Hey everyone, my name is Axel, I'm one of the Trinity students and yeah, today I'll
be reading the Bible, those two passages that are on the string.
So first up, John 17, 20 to 24.
Give you a moment to get that.
My prayer is not for them alone.
I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them
may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.
May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be as one as we are one.
I in them and you in me, so that they may be brought to complete unity.
Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved
me.
Father, I want those you have given me to be with where I am and to see my glory, the
glory you have given me because you love me before the creation of the world.
In second reading, Genesis 12, 1 to 3.
The Lord said to Abram, go from your country, your people and your fathers household to
the land I will show you.
I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you.
I will make your name great and you will be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you and whoever curses you, I will curse and all peoples on
earth will be blessed through you.
Thanks, Axel.
Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, we just say thank you for your word.
As we look at your word together this morning, I pray that you will speak to our hearts.
We know that there are so many things that could be on our minds as we heard at the beginning,
Lord.
We just want at this time to focus in on what you say to us.
Help us to listen, Lord.
Help the words I have to say be from you only.
I pray all this in Jesus' name.
Amen.
As I said, I'm the missions lecturer.
This morning, I'm going to talk about missions, basically.
When I say the word missions, I want to know what you think of.
Maybe when I say that, maybe you think of people going to someone who is living in one
of those grass huts.
When I say word missions, you think of grass huts.
Maybe you think of doing like a Christmas carols event.
Maybe it's actually going to the jungle and doing medical work.
You can see my wife doing medical work in the jungle there.
Basically, when I say the word missions and think about missions, what's going to shape
your understanding of missions is all the experiences that you've had.
What you've seen about missions, what you've heard about missions.
As I've been talking to more and more people about missions, what I see more and more is
that people are becoming more and more confused about what the actual word missions means
today.
It's basically because the word missions has changed its meaning.
Fifty years ago, if I said the word mission, everyone knew that I would be talking about
going overseas and sharing the gospel with people from a different culture.
Then if I said the word evangelism, you go, okay, evangelism, that's what we do here,
right here in Armadale.
Sharing the gospel locally.
But things have changed.
The young people are experiencing, what they're hearing is that missions is more and more
about doing local.
Why?
It's because we're in our churches, we're talking about missions as being local.
We keep saying missions isn't international, it's also here.
It's here as well.
Then we add to the fact that we live in these multicultural communities.
When we go to the shops, we're going to see people from all around the world, all around
the globe, here with us.
According to the 2021 census, there's about three out of 10 people in WA were born overseas,
three out of 10.
What's going on, the result of all these changes is that people are starting thinking that
you can do missions wherever you are.
You don't have to go overseas to do missions, you've got people from all over the world
right here with us.
You can do cross-cultural mission right here in Australia.
What's happening more and more is that people are going, well, missions has become about
the local context.
I was going, what does this matter?
Does this even matter?
Because we need to share Jesus with our friends and neighbours, our work colleagues and our
communities.
This is really important.
I want us to make this really clear.
We can't stop doing this.
The problem is that research in Australia has shown that because of this change, churches
are sending less and less missionaries overseas.
I've worked with a lot of mission agencies and they've all said to me that our numbers
are dropping, our numbers are dropping.
This fact just made me stop and ask, well, does God even need missionaries?
Does God need missionaries?
I mean, let's face the fact, knowing who I am and we know who we are ourselves, that
we actually reject God, why would God even want to use someone like us to take the gospel
to people?
This question, it takes me back to the Bible, to before creation.
I go, when God was before himself, does God really need us?
Let's go back before God even created man and say, what happened then?
When God was this perfect triune God, when there was only God, and we go, well, let's
have a look at this picture.
We saw this in that passage in John 17.
If you've got your Bibles, have a look at John 17 with me.
We're going to focus on one verse.
It's John 17, 24, and we'll put it up in the overhead.
It says, Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my
glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.
So Jesus right there, he's sharing this relationship between the Godhead of glory and love with
his Father.
And this is what Jesus focuses on.
This is what Jesus focuses on before the creation.
He wants us to see this.
This relationship is about giving glory for who God is.
And the concept of glory is a hard concept to get your head around it.
I think because we are very limited in our words.
We don't know how to express this, but let me go to Isaiah.
Isaiah tries with limited words to paint a picture of God's glory.
And he has God sitting on throne above the circles of the earth, and his people are like
grasshoppers.
And he stretches out their heavens like a canopy and spreads them out like a tent to
live in.
And what we can see is God's greatness.
God's just so amazing.
He's perfect.
Everything about God is stunningly beautiful, like the sunset or the sunrise.
It's just amazing.
