. Right? We know what it means to be ambassadors.

Now, in Scripture, we find a lot of different words that are used to describe followers of Jesus. We're called Christians and disciples, saints, believers, followers of the way, children of God, temples of the Holy Spirit, a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. And we're also called ambassadors. The reason Ozark Christian College chose that strange mascot is because of the Apostle Paul's words in Second Corinthians, chapter 5, where Paul wrote this. Paul said, christ, love compels us because we are convinced that one Jesus died for all, and therefore all died.

And he died for all. That those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised again. So from now on, we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come, the old has gone, the new is here.

All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. That God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting people's sins against them. And he has committed to us that message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ. Say this word with me ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us.

We implore you, on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. Now here's what Paul is saying. This reality that Jesus loves us and he died for our sins and he rose from the dead to give us new life, urges us to let others know that he wants to do the same for them. If we are in Christ, if we have surrendered our lives to him, we have been made new.

And that means that the old sinful life that we used to live, that's been crucified and buried with Jesus and that is no longer held against us. That is no longer how God sees us our sins, which is just a simple word for our insistence on doing things our way rather than God's way. Our sins separate us from God, but through Jesus sacrifice, through our trust in that, God has bridged that gap and he has reconciled us. And when Jesus makes us new, we become his ambassadors. He calls us as citizens of his kingdom to live in the foreign nation of this world and speak to others on his behalf.

Now, I want us to zoom in really closely on verses 20. And I just read that, but I want us to look at it again. Paul says, we are therefore Christ's ambassadors. And here's what that means. As though God, did you catch that?

Were making his appeal through us. God wants to use you. God wants to use me to share his message of love and reconciliation with others. So we implore you, we urgently plead with you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God. Recognize the separation that your sin creates between you and your heavenly Father, and embrace this offer of peace that God extends through Jesus, which can be summarized like this.

That God made him who had no sin, Jesus, to be sin for us. Meaning to take the burden of our sins on himself and die on a cross in our place. So that in him we might become the righteousness of God. So that rather than remaining in our guilt, we can be cleansed of that and restored to God. We can have our sins covered with his righteousness and we can be made right with Him.

That's what it means to be an ambassador and to have this ministry of reconciliation. And. And Paul is not the only person that talks about that. The Apostle Peter described being a kingdom ambassador in terms of declaring the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. See, once Jesus rescues us from the darkness we once lived in, and he gives us this new light to live by.

He wants our lives to let others know of his desire and his power to. To do the same thing in their lives. Both Paul and Peter, all of Jesus apostles, were influenced by his parting instructions to his disciples right before he left the earth. We often call that the Great Commission. It's a, I believe, a longer conversation that the New Testament offers us.

A few excerpts of the Gospel of Matthew records this piece of that conversation. Then Jesus came to them and said, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I'm with you always to the very end of the age. Now, the Gospel of Luke records these words that Jesus spoke in that very same context.

Jesus said, this is not the Gospel of Luke. This is the Book of Acts written by Luke. But it says, 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. And I want you to see that both of these texts emphasize a couple of things.

Number one, they both emphasize. Because this conversation Jesus had with his disciples emphasized that Jesus sends His followers to tell the world about him and to inspire others to follow him too. But not only that, we're stressed in both places that we're not alone in this mission because Jesus gives us His Holy Spirit to go with us, to empower us, to guide us in that process. To follow Jesus is to become a kingdom ambassador. Friends, please hear this.

There is no version of following Jesus that allows us to dismiss this responsibility to let others know about Him. If you and I can recommend a favorite restaurant, if we can rave about a football team, if we can encourage others to watch a certain movie or TV show. If we can gush about our favorite musicians or urge others to read a certain book or talk up a local business, we can tell others about the difference Jesus is making in our lives. But if we're going to do that effectively, we have to cultivate certain habits to be effective Kingdom ambassadors. We have to.

