[0:00]
The Bible reading is from one Corinthians chapter 9. Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not the result of my work in the Lord? Even though I may not be an apostle to others, surely I am to you, for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord. This is my defence to those who sit in judgment on me. Don't we have the right to food?

[0:30]
Don't we have the right to take a believing wife along with us as do the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and seaface? Or is it only I and Barnabas who don't have the right to not work for a living? Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat of its grapes? Who tends a flock and does not drink the milk? Do I say this merely on human authority? Doesn't the Lord say the same thing? For it is written in the law of Moses. Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain. Is it about oxen that God is concerned? Surely he says this for us, doesn't he?

[1:16]
Yes, this was written for us because when farmers plow and thresh, they should be able to do so in the hope of sharing in the harvest. If we have so in spiritual seed among you, is it too much if we reap material harvest from you? If others have this right of support from you, shouldn't we have it all the more? But we did not use this right. On the contrary, we put up with anything rather than hinder the gospel of Christ.

[1:47]
Don't you know that those who serve in the temple get their food from the temple and those who serve at the altar share in what is offered on the altar? In the same way, the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should receive their living from the gospel. But I have not used any of these rights. And I am not writing this in the hope that you will do such things for me, for I would rather die than allow anyone to deprive me of this boast.

[2:17]
For when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, since I am compelled to preach. I am not willing to preach the gospel. If I preach voluntarily, I have a reward. If not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me. What then is my reward? Just this, that in preaching the gospel, I may offer it free of charge and so not misuse the rights as a preacher of the gospel.

[2:47]
Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone to win as many as possible. To the Jews, I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law, I became like one under the law, though I myself am not under the law, so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law, I became like one not having the law, though I am not free from God's law but am under Christ's law, so as to win those not having the law.

[3:17]
To the weak, I became weak to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel that I may share in its blessings. Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.

[3:53]
Therefore, I do not run like someone running aimlessly. I do not fight like a boxer beat in the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize. Morning, everyone. It's good to be here with you again. Just to say, I have this, is this working?

[4:23]
Apparently it is the problem with my beard. Obviously, Australian men are not manly enough to grow proper beard. That is just an inference that I have made, so it may not be accurate. Just to say as well, it has been suggested that yesterday I did not smile enough. I am sorry about that. I have this affliction, it is called my face.

[4:55]
It has got set in this kind of permanent frown. I will try and smile more, I promise. Please have your Bibles open at 1 Corinthians 9. I want to do three things in this talk. I want to identify the critical feature in growing a mission-minded church, the critical feature in growing a mission-minded church.

[5:30]
Secondly, I want to look at how Paul works to grow the church in Corinth as a mission-minded church. Thirdly, I want to unpack five specific culture-creating strategies in nurturing a mission-minded church. Those are my three tasks. Let me try and get through them within the allotted time. First of all, to identify the critical feature in growing a mission-minded church.

[6:03]
I am not beginning here because this is so often overlooked. I have so often overlooked it and to the detriment of the people that I have been responsible for pastoring. What is the critical feature? Love is the critical feature. Love isn't all you need, but you do need love. I spoke yesterday about my many mistakes that I have made in my ministry.

[6:33]
I wasn't engaging in some kind of rhetorical disclosure to somehow make me seem like I am like you ordinary people. I was making a public confession before you. I have made so many mistakes. I think my principal mistake is that I fail to love my people as I should have done. Certainly, I fail to love them to such an extent that they know that I love them. They know they are loved by me as their pastor.

[7:05]
That has been a very significant failure on my part. Because a planter, a pastor, a preacher is first and foremost before he is all of those things he is a lover. A lover of God and a lover of others. You have to love your people well. You have to love your people truly. You have to care for them deeply. You have to shepherd them faithfully.

[7:36]
People in our churches, our core teams, or as our churches grow, or the people who lead the various ministries that we have, they are not fodder for our ministry. They are not tools to build our reputation. They are not pawns to sacrifice so that we win the game. They are the sheep for whom the shepherd died. He calls me as their pastor, us as their pastors, to love them, to care for them, to feed them, and to nurture them.

[8:13]
To grow a mission-minded church, you have to love your people. You have to bear with your people. You have to be patient with your people and you have to invest in your people. Too often we short circuit that process. Too often we try to, as it were, vault over that so that we can get down to the real business of having a mission-minded church. That becomes our goal, a mission-minded church. We have to love our people well so that we love them through B to where they become missionaries.

