All right, would you please stand for the reading of God's word? We'll be reading Ephesians 4, 1 through 16. I, therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called with all humility and gentleness. with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit, just as you recall, to the one hope that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore it is said, when he ascended on high he led a host of captives and he gave gifts to men. In saying he ascended, what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is the one who also ascended far above the heavens that he might fill all things. And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into Him who is the Head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes bodily growth and builds itself in love." Let's pray. Father, apart from you, we can do nothing. Christ said, apart from me, you can do nothing. He also said, ask and you will receive that your joy may be full. So right now we ask that you would impart your Holy Spirit to our hearts and minds and the eyes of our heart that we may behold wonderful things from your law. We pray it in Jesus name. Amen. You may be seated. I did not want to forget, too, to mention that my travel companion is my son, John Mark, and he is with me. He's just six weeks back from a Fulbright teaching program in Korea. He was in Korea for a year teaching 500 high school boys English. So I'm very, as the exhortation said today, I'm very proud of him. So it's been a joy to have him with us and to be in beautiful Colorado. I preached last Sunday in Grand Junction, and then today I get the privilege of preaching to you all and then in Monument. So this is a fun and full day and a wonderful time to be back in the area that we lived in and ministered in in 84, 85, and 86. I'd like to tell you about a very interesting development in the Reformed world in the United States. The man's name is Erich Sautter. He's pastor of Christ the King Church, Springfield, Missouri. And about maybe three or four years, I visited his church. And I'd already talked to him on the phone about adopting a church in the Soviet Union. He was already interested. I got there and I knew things were different than a lot of churches I went to because they had an evening family get-together, an evening together, Friday night or Saturday night. And there were about maybe six families there. And those six families grilled me with questions till one in the morning about adopting a church in the Soviet Union. And I had never had that happen before. And I actually wanted to go to bed. So I knew something good was up. I found out later that Eric had been in the PCA and was an MTW missionary to Japan. And I didn't know that then. So he already had a missions background. And he developed a relationship with Ravil Kunakhaev, one of the men that we began to train about 2001 in our seminary, right out of the Russian army. And Ravil was already out in Siberia. We'd send him there as a church planter missionary from our church in St. Petersburg, Russia. Ravil was in Siberia, where about 0.5% of the population is evangelical Christian. It's the gateway to the oil world of Russia. And Russia is the world's largest. It's the country in the world that produces more oil than any other country. So this is a big deal, lots of money out there. Reveal took over that church and was doing very well. And the first thing that happened in their relationship was Eric went out there and visited him about three or four years ago. And then they had Reveal and Yulia, his wife, and I believe their daughter Marguerite, come and visit in Springfield, Missouri about two and a half years ago. But not long after that visit, I got a call from a reveal that his daughter, Marguerite, had had complete kidney failure. She was in the hospital as a two-year-old with complete kidney failure. And not long after that, they life-flighted her and her father, a reveal, to St. Petersburg, where she was in intensive care. And for about a year, about a week, she hung on in the hospital. But through that time, we visited Reveal. We visited him. She was in intensive care. We couldn't see Marguerite, but we could be with Reveal. And through that time, Eric's daughter was calling him on the phone and had all the churches in the CREC praying for Marguerite's life. And unfortunately, she passed away about a week after she got to town. I had the solemn duty of burying her. And then, as God often does, I baptized Reveal and Yulia's son, Nathan, a week later. She had a baby a week later there in St. Petersburg. So it was an amazing time. But after this tragedy, or during the tragedy even, Reveal said that the Russian friends he had out in Siberia were not able to counsel him effectively while he was losing his daughter. And he said that Eric and I, our willingness to go with him into the valley of death, so to speak, with his feelings when he was losing his daughter, it was the only thing that encouraged him. It was the only thing that gave him some perspective as his daughter was dying. And I really, afterwards, he shared that he thought he was going to have to be out of the ministry six months, maybe three months, maybe a year. Some people, when they lose a child, they never get back in the ministry. Eric's involvement and my involvement, we believe, God used, we were just trying to be faithful, to keep him with some perspective on what God was doing. And I, it just emphasized the fact, to me, of how powerful these kind of relationships can be worldwide. And that ties in to what I'd like to share with you today. I'd like to share with you today, using Ephesians 4 as a springboard, I'm not going to completely exegete Ephesians 4, but I'm going to exegete some essential parts of this passage of Scripture, because I believe without those key words and understanding what they are, we can't understand the whole book of Ephesians, nor God's will for our lives. And I'll finish up today. I'll refer back to the relationship between Pastor Eric and Pastor Reveal as we go through today's discussion. Today, I'd like to share with you about owning the world through the five gifts that are in this passage. Owning the world. It's a nice way of saying taking over the world, OK? And owning the world through the five gifts. And I have about seven points to make. Let's read verses 8 through 10 again. Therefore it is said, when he ascended on high, he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men. In saying he ascended, what does it mean but that he also descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is the one who also ascended far above the heavens. That what? That he might fill all things. Okay? Then we have to keep reading. That's verse 11. And he gave, and in the most older translations it says, it reads here, and his gifts were that some should be evangelists, some pastors. The word gift is not in the Greek, but it's implied. He gave gifts to men. And then in