Number one, we have to spend time where non believers are. Now, this may sound completely Captain Obvious to you, but we can't share Jesus if we have zero contact with anyone who doesn't know Jesus, right? This is so important. Often when we begin to follow Jesus and we begin to grow spiritually, our desire to keep growing, which is a good desire, and our desire to avoid veering back into the habits and the behaviors that Jesus died to free us from, which is also a good desire. Those desires can cause us to gradually insulate ourselves into a Christian bubble.

So the relationships that we're building at church may begin to consume all of the energy that we once gave to some other friendships. We join life groups and Bible studies, and we tackle Bible reading plans together. And these are all good things. But if we do so much of that, we can get to a place where we don't have much time left to have any involvement with people who are not a part of those same circles. And if I could be transparent with you for a minute, this is one of my ongoing tensions.

Our church is large enough that if I only ever pursued connections with people who are already connected here, I still wouldn't get to everybody. So creating margin to invest time and energy in people who have no connection with Jesus has to be intentional. I have not mastered this by any means, but I make a habit of working regularly at a local coffee shop just so I'll have opportunities to meet people who aren't showing up here on Sunday mornings, just so I'll have a chance to put myself in the path of someone that doesn't already know Jesus. Friends, if our pursuit of Christian community and greater Bible knowledge keeps us so busy that we never get around to Jesus, command. Command to be salt and light and make disciples, something has to change.

We can't miss this now. We can learn a lot about this principle from the Apostle Paul. In Paul's extensive travels as a preacher and missionary, he developed a very strategic routine. When Paul would arrive in a new place, when he would visit a new city, he would usually first go to the local synagogue because that's where he would meet other Jews who shared his heritage and who knew the old Testament scriptures. And starting from that common ground, Paul was often able to to introduce to them Jesus as the Messiah that all of their prophets pointed to.

Paul could introduce Jesus as the fulfillment of centuries of anticipation. Now, not everyone was receptive to those conversations, but Paul created some opportunities for meaningful spiritual conversations that way. Another strategic place that Paul liked to visit was the local marketplace. In Acts chapter 17, in the city of Athens, Paul divided his time between the synagogue and the market, where people would often come together and they would just kind of shoot the breeze. They would discuss and debate all the latest trends in philosophy.

And as Paul met and began to speak to some of these Athenian philosophers about Jesus, some of them were intrigued enough by what he was saying that they invited him to a meeting at another time or where he could explain things further. And in that setting, in that standalone meeting of an organization called the Areopagus, Paul modeled something that I would encourage all of us to work at. And that is, number two, we need to seek common ground. So Paul's invited by these philosophers to the meeting of the Areopagus, and he tells them a story. Paul explains to them how as he's walking around Athens, he's just sightseeing, he notices all of these pagan idols, including a generic one that is inscribed to an unknown God.

In other words, these people didn't want to take a chance on overlooking or upsetting any God, even one that they'd never heard of before. So what do you suppose Paul had to say about that?

Do you think he seized the moment to mock their superstitious tendencies? You suppose Paul said, what's wrong with you people? Don't you know the book of Exodus says you shall have no other gods before me? No. This is what Paul said.

He said, people of Athens, I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription to an unknown God. So you are ignorant. He's not insulting their intelligence, saying, you legitimately don't know of the very thing you worship. And this is what I'm going to to proclaim to you.

In other words, Paul said, what a cool coincidence. You guys are into spiritual things, I'm into spiritual things. Let's talk. And since you already suspect that there might be a God out there somewhere that you don't even know about yet, could I tell you about him? So Paul told them about this God who made everything and who doesn't need a temple or anything else that we have to offer him, because he in fact gives everyone life and breath and everything else.

Paul explained how, starting with one man, God made all the people that populate the earth. And he wants us to seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he's not far from any one of us. And then Paul quoted the Cretan philosopher Epimenides when he said, for in him we live and move and have our being, as some of your own poets have said. And here Paul quoted the Cilician philosopher Aratus. We are his offspring.