Every characteristic of God and everything he has done is totally perfect.
And it's hard to get our minds wrapped around that, isn't it?
And our response to seeing or knowing this is giving glory to God to worship him for
all that he is.
We need to worship him for his gloriousness.
And then we read in John 17 that this glory comes from a place of love.
And the Bible demonstrates to us that God's love isn't conditional.
As Josh said, it's about grace.
God never stops loving us no matter what we do.
His love is sacrificial.
He gave us Jesus.
So if God was already glorious and if God was already full of love, why did he create
people who were so bad?
Why would he even bother with us?
And it takes us back to John 17 verse 24.
It says, Father, I want those you have given me to be with me to see my glory, the glory
you have given me, because you loved me.
Jesus wants us or his disciples to experience what he had already experienced, what he is
experiencing with his father, to be with his father, to experience his glory and to know
the perfect love of God.
Can you just imagine that?
And then this is not just for those current disciples.
In John 17 verse 20, it says, Jesus prays this prayer for all who will believe, for all
believers, for us today, for all believers in the future, for you and for me.
That's what he wants everyone to experience.
And what we see in the Bible is the story of how God unveils his plan for his creation
to experience this love and this glory.
And it starts with Adam and Eve, made in God's image, made to be in loving relationship with
God, walking with him in the garden.
And then we have the four.
The four changed all that.
Adam's and Eve relationship with God was just in tatters, wasn't it?
They were thrown out of the garden.
But I have to remember that God, he doesn't actually abandon humanity, because we've got
to remember that God knew that this would happen.
And God had a plan that would end in his created, participating in being able to experience
his love and his glory.
And we see this plan first in Genesis three, verses 14 and 15, where God pronounces judgment
on the serpent.
And God says that the woman's seed or offspring will crush the head of the serpent.
It's sort of hinting how Satan will be defeated.
It's the first mention of the gospel right there in Genesis three.
God had a mission.
He had a plan and it's a plan to restore the relationship of those he created out of love
for his glory.
And for the next few chapters, they, all we read about is men stuffing up again and again.
Sin judgment.
The flood.
The tower of Babel.
But right then in Genesis 12, it's like the beginning where God starts putting his plan
into action.
And it's where he chooses one family to be the vehicle of blessing to every person.
And in verse one, God tells Abraham to go.
And all that follows flows from God's command to go.
Go from your country.
Go from your people.
Go from your father's house.
And here we have God is sending out Abraham.
And the reason why God is doing this, why he sends him out is in verse two.
And it's a bit tricky to look at this because it doesn't really, the NIV doesn't translate
it that well.
But at verse two, he actually starts with the words, so that.
And these two words are like a signpost.
He's saying, here's the reason.
Verse two gives the purpose of Abraham to go.
So what's his purpose?
Verse two says, so that I will make you into a great nation.
So that I will make your name great.
So that I will bless those who bless you.
All the families of the earth shall be blessed.
And the so that is repeated.
Now in repeating a word or a phrase, what happens is you're building up the climax to
something.
You're going, whoa, what's the final so that?
I want to see what the final so that is.
And it's in the last phrase.
The final so that the ultimate reason why Abraham, where Abraham was sent out was, here
it is, so that all the families of the earth shall be blessed.
This is God's ultimate purpose is to bless every single family on the earth.
So I go, what does this mean?
Every single family.
I mean, it's hard to get my hand in my head around.
And I've got to be careful not to think about through our Western eyes where I think about
my little nucleus family.
Because this is not what it's talking about right here.
It's talking in the original language, more like a group of people.
So what is a group of people?
A people group.
Now this whole phrase has been thrown around the missions world for a long time.
So this is really famous missions guys called Ralph Winter.
You don't have to remember his name, but putting it out there, I can't claim it as my own.
And this is what he says a people group is.
It's a large group of people who all share belonging because of their shared language,
religion, ethnicity, residence, occupation, class or caste or situation.
Basically it's the largest group that you can share the gospel with without encountering
a barrier.
So if I share a gospel with you and it keeps sharing and spreading and spreading, but then
there's a language barrier.
Well, that's another people group.
So basically a people group is the largest group which you can share the gospel with.
So here we have, so God's making this promise, this covenant with Abraham and he said, I'm
going to make you into a great nation.
I'm going to make your name great and it's a blessing to Abraham so that every single
people group on the earth should be blessed.
So God works through Abraham to bring his creation back into relationship with him so
that they may experience his glory and love.
And just, you know, humans are not very smart.
So God's really gracious again and he keeps restating this whole promise to him.
So you see this in Genesis 17 verse 4.
He says again, he said, you will be the father of many nations.
