I appreciate very much the introduction, Pastor Barron. It made me feel tired. It made me feel like, wow, that guy is so busy. You know, I'm 55. I made a decision a few years ago. You go through these midlife crisis, you know, I'll admit it, I pretty much had that. I didn't go out and buy a red sports car. But I did stop and rethink a lot of things. And one of the things I just decided was, I'm going to use every opportunity, every chance I have to use what God has given me in the years that remain in order to affect the cause of Christ, especially in terms of missions. Sometimes, I suppose I probably get too busy, and my wife and I have discussions about that, but I do want to use what time and talents I have for the glory of God. I have appreciated, I went back and listened to the, on Sermon Audio, to the messages that you've had so far in the book of Colossians, and I've been asked to continue preaching through the book of Colossians. And what a great opportunity, what a great privilege, what a great book. Paul is writing to a church that he didn't start. The church at Colossae is, in fact, a model of what good missionary activity amounts to. Paul was in Ephesus for three years, and during those years when he was there, primarily, his primary work over the bulk of those three years was to teach in a school, to gather disciples together and to teach them. And Acts 19 tells us that because of that teaching in the space of just several years, everybody in the entire region, all the people of Asia, that's the Roman province of Asia, everybody, both Jews and Gentiles, both men and women, boys and girls, everybody heard the Word of the Lord. That's an incredible statement. When you first read that statement in Acts 19, you think, that can't quite be right. How could everybody in the space of two years have exposure to the gospel? But it's because when Paul is teaching in Ephesus, people are going from there and disseminating the gospel. And some of that ended up in Colossae. And Paul is now writing a letter to this church that he hasn't founded with the goal of strengthening them, encouraging them, and especially as you get into chapter 2, sort of warning them against false teaching. There was a false teaching that was taking place in Colossae. We're not exactly sure what that was, what that looked like. We can only kind of guess from what Paul writes to them. Doesn't fit any of the patterns that we know of, of specific heresies. But we know that it was a problem for them. We know that it was causing them fear and doubt and uncertainty. And of course we have those same kinds of things today. So what I'd like to do is take some time to go through these first eight verses of chapter eight and then to look at what Paul says to the church at Colossae to make some application to us, and then at the end to try to tie that in with missions and some of the themes that you've no doubt been hearing in these last few weeks. So I wanna start with lunch. Let's see, this isn't advancing. Maybe you can give me some help there. There we go, lunch. Because Pastor Jerry told me that after the service we were going to Arizona Steakhouse. Now, I'm risking a lot here because, number one, maybe Jerry changed his mind, or number two, now you're all gonna be thinking about lunch the whole time I'm trying to preach. But I've not been to Arizona Steakhouse. That sounds like a great place to be. What I'm guessing is at Arizona Steakhouse, you get steak, right? And that looks really good. I don't know if that's exactly what I'll get, but I assume at a steakhouse, you can get a good steak. I want to start by making the point that if you put that in front of me, and I'm looking at that steak, this isn't all that encouraging, this isn't all that exciting. Now, I like McDonald's hamburgers. You can tell by the size of me that I like almost everything that I can put in my mouth. But if I'm looking at this, and I'm thinking about this, this isn't all that appealing. And basically what Paul does in the first verses of Colossians chapter two is say, look, folks, you've got this. So somebody comes along and they offer you this. The only reason this would be appealing is because you don't understand that you've already got this. So let's see how he does that in these first eight verses. The first thing I wanna say is that Paul's message to us is that you cannot improve on what you already have in Jesus. You already have more than you can possibly imagine. You already have everything that God intends to give us in Christ. He is, as it says in chapter one, the hope of glory. And Colossians expounds, the book of Colossians expounds to us what that looks like. And then you get into chapter three and its practical application of how you live in Christ. And this is a glorious book to give us a sense of who we are in Jesus. So in the first verses we read, Colossians 2 verses one through three, I want you to know what a great conflict I have for you and those in Laodicea and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh, that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love and attaining to all the riches of the full assurance of understanding to the knowledge