verse 11, what were those gifts? There were five gifts. They were gifted men. The first gift was that some should be apostles. The second gift were that some should be prophets. The third gift were that some should be evangelists. And the fourth gift was that some should be pastors. And the fifth gift was that some should be teachers. And we don't see it here, unless you look at the bigger picture. But what's actually happening is, when Christ ascended, He took, apparently, all the Old Testament saints. Okay? And so He had a host that He invaded heaven with. He threw down a third of the angels, correct? out of the rebellious ones, the demons. He threw Satan and his cohorts out of heaven. And then when he sat on the throne, what did he send back to the earth? He sent back his Holy Spirit to gift the leaders of his church in five different ways. That's what he did. So this is God's invasion of the earth. Okay. After he ascended, he sent back an invasion force. And that force was to be led by five different kind of gifted men. And it's an exciting... this word filled is much more militant and action-oriented than if you just read Ephesians, you don't get it, okay? You've got to read the whole Bible to figure out what the word filled is all about. But let's go to Ephesians 1, 22 and 23. So what I'm calling this first point is the five gifts are an integrated assault force to take over the world. That's what the five gifts are. They're an integrated assault force. I was an infantryman. My son just is a platoon leader. First Lieutenant Graham Purcell just got to Afghanistan the day before yesterday, so he's leading a platoon of infantry by the Iranian border in Afghanistan right now. So I have army on my mind, but in verses 1 and 2 of chapter... 22 and 23 of chapter 1, And He put all things under His feet and gave Him as head over all things for the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all. So when He ascended on high, it says in chapter 4, what does it mean? He also descended that He might fill all things. So Ephesians 4 and Ephesians in general is about Christ filling all things. When you hear the word for fill, It'll be somewhat familiar. I had to look it up again this morning. I'm 53 now, and I have a grandson, and I can't remember some things like I used to. Don't make fun of me, but it's Pley-rah-oh. There you go. I got it. Pley-rah-oh. Can you say that? Pley-rah-oh. Pley-rah-oh. Okay. In Russia, we have a little interaction. I'm sorry if it offends you, but I came 7,500 miles to be here. And I take liberties, OK? Because I have to. And I'm going to have maybe someone else read some scripture in a second, too, because I'm just finding the places. It's not as easy as it used to be. So, plerao. Now, this is a very interesting passage. Genesis 128, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. When the New Testament writers wrote the New Testament, often they were simply quoting the Septuagint, the Greek version of the Old Testament. This is an example. This language is from Genesis 128 in the Greek. I looked it up this morning on the computer. Amazing age we live in. In the Septuagint, it's the exact word. Plei-ra-o. And what are, you're homeschoolers, and so you children are supposed to have read books and things like that. So, children, 10 and below, what are, play, what are some words that might be connected with the idea of filling? Play, ra-o, 10 and below. Usually I have these mothers who answer these questions, but that's not what we're doing here. We're doing children, 10 and below. What would be words in our language that are something to do with filling? Play. Or close to play. Plenteous. Please, plenteous. Books, books, read your books. Have a good vocabulary. How about plenty? Same thing. How about plethora? That's, okay, fifteen and above can answer, it's just no plethora, okay? Okay? So, it's where we get the word, it's where we get the word, uh, plenty, uh, plenteous, probably some other ones I can't think of, and plethora, okay? A lot, fill, alright? That's what it, that's what the Greek word is. Uh, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. So the first, when Paul wrote this, he's talking about the dominion mandate first, have lots of children, okay? That's the first part. The second part is from Numbers. The second basic meaning of this word is in Numbers 14.21. Let's turn there. Numbers 14.21. If somebody gets there before me, you can read it. Numbers 14.21. A man can read it. We want to keep the quorum. 14.21. I got it. But truly as I live and as all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord." The exact same word. Okay? The earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord. The first context, what Paul is referring to in Ephesians when it says, he shall fill all things. The first context is filling all things through natural generation, through families and through childbearing. The second context is through conquest. Numbers 14 is one of the most profound and tragic passages in all of scripture. And the people of God refused to do the conquest they were supposed to do. And if you go down to verse 31, it's very interesting to find out why they rationalized before God they would not take the promised land. And it should be near and dear to homeschoolers and those that take Christian education of our children seriously. But your little ones, whom you said would become a prey, I will bring in, and they shall know the land that you have rejected." Okay? So there's two times... Ephesians refers to filling the earth, Christ himself, and then it's Ephesians 1, 22 and 23, his body filling the earth, the church filling the earth, okay? And in the Scripture, that filling is through natural generation, and it's through conquest. Okay? Now, conquest, crusading, has two aspects of it in Numbers 2. It's taking land, right? Bad people have the land, and you go take the land. And, it's dealing with people not inside your family. You hope they're not inside your family, because in that passage, they're going to go kill them all. Okay? So, you hope you're not having to kill your own family. So, it's people outside your family. Conquest, in the New Testament, therefore, would be taking new lands for Christ, planting the church in new lands, and it would be leading people to Christ and planting churches among people who are not in your family. Right? That's conquest. Am I wrong? Can you follow me here? Okay. If you haven't served in the military, this might be too complicated. I don't know. No? So, you're following me. Alright. So, Point number one, the five gifts are an integrated assault force. And what we're talking about now is how they're an assault force. And here's what's interesting about this interesting passage in Numbers 14. I'll have to read it. When natural generation, having lots of kids, is used as an excuse, God does not take away the children. God takes away who? The parents. Very interesting, huh? God's a