If you turn your Bibles to Luke chapter 12 and verse 32, before we read it, I want to make some introductory comments. And I've entitled this message, In Defense of Small Congregations. In Defense of Small Congregations. And what could be more fitting than preaching to 15 people. So we live in a generation where the majority of professing Christians have come to believe that a large church is successful and a small church is a failing church. Every time I go to a meeting, the primary question that is given to me is, how many people attend your church? I've never been asked, what is the spiritual welfare of your congregation? How are they doing? Are they growing in grace? Is your church spiritually healthy? I've never heard that. I've never been asked that question. And so I want to spend our time this morning to step back and analyze who we are as a New Testament church. because it is very easy to judge ourselves in light of the modern church growth movement. It's easy to measure our success or our failures based on the modern definition of what is a successful church. So I want to start with the basics. And the basics is that the father purposed this church. He is the one that ordained that this church exists in eternity past. He did this before the foundations of the world by determining to save us. And the way he did that was by sending his son into the world. He sent his son into the world to redeem us from our sin and the wrath of his father alone. Paul wrote to the, or spoke to the church at Ephesus when he was saying goodbye to them. He said, take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock. over the which the Holy Ghost has made you overseers to feed the church of God which he hath purchased with his own blood. So this church is very precious to God. And it should be very, very precious to us knowing what it took to put this church together. It took the shed blood of the Son of God. And so the Holy Spirit is our architect. We're taught that in 2 Corinthians 12, that he is literally is the architect of this church. He has placed each member of this church in this church. We are members one of another. We are members of one body and we function as one body, but we are many members and each of us has a purpose in that. So all of these things are very important for us to understand because we need to realize that we exist because God purposed it, the Son died for it, and the Holy Spirit is the architect of this. This is the reason we are together this morning. We have been called out of this world to be image bearers of God. And when he did that, when he called us out of the world and made us image bearers, it means we had to leave our traditions and our religions at the door. All of that is gone now. Our only standard for our faith, for our practice, is the New Testament. Church. So let's look at verse 32 of Luke chapter 12. We studied this a few weeks ago in the 11 o'clock sermon service, but I just want to read this. Do not fear, little flock, for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. If you remember, there was a innumerable multitude, a very large crowd, into the thousands surrounding Jesus. and they were listening to him preach, but that wasn't necessarily the motive for them going. They were listening, and yet they were not listening, because the majority of the people in this group rejected the Lord Jesus Christ. They were amazed at his authority. They loved the fact that he could heal and even raise people from the dead. They loved his compassion and his love. Yet they rejected his gospel. And that's the way it is in the world. There is a remnant of believers in every generation. And there was a remnant of believers during the time of our Lord Jesus Christ. But in the midst of that crowd, Jesus stopped and looked at these people and said, fear not little flock. So what's important about this is he knew them. He called them by name. He recognized them and they recognized him. And the motive why he came is told in what he said after that, for it is your father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. So that's the context of our very existence, that it is the father's good pleasure to give us the kingdom. And he does that by sanctifying us and enabling us to grow in grace as a body of believers in this local assembly. The culture of Israel was much like the culture of our day. That is, it was religious. Every culture and every generation and every part of the world has some sort of religious belief system. And the Jews had theirs. It was called Talmudic Judaism. It was a tradition of the elders. It was a religion alongside the law of Moses to make sure that nobody could accuse it of being against the law of Moses. but make no mistake, they were anti-law. They were legalistic in their traditions and their ceremonies, but their heart wasn't in it. John the Baptist came in on the scene and declaring that Jesus Christ has come, the Messiah has come. He prepared the way for the anointed one, and yet he was rejected by the rulers. He was rejected by the religion of the day. He was an Old Testament prophet, and like those who walked before him, he was rejected. It doesn't take away from the fact that they were religious people, and they were very religious, but their whole religion was based around a false teaching of tradition, not truth, not absolutely in God's law, and so therefore, They rejected the prophet when he came and they rejected the Messiah when he spoke. So they functioned within the strict rules of their tradition. Their tradition determined how they ate, what they ate, when they ate, what clothes they were to wear, when they were to go to synagogue, when they were going to go to the feast days, and go on and on. The Sabbath laws were strictly obeyed. All of these things were their religion, but they were all outward forms of religion. Nothing touched their heart. Nothing was inside of them that flowed out of them. It was a religion that started from the outside and never entered into their hearts. And no one questioned that. No one wanted to hear that their tradition was dead and that they were dead spiritually and that Abraham's blood was not going to get them to heaven. Only the blood of Christ can do that. So they robotically went through the motions of outward duties and rituals and ceremonies. Then Jesus came on the scene. And he said, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Well, that destroyed their religion. That very statement destroys all man-made religions. Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. That's it. That's the religion of God. And it completely dismantles all of our notions about our man-made religions. He said, you must be born again. He was telling this to the children of Abraham. The result was the shocking reality that the leaders conspired to murder him and the Romans did murder him for simply preaching from the eternal word of God. The light shineth in the darkness and the darkness comprehended it not. That's true Christianity. That's true religion rejected by the world. He was standing in the very midst of those unbelievers. A sea of people. And he looked at those believers. He knew who they were, scattered throughout that crowd. He said, fear not, little flock, for it is my father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. He recognized his sheep, and his sheep heard his voice. So the little flocks of Jesus have always been the minority in the world, and they will always continue to be a minority in the world. unless the post-millennialists are right and there's gonna be a great worldwide revival and God's going to usher in his kingdom that way. I don't know. I don't know what's gonna happen, how it's gonna happen. Everybody's so sure about what's going to happen, how it's gonna take place. I don't know. The fact is lost souls crave religion. because we're made in the image and likeness of God. We've defaced all of that in our fall, in our sin, but everyone craves religion. The people that crave it most are the atheists, the unbelievers. They're always fighting about religion. You ever notice that? It's always negative, but they're always talking about religion. And so the reality is people will conform to whatever the culture of the time says it is. Whatever the culture of the time says what religion is, then that's what religion is. Whatever your culture says, whatever the times you live in, whatever part of the world you may live in, you're gonna conform to that religious thought. That's why a whole swath of people are Hindus or Muslims or Shinto or Catholics, or Baptists. Most of it's cultural. For centuries, the Catholic Church was the dominating religion of Europe. And they were forced to believe. Forced to submit, I should say. Whether they believed or not, I don't know. But most people, under penalty of law, became Catholics. And people enjoy it, because people love the ceremony, and they love the big cathedrals, and they love the glass-stained windows, and the silk robes, and the big hats, and the incense, and the candles, and the majesty of it all. And so they go to these big churches, and they feel religious, because it's very religious. But there's nothing about it that's true. There's nothing about it that will save your soul. So today, in modern America, we have a dominant religion called the megachurch movement. It's dominating our culture. It's a new modern day growth movement, and you will find it in every city and every town. It's the default position for religious people now. This is what a successful church looks like. The goal of these churches is to pack as much flesh into their building as they possibly can, and then make sure the people coming in the front door are more than the people running out the back. They build massive campuses now. Campuses with satellite campuses. They're being erected everywhere, but they're not building meeting houses. They're not building humble meeting houses where God's people meet to gather together to worship. They're building massive campuses where thousands come to three to four to five different services a Sunday. My point in all of this isn't to criticize them. Believe it or not, it's not. I'm not here to criticize them in any way. I'm just telling you the facts. But I will ask you this. If you attend a church where 5,000 people are a member, Will you ever get an audience with the pastor? Will he ever know your name? Can your preacher, the shepherd of that church, pray for you? What kind of a relationship does a sheep have with a shepherd is the question on the table. My point is that people get used to the religious culture of their day. And this is now what people are used to. And so they go to the churches that everybody goes to. It's comfortable to do that because there's safety in numbers. But that's not true in Christianity. We can't think like the world thinks. There's safety in the majority. If everybody's doing it, that must be the way to go. And so the mentality is that large churches with lots of activities and programs are the default church that people just go to without thought. I spoke to a man recently and he was very concerned about our church, our little flock. He told me that his church has 3,000 members and they have five services a day. And the pastors of the church are world-renowned preachers, very famous preachers. And he told me, he said, what I can do for you is I can send one of my pastors who's very well known, and we will set up a date for him to come and preach at your church, and then we will announce that my pastor is going to come to your church. And then we're going to advertise all that, and then we're going to put you in our directory. And then you are going to be put on the map. You are going to be a successful