of the mystery of God, both of the Father and of Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Paul starts off by saying, look, it is worth it to me to proclaim Christ. He says, I have a great conflict for those of you in Colossae as well as those in Laodicea, a sister church nearby. And in the end of chapter one, in the portions that Pastor Ice has already preached through, Paul talks about the struggles. He talks about how he is working hard to make sure that they have a correct understanding of who Christ is. He has devoted his life to this. He has given himself selflessly so that they may understand who Jesus is. And Paul starts out by saying, it has been worth every bit of effort so that I can make known to you who Jesus is. He says to them, I want you to understand that even those who I've not seen face to face in the flesh, he says, I want your hearts to be encouraged. I want you to be knit together in love. I want you to have the blessings that come together as a congregation as you contemplate who Christ is so that you can attain all the riches of the full assurance of understanding. And it appears that what Paul is driving at is that this heresy that had come, this false teaching that had sort of risen up among the people of the city of Colossae, was causing some people to think maybe there's something more. Maybe we don't have all the good things that God wants to give us. Maybe if we just buy into this teaching that's being presented, our experience will be greater. Frankly, that's how the Bible begins. in the garden with the devil coming and saying, Adam and Eve, God is holding out on you. There's something better. And Paul is saying, it's a lie. It's always been a lie. What God delivers to us in Christ is as good as it can possibly get. And he talks about all the riches of full assurance of understanding, to be convinced, to know, to have the conclusion that What God has given us in Christ is the best that can possibly be received. One translation of verse two says, I work so that they may be encouraged by all the riches that come from a complete understanding of Christ. So that's the goal. And that's frankly what we do in our local churches. That's what we do in discipleship and even in evangelism. We're giving people the message of what is available in Jesus Christ, what it is to know him, to have a relationship with him. And he says, this understanding is the knowledge of the mystery of God. It appears that part of what Paul is dealing with in Colossae is perhaps at least in some way related to some of the mystery cults of the first century. And there were a number of these. We won't go into detail about any of that this morning. But the idea was if you can just reach a certain level of of understanding, then you'll have the keys, you'll have what is better, better than what you have now. And as then, so now, there are always a number of mystery cults, secret societies, things that say, if you just study with us or learn with us or enter into these mysteries, somehow you will obtain something that is not available in Christ. So whether it be something like the Masons, have you ever spoken to a high-level Mason and tried to find out how things work? Well, obviously, they're very tight-lipped. But at the end of the day, it's just a lot of talk. The Jehovah Witnesses came to my door last Saturday morning. It's been a long time. I think we got marked, don't come back to that house. But they came by last Saturday morning. And what do you do when the Jehovah Witnesses come to your door? I talk to them. I say, hey, you know, obviously you care about your spiritual life. Obviously this is very important to you. Let's talk. And as I've very often done with Jehovah Witnesses, I say, what were you before you became a Jehovah Witness? Almost without exception. In fact, I can't remember ever getting any answer other than this. Well, I was some form, some type of supposed Christian, or at least in Christendom, Roman Catholic, Baptist, Methodist, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, whatever. This particular couple, they said, well, we were Methodist. And so as we talk, it becomes evident that what has happened is somewhere along the line, they were unsatisfied with what they were experiencing as Methodists. Jehovah Witnesses come along and they seem to have everything buttoned up. All the answers, all the threads are tied. All of the dots are connected. And so you study with them and you start to learn and supposedly it all comes together. And I told them, I said, you know, frankly, the Watchtower does not have the answers. The Watchtower does not give you what is available in Jesus Christ. So you don't know, you've never studied with it. I said, oh, I've been to a number of Jehovah Witness Bible studies until I got kicked out. Well, you haven't been to the, oh, I have been to the Kingdom Hall. Got kicked out of there too. But when you go to those kinds of meetings, it sounds like if you just keep studying, if you just learn a little bit more, Then you'll have it. Then it will be glorious. Then it will be wonderful. Or you can go to the Mormons. And you can get involved in that and you can go through all