[8:49]
Paul clearly exemplified this, didn't he? In writing to the Corinthians, one of my favorite chapters in the Bible is 2 Corinthians chapter 4. You don't need to turn to it. Obviously you can if you want, but you don't feel obliged to. In 2 Corinthians 4, it's quite clear that he loved, all the way through in the two bits of correspondence with the church that we have. He clearly loved this quarrelsome, this cantancras, this befuddled and wayward church.

[9:21]
He clearly did. He persevered with them, didn't, in ways that I don't think that I would have done. The very fact that in the passage that we read, he acknowledges himself. He identifies himself as the one who planted the church. Say you're the proof of his apostolic ministry. Now I don't know about you, but if I was writing a CV or resume, I wouldn't put Corinth down as one of the churches that I planted. Seriously, you wouldn't want somebody going there approaching the leaders to get some sort of reference from me, would you?

[9:54]
What are they going to say? Because it was a crazy church. Quite clearly it was a crazy church. Who were doing the most ridiculous things? And yet Paul loved them. He persevered with them. He pursued them. He had to bed his soul to them. That's how much he loved them. And as you read on in two Corinthians, in those very painful chapters, 10 to 13, he has this kind of confliction, doesn't he?

[10:24]
He wants to be real with them and he opens his heart to them. He says, look, I'm speaking like a fool here. But for your sake, I'm prepared to be a fool. But in two Corinthians four, which is a superb chapter, there's this delightful moment in verse five when this is what he says, for what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ our Lord and us as your servants. But we don't preach ourselves, but we preach Jesus Christ as Lord and us as your servants.

[10:55]
And for Paul, these two things go hand in hand. There are two statements to make one point. Because if Jesus Christ is Lord, if He is my Lord, if that is who we preach, if that is who we serve, then that means necessarily inevitably, essentially, that means that I am we are slaves of His people. That's what we are. So that's why they're not fodder for our ministry. They're not tools to advance our cause, to build our ministry. They're not pawned to be sacrificed so that we might win the game.

[11:32]
They are sheep for whom the shepherd died. And that is so critical in growing a mission-minded church. So let's have a look at what Paul does in the passage that we read. Now it is clear, isn't it? Second point, that what Paul is doing here, in this passage, this central passage, chapter eight verse one, to chapter eleven verse one, is quite clear, this central passage in one Corinthians that he's shepherding these people so that they might better understand the gospel and what it means to be a gospel people.

[12:11]
That's what he's doing, clearly and ambiguously. He wants to share his love for Christ. He wants them to share his love for the people of God. He wants them to share his love for the lost. He wants them to serve as gospel ministers. He's not just writing to them as a professional so that he might put them right on a number of theological issues or church discipline, or matters.

[12:41]
He's not writing to them so that they can sort out their church order. No, he wants them to be formed after Christ. He wants them to be able to present them. Mature in Christ, that means that they're going to emulate and imitate who he is as a gospel minister. That they're going to love as he loves. They're going to serve as he serves. That's what he's doing. And this section here, as I say, eight, one, two, eleven, one, is the sharp point of this ambition. Now again, because it's not my privilege to be engaging in careful exposition here, but we are just going to kind of go quite quickly through this to embed it well.

[13:25]
So please do have your Bibles open at one and just go through it with me. Now it's rather striking this chapter in the number of ways, and I hope that you'll see just how striking it is. But for the sake of convenience, we're just going to look at it in different sections. First of all, we have verses one to fourteen, which is as it were Paul's self-defense. Quite clearly, there was a degree of criticism of Paul in the church at Corinth. Not only from interlopers, but from the believers themselves, the people who'd been converted under his ministry, presumably.

[14:00]
But Paul isn't really concerned about defending himself. He's not getting defensive here. He's not getting upset because they're criticizing him. Now he has a far bigger project in mind, and that is that he might disciple them through this so that they might be better served and surprised, better believers. Now the first thing that you notice in chapter nine is how many questions Paul asks. For all of them are what we might call technically rhetorical questions in that the answer is meant to be self-evident.