very, very interesting God. If we get in the way of our kids being faithful in the conquest, the global conquest of Christ, God promises right here in Numbers chapter 14 to get you parents out of the way. That's what he promises. You could wake up one day and you're in a wilderness. And you could be there a long time. See? And of course, there's lots of different kind of wildernesses. You could be in a wilderness. So God says, they literally used their children as an excuse not to do conquests. That's what they did. And God says, OK, I don't have a problem with your kids. I have a problem with you. You've gotten in the way of my work. And you know, we raised our kids in the Soviet Union. And the last thing I want is for them to go do conquests. because I'm a good father. And he went to Bangladesh and then Korea. Okay, that's enough of that. You know, it's unnatural. But the thing that is interesting here is that, and there was some famous missionary that I can't remember that said this, the thing that's interesting is that we think that going out, like starting an evangelical Bible study at a university, or becoming a cadet at the Air Force Academy, and leading people to Christ there, because the cadets I work with, they led all sorts of guys to Christ. And I had the privilege of doing the same thing. Wonderful place. Great place to send your sons. You think that, you know, you're risking their life. But guess what? Number 14 teaches us about the good of the world. What's the most dangerous and stupid thing you can do? Well, when God calls you to do a conquest, not to do it. That's the most stupid thing you can do. God didn't just kill some people or half die off in a useless death. God didn't just cause some of the parents who were unfaithful to wander around aimlessly and have a useless life. What percentage of the parents of that generation did He cause to have a useless life? Not totally useless. Their sons took the land, right? But I don't know what they were doing. They were eating a lot of manna. A hundred percent! That's a hundred percent! Oh, except for two. There you go. Very good. Almost 100% out of 6 million. Yeah. See? The most dangerous thing you and I can do is not to do God's will. And God's will is what? In Ephesians? To fill the earth that Christ might fill the earth. What is his will in Ephesians 1, 22 and 23? His body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. The church is to fill the world. If you're not involved in that crusade, that is dangerous. It's very dangerous. It's a lot more dangerous than having your kids go do that. I don't mean, you know, that you should send your kids to go share Christ with the Taliban the first day. you know, and see what happens. I'm not talking about stupidity. I'm talking about normal, wise missions, work, and evangelistic work. Okay? And I'm getting ahead of my story. And, of course, the wilderness that God sends us into is a spiritual wilderness now. I mean, He can also just physically wipe us out. But, usually, it's a spiritual wilderness. You don't know what's going on. You just wander around. You can't tell up from down. You just wander around. And then, that's the assault portion. It's an assault force integrated. The second part is integrated. Look at 4 through 8. It's very interesting. Chapter 4, 8, go to 11. Apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. Five men who equip the saints. First of all, if they're going to equip all the saints, who do they have to equip? First of all, who has to be equipped first of all? Themselves, right? So a teacher is not just a teacher. He has to be equipped by the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, and the pastor, right? He's not just a teacher. He has to in some way be equipped that way. So it's an integrated force. There's not one man other than Christ himself who reflects all of Christ for all these gifts, okay? There's not one man. It's integrated. It's interdependent. And I've had the privilege in Russia of getting involved with James Jordan, a great teacher. I cannot and I never will be able to teach the biblical language like Jim Jordan teaches. He's given his life to biblical language. I've given my life to leading cadets at the Air Force Academy to Christ. I can lead people to Christ, but the master Hebrew I've already done Spanish and Russian. Before I die, I'm not going to master Hebrew, I don't think. Maybe you can, but I'm not going to. So there are people, for adults, elders are dependent upon one another to fill in. The elders have to equip each other. It's integrated. OK? Secondly, about that. If you don't get that kind of training, if you become a teacher of the Word, but you don't care a rip about evangelism, about leading people to Christ, are you equipped? You're not. You're right. You're not. You're not equipped. You know, a man, and I love it, the first time I met Jim Jordan was when he came to Russia and he brought everything he'd ever written and all the other great theologians had ever written, he brought it on the airplane. He knew that his giftedness was teaching. Mine is evangelism and church planting, cross-culturally. So he knew he needed, why, I think I'll brag a little bit here. He knew because he said when he was in college, the navigators taught him, you have to evangelize. You ever heard of the navigators? They have a wonderful castle down the road. I'm going to get to see it hopefully tomorrow. So, you know, you're a college student. Your obligation was to go out into the dorms and share Christ every week and start an evangelical Bible study. That was just what we did. That was an air we breathed, you know. So he had that training. So he was already equipped. That's why he showed up with all these books in Russia. Because he knew his gift was not being a missionary and his gift was not being an evangelist, but he was going to use that gift in that world. See? Does that make sense? Good. Okay, next thing, point number two. What are the gifts? Sorry, can't read my own writing. What do the gifts do? This is a really cool word, kata atizomai. Artesian, to be a craftsman, see? Atizomai is where we get the word craftsman. Kata means very, completely, kata. And there's no English word that I know of You can't go there, but... So it's completely fixed up and fashioned. And then in Matthew 4.21, the similar word, the word that's next to it in the concordance, is that word katartizomai. And it means to mend their nets. The men were mending their nets, okay? They were katartizomai-ing their nets. So, to equip... What do the gifts do? As a missionary, what am I to do with the church? As a pastor, what is he to do? As a teacher, what is he to do? As a prophet, what is he to do? And of course, we Reform people, we call that an affected preacher of the word. What do you do with that? You mend the nets of people's lives. And in the vernacular, what it means is you lay hold on a man and you tie him in knots. That's supposed