the temple ceremonies and you can do all the rituals and somehow if you just keep going long enough and far enough, suddenly it will all come together. And this is the promise, this is the deception, this is the lie that somehow there's something better, there's something more, there's something that God has not yet given to us. But Paul says, the knowledge of the mystery of God both of the Father and of Christ in whom are hidden all the riches, I'm sorry, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. It's all there. There's not something more. There's not something the watchtower's gonna add to that. There's not something that wearing the special underwear and going to the Mormon temple is gonna add to that. There's not something that receiving the mystical mass is gonna add to that. There's nothing out there more than what is possible to receive in Jesus Christ. That's as good as it gets. So what happens? We come to church. We sing the songs, we listen to the preaching, and we're thinking, there's gotta be something more than this. And the problem is not that somehow Christ fails to deliver, it's that we fail to appropriate everything that is available in him. And that really gets us to chapter three, which I won't get to today. But the point is, we keep coming back to this reality. You cannot improve on what you already have in Jesus. This is as good as it possibly gets. So sometimes we feel like this. We feel like we're out in the middle of the ocean and this is all we've got as a life preserver. And we're focusing on all of our difficulties and all of our problems and all of the things that discourage us and all of the things that aren't the way we think they should be. And we think that we have some connection with Jesus, when in reality, all we have is just a slight grip on him, a slight shadow of the potential reality. And so this is our religion, this is our hope, this is what we're trusting in, when in reality, this is Jesus. Now obviously Jesus is even much more than the biggest cruise ship in the world. Jesus is infinitely greater than everything we can offer. But with the false hope, with the false promise, what we think is going to sustain us is just like this. It's nothing. It's incomparably weak and unable to save and to deliver. By the way, when you talk to someone from some other religious background, whether it be Hindu or Mormon or maybe Buddhist or Muslim or whatever. We tend to do this. We tend to come alongside of them and say, look at that stupid life preserver. Your religion is so worthless. And we criticize their religion. We tell them everything that's wrong with their religion. You know what? I can do that. I can have a conversation with a Roman Catholic and tell them about the foolishness of the mass and how everything is just a bunch of hocus pocus, and that priest can't change that bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ. Why do you think that? And I could talk to a Muslim, and I could talk to him about Muhammad being a pedophile. Was Muhammad a pedophile? Absolutely. A lot of people were pedophiles in the 7th century, but Mohammed marrying a 9-year-old girl was really not all that different from what other people were doing in the 7th century. But we can talk about that, we can criticize the religion, we can poke holes and we can try to tear it away, but what happens if you find a guy in the middle of the ocean and this is all he's got? You come along, you try to take it away, what's he going to do? He is going to fight with every ounce of strength he has to hold on to that because that's the only hope he has. And I think a lot of times this is how we tend to try to evangelize people. We come along, we try to take away what little bit they have. Rather than coming up alongside them and saying, you know what, this is Jesus. And you can't have Jesus until you let go of that life preserver, that donut. But when you let go, this is what you get. This is Jesus. This is security, this is safety, this is permanence, this is salvation. And so rather than attacking the religion. I'm not saying there's never a place for that, but rather than focusing on attacking what people have their hope in, show them the glory of Christ. Focus on the immense value and the intense satisfaction that comes from truly knowing Jesus. And so, as we continue in the passage, you see not only is it worth it to Paul to proclaim Jesus, but he talks about joyfully growing in Jesus. And he says, now this I say, lest anyone should deceive you with persuasive words. Deceive with persuasive words. The word deceive there is the word that's used in the Old Testament, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, when Laban, gave Jacob Leah at the time that Jacob was expecting to get Rachel. And Jacob says, you tricked me, you deceived me. That's the same word. It's the idea of coming along and thinking, okay, there might be more than what I have in Jesus. And someone comes along with some plausible message, some secret, mysterious approach and, There's the potential of being deceived with persuasive words. Persuasive words, in a sense, you could translate that as lawyer talk. And don't get mad at me, lawyers. You