[14:31]
Am I not free? Well, yes, of course I am. Am I not a possible? Yes, of course I am. Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Yes, we know you did. Are you not my workmanship in the Lord? Well, yes. So he asks a number of questions. 17 in just these few verses. 4 there in verse one and 13 in verses four to 13. Question after question in a relentless torrent. It says, oh, you don't even get time to draw a breath.

[15:02]
Let's just try and capture something of that there. Verse four. Do we not have the right to eat and drink? Do we not have the right to take a longer believing wife? Is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from working for a living? Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard without eating any of its fruit? Or who tends a flock without getting some of the milk? Do I say these things on human authority? Does not the law say the same? You see what Paul is doing? He's building up his case. He's creating an impression.

[15:32]
He's making his case compelling. Of course these things are true. But he's not making a point for his own sake. He's not defending himself because he's being attacked. Now he's interacted with the Corinthians, ostensibly over the issue of food being offered to idols and the legitimacy of eating that, of buying it from the marketplace and eating it when it's been laid on an idol's altar.

[16:02]
But it was a far bigger issue that was at stake. And that far bigger issue was the defining of love, defining actions. Look at chapter 8 and verse 1. Now concerning food offered to idols, we know that all of us possess knowledge, but this knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. But if anyone loves God, he is known by God. He's the issue of his love, isn't it? There. The issue is how much he loves. How much say love their brothers and sisters,

[16:33]
not whether they have the right to do or not to do something. Yes, they have the right knowledge, and that right knowledge is that it's okay to eat food offered to idols because an idol is nothing, but that knowledge can so easily destroy if it is exercise or if it leads to behavior that takes no regard for your brother and sister. Their primary concern was their freedom and their rights. Is this mic dropping?

[17:05]
It just seems to be kind of, can you hear me? Yeah. Okay. So it seems to be their freedom. I'm free to eat food and I'm going to eat food, I'm going to exercise that right, whatever. They were free to attend a cultic worship. So they should go ahead and enjoy themselves because an idol is nothing, but Paul deals with that in chapter 10. But without the controlling ethic of love, then they were in bondage to their freedom. Whereas love for Paul defined their freedom.

[17:41]
Love was the means by which they knew how to express their freedom in a way that glorified God. And in verse 13 of chapter 9, Paul somewhat suddenly and unexpectedly switches to the first person singular where he says, I will never eat meat again in chapter 8. I will never eat meat less than I make my brother stumble. And that focus continues into chapter 9. And in the first instance, as you read there,

[18:14]
it's to demonstrate a right use of freedom in contrast to the Corinthians perverted use of freedom. Selfish use of freedom. Hence is initial question, am I not free? Does my decision not to eat meat because of the foibles of somebody else mean that somehow I'm in bondage? Well, absolutely not, says Paul, because let me use myself as an example. So his next question, am I not an apostle? And so it goes on.

[18:47]
Now, he comes to the presenter, a presenting issue, namely that he is refusal to accept money for his ministry from the Corinthians. We don't have time to go into why or why he didn't do that, but he's adamant that he is not going to do that. But that's the right use of his freedom. Of course, he has a right to finance. And he argues his case biblically and through the example of other apostles. Of course, he has a right to that, but he's going to forgo that right because there's another issue at stake.

[19:17]
And it's a far bigger issue. And the far bigger issue that Paul has in mind is that as a gospel of free grace in the context of Corinth is vital that he can offer it freely. It's a gospel that focuses upon the needs of others. Not my rights, and not my privilege. So by freely forgoing my rights, I can freely discharge my ministry without fear and favor.

[19:47]
You see, of all, he of all people is free. But look at verse 19. For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all that I might win more of them. I have made myself a slave of everyone. Isn't that incredible? I have made myself a slave. Yes, I'm free, but I've made myself, I've enslaved myself to people's prejudices.

[20:17]
I've enslaved myself to people's personal history. I've enslaved myself to their baggage. Not so that I might please them, but so that I might win them. I'm willing to forgo any right. I'm willing to endure any hardship so that I might win them for Christ. You see, Paul wants to grow a mission-minded church in Corinth. A critical piece is his own ministry among them, and then understanding why he does what he does, how he lives as he lives.