See, I think if Paul were speaking in our culture today, he would probably quote a movie or a famous athlete or a pop song to underscore a spiritual point. Common ground. So Paul went on to explain in Athens that since God made us, he doesn't even belong in the same category as other man made idols. God is large and in charge, and he commands us to turn to him because a day is coming when he will judge the world through Jesus, whose power and authority he demonstrated by raising him from the dead. And that prompted a response.

Verse 32 says, when they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some of them sneered, paul, you're off your rocker. But others said, we want to hear you again on this subject. At that, Paul left the council, and some of the people became followers of Paul and believed. Now, one of the things we see in the Gospels is that Jesus made clear that not everyone will follow him. We need to understand that we have a responsibility to try to share the message with whoever we can.

But not everyone is going to receive that message. So we shouldn't expect that. If our expectation around trying to be ambassadors is that every single person we ever try to introduce to Jesus is going to just welcome that with open arms. We're missing some really important things that Jesus said. But that being said, if we can find common ground, we'll have more opportunities for meaningful spiritual dialogue.

For example, people may not agree with us about the Bible's authority. That's not usually where I would start a conversation. But are there major concerns, moral concerns, that we share in common with other people, that we could begin to talk there, or we're not all going to agree about what kinds of laws, what kinds of public policy it's going to take to build a healthy society? But are there certain desires that people on the right and on the left and in between share about the kind of world we want to live in? Could we start by talking about that?

We might have very different concepts of spirituality, but can we find common ground in our desire to Serve other people who are in need. Could we serve together and build a relationship that allows us to talk about some other things? See, our search for common ground, our determination to find that can be a launch pad for all kinds of meaningful and influential friendships. And all of this points to why it's so important that we, number three, strive for real relationships.

Sometimes I see people who are wanting to tell others about Jesus. And the way they do that is they take a bunch of gospel tracts and they start going door to door in a neighborhood where none of them live. Or they try to strike up conversations with random strangers at the mall or on an airplane. And don't get me wrong, there will be times when they encounter someone who by virtue of some other circumstances and other seeds being planted, are already primed and ready for that conversation. But let me ask you this, just honestly, I'd love to see your hand.

Do any of you when you hear your doorbell ring and you discover that there is a random salesperson standing out there, does anybody say yes? Yes, anybody?

Yeah, 9:30 was the same way. That's certainly how I feel. See, genuine relationships allow us to have a kind of conversation that these random drive bys really don't. So I wanna encourage us to follow the example of scripture in working to build actual relationships with people rather than just throwing the gospel at them, rather than just doing a high speed Bible drive by. I love what Paul wrote to his friends in the city of Thessalonica.

Paul said, just as a nursing mother cares for her children, so we cared for you because we loved you so much. We were delighted to share with you not only the gospel, the gospel is important, but not only the gospel of God, but our lives as well. Paul didn't just preach to these people, he and his team invested in them. They opened their lives to them. We talk a lot around here about our ones and when we say our ones, what we're talking about are those people who are close to us but not necessarily close to God.

They're not bad people, they're just people that we have a relationship with who don't have a relationship with Jesus. So would you for just a moment picture in your mind one of those ones in your life. It might be a neighbor, might be a co worker, might be somebody you talk to at the gym or the coffee shop that you frequent, might be a classmate or a relative who doesn't know Jesus. And just ask yourself a few questions. Am I praying for them?

When was the last time I reached out to them? Are we overdue perhaps to have a cup of coffee or breakfast or lunch together. Has that person ever seen the inside of my home? What opportunities might I have to invite that person into my larger circle of friends? Is there a watch party for tomorrow's IU game that I could invite them to be a part of Super Bowl's coming up?

Maybe a backyard barbecue? I wouldn't recommend that today. Let the temperature get above freezing and then knock yourself out. But think about this before we try to talk to someone about something as personal as faith. Isn't it wise to become a friend if we can?