know, everybody loves to pick on lawyers until you need one, and then you're really glad they exist. But a lawyer's job, especially a trial attorney, his job is to persuade people with convincing words. to make an argument, to give a plausible explanation that the jury in this case will believe. But when we get into religious discussions, or when we get into questions of deceiving words in terms of the danger that comes to taking away from what we have in Christ, it looks more like this. I think, here we go. And the idea that somehow what you have in Jesus is not quite enough. Your best life is now, and if you just learn these principles of health and wealth and the prosperity that the gospel supposedly will bring, everything will be glorious. And Paul's reminder is now. No, what you have in Christ is absolutely as good as it can possibly get. And Paul commends them. He says, I'm absent in the flesh, yet I'm with you in spirit. And he rejoices to see their good order and the steadfastness of their faith in Christ. So he's commending the Colossians. You're doing this right. You're resisting this foolishness, you're resisting this deception. These are basically military terms, good order instead of fastness. In Paul's day it would have looked like this, a Roman phalanx. Good order, that doesn't happen without some study, some practice, some discipline. and you have steadfastness, you can stand the test. That's why we have church, that's why we have preaching, that's why we have Bible studies, that's why we have small groups, that's why we have Sunday school, that's why we have youth group. We're trying to help people become established in the faith, in the truth of the gospel so there can be good order and steadfastness in the faith of Jesus Christ. And then Paul says, as you have received Christ Jesus, the Lord, so walk in him. Now, this verse is often used, and frankly, I've used it myself this way at times, to say, you received Jesus by faith, so don't try to replace your walk with Jesus with something other than faith. That's true, but that's probably not what Paul's talking about here. Paul's probably not saying here, don't think that you can receive Jesus by faith, but then you can live the Christian life by works. Actually, that's the book of Galatians. Paul does address that topic, but not here. What he's saying here is, you receive Jesus Christ on the basis of the truth of who he is, the Messiah, the promised one, the vicarious atonement, the virgin-born Savior, the one who died and rose again, All the truths that we know about Jesus are not just doctrinal verities. They're not just creedal statements. They're glorious reality of what Jesus can do for us because of His death and resurrection, because of His presence on this earth as the Son of God who gave Himself for us, and so Paul says the truth that delivered you from your pagan background, your lost heathen ways, is the truth that will continue to sustain you and deliver you in this life as you rest in Christ and experience the glorious fullness of what it is to walk in him day by day. He talks about being rooted and built up and established in the faith. The idea of rooted is a perfect tense, meaning this took place when they were converted. They became rooted in Christ. They are pegged to Jesus, and this is now the reality of their condition, but they're being built up, present tense, and they're established in the faith, present tense. This is an ongoing process, and because all of those things are taking place, We can abound in this truth with thanksgiving. Let me ask you a question. Are you joyfully growing in Jesus? One of the great privileges of my life because I'm a missions guy is to travel, to go to different places. I've met people all around the world who don't have anywhere near the education I have. Don't have anywhere near the experiences don't come from a stable religious background like I do, but who are passionately in love with Jesus Christ. I met a man one time in India who had been beaten into a coma at the order of the Hindu priest who happened to be his dad. And when he was beaten into a coma because he was preaching the gospel in his village, his younger brother came along and started preaching the same gospel. And then the priest came along and said, beat that one too. And as his second son was being beaten, perhaps to death, the father looked down and said, son, is this Jesus really worth it? And he said, oh yes. And the father said, okay, stop. I wanna learn more about this Jesus. I had the privilege of meeting both sons and the father. passionately enjoying Jesus Christ. So thankful to be delivered from darkness and death and sin. And I look at people like that and I say, okay, I can teach you maybe theology, I can teach you some hermeneutics, I can teach you some Bible doctrines, but I need you to teach me what it is to truly love Jesus Christ. I met a man, I remember one time teaching a group of underground Christians in China, in southern China, in Guangzhou, And they were all house church leaders, mostly pastors. There were a few women there as well that were part of different house church movement. There were about 35 or 40 of