No longer will you be called Abraham.
Your name will be called Abraham for I have made you a father of many nations.
And so this is the whole thing.
Abraham gets a brand new name which actually means father of many nations.
So when you think about the name Abraham, you should think of the nations.
And it reminds me, I don't know with you, maybe you're as old as me.
In Sunday school, when I went to Sunday school, we used to sing a song and was called Father
Abraham.
Who remembers that song Father Abraham?
Oh yeah, you know Father Abraham.
I think it's the Christian fursy of the hokey pokey.
Right, but basically the song is meant to remind ourselves that we are one of Abraham's
children.
Abraham is our father of all the nations.
But what we see in Genesis over and over again is this promise of blessing.
It's repeated over and over again.
Genesis 26, God renews the covenant with Abraham's son Isaac.
He says, I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky.
I'm going to give you all these lands and through your offspring, all nations on earth
will be blessed.
And then again, because we're not that smart, he repeats it again, Genesis 28 to Jacob.
So I start thinking, well how is this going to happen?
How are the descendants of Abraham actually going to bless the nations?
And in Exodus 19, 5 and 6, so after these lights have been freed from Egypt, before
they receive the law, the Lord said to Moses, now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant,
then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession.
Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy
nation.
But what I want you to really see when we look in this passage is the word of.
It says, God says a kingdom of priests.
It's not a kingdom with priests.
It's one little word that makes a huge difference.
God's saying to Israel, I want you to be a kingdom of priests, a holy nation, and so
who are they going to be priests to?
The nations.
I'm going to make you a kingdom of priests to be the go-betweens between the nations,
between God and the nations.
That's the job of Israel.
God wanted Israel to live such as this great holy life so that people would see him.
They could go, I want to know who your God is because you are so good.
So it was like Israel was going to be like this magnet.
Israel was going to be a magnet attracting the nations and that God's love and glory
would be talked about among the nations.
Can you imagine that?
Wouldn't that be fantastic?
And so basically the mission strategy, the Old Testament is come and know.
Come here, come and know.
Three words.
But you know what I mean?
It's quite funny really because the Israelites really didn't do that very well either.
But you know what God says, even if they fail, they're going to be like this witness to the
nations.
Even if you fail.
And we see this when Moses renews the covenant with the Israelites in Deuteronomy 29.
Even when you stuff up, even when I pour out my wrath on you, it's going to be like this
witness to the nations that I am God.
He says, all the nations ask, why has the Lord done this to this land?
Why this fierce burning anger?
And the answer will be, it's because these people abandoned the covenant of the Lord.
The Israelites, no matter whether they're good or bad, were going to be witnesses for
the Lord.
And so I start thinking about this sort of illustration.
So I used to be a leader in pioneers, which is a mission organization.
So I was a missionary for many years.
So when I was actually a team leader for a while, and then I actually became, they said
to me, Mike, we want you to become the area leader.
It was basically looking after a big geography of land in Indonesia.
Oh, okay.
Now I'm going to join the big dogs.
All right.
So they're going to have the first meeting.
You know, can you imagine that?
All these people, you go, these guys are really special and we're going to join them up in
the special room.
We had a conference beforehand and after the conference it's going to be the leaders, the
area leaders.
I'm going, very, very nervous.
You know that feeling when you're going to meet these people.
So I walked into this room and all these leaders, there's about 20 leaders sitting around this
horseshoe.
And it's all pretty, you know, a bit of murmuring, probably like your session, really.
I'm giving a murmur, a bit of a chat.
And I said, so about, so before we started, one of the other leaders was, I didn't really
know that, so she stands up and says, Mike, everyone, everyone, I want you to listen up.
Want to introduce a new area leader.
His name's Mike.
The reason I know that his son took my daughter to burp the whole alphabet.
That's what I was known for.
From the beginning, I was the father of the son who taught his daughter how to burp the
whole alphabet.
And it was like, well, no matter whether I was good or bad, people are going to know
who I am.
This is what kids do.
And that's what the Israelites, God's kids, were going to do.
Whether they're good or bad, they were going to let his name be known.
The nations were going to talk about God.
And they kept failing, though.
They failed to glorify God and let alone help others know about God's love and His glory.
So I've got to keep reminding ourselves, again, that this didn't take God by surprise.
God knew that this was going to happen.
God had a plan.
And let's go back to Genesis 22 again.
After Abraham was tested with the sacrifice of Isaac, God renewed his covenant with him.
He says, I will surely bless you and make you descendants as numerous as the stars in
the sky and as the sands in the seashore and through your offspring, all nations on earth
will be blessed because you have bathed me.