to be. funny, a little funny. It was. Okay. I thought it was very funny. I have a good time wherever I go. I always laugh at my own jokes. What is a net with a hole in it? Do you think this little string is hanging out here and this little string is hanging out there? How do you mend it? You tie it in a knot, right? Unless you have a lot of money and you go buy a new net or something. Right? That's what it means to mend a net. Or you re- I've seen them. You re-sew that whole part or you re-weave that part of the net. In any case, it has to do with laying hold of the thing and manipulating it. It's training. Okay? So, they're to be equipped. And then to do what? Let's go back to it again. Look at this passage. To equip the saints for what? The work of ministry. What saint in the history of the world is not to have a ministry? None. You are to be equipped for a ministry. And what kind of ministry? Well, there's five kinds. There's five kinds. And of course, men and women do these a lot differently. There's five kinds of ministry. And I'll explain what the apostle is, because you and I cannot do one aspect of that word, but we can do other aspects. Evangelism. You're to be equipped in evangelism, how to lead people to Christ. You're to be equipped in effectively communicating the Word of God in a convicting, life-changing way. You're to be equipped as a carer of souls, a pastor. Of course, a mother, it means her children, and so forth. You're to be equipped as a teacher of the Word. And it might be, you know, you're never going to necessarily be an ordained elder, but all the saints are to be equipped in all five. Isn't that what the passage says? It is. I went to Texas A&M. I went to seminary in the United States Army Infantry. That's what it says. So that's what it says. You are to be equipped in five ways for ministry. And what does this ministry do? Look at it a little bit further. To equip the saints for the work of ministry. For building up the body of Christ. until we all attain to the unity of the faith and knowledge of the Son of God, the mature man, who is the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." What does this ministry experience that you're equipped in do to you? It makes you like Christ. It changes you into Christ's image. And I have great, there's great, there's at least two other philosophies of how you come to Christ, how you become Christ-like, okay? There's This one here in Ephesians is, you become Christ-like through being equipped and doing ministry. Okay? That's how you become Christ-like. Now there's another one. And that is, sort of, you become a more and more effective prophet by having sort of visions. Alright? And I wrote this down to make sure that I don't mess it up because this is very important. But Saint Simeon, in the year, from the year 322 to 359, believe that he needed to be undisturbed and to meditate and to have revelations and so forth, to be a better prophet, so to speak, he needed to get up on a column. So his first column, John Mark, check this out, yes, it's very important. His first column was four meters tall, his second column was 15 meters tall. That's high. And he stayed up there from 322 AD to 359 on the column. Okay? So he's a column sitter. In fact, his last name in history is Thylite. And I think it has something to do with stalactite. So, in other words, his last name was Column-Sitter. Isn't that great? And he was up there to, feasibly, because being around church people bothered him. Oh, monastery. The monastery brothers bothered him. So, he got up on the pole, or big column. Okay? So, one philosophy is you get away from the world. And you become like Christ by meditating on a pole for 37 years, and then you die. That's what happened. Okay? I know you were wondering about this, and so I brought it into the sermon. This is a very important point. Okay? So that's one philosophy, you know, separating from people. Another philosophy in the Reform world are books. Books and knowledge. How do you become like Christ in the Reform world? You read lots of books and you talk about all sorts of stuff that normal people don't talk about. That's how you become like Christ. True. Infralepsirianism. My mother never said infralepsirianism. She's 76 now. She's not going to say it. She's not going to say all the other fra-lepsirianisms either. There's two or three others. It's very important, you know, for us to read books. So, uh, there is another way of, of, of kind of a philosophy. How do you become like Christ? Knowledge, being off by yourself, to have a vision, you know, some sort of a supernatural vision. But in Ephesians 4, you become like Christ through what? Ministry. You're deploying yourself into other people's lives to help them. And it's in five areas. So it's non-Christians, because it's evangelism. And then it's people that need to be rebuked because it's a prophet, you know, need to be challenged and so forth and so on. You got those five gifts. I haven't gotten to the apostle yet. So we are equipped, we're laid hands on, we're tied in a knot by our equipers for the work of ministry. And this ministry experience causes us to be more and more like Jesus Christ. And there are five kinds of ministry. And I have to say now, and I'm You may think that I'm beginning to be one of the oldest people in churches, but I have a grandson and we have six children. Only one is left in the home. My wife went back on Monday to Russia without me and my daughter, Laura, who's 15, a freshman in high school education. And what we have experienced in Russia and with raising our kids is that one thing the Lord has really been faithful to do. He's given all of our kids. I would say the oldest five, of course, are more visible because my daughter in ninth grade had less opportunity. All five of the older ones have a heart for ministry. All five of the older ones want to help people and feel responsible for helping people worldwide. They don't do it all at once worldwide. And so Emily, our oldest, is married to a really godly Presbyterian. In Dallas, they go to PCPC Church. And she had a heart for ministry. So she began early on, she became a teacher in West Dallas Christian School for minority kids, for black kids and Hispanic kids. She worked there two years until she got married. And it was a wonderful ministry. She married a man who was interested, who had adopted one of these kids as a church adoption, where you go and visit the kids in their homes. So Emily has a heart for ministry. And then, and still does, they're working to have a real ministry, very real ministry. They're working on adopting two minority kids right now, even though they have, you know, she's healthy and they just had a baby. So that's very real ministry. Graham. Graham's the first lieutenant. Got his commission from Ole Miss. And one of his main concerns is that he leads his platoon to Christ. He's written about it. And don't forget, you can keep up with him on