church once this man shows up to preach for you. Everybody's going to want to come to your church after that, and then you're going to be like us. You're going to be successful. Well, I turned him down. I said, no, thank you. I appreciate your kind offer, but I'm not going to accept that. Because any man that would dare to believe that his personality or his popularity is the reason for a successful church is a wolf in sheep's clothing. He's a fool. But this attitude is everywhere. Large campuses and lots of people equals success. Well, tell that to the Muslims. Or tell that to the Catholic Church, who's responsible for the death of 60 million Christians over the last 2,000 or 1,500 years. Our legitimacy as a New Testament church is found only in the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit in keeping us together. We are a church. We are the pillar of truth. We are the pillar and ground. We're the foundation of truth where we defend the truth. That's what it means. But if I tarry long, Paul says, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God. Well, how do you do that? Which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth. Amazing. Many have walked through these doors. And it breaks my heart because they listen to the message and they're very impressed with the people, how loving they are and how kind they are. And every once in a while, they even say that I did a pretty good job and Pastor Stephen did a pretty good job in the pulpit. But then they always wonder why we are not like all the other churches. There must be something wrong with these people. And that's the mentality that we're fighting, this modern mentality of what a true church is. It's got to be a big campus with a lot of stuff going on all the time. So what do we have to offer? Well, only what the New Testament allows. I can't go beyond what the New Testament allows. Because if you go beyond that, then you're just like the Talmudic Jews. And you might as well just quit. If you come to our church, we faithfully, we promise to faithfully proclaim the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. We'll do it in his fullness. We'll do our very best to not leave anything out, to give you the whole counsel of God. Well, that's great, says a visitor, but why are you so out of touch with everybody? So here we are, this little flock meeting together on Sunday morning, doors are wide open, lights are on, thousands and thousands of people surround this church and nobody's coming here. So we're gonna sing our hymns, and we're gonna pray, and we're gonna fellowship, and we're gonna listen to preaching. But then what are we gonna do? We're even gonna have fellowship together today. It's gonna be wonderful. It is wonderful, because this is what God's ordained for us. But that's not enough for our generation. They need more. They need more than what God will offer them. So they look around, the people walk in, they look around, and it looks like they just walked into a building and a church that looks like they're conducting themselves in the 1950s. The men even still wear suits here. Wow. But they're wrong. We're not a church that's echoing the days long gone from the 1950s America. When a family walks through the doors of this building, they're going to be taken back to the upper room of A.D. 30. They're going to be taken back to the churches of Galatia and Ephesus in 52 A.D., and they're going to be taken back to the seven churches of Asia Minor in 92 A.D. That's who we are. Because the Bible is a timeless book. We live in the Bible. We don't live in this generation. We're pilgrims and strangers in a strange land. We live in the timeless Word of God, the eternal timeless Word of God. It transcends everything. It transcends our culture. It transcends our race, our borders, our generations, and every crazy idea that every generation comes up with of what religion should look like. New measures come and go, but the word of the Lord is going to stand sure. And so if we have to fail as a church, let's fail in our success in being faithful to God. Let us beware of thinking we are in competition with the modern growth movement. We are not in competition with anyone or anything, and I'm not here to make enemies. I like all of those men. I don't agree with them, but I like them, and I'm their friend. I'm certainly not gonna make them my enemy. But we are to focus on the example set forth in the New Testament and nothing more. That is our competition, to be faithful to the word of God. After Pentecost, that little flock, remember that little flock that met in the upper room? There's 120 people in it. It grew in one day to 3,000 people. And it kept growing to 8,000 within just weeks. And it's amazing to me that those new converts knew how to live. They knew how to behave as they were walking through the city of Jerusalem. Acts chapter 2, verses 46 and 47. And they, that is this new membership, and they continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God and having favor with all people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved. All of that comes together. Let's read this negatively. And they did not continue daily with one accord, with one mind, with one purpose in the temple. They did not do that. They did not break bread from house to house. They did not eat with gladness and singleness of heart. They did not praise God. They did not have favor with all the people. Well, what would be the result? God did not add people to the church because there was no testimony. But that's not what it says. It was the testimony and the lives of the people entering into the community that completely transformed Jerusalem. So much so that they had to bring out persecution and they all had to scatter all over the Roman Empire because they were too influential. These people lived their lives before their friends and family. Why? Because