And I mean a real friend? Not somebody with an agenda, not someone who is willing to buy a cup of coffee or not someone who is willing to do the salesman type thing just to get a foot in the door, but someone who is willing to genuinely invest in them and demonstrate that I care about you. I'm here for you. I'm on your team. In the hopes of building a relationship that will allow us to have healthy conversations about all sorts of other things.

In the context of genuine relationships, we'll find opportunities for healthy conversations as we, Number four, live in a way that is noticeably, beneficially different. And I use the word beneficially because the guy who puts a cape on and runs around downtown with a tennis racket attacking pedestrians is noticeably different. That doesn't help anybody, though. We don't want to just be different in a way that people notice. We don't want to just be weird or obnoxious.

We want to be beneficial. We want to be helpful to people. The apostle Peter wrote this. He said, in your hearts, revere, set apart, honor, respect Christ as Lord, and always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. And then he says, but do this with gentleness and respect.

The way we go about it matters. Keeping a clear conscience so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ. So that those who think that Christians are washed up and out of their minds will ultimately have to change their minds. They'll be ashamed of that when they recognize that this is the genuine article. Notice that Peter didn't suggest that there's never a time to initiate a conversation about Jesus.

We're actually going to talk next week about the content of helpful gospel conversations. Peter just observed, and I think you could back this up in your own experience. I certainly could. That when we live with hope, when we exude joy in the midst of trials, when we see troubling things happen in the world around us. And yet we don't spiral into a tailspin when people mistreat us and we refuse to lash back at them in the same way.

People notice that, and they might even ask about it. And when they do, we need to be ready to explain the difference that Jesus makes in our lives. And there's an obvious flip side to this reality, and that is that if we tend towards cynicism, if our reflex position is standoffishness or sarcasm or angry online rants about whoever we disagree with, we have to recognize people are not going to be likely to say, matt, I notice how condescending and how harsh you are with people, and I really want to be more like that. Could we please spend more time together? It doesn't work like that, does it?

See, living in a way that is noticeably and beneficially different is something that Peter learned from Jesus, who said this? Jesus said, let your light shine before others that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. As followers of Jesus, we try to do good because we want to honor God, because we want to love people, because that's who God loves. But we have to understand our goal is never to impress people with how good we are. Our goal is not to showcase our virtue or our spirituality.

We want others to see the difference Jesus is making in our lives and want to know more about Him. Let me say that again. It's so important. We want others to see the difference Jesus is making in our lives and want to know more about Him. That's why we say that this third component of our mission is to inspire others to follow Jesus.

Any of you who have been a part of creating vision or mission or purpose statements know that words matter. We try to wordsmith these things really carefully. And there are lots of words that we could use that we ultimately decide to edit out of the picture. And we leave them on the cutting room floor. And we try to focus in on the words that we believe are best.

And we believe that inspiring others to follow Jesus is what we want to be about. We do not want to pester others to follow Jesus. We don't want to pressure others to follow Jesus or intimidate others to follow Jesus or condemn others to follow Jesus or berate others to follow Jesus or shame others to follow Jesus. We want to live as individuals with the help of God. And we want to function together as a church by the power of the Holy Spirit in a way that inspires others to follow Jesus.

We want to surrender our lives to Jesus as Lord and Savior, we want to invite him to move freely in us and work through us so that others see him in us and want to know more. I've been to some churches, maybe you have too, where as you walk out of the building, there's a sign over the door that says something like, you are now entering the mission field. That's not a bad reminder. My friend Brock, just a couple of miles east of here, regularly concludes the services at Redeemer Bible Church by reminding their congregation of two things. You are loved and you are sent.

And that's really the same goal we have in mind when we talk about inspiring others to follow Jesus. Here's the bottom line. God's love saves us. And we talk about that a lot, right? We sing about that a lot.