email if you'd like. I can give his email number. He writes very well already. He's writing reports on the front line. And you can be praying for him to do their job well in Afghanistan and also to lead his men to Christ. And I gave every one of his men. I had a great opportunity. I prayed over the whole company that went at the cookout. I got to pray over them. And I gave each one of his men a Bible signed by me. And now, they have a Bible signed. The chaplains give everybody a paperback Bible, but they just lay around. But this one's signed. Hopefully, they're going to put it on, and then they'll start reading it. Right? That's what I hope. So it's a great opportunity. So Graham has a heart for ministry. John Mark has had a heart for ministry, helping 500 Eurasian kids. And he said in the school, you could talk about anything you wanted. So you could talk about Christ all you wanted to there in Korea. in public school, so he had him do questionnaires about Christ and so forth, and answer some interesting questions about Christ. And he's been to Bangladesh to see how to help the poor in the face of the earth, so he has a heart for ministry. And Zachary's at the University of Texas Film School, just started, and he's already in a leadership Bible study. He's a freshman, so I don't want him to start a Bible study yet, but he's in training to start a Bible study with kids from, well, pretty woolly kids that have strange tattoos and plugs in their ears and things at the University of Texas. You know, he's going to get, I think God's going to use him to lead those guys to Christ. I don't know what, I don't know who they're imitating, maybe the Zulu or something. But anyway, that's, that's where he is. He's at the University of Texas. He has a heart for ministry. And so one of the wonderful things about raising your kids on the mission field is the privilege of, they, when we got there, we had students, start doing Bible study in our living room. And so from the time they were six years old, they saw us with non-Christian students in our living room. And 10 of them came to Christ. And those 10 ended up helping us raise them by chauffeuring them around St. Petersburg. And so from the very beginning, they saw us in this lifestyle of opening our home for ministry. And now, they see it night, they saw it night and day. And now, it's in their blood. And so, I didn't know, you know, we didn't, you know, when you're parenting, you don't really know what you're doing, and you're just trying to do what God wants you to do. You don't know the effect it's going to have, right? And when you get older, you get to see it. And so, I just praise the Lord. All of our kids have a heart for ministry. And that's wonderful. And I promise you, a good offense is the best defense. If you're not in ministry, and you're just idle, It's very dangerous. That's not one of my points, but that's what it does. The last point, my fifth point, what do the fact that you have five gifts do? It keeps all your leaders humble. Ephesians 4, therefore, as a prisoner of the Lord, I urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling which you've been called with all humility. We talked about it today. When you know you're dependent on others' gifts, and two of those leaders are usually not local, then you're humble. The five gifts keep leaders humble and dependent upon one another. That's what they're meant to do. Okay. Jim, can you remind me what time I started? Okay, good. Doing good. but I'm on the road a lot, and I forget a lot. And I woke up about two weeks ago, and I could not remember where I was. I know it's in America. It's got to be in America, you know? I'll remember you. I'll remember that I was here. Point number three, why is God so serious? Why does God go around through his leaders, grabbing people and tying them in a knot? Okay? What's the deal with that? Why is he so serious? Let's go to Ephesians 2, 13. Ephesians 2, 13. But now, in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. When Christ shed his blood, what happened in the world? in God's economy in the world, God's order in the world. The nations that were really mostly represented by Israel and all 70 nations of the world that were represented by the 70 elders of Israel, as in the list of nations, I think, in Genesis 10, there's 70 nations. So the elders represented all the nations of the world. Those 70 nations are all of a sudden in the realm of God's Presence. Okay. You're brought near. Before that, only the Israelites and the converted ones were brought near. But when Christ died, the nations were brought near. There's a reordering. And at Pentecost, where are the people that had the Holy Spirit the very first time the Holy Spirit fell? Where were they from, does it say in Acts chapter 2? The whole world. It says the whole world. Okay. Symbolically, the whole world was atoned for, symbolically, typologically, when Christ died. Okay, that's biblical language. I don't want to get into the limited element and all that. I'm talking about biblical language. And so, it says, you who are far off, and of course what we mean here is the elect of these foreign nations, were brought near. Okay? God's elect of all these nations were brought near. There's a change in the way God viewed the world, a complete change. In fact, in Ephesians 1.10, he says this, which is also language that's hard for Presbyterians and Reformed people to figure out. There's a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in Him. You know, what does that all mean? things in heaven and things on earth. And so when Christ died, that inaugurated the plan to unite all things in heaven and on earth. That was the beginning. And so literally, when Christ died, somehow, someway in the development of the history of the world, all things are going to be united, heaven and earth. Is that true or not? Or is it just, he just meant it, you know, he meant for that to happen, but he's not going to happen. You know, almost, but not quite. What is it? Yeah. The plan for the fullness of time. In the fullness of time, all things are going to be united. Heaven and earth are going to be united in Christ. So it's a major reshuffling. Why does He want us to be equipped as evangelists, for instance? Isaiah 52, uh, 52, 12. You can turn there. You have your Bible? Turn to Isaiah 52, 12. As they 52-12. Sorry, 52-15. So he, so shall he sprinkle many nations. The word sprinkle is naza. It means to spurt, to splatter, to, you know, to pour out so much that it just splatters everywhere. So when Christ died, what happened to the nations? They were They had the blood of Christ in God's economy gushed upon them, poured out, splattered. The nations did. Okay? And then you go to 53, you go to 53, uh, 12. Isaiah 53, 12. And, uh, you see, if Jim found it, I'll have him read it, but I'm going to find it, maybe. Isaiah 53, 12. Therefore, I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoiled with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors." Why is God equipping the church to reach the world? Because Christ was poured out for the world, for the elect of all nations. Okay? Why? Is it so? Is God ruthless? Why, in 1990, when the 89 when the Berlin Wall fell. Why did 20,000, mostly Americans, but maybe a third Americans, a third South Koreans, and a third other nations, why did 20,000 more or less long-term missionaries go behind the Iron Curtain in about a 10-year period? Why did that happen? Why? Because of the love of Christ. See? God believes that when his son died, he deserved the reward of his suffering. When Christ died, the father said, I am giving you a plunder. Your death is not in vain. The nations will worship you. And he's serious. And I mean, it's astounding to look even just at Russia, how many were martyred for the sake of Christ? It's probably at least a million believers were martyred for their testimony to Christ in the new law. At least a million. And in all the other Stalinistic texts. What a great privilege to follow their prayers of their blood as they died. They lifted up their prayers. What a great privilege. And why were they willing to be martyred? Because Christ died for them. Christ was plundered. And so they were willing to be plundered. See? So God is absolutely, violently, in a sense, committed to using you and I to reach the nations for Christ because of what He's done. See? And so people that are just, well, I'm just, I know, I just don't know about world missions. I just don't know about evangelism. They don't know, they don't understand the blood of Christ. And I run into it in reform circles all the time. Well, you know, I don't know. What are you, what are you, you're neutral? You're neutral about the blood of Christ. Look, what is that? That's just nuts. Well, you know, but it's just so inconvenient. Well, yeah, yeah, that's right. If Christ dying for you was rather inconvenient, I can't. Was it? It was rather inconvenient. I, you know, the revelation is right now. So Christ does not bother. He doesn't bother to talk Christ is all that you need to see. He doesn't bother to talk. He's not bothered. He just doesn't bother. He doesn't say, wait tonight. That's the good news, isn't it? So why are the leaders of the church, why are they supposed to grab you and tie you in a knot to make you useful for the worldwide crusade of Christ? Because Christ died for the nations. For the elect of the nations. Of course, that's what we're talking about. And then, secondly, why is God so serious about you being equipped for ministry? Because He's serious about you becoming like Christ. And guess what all five of these gifts represent? Matthew 9.35, Christ was a teacher. John 10.11, He was a pastor. In Luke 4.18, He was an evangelist. In Luke 4.24, Christ was a prophet. In Hebrews 3.1, Christ was an apostle. Why must you be equipped as an apostle, an evangelist, a pastor, a teacher, and so forth? Because Christ was all of those. God is calling you to become like His Son. That's why. That's why it's so serious. This is not just some stuff out there. You know, yeah, we got all those gifts over there, and yeah, you're equipping, you know, ministry, and yeah, you know. No. This is becoming like Christ. Christ was all five of them. So you and I have to, in our own way, in our own calling, in our own role, become like those things. So now, I've told you, I would get to you, point number four is what is an apostle. In 220 of Ephesians, in 3.5, We have an apostle is, of course, the 12 that wrote the New Testament, or that saw Jesus and were with him. That's the special apostles. But six times in the New Testament, there are references to groups of men that were not the 12 first apostles. Six times, at least. And look at, I can read them to you, so when you re-listen to this message, because you can't possibly catch all this, you can look them up. But first that's 2, 6, and 7. 1 Corinthians 15.7, 1 Corinthians 4.9, Philippians 2.25, 2 Corinthians 8.23. And the most famous one in the text is Acts 14.14. Look at Acts 14.14. But when the apostles, Barnabas and Paul, heard it, they tore their garments. Who were the apostles? Barnabas and Paul. When you read the New Testament, you find out that Sosthenes was an Apostle, Apollos was an Apostle, Timothy was an Apostle, and Silas was an Apostle, and some unnamed messengers were Apostles. And so, the word Apostle, what we say in English, capital A is the first twelve that wrote the New Testament. Capital A, Apostle. Small a, Apostle, is simply the word cross-cultural church-planting missionary. That's what it means in the New Testament. small a cross-cultural church planning mission people there were on Paul's team in doing the normal things now you know you can get into it before people do well did Timothy perform any miracles and it's so I don't know I mean Paul was both obviously Paul was both but his team was apostle with a small a That's the only word you have in the New Testament for missionary, a sent out one. And Russian is based on this, pasla, to send. A is out, to send out. Christ was an apostle. He was sent out from the Father, and he was sent into the Father's presence as the first human being allowed in the complete presence of God in his glorified body. He was an apostle of our faith, see, because he went before us, right? So the very nature of the Trinity, the nature of Christ, is to be one who goes out. All right? That's what it means to be an apostle. Now, obviously, I'm not talking about women going out and doing dangerous things without the protection of men. So do not put those kind of silly thoughts in my mouth. Okay? You know, you have to do ministry completely different with men than with women, if you're going to do it wisely. What is an apostle, therefore, is one who is, in the scriptures, most of the time, in Paul's letters, at least six times, is talking about people who helped him plant churches worldwide. What do they do? You can go to Acts 19. We don't have time to look at it, but in Acts 19, they got to Ephesus, and they had a group of people who were not, didn't know about the Holy Spirit. They were baptized only in the name of Jesus. and then they were re-baptized, so he perfected the church. Essentially, his job was to plant the church permanently in a new area. Evangelists were to lead individuals in Christ. The apostles were to plant the church permanently in a new area, the way they did in Ephesus in Acts 19. The second thing in Acts 19, 9 and 10, he stayed there two years and trained leaders. He poured his life in a gymnasium about like this, which is what it sounds like. something of training. It was a big place apparently. And he trained men in 1909 and 1910. He trained people for two years in an in-depth way. So essentially what he was doing was making Ephesus a new stronghold to take responsibility for spreading the gospel in the whole area of Asia Minor. Okay, that's what he