their friends and family and neighbors were dying in a Christless religion. And they wanted them to be saved. Just comes down to that, doesn't it? This was a brand new religion. A new sect coming out of the Jewish religion. No one knew anything about it. They knew that Jesus ministered for three years, but he's dead. All of a sudden, there's a giant church in the midst of Jerusalem. Like I said, they just murdered the leader. No one had any experience how to conduct themselves. The pastors had never pastored a church before. They had no experience in that. They had no money. They had no organization skills. They didn't have an advertising budget. They're just a bunch of regular people like you and me. And they went to the temple every day, and they had the same mind and purpose, and they praised God in front of all these people, and they worshiped Jesus Christ. And they did it with such love and compassion and integrity that everybody respected them. They found favor with the people, and those people said, you know what, I think I'm gonna go to their church services. And they did, and God saved them, and then God added daily to that church. So it's our responsibility to be like them. is what I'm trying to tell you. We've hid behind these walls too long. We need to be outgoing. We need to be courageous. We need to tell people that we love Jesus Christ. We need to tell people that they can find the truth within these walls But they need to find it in us personally first before they're going to come through those doors. Yes, we need to be like them, loving, friendly, outgoing, kind. Above all else, we have to be humble because we're sinners saved by grace. And that's the message we want to convey to this community. We are called to be salt and light. And if we're not going to do that, Then what are we doing? Fear not, little flock, because large churches have always been the exception to the rule. They've never been the rule. We've made it so that in order for you to be successful, you have to go to this gigantic corporate conglomerate. I don't agree. God has purposed his little flocks to advance his kingdom through the lives of his people and the pulpit ministry, but they have to work together. It's really that simple. And so I'm not advocating for a small church because the Great Commission is looming over us, right? The Great Commission is looming over us. Do you remember what he said to his disciples? And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, all power is given unto me in heaven and earth. Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even unto the ends of the age. So that's the commission. And that's why we're never to be satisfied with a little flock. And sometimes you can be very satisfied with your little flock because it's safe. We can build walls around our church, like the 30 foot walls around Edinburgh. Keep everybody out. But we don't wanna keep everybody out, we want everybody to come in. We gotta get rid of our safe space. We are evangelical Christians in our nature, and we need to let that get out of our systems, don't we? We have to have the desire to fulfill the Great Commission as individuals, as each different member, and then do it as a whole. And that will enable our churches to grow in number. But that's up to God. God adds to the church such as should be saved. Our job is to be like the members of the church at Jerusalem after Pentecost. Little flocks. This little flock. I truly believe we long to see our church full. Boy, don't you? But I'm not willing to do it at the expense of importing the world into our church. Because if you import the world into the church, then your church is of the world. Am I out of time? I'm doing pretty good today. I'm almost done too. There's one more reason it's important that that our churches are designed to be small. You think about what it was like before the Industrial Revolution in the late 1800s. The average person that lived in this world never left their county, because there was nowhere else to go. You had horses and buggies, if you could afford that. And so you stayed in your plot. You stayed in your community. You went to that church. If you were saved, you went to the local Baptist church. And you lived and died there. The pastor may not have even been a very good pastor. Probably only had three books on his shelf. But if he was a loving pastor and an engaged pastor, and a pastor that loved his sheep. It didn't really matter if he was a very good preacher, did it? Because you knew he loved you. So you didn't have to worry about the competing methods of the mega church movement until recently. Because we can move so easily now. Go anywhere we want, do anything we want. Be lost in the masses. But it is impossible, and this is what I mean when I say that I'm defending the little flocks. It is impossible for a pastor to effectively pastor a church of 3,000 people. Your pastors are yours. And you are ours. And that's very important for us to understand. It's a very serious relationship we have. And I don't even think we've begun to have a relationship like that yet. Because we're so new as a church. But I can't effectively do my job if I can't be your pastor. An intimate relationship with you. And you open up to me and I open up to you. Psalm 23. Let's read Psalm 23. How can we not? Psalm 23. I wish I had my King James Bible. I can't imagine reading Psalm 23 apart from anything other than the King James Version, but let's try it. Psalm 23, a Psalm of David. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures. He leads me besides the still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of mine enemies. You anoint my head with oil. My cup runs over. Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Clearly this is the great shepherd and his sheep, but it is indicative of the relationship of a pastor to his flock, to his sheep. And it reveals to us the intimacy an actual shepherd has with his sheep. He has to be there all the time for them. They can't live without him. They can't survive a day without him. If he leaves them, they wander off. If he doesn't anoint their oil, their faces with oil, the screw flies are going to go in there. Worms are going to get into their brains and they're going to go crazy. He has to take them where the food is and bring them down when the cool air, when the hot air is too much. He has to do all of these wonderful things for them because they can't do them for themselves. And God likens our relationship to a shepherd and a sheep's relationship. My point is that it is vital that a church stays relatively small so the sheep have access to their pastors. Direct access. Mega churches don't have that. They have created leadership teams. I had to read their books when I went to Bible college. They taught me how to be a mega church pastor, how to be successful. And I graduated, I got my, this was over 20 years ago, they were pushing this. 25 years ago, I think I graduated from Bible college. They create leadership teams made up of the senior pastor, the associate pastor, the junior pastors, the youth pastors, the counseling teams, the team leaders, the staff, the husband and wife marriage counselors. How can you even get to the pastor if you're a sheep? There are so many layers. No. God has ordained the pastor-member relationship, not a corporate head, CEO. There was a pastor in New York City. He was very talented man. His name was John Gano. He had a church of 200 people before the war for independence from England. And he was called into the army. as the pastor of that church in New York City. And he was commissioned, obviously, as an officer, and he became George Washington's chaplain. He was a great man in his own right. He was an excellent man, an excellent preacher, an excellent servant. He was so excellent in his preaching abilities that George Whitefield came to hear him preach. about 15 years before the, oh no, over 20 years, about 20, 21 years before the Declaration of Independence was signed, George Whitefield sat under his ministry. That's amazing. Anyway, while he was away during the war, the British occupied New York, destroyed most of it, and they destroyed his church. And so his little flock was scattered When he came back after the war, he rebuilt his church, and he was able to gather 37 people of the old membership. He ministered to that church, and it grew back to a good number, but that left over 160 people scattered. His sheep were scattered, not because it was his fault, but because he was called to duty by his government. He couldn't stay in the church, so he left. Where did he go? Mostly he went to South and North Carolina to seek out the lost sheep, the scattered sheep, the sheep that wandered off without a shepherd, because he believed it was his duty to take care of those sheep. And he found many of them. And he ministered them one-on-one with Bible studies, got the neighbors together, formed a church, then went to another family and did that. He did that to the day he died almost. He became a missionary to the lost sheep of his church in New York and spent the remaining years of his life in the South because it was his duty to care for the sheep. Those were his sheep and he wouldn't let them go. They wandered in the wilderness and he found them. That's an amazing thing. That's what it means to have a pastor. That's what it means to be a shepherd and a sheep. And we've lost sight of that in our generation. because I can get in my car right now and before lunch, I mean before dinner, I can be in a hotel room in Los Angeles. I can get on a plane and be in Paris tonight. And so can you. And so we go where we want, we do what we want, but we don't think about why we're doing what we're doing. A true shepherd has to be always accessible and intimate. But we can't do that if you're not accessible and intimate with us. So this is what we have to offer. To continue to preach Christ in him crucified from this pulpit and from your lives. Because that's the only way a man can be made right with God. And if we don't have a true desire to see that for our neighbors and our family and our friends, then we need to check our hearts. We live to tell the world of the vicarious sacrifice of Jesus Christ at Calvary. Vicarious, it means on our behalf, he did it for me. So let us be missionary minded. Let us be encouraged and recommit ourselves to these basic principles and practices of New Testament Christians. Principles, what we believe, practices, how we live, very simple. Pray that we can be active in our community with boldness and courage and love and compassion. Maybe we can actually set up a table at the farmer's market and say, come visit our church. This is what we have to offer you, the gospel. What about our kids? We have the gospel for them too. We may be a little flock, but we're Jesus' little flock. And so the question on the table is, if we are faithful to his calling, he may seem fit to give us more responsibility in the future. But right now he has not seen fit to give us more responsibility. And maybe that's because we're not living up to our potential. Just a thought. But I promise I'm gonna do better. I'm gonna do better. I'm going to be more bold, and I'm going to tell people that I'm a Christian, and that I'm a pastor, and come to church. And I'm not going to apologize for why our church is the way it is, because our church is doing what's right. And we're going to continue to do what's right, and we're going to do it in love. We're not going to attack. Okay, I'm going to stop right there. Our Father, we thank you for your goodness. May you bless our little flock and may you enable us to be a shining light on a hill that all can see. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.