And what we notice here is that all families on the earth would be blessed through Abraham's
offspring.
And we look at the word offspring, it's actually not plural.
It's singular, which means it's just one offspring.
God's plan was not going to happen through all of Abraham's, all of his descendants.
It was going to happen through one future descendant.
And this is those questions in Sunday School.
You go, what's the answer?
And everyone says, Jesus.
That's right.
The answer is Jesus.
Jesus is that future offspring.
In Acts 3, 25, 26, Peter in his first sermon after receiving the Holy Spirit, preaching
to the cloud.
This is what Peter says, and you are the heirs of the prophets and of the covenant God made
with your fathers.
He said to who?
Abraham, through your offspring, all peoples on earth will be blessed.
So when God raised up his servant, he sent him first to you to bless you by turning each
of you from your wicked ways.
So here are the exact words given to Abraham in Genesis.
Peter proclaims Jesus as Abraham's offspring.
And with the coming of Christ, the strategy, we see you have the strategy, remember the
first strategy in the Old Testament was here, come and know.
Now with Jesus, that strategy changes.
And we can look at this.
This is not, again, God knew about the changes strategy.
He was part of his plan.
Isaiah 66, before Jesus comes, it says, it talks about a sign.
And at this time, God will send his people to the nations.
His people would go to the coastlands.
They will declare God's glory among the nations.
So the strategy changes from here, come and know, to go, declare and make disciples.
Just go to the next one.
One more.
Here we go.
Go, declare and make disciples.
And this brings us to that most famous mission verse, Matthew 28, 19, where Jesus straight
after his death and resurrection.
And just before he goes to heaven, tells his disciples, go and make disciples of all nations.
And the way it's written makes the word go, which again we saw in Genesis, focus on the
place where they were to go and make those disciples.
And it's to all the nations.
And it harks back to Genesis 12, the initial covenant with Abram.
And the word nations, again, is actually referring to that same word, people groups.
So Jesus is telling us in Matthew that we are to go to all people groups in the world.
Our role as disciples of Jesus is to bless the families of the earth.
That's your role.
That's my role.
And Acts 1.8 clarifies how we're going to do this.
Jesus' disciples were commissioned to be witnesses in Jerusalem, Samaria, and to the ends of
the earth.
And this brings out two things.
First Jesus adds a geographical element.
He's telling us to go to every corner of the earth.
God's salvation is for all nations, for every people group.
So geographically, every corner.
Historically, it means to every people group, again, to all the nations, those who aren't
Jews, the Gentiles, every nation.
So the story of Acts shows the beginning of the fulfillment of this command.
It doesn't show us the end.
This task is not yet finished.
The church's mission, our mission is to go to the ends of the earth, to every people
group, until the task is finished.
When is the task going to be finished when Jesus comes back?
Now according to the Joshua Project, which is a project which looks at unreached people
groups, there are 17,260 people groups in the world.
Out of this 17,000 odd, 7,219 are unreached.
That's 41.8%.
3.44 billion people who have little or no access to the gospel.
3.44 billion people.
Why did God create man so that every single human on this earth can share in his love
and his glory?
But 3.44 billion people, 3.44 billion, have no one to share that love with.
They don't have anyone.
And it brings us back to our original question.
Does God need missionaries?
Yes.
But our focus in Australia on sending missionaries is decreasing.
Research has shown that if we focus on global missions, our local missions will increase.
It has also shown that if we focus on local missions, global missions decreases.
We say that again.
If we focus on global missions, our local missions will increase.
If we focus on local missions, our global missions will decrease.
We've still got a job to do.
God created humankind so they will experience his love and his glory.
Every people group needs to hear of his love and his glory.
He wants people to know this love and glory.
It reminds me of that picture in Revelation where every nation, tribe, people and language
stand before the throne and the Lamb crying out a loud voice.
Revelation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.
This is what we want to see.
God wants our churches, He wants Grace Christian Church to be part of this plan.
And if God has spoken to you this morning about those people who still have not heard
about Jesus, come and speak to us.
Come and speak to Michael.
He's still a big job to be done.
Again I want to say this is not taking away from local missions.
We need to do this but we need to also send our best to the world so the world will hear
of his name.
Let me pray.
Heavenly Father, I pray that you will just transform our hearts.
Your Word speaks to us today.
We acknowledge, Lord, that we are not always the best of taking your Word to all nations
so we ask for your forgiveness.
We thank you for this commission.
I pray that you'll help each one of us challenge us, Lord.
Help us to see whether you're calling us to be that person who will take the Gospel to
all those people who still have not heard of your love and of your glory.
I pray this in Jesus' name.
Amen.