was doing. So it went Jerusalem, Antioch, Ephesus, And then his plan from Romans 15 was Rome as a new stronghold. And then it was going to be Spain. OK? So an apostle goes in, plants a missionary, a cross-cultural missionary in the Bible, plants a church in a new area, and raises up leaders to take responsibility for the whole region. That's what they did. That's his calling. And conveniently, that's what we do in Russia. Kind of fits right in, doesn't it? That's what we do. We have a seminary, and we train men to become these apostles of the church. And, so that's the second thing that an apostle does. The third thing an apostle does is he casts a vision for the church. What it's supposed to do in that region wide, and even church, what it's supposed to do. Okay? So, it was a, the book of Ephesians is a great complement to the Ephesian church. It's a great compliment. Because in it, he does four things. He does five things, in fact. In the book of Ephesians, he casts a vision that the church is a global body. The church is a global body. Nine times in the book of Ephesians, the word church, ecclesia, is used. Nine times. Every single time, guess what the ecclesia means. Nine times in the book of Ephesians. What does ecclesia mean? Local church or global? Global. Universal. Okay? Nine times. Eight times he uses the word soma, body. What does it mean in every single instance? The whole church worldwide. Really for all time, you know. But the whole church worldwide. So he's casting a vision for what they are as the global body of Christ. Second thing, he tells them that the global body of Christ is for God's glory. And the third thing he shows them, and this is in Ephesians 4, 3 and 16, The third thing is right here, Ephesians 4, 3 and 16, eager to maintain the unity of the body and the bond of peace. And then verse 16, from whom the whole body, the global body, joined and held together by every joint which is equipped to make bodily growth when each part is working properly. So in Ephesians 4, he's teaching them that the global body of Christ is a lot of work. He says, eager to maintain the unity of what? The body. What body is that? OPC? Eager to maintain the unity of the OPC. Yes? But that's not all. PCA? Yes? That's not all. CREC? Yes, but that's not all. America? Yes, but that's not all. Every kind of believer in Christ, I guess you could say the Trinity, in the whole world, eager to maintain the unity of the whole church worldwide. And he says, eager. That's spudazo. It means to run. It means to work. It means to make haste. It means to do your best. And then he says, when each part is working properly, so he's casting them a vision that it's going to be a lot of work to have global unity in the body of Christ. And he wasn't kidding. I don't know if you've ever tried to have unity in the church. It's a lot of work. Locally, and then, you know, it gets even hairier and wilder when you go non-local. So, the next thing he does is three, and I'm going to tell you a story so that I can get you back here with me. Because I know that this is long. I've been close to closing. 3.1. Paul says, For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles. He says he's a prisoner. 4.1. I, therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling." And then at 620, he mentions he's a prisoner again. He says, I want you to live this way in the light of me being a prisoner for Christ. About three years ago, we had a man whose father was in the gulag, prison. And he came to the seminary, and he's been in Christ about 20 years, by the time I got to Russia. And I told him that one of the things we taught in the seminary was that you need to quit being dependent upon government schools in the form of subjugation. And for them, this was radical. And for him, this was radical. He was wrestling with this, and he was a bit resentful about how could I, as a foreigner, come in and voice this outside value system, this outside system where there's all this freedom and money in America, There's all this oppression in the form of Soviet Union. So how can you force that on us? It's a burden we can't bear. And his father was into gulags, so he wasn't afraid of anybody. He grew up right outside one of the worst places on the state street. So he was a pretty tough guy. He'd been an organized crime for years. So that was in front of all the students, if you question my authority. So we had a break. I went back and I thought about it, prayed about it, you know, we had a five minute break. Came back in and I thought, you know, I will just share, instead of trying to talk about it forward, kind of a head-to-head American way, I think I'll just share what we went through in the 90s. So I started sharing. Jean-Marc, who is right here, was coming home from kindergarten, one of the stories I share with my son. Jean-Marc was coming home from kindergarten and my wife was leading him. She heard this pop, pop, pop in a Mafia car just been pulled over by the Russian police. And the Russian police pulled out. They were filming the Mafia because they'd taken a bribe. And the Mafia pulled out and shot him dead right there, right next to South Market. They didn't really know what was going on. It was very close. They just ran behind the cars and kept running. They found out the next day in the newspaper. And my wife was driving the car, and she pulled over. She didn't notice, and she pulled over in front of some mafia, a car, about 94 maybe. And the car went on a chase. They chased my wife around. She was about six months pregnant, I think, was our last, about Laura. So these grown men in black leather jackets jump out of the car and start beating it on all sides. When she finally stopped the car. After chasing her like, you know, like idiots, like the idiots they were, through the town. So they could have pulled her out and beat her. They just beat the car on all sides, and she came home rather upset. The first year we were there, at the last minute, put in baked beans, not baked beans, but these big tenno beans, tuna, and rice for the moment, put it in before we moved to the Soviet Union. The next thing you know, we got there, and there was no food in the store. So for a year, our kids ate tuna, rice, And, you know, my wife's very creative, so I don't think they even noticed. But, you know, we weren't planning for that. Later on, we've had, the kids have been attacked, my kids in front of me, because I always mention this, but they've been attacked in various ways, my boys have, by hooligans mostly in town. And then, we've had People in our seminary steal thousands of dollars from us. We have been extorted. The police pulled me over 300 times in the first four years, about, on our part, 300 times, extorted money. I counted 200, then I quit counting. I figured it kept about the same pace. That's what I figured. And so, in a sense, 90 through 2002, just every six months, something really bad happens. So sharing these