them. This was very sequestered. In fact, every time the door opened, everybody just kind of froze. They were afraid all week that the police were gonna come in and raid them. But what struck me was the way these people worshiped. So we'd have a lesson. I had a lecture. I'd give my lecture with a translator. I'd give them some material. And they'd say, okay, that's enough for now. We want to worship. And they were all basically college age. I think the oldest was maybe 30, but most of them were in their early 20s, mid 20s. And they'd get to worship. And they didn't have any music. It was all just them. And before you knew it, they were jumping up and down. And they were shouting, and I thought, oh wow, this is charismatic. No, no. They just really enjoy Jesus. And I went away from that experience, and experiences like the one in India, and I've had the same kinds of experiences in Africa, and South America, and different parts of the world. I go away from those experiences, and I don't say, you know what, they should be more like me. I say, I wish I was more like them. I go away jealous. I go away saying, how can I experience Jesus in that way? And you know what the answer is? By following the doctrines that have been presented to us. There's not some secret, there's not some special second blessing, it's not, oh, I spoke in tongues, now I have, no, it's not that at all. It's coming back to the basic truth of the gospel, who we are in Christ, what we have in Christ. That's Paul's message in this book. And when we settle on that, and when we enjoy that, and when we meditate on that, and when we live that, and we appropriate that, we become those joyful Christians abounding in it with thanksgiving. And so Paul's message is it's joyful to grow in Jesus. The experience of practicing right belief about Christ is a bountiful, joyful, thankful experience. The reason that oftentimes we do not live abundant, thankful lives is not because there's something beyond Jesus. It's because we're not focusing enough on who Jesus is and what he's done and what we have in him. So once again I say, you cannot improve on what you already have in Jesus. Well then Paul comes specifically to the warning. And he says it's crucial to remain in Jesus. Okay, that's my sound effect, it'll stop. Beware! Be careful! There is real danger with false teaching. Beware lest anyone cheat you. This can also be translated, kidnap you, take you captive. Beware lest anyone come along and they plant in your mind the idea that somehow there's more, there's something better. Beware lest anyone cheat you. And then he talks about philosophy and empty deceit and the traditions of man and the basic principles of the world. And we could take time to go through all of that, but it really comes down to this. It comes down to the idea that all of this, all the different ideas of the world around us, whether it be some mystical teaching that tries to add to Christianity, or whether it be just the base instincts of humanity that says live for yourself and do what you want, it all comes down to this. It's smoke and mirrors. It sounds good, it sounds enticing, it sounds real, but Paul says, beware, because that's not gonna take you anywhere. That's not gonna give you anything compared to what you already have in Christ. He says all of that. is the antithesis of what you have according to Christ, what you have in Jesus. So philosophy, vain deceit, elemental spirits all point back to the fact that there's nothing new under the sun, there's always some new teaching, there's always some new doctrine, there's always some new faddish hope if you'll just pursue this. These are things that compete against the grace that is ours in Christ. But it always comes down to something that I have to do in order to attain more of God works. Or it comes down to something that competes with a sense of full and complete abandonment to Jesus. So these things are not according to Christ. So where does that leave us? Well, it leaves us with this. You cannot improve on what you already have in Jesus. That's as good as it can possibly get. Well, that's what Paul has to say to these believers. And I understand that you're gonna continue in the book of Colossians. It's a glorious book, and I trust that you're going to continue to see how Paul fleshes it out. The remaining part of chapter two, he fleshes out more specifically these dangerous teachings and how they compete with what is ours in Christ. But I wanna take a few minutes and talk about the application of missions, because this is a mission Sunday and the mission's message. So how do these dots connect? Well, quite frankly, they connect very simply in that the message of the cross is the fullest and most complete, most glorious and most satisfying message that can possibly be proclaimed. So we should know the truth and we should live the truth. We should proclaim Christ as a first priority. Those who are involved in missions need to be very well versed in what the Bible actually says. Because I promise you, it doesn't matter where you go in the world, how many different variations or permutations on heresy or falsehood that you may find, all of it is going to