[20:51]
And that takes us into this section, the hottest part of the furnace, where his strategic slavery. Because he gets on again to the right use of his freedom. And he is so free that he can use that freedom to enslave himself to others. The Corinthians were in bondage to their liberty. Paul is so free he can be a slave. It's gloriously perverse, isn't it? Because this is a deliberate choice.

[21:22]
And it's the context of his ministry, isn't it, that determines his behavior. There's this glorious flexibility about what he does with who he does, because he knows why he does it. Now in all probability here in verse 19 following, he's again dealing with the specific question of to eat or not to eat that he's addressing in chapter 8. But he's going to return to this. But this isn't simply the question of am I vegetarian or a meat eater.

[21:53]
It's a far bigger issue, and that's why he goes on in verse 20. So okay, what does that mean? If I become a slave to everyone, what does it mean? Well, it means to the Jew, I became a Jew. Now I find that an interesting phrase given who Paul was, but maybe if we have time, we'll come back to that in a moment. But he's speaking about his strategy among Jews with specific reference to their legal obligations under the law. He says to the Jew, I became a Jew, so that I might win the Jews.

[22:25]
That is, to those who are under the law, I became as one under the law. Though I'm not under the law, he says, I'm not under the mosaic covenant because I'm in Christ. But nonetheless, I become as one under the law that I might win those under the law. He says, it's not my freedom that matters, is it? And if for going a poor chop means that somebody's going to become a Christian, well then let me throw that poor chop into the trash can.

[22:55]
It's a thing that is trivial and incidental, isn't it? Because the glory is winning somebody for Christ. So to the Jew, I become a Jew. That is, to those who under the law is one under the law, though, not being myself under the law, that I might win the law. And then, in verse 21, he speaks about Gentiles. That is, those who are outside the law. Well, to those who are outside the law, I become as one as though outside the law, though, not myself being without law, but being in law to Christ, which again is another very significant phrase that we may refer to.

[23:29]
No, we won't. But I wish we could because it's a very significant phrase, but he says, in order that I might win them, because that's all that matters, isn't it? My own kind of cultural foibles, my own predelictions, my own preferences from my upbringing count for nothing, oh, with this surpassing glory of seeing men and women for Jesus. Now remember what Paul is doing here. He wants them to be mission minded. He wants them to understand why he does what he wants to do.

[24:01]
So he expounds a gospel. He expounds the true doctrine. He expounds his own experience so that he might see. He makes himself real. He gets, he allows them into seeing his working as it were. And then it's also intriguing that in the, you know, you think this is great rhetoric to the Jew I become a Jew that I might win the Jew to those, to Gentiles that I might win the Gentiles, but look at verse 22, to the weak I become weak, that I might win the weak.

[24:35]
You see, it's not just those without Christ that I'm concerned with, this is it. It's believers, weak believers. Those with tender consciences, those with inconsistent practices. So if I need to, as it were, become weak to win them, then that's so be it. I'm going to become weak. Because what matters is that I win them. And I'm going to win them with the same gospel that I win the Jew with the same gospel that I win the Gentile. Because to be mission minded isn't just being concerned about what is going on out there in the world,

[25:07]
is it worth all with those out there in the world, but it is being concerned with all of God's people. And then being concerned with all of God's creatures is being concerned about everything and everyone because we want all of it to be brought under the Lordship of Jesus. And the same gospel that saves us is the same gospel that sanctifies us. And then look what he said. I have become all things to all people so that I might by all possible means save some.

[25:41]
What does that mean? It means that I do everything for the sake of the gospel. There's one section of the Bible that I can identify as being the defining section for my understanding of gospel ministry over the last 35 years. It is 1 Corinthians 9 to 9 to 23. I cannot tell you the impact it had upon me when I first heard it preached by a man called Philip Jensen,

[26:15]
who some of you may have heard of when he was in London back in the mid 1980s. And it's been the passes that I've gone back to time after time after time after time. In all of my ministry and everything that I do, I do it for the sake of the gospel. And that means that everything is potentially a gospel issue. Everything is potentially a gospel issue. Not everything is a gospel issue, but everything potentially is.

[26:47]
Circumcision in and of itself is not a gospel issue, but potentially is, as we see from the letter of Paul to the Galatians. Drinking alcohol is not in and of itself a gospel issue, but potentially it is. Eating particularly kind of food is in and of itself a gospel issue, but potentially it is. Whether you have piercings or not, it's not in and of itself a gospel issue, but potentially it is. Whether you have tattoos is not in and of itself a gospel issue, but potentially it is.