We celebrate that every time we baptize someone. God's love saves us. But it doesn't just save us. God's love also sends us. Jesus came to save all people, not just some, not just those of us who are here, not just Western hemisphere, not just upper middle class people, not just white people, not just people who come from a certain socioeconomic background, anything like that.

He came to save all people. And when he rescues us, he calls us to let others know that he wants to redeem them too. Because God's love that saves us also sends us. So here's the question. Who will have the opportunity to learn about the love of Jesus through you?

Would you pray with me, Father? God, we are so grateful for your love, God. Every single one of us, with our own stubbornness and selfishness, we've done damage to our own lives. We've damaged other people's lives as well. And Father, we live in a world full of people who are damaging themselves and damaging others.

And every time we open up social media or turn on the news, we see it.

And Father, you have called us to be ambassadors as we live as citizens of your kingdom here in this foreign place. God, you've invited us to, on your behalf, speak to other people about this amazing opportunity for redemption and reconciliation and forgiveness and new life and hope that you make available to us through Jesus. God, that's an incredible privilege and it's an enormous responsibility. And so we thank you that you, not not only do you give us this. This daunting challenge, but you give us the presence of your spirit within us to guide us, to remind us what to say, to help us to notice people who need to be noticed and who need to be loved and encouraged.

Father, as we get ready to walk out the doors as we get ready to go back to the routines that make up much of the fabric of our lives, we just ask that you would help us, God to do that with and inspire others to follow Jesus sensibility. Father, help us not to be oppressive, Help us not to be obnoxious. But Father, help us to be compassionate and aware and present and accessible so that when people who are a part of our sphere of influence need to be loved, need to be noticed, need to be encouraged. Father, we can be there and be a part of your response to that need. God, we thank you for your amazing love and grace that you've shown us.

God, use us as conduits so that other people could experience that too. We pray all of this in the mighty and holy name of Jesus. Amen.

Two words that we say a lot around here are Next Steps. Each week we talk about that because we truly believe that we all have a next step to take. Whether we are brand new in our faith or we've been following Jesus for a long, long time. He calls us to continue to walk with him and to take our next step. So so maybe your next step is to attend one of our Next Step classes.

We offer those on the first three Sundays of the month at 11 o' clock in room 502A and D. There's a big Next Steps banner outside that room. So we'll be offering the next class on February 1st. It is our Next Steps Discover class where we talk about how our personal story fits in with the church's story and than God's bigger story. So that might be an opportunity there. If you think that's your next step, maybe you don't know what your next step is and that's okay.

We'd encourage you to explore that. You can text the word next to the number on the screen and find out some ways that maybe God is leading you to take a next step. Maybe you have something that's on your heart that's really heavy and you would like to have us pray over that for you. You can submit prayer requests to greenwoodchristian.com prayer and our staff prays every week over those prayer requests and we'd love to do that. Maybe you'd like to talk to somebody in person about something that's on your heart.

I'd invite our Next Steps team to come to the front of the room at the conclusion of the service. You can come up and talk with one of the people that are down here in the front. They would love to talk with you. They love to pray with you, you, as you think about that next step, maybe your next step is serving. We have a serve opportunity coming up on Saturday, February 7, and it is, it goes along with our Christmas offering.

So we gave money to build a clinic in Ghana and now we are getting ready to send a shipping container over there full of medical supplies. And so we did this in partnership with FAME and Ghana Christian Mission. And so Fame is the place where we're going to go and pack those supplies. So if that's something you're interested in, we need two teams that day of eight, a morning team and an afternoon team. You can scan the QR code or go to greenerchristian.com info to sign up for that.

And then another team on a different date will actually pack or load all those things onto the shipping container to send over there. So maybe that's your next step if you, if you'd like to serve in that way. But as we leave this morning, let's just, let's think about the words that Matt shared with us this morning about thinking about those people who are close to us but far from God, that we can really invest in relationships with them and share Jesus with them. So thank you for joining us this morning and we hope you have a great week.