compete with the gospel of Jesus Christ. So missionary needs to really know the gospel. What is the truth of my relationship with God in Christ? And that's really what Paul is laying out for us throughout the book of Colossians. And then proclaim that as your first priority. There's a lot of things that can be done in missions. There's a lot of different ways in order to accomplish the work of God, to make disciples throughout the world, to build local churches. But all of it begins with simply proclaiming Christ as our first priority. Make Him known. Put that as our number one missionary task. And then resist anything that competes with the sufficiency of Christ, both in my own life in your own life and in terms of missionary activity. There are lots of things out there that end up competing with Christ. Could be a good thing. Could be a helpful thing. But it's possible that even some of our own missionary efforts become for the people on the field we're trying to reach those philosophies or those traditions or those things that we've brought with us that work pretty well for us here. but really are not what they need, at least at that moment, in order for them to experience the fullness of Christ. So I could go to a place like India, where people are living in poor rice villages, where they have literally nothing. And I was over there with Johnson George, some of you know Johnson. And after the service, People come up and they gather around and he prays for them. And I said, so what's going on here, Johnson? He says, well, this is prayer for healing. I said, what, so now you're a faith healer? And he looks at me and says, you have to understand something. These people have nothing. They have no money, they have no medicine, they have no physicians, and if they do have enough, if they get really sick and they can find their way to a physician, it may be 100 miles away, and it's gonna take everything they have, their extended family to collect money together, and all they can do is get a diagnosis. They don't have money for treatment. And so if they have cancer, if they have tuberculosis, or if they have even something like pneumonia, they're gonna die. So he says, they come and they ask me to pray for them, and I do. And I says, then what happens? He says, and they get healed. Because that's all they have. So here's what I'm saying to you. People all around the world They look at a country like America, we have so much, this is wonderful. I'm never gonna criticize all the great things we have in America, but this is not the hope of the world. Christ is the hope of the world. And we have to make sure that whatever we're doing in missions is magnifying Jesus Christ. That's the answer. He is the solution. So resist anything that competes with the sufficiency of Christ. And then last line. How do we do missions in a way, I'm sorry, how do we do missions in a way which most efficiently communicates the message of Christ? So I have to admit to you, it's kind of tempting. I'm kind of a pot stirrer, some of you know that. I'm the guy who's always pulling the loose threads. And so I look at a lot of things in missions and say, well, maybe that's not such a great idea, or maybe that's outlived its usefulness. And so it would have been kind of easy when we talk about philosophy and tradition to kind of launch into, but that's not what Paul's talking about there. But there is a connection, right? There's a connection in that when we look at the way we do missions, we want to make sure that how we do missions is most effectively communicating Christ and His sufficiency, Christ alone, Christ's glorious and His salvation to people on the fields we try to serve. So there are some things that we do in missions that probably are a bit outdated. And at the very least, could be re-examined. And so people say, well, you need to step outside the box. Maybe we just need a bigger box. Maybe we just need to think through some things that we've been doing for a long time. And frankly, I could take the next hour on this, which I won't because I'm looking at the clock and you're thinking of Arizona Steakhouse as well as I am. But frankly, a lot of what we do in terms of how we approach missions is not based on some New Testament mandate. It's just pragmatically what has worked. And it comes out of our collective experience, and it comes out of our collective history. And all of those are good, and I'm not gonna criticize any of it. I'm just going to say maybe some of it needs to be rethought. So in terms of the idea of deputation and support, I don't know if you've thought about this. Folks who are on deputation, they think about this all the time. But this isn't working all that well anymore. And it's taking people two, three, sometimes more years to get to the field. And so maybe we need to rethink that. Maybe we can look at more support directly from individuals. I know in some places that's almost anathema. Only the local church supports missionaries. Frankly, I can't find that in the New Testament. Jesus and his disciples were supported by wealthy women who followed them around and gave them money, you know, individual support. And Paul received help