[27:19]
Where you go, what you do, there's great freedom, but all of them are potentially gospel issues. Now what is Paul trying to do? He's trying to grow a mission-minded church. You know, if we had time to go to the end of this section, we'd hear him say, imitate me as I imitate Christ, because Paul's saying here, look, this great kind of gospel focus and flexibility isn't just my thing, it's not just my bag as the apostle to the Gentiles, no, that I'm just imitating Christ,

[27:53]
the greatest cross-cultural missionary of all time, that he's the one that I'm imitating. So imitate me as I am, it ain't him because that's what it means to be the people of God. It is to be mission-minded. It is to be concerned about those who do not know Christ. It is to be concerned about those who do know Christ, but do not know Him well. It is about be concerned about those who know Christ, but struggling so many areas, because you want to see them formed for Christ's glory. That's what it is. That's what it means to be a believer. That's what it means to be a church.

[28:30]
So we should, like Paul, encourage, we should be seeking to grow mission-minded churches. We should be growing people so that they love God and they love others. We should be nurturing people so that they are passionate about the fame of Jesus. Of course we should. What else is our ministry other than that? Because this is integral to the gospel. It is essential to our identity as God's people.

[29:00]
To love Christ, to know Christ is to make Him known. To love Christ is to show that He's lovable, that He's altogether glorious, lovely. The Christian is to be somebody who is captured by Christ and therefore captivated by Christ. And as someone who is besotted with our Savior, who should be the chief topic of our conversation?

[29:30]
So those are the first two things. So let me give you some specific ways that you might do this. And I've left myself a good bit of time to unpack these carefully. Because I think leaders, pastors, preachers, church planters, that what we're doing essentially is we're culture creators. Culture, each strategy for breakfast is a famous saying and I think it's completely true.

[30:04]
Not the strategy is irrelevant at all but that it grows out of culture. It is an expression of that culture and leaders are about culture creation. And I think there are particular things that we should do. We need to do in order to nurture a gospel-centered culture. To nurture a mission-minded culture. Very specific thing. So here they are. Each of them are in couplets. Well no, four of the five are in couplets. And it's not because I kind of ran out of an ability to do couplets.

[30:37]
The fifth one isn't, you'll understand why in a moment. Am I smiling enough, by the way? Okay, the first one. Preach and teach. Preach and teach. This is critical. Because God's people are those who are formed by the gospel and for the gospel. It is the word of God, the scriptures that have formed us, isn't it? So if we're going to create a particular culture, a gospel-centered culture,

[31:11]
a mission-minded culture, then we can do nothing better than bring God's Word to bear upon it. Because it is God's Word that shapes it. I'm sure you're familiar with the parable of the soil or the sower in Mark IV, for example. And what is intriguing there is that the word, the gospel, is seen as portrayed as a seed. Because it is a life-giving thing. It carries within it its own ability to germinate.

[31:43]
Because that is what the Word of God does. That is, as we teach the Bible, we're teaching God's truth, which not only informs our mind, but it captures our affection. It shapes us as God's people. It defines us. It actually works upon us. It is the sort of the Spirit, isn't it? That's how Paul describes it. It is the sort of the Spirit. And that's how the right to the Hebrews is. It's sharper than any two-edged sword. That's what it does.

[32:13]
It works upon it. It is the means by which the Spirit cuts away that which is hindering our growth. And he exposes that which needs exposing so that we might be healed and mature. So if God's Word is so central, so pivotal, and we are a people under the Word, then we should make sure that we preach it and teach it. There should be a glorious consistency and predictability about our preaching in our gatherings week by week.

[32:47]
I often say to our people, in a sense, you know what you're going to hear when you come here each Sunday morning, don't you? Really, nothing is going to take you by surprise. It might be the odd phrase or whatever, but overall, they know what they're going to get. And so I want to preach the Bible. I want to preach the Scriptures. And if I'm preaching the text of Scripture from Genesis 1 to Revelation 22, I am going to be preaching about mission. I am going to be preaching about a mission regard. I am going to be preaching about God's people with a missionary identity.