stories, about what it was like to live there in the 90s, and this von Sonnevich, the strong pastor, went from being skeptical of my authority, and I turned around, and he had a tear in his eye. And he went from being skeptical, then he said, well, Blake, my wife and I have been through that, and we would have left if it wasn't for you. But to this day, that's one of the highest compliments, I think, I've ever had, and it'll probably be the day I die, to have a man who grew up outside the gulag say he would have left the Soviet Union. You've got to do that. Why do I say this? This last 10 years, God just keeps bringing us more and more men who want to grow in their faith. Passive. They're never going to try. So our little Bible study of 20 years ago in our living room has grown to a church, a reformed Presbyterian church in St. Petersburg. And then, through the seminary, we added one or two churches out of Siberia, as I mentioned. And now we have about 15 churches, 10 of which want to join us in a union, whose pastors are in training now. And one of them will be in Colorado in a couple of weeks. They're going to be in America. Now we have a ministry covering nine time zones, planting churches. Latvia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Siberia, the Far East, and so nine time zones. Why does God keep on blessing us? I believe one of the reasons is, by His grace, we've been willing to be the prisoner, the kind of prisoner anyway, a type of prisoner for Christ. And so Paul, people in Ephesians did what Paul said because they knew his ministry was a real ministry. He was willing to be in prison for Christ. And the longer you're in your prison, the longer you serve the Lord, and people know it's painful, the more proof God brings. And they know we've signed up to the end. They know it. They know that we're not going anywhere. You know, we don't talk about it much, but we couldn't have a better ministry. Can you have a better ministry than about a thousand people in fifteen churches, nine time zones wide, in a part of the world that has never had a mature church? Can you get any better than that? I know you think, well, our church is better. Our church is better, but OK. You can't get any better, you know? So what do apostles do? They remind the church what Paul did in Ephesians 4.1. They remind the church that we're to minister out of our sacrificial love for Christ. And it's the sacrifice that gives us the authority, OK? It's not knowledge. Do you hear me? It's how much you have suffered for Christ. If you want spiritual authority, do something that's hard and dangerous, and you will have spiritual authority. You will. God will bless your ministry. But if you think that it's knowledge or being careful, of course you should be wise, but being overly careful will get you nothing but very careful children and a very careful church. It will not fill the world. It won't. And then if you get careful, that's what the guys in the wilderness were, weren't they? They were very careful. You know, Lord, we love our children so much. You know, you would abuse our children if we let them fight. So we're just going to hold them back. For the sake of our children, we're just not going to do a fight. And everything will be much better. Lord, we love our children more than you do. That's what they said in the wilderness. OK. My last point. How does the story with Eric and Reveal end? Well, Eric took his family over there just now to Siberia. And he took his wife, and his son, and his daughter. And for the first time, the women, he'd been talking about Christian education, homeschooling. For the first time, the women met a wife who homeschooled. And she didn't work in the street. I mean, you know, not in the street, but she didn't work outside the home. In Russian, it's на улице. So I started to speak English with the Russians. And so they met a real live woman, and she was like a unicorn. It's like, you don't have a regular child outside the home, and you teach your children at home? What? A real male had been talking about it, but now they saw someone who really did it. She had a wonderful influence of hope and encouragement for those women. His son is 18 and is godly. Well, there are, you know, you can count on one hand the amount of godly teenagers that are 18 years old in Russia. There's probably a few thousand, but no one's ever heard of a godly teenager. It's an oxymoron. In Russia, you don't have a godly teenager. So it's not possible. So here's this godly teenager. So he took his family over there. And you would think that... And so the church was blessed in his long-term investment. They're supporting that church for $500 a month. And that church is being transformed by Reveal's ministry through Eric and I ministering to him. So now there's men in the church. It's very difficult to get men in churches in places like the former Soviet Union. So the church is being transformed, and you would think that through all that equipping, so to speak, that Eric's doing, he would say, you know, we're giving a lot, and isn't it great that we're giving a lot? Instead, go to, or I'll just quote, well, let's go to Isaiah 58, 10 as a last thought. Isaiah 58, 10. If you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as a new day. And the Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in sports places and make your bones strong. And you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water whose waters do not fail. And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt, and you shall raise up the foundations of many generations You should be called the repairer of the streets, the restorer of the streets to dwell in." When Eric, when I talked to him, and this has happened a number of times, he says, you know, you would think that we would feel we've given more than we've received. He says, in reality, every time we go, we see how much they do in Siberia, how much they do with ten times to a thousand times less than we have in America. A growing church in a hostile environment, and it's minus 50 there in the winter. for the people that have never known any kind of in-depth Christianity or in-depth church. Never known it. Never seen it. And it's happening before his eyes. He says, every time we go, we receive more than we give. We're equipped more than we equip them. We think how much more we can do in Springfield, Missouri. Springfield, Missouri. If we were just as faithful as they are and as bold as they are in Russia. They get more than they give. And so that's exactly what Isaiah 58 says. If you pour yourself out, you get more than you give. You cannot give God. If you pour yourself out for the hunger of the world, you're going to get a lot more with persecution. But in the ages to come, it's going to be a lot. And so that's what Derek's story is. They get more than they give. And when you serve Christ, that's what always happens. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.