from individuals as well as help from churches, as well as working to support himself. And as painful as this may be, I think in the long term, having fewer missionaries that we connect with that give us greater relationships and greater connectivity, greater discipleship opportunities is probably a good thing. I'm the chairman of the elders and the chairman of the missions committee at Heritage Bible Church, and these are some things we're working through. By the way, Heritage Bible Church would appreciate your prayers. Next Sunday, Lord willing, we're voting on our pastoral candidate. I know that you're in that situation as well. I don't even want to think about how many hours of pastoral search committee work. And I know it's draining. It's a process. It's been a long process for us. We don't know if we're at the end. We're hopeful that we're at the end. But one of the things we're working through in terms of the Elders and the Missions Committee is maybe we have too many mission partners. It's like, as soon as you say that, you want to duck. It's like, oh man, how can you do that? But as a church, we want to make sure that the people we're connecting with, we're really connecting with. And there's a huge danger looming, and I'll try to move on from this because I get started talking about these things and I lose my sense of time. There's a huge danger looming in the way we fund missions because younger donors do not want to give institutionally. You're probably feeling that here as a church. And typically, younger donors will give person to person. They'll give to someone they know, someone they believe in. and not so much through a church, through an institution. And that changes the dynamic. I'm not saying that's good or bad, I'm just saying it is. And that changes the dynamic. So we're trying to think through how do we have fewer missionaries with whom we have much greater connectivity. We're going every year to their fields, we're actually participating with them. And what we'd like to do, just throw this out, what we'd like to do is get to a point where all of our mission partners, we support them for 50%. So when they come home, they come home to us. And they teach in our Sunday school, and they preach, and they are part of our leadership team. But you can't do that if you've got a huge number. And like I say, I'm stirring the pot. It's up to Jerry now to figure out what that means for you. And Jerry, you asked me to talk about some of these things, so I'm gonna make your job harder by bringing them up. Platforms. Another issue is platforms. That is, how is the missionary present? The Howard has mentioned this this morning in the Sunday School Hour. It's getting harder and harder, especially in Europe, to get a missionary visa. That's true in a lot of places. So how are you present? Look, think about the whole immigration issue in the United States. And I'm not about to tell you what I think about that, because whatever I might say, I'll lose half of you, right? So I'm not that naive. But think about the concerns about immigration in the United States. Don't you think people in other countries have the same concerns? So somebody shows up from America, they move in next door, and they have apparently no job. But they have money. And you're thinking, what's the deal with this? And then they wanna come and tell you about a religion that doesn't quite jive with what you know, and so it all gets a little bit cagey. So the issue of presence, how are you present on that field? What is your platform? What is the sense by which you come there? And so there's a lot that could be said about this, but let me just throw two things out. One is a big field, and that is business's mission. Business's mission has, a dozen subsets and subcategories, anything from teaching English to operating a business which employs non-Christians that you can use your business as a means to get into the gospel, to establishing businesses within a community so that people in the church can have a business and therefore afford to pay for the future of the church, a pastoral leadership, and other aspects of ministry. Business's mission is a big thing. And there are people who have skills, that are not necessarily planning to become a church planter, but you have skills that are marketable that could get you into places where the typical church planning missionary is never going to get a missionary visa to go, but you could go there and you could use those skills to advance the kingdom of God. and the world as a global economy is ripe for this kind of thinking. So business is a mission. And then another is just basic community involvement. Again, we want to make sure our priority is proclaiming the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ. But if that's your whole sense of presence, you don't have connections to the community. You're not part of that society in some way. you're probably going to be looked at with suspicion and fear. So platforms is a big issue. And there's a lot of, of, of ideas and thinking, and someone will come to you and you'll say, that's not how we do missions. But maybe that's how we should do missions. Maybe that's what