[33:18]
I can't help but do that. A summary statement that I have in terms of encapsulating this entire message is that God's purpose has always been to have a people for himself, a people that he reveals his glory to, and a people that he displays his glory through. Now you read 1 Peter, chapter 2, and you'll see that God's purpose is in who we are as God's people, is so that we might declare the praises of him who called us out of darkness into his marvelous light.

[33:50]
So that we might do it. So why are we God's people, God's chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation? Why? So that we might declare the praises of him. And that's what mission is. Mission is declaring the praises of him who called us out of darkness into his marvelous light. Mission is not simply a means to an end. The end being worship, as has been famously said, mission exists because worship doesn't. No, worship exists because mission happens.

[34:20]
Mission defines worship for us. It creates worshipers. That's what mission does. And yes, mission will carry on into eternity. If mission is declaring the praises of him who called us out of darkness into his marvelous light. Now if I believe that, well then whatever passage of Scripture I'm going to be preaching, I'm going to be preaching the gospel. Whatever exegesis I'm going to be engaging in, it's going to be exegesis, isn't it? Because I'm going to be exegiting Christ in it, who Christ who is the ultimate missionary, who for the glory of God and the love of the last

[34:54]
left, the glory of heaven for the slums of earth, and hung upon a cross of shame before returning to his father so that he might gather a people for himself. This is what mission is. And I'm going to be preaching that consistently, and I'm going to be teaching it, not just preaching it from the pulpit in a gathering, I'm going to be teaching it from house to house. I'm going to be teaching it in our small groups. I'm going to be teaching it, yes, even in my evangelistic classes that I run.

[35:24]
Because I want people to know that when they bow the knee and confess Christ as Lord and Savior that they are then called to live a life for him, which is a life of making him know. So we create this culture. We grow a mission-minded church by preaching and teaching consistently, constantly, and building that into the warp and move of all of our teaching opportunities within the structure that is a local church. Secondly, as well as preaching and teaching, we pray and sing.

[36:00]
We preach and teach, we pray and sing. Now what I mean by that, I don't just mean we pray for it, although of course we do that, we pray that God might so capture the affections of His people that they want to make Him known and they will do everything for the sake of the gospel. Of course we pray for that, but we make sure that that shapes how we pray, that that feeds into what we do on a Sunday morning when we're putting our meeting together. When somebody who is going to lead the congregation in prayer, we help train them so that they might

[36:34]
pray well. We don't just get them to stand up there so that they might pray off the cuff as it were and pray for whatever comes into their head. Now we say we want you to pray for these specific things, so that they model what our passion is in their prayers, that we're praying this into existence, in the life of the congregation. Prayer is not simply a recitation of knees, it is a means by which God acts in His Word, world and in the hearts of His people. It is a powerful thing. Now I'm a Calvinist, I put up my hands and confess that I'm a Calvinist

[37:08]
and I'm a happy Calvinist too, even though I don't smile much, I am a happy Calvinist. I promise you and I'm a happy Calvinist, but I can say that in God's great overarching sovereignty he has chosen to make prayer the means by which he acts. So prayer isn't something that I simply do or we do, it is a means by which God works. And that is how he works, so therefore we work with him as we pray and we become participants and fellow laborers with him.

[37:39]
So you pray for it, you pray about, you pray it in your gathering, in your prayer meetings, you structure your prayer meetings around these glorious ambition that men and women might come to know Christ, that you might have an impact upon your town or your city for Christ because people will be exposed to the gospel, they'll hear the gospel, they'll have opportunity to respond to the gospel. And if you pray it, you sing it. Now I love corporate worship, I really do love it.

[38:14]
And I think it's so important, there's a saying that methodism was born in song, but I think the gospel, the church is bathed in song. The gospel is a glorious song that we sing together, a song of God's majesty and glory and grace and condescension and mercy. And we sing in order to stir and shape the affections, that's what we do. Singing reaches apart that other means of teaching can't reach.

[38:49]
That's just a way that God has hired us. So make sure that the songs that you sing articulate the gospel well and articulate what it means to be a gospel-minded people. Just choose your songs carefully and write your songs wisely so that they're a means of teaching people, because that's what Paul says it does, doesn't it? In Ephesians and Colossians, so that we speak to one another with Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, we teach one another through that.