will work as long as it's not against the Bible. Remember a lot of what we do, we do because of our history and our experience, and this is what's worked in the past. Maybe what will work in the future will be, will look a little different. And then practice. How do we promote indigeneity? That is, how do we help people to become responsible for their own ministry on the field? Well, one thing that is taking place in the world today in missions is church planning movements, where the focus is not so much on the depth as the first step, but on just getting people who are willing and eager to tell others about Christ. You see this in places like China. somebody gets saved and the first thing they think of is, I'm going to go tell somebody else. In fact, that happens here, but then we put them into an institutional situation and they quickly get talked out of that somehow. But the first impulse of a new believer is to tell somebody else, this is great news. And so to capitalize on that and say, okay, let's have church be really simple And then we'll come back later, and this begins to spread and to grow. And so people say, for example, about Christianity in China, yeah, it's a mile wide, but it's only an inch deep. Yeah, that's true. One of the fastest places of Christianity growing in the world today is in Iran, believe it or not. I just came back a couple weeks ago from Cuba. I've been to Cuba a bunch of times over the years. And Cuba probably has the fastest growing church in the Western Hemisphere. It's amazing. Literally, somebody went in and did a survey and counted just among Baptist churches, just Baptist churches in Cuba. Over 8,000 churches now. in a population of just over nine million. Now a lot of those, most of those are church planning movements or just house churches. They're people who don't have any education. So we come in after we give them education. We come in after we help them with the discipleship. We help them. But we want to see stuff get started. And so it doesn't have to fit all of the parameters of all of what makes us church here. It just has to have connection with Jesus. and get started and be doctrinally true. And then it can grow in depth. So church planning movements. There's weaknesses and fears with that, but I think it is a viable discussion about how we do missions. And then contextualization. In some circles, contextualization is almost a scary word. But contextualization is basically making the gospel making the message of the gospel understandable within someone else's cultural context. Not changing the gospel, but communicating it in a way so that what you're communicating is what you want them to understand in their context, and then let them experience Christ within that context, what that looks like. So, you know, you go to some places and they have drums. But that's maybe the only instrument they have. So, okay, I go to Cuba and they have tambourines. It's like, wow, I feel like I'm at Woodstock. But you know what? It helps them sing. And you know, I think, isn't the word tambourine in the King James Version of the Book of Psalms? Maybe I'm wrong about that. But tambourine, is that the same thing? Okay, now this is where I get in trouble. So I'm gonna stop. But my point is, You have to make the message understandable, and the experience of Christianity is that experience that we talked about earlier, the fullness of Christ, but it's gonna look different in different places. And we have to accept that, embrace that, and really welcome that, even in Greenville, and that's a challenge. So, have I stirred the pot enough, Jerry? Have I given you enough work to do for the next year? Put out all these fires I just started? All right. But again, it all comes back to the simple reality, you cannot improve on what you have in Jesus. So let me end with this. We send people all around the world so that they can experience the glory of the gospel, so that they can experience the fullness of Christ. And yet oftentimes we sit back here and we're not experiencing that ourselves. Our Christianity has become very, I don't know, formal, kind of stodgy. And I'm not implying, I'm just saying, I'm not talking about church, I'm talking about my experience, my personal relationship with Christ, when it's supposed to be something vibrant and exciting and overflowing. And the only way we're gonna find that, is by just focusing on Christ. Learning, focusing, meditating on the fullness of who he is and what we have in him. Because there's nothing more we can add to what we already have in him. Let me pray. Father, thank you for These folks, thank you for their patience. Thank you for Pastor Barron and the invitation. The others who have served here tirelessly and selflessly as this church seeks a new man to be their lead pastor. And we pray for your blessing on that. We pray for your blessing on our efforts to the same end at Heritage Bible Church. And we pray that, Lord, you will bless and use us in our own interaction with people around us. May we overflow with the gospel of Jesus Christ. so that when people come to know us, they experience someone who follows Jesus with a full heart. We pray in his name, amen.