[39:19]
We capture our affections, our affections are stirred, our hearts are one for Christ again in that moment of singing these great truths of his glory, of his majesty, of his grace and his mercy, so that we might tell others about him, so that we might live lives that commend him individually and corporately together. So you preach and teach, you pray and sing thirdly, you model and you mentor. If you're a planter, if you're a pastor, if you're a preacher, you've got a model in it.

[39:49]
You can't have a mission-minded church, if you are not a mission-minded minister. It just won't happen. It shouldn't happen. You've got to do it. You've got to model it. You've got to model what it means to be a man of God who is in love with Christ and passionate for others to know him. And we'll do everything and anything for the sake of the gospel. Just as Paul was willing to forgo any right, just as he was willing to endure any hardship, just as he was willing to give up on any privilege,

[40:22]
so that he might win people for Jesus. You too need to be such a man. I need to be such a man. As husbands and wives, you need to be such a man and a woman, a husband and a wife, living that kind of life as families. We need our families to be on mission, to model that for the church. So that people can't say, well, that's okay for you or I couldn't do that because of my situation. That's not fair on my children.

[40:55]
It seems that many Christians are very willing to sacrifice their kids to materialism and the careerism and all sorts of other idols that our culture has. They're willing to sacrifice them to that but they won't sacrifice them, their education or their friendships or whatever, so that they might understand what it means, the cost of following Jesus. And as a leader, you need to model that. And as well as model it, you need to mentor it.

[41:26]
That is, you need to bring people into your life not only so that they can see close up and personal what that looks like, but so that you can articulate what that's about in the rub of life itself. You can explain to them why you go down to and shop at these particular shops or why you go down to this particular coffee shop. We can week out so that you might get to know people, so that you might get to be friend people, so that you might get to share Jesus with people. And you're mentoring people in that.

[41:58]
That they're seeing how you spend your time. They're seeing how you spend your money because you do everything for the sake of the gospel, don't you? And I mean everything because that's what Paul meant. So we preach and teach, we pray and sing, we model and mentor. And fourthly, we structure and resource. Now, structure means that in terms of the churches that we plant or the churches that we build, we build them around this great and glorious commission that Christ has given us to make him know.

[42:29]
So you don't have missioners just part of just one line on your budget, but there's a missionary rationale for every line on your budget. And the structures that you have are all missional in intent. So you might run a women's program or you might run a kids program or you might what you do in terms of your Sunday gathering that all of them are structured around this. So there's this glorious consistently. What are we about? We're about making Jesus known. We're about presenting people maturing Christ.

[43:02]
We're about nurturing disciples who will make Jesus known, who will make disciples. That's what we're about. So structure everything around that. Don't be afraid of structure. Don't think that structure is somehow insignificant and somehow irrelevant. It is profoundly important. All life needs structure. The reason you can see me now is because I'm alive and I've got this body. It's a structure that God has given me to kind of harness this life. And that is what we're like in our churches. We need structures. And those structures are going to change. They're going to adapt. They're going to need to be dismantled and then built again.

[43:37]
And that's fine. And that's a constant process, but you need to structure for this. And you need to resource this. You need to put your money where your mouth is. And if people need discipling in this, well, then you need to start paying somebody who's got the time to really invest in doing that. So that he might equip others who can disciple others. None of this is just going to happen to grow a mission-minded church means that we have to do intentionally, purposefully, rigorously, and irresistibly.

[44:11]
So we pray and teach. We preach and teach. We pray and sing. We model and mentor. We structure and resource. And the fifth one, repeat. You just keep doing it. You just keep doing it. You just keep preaching and teaching. You just keep praying and singing. You keep modeling and mentoring. You keep structuring and resourcing. Because that's how you grow a mission-minded church. Just as Paul, when he was preaching the gospel to the Corinthians, in order that he might be a mission-minded church, he just kept preaching the gospel.

[44:46]
He addresses every issue and he preaches the gospel. The essential issue in Corinthians is a nature of true spirituality. And what is a nature of true spirituality? It's not ecstatic experiences. It's not mystical, it's not mystical meandering. It is a Christ-centeredness that is for the good of others. That's what he says all the way through. Whether he's talking about marriage, whether he's talking about singleness, whether he's talking about food offered to idols, whether he's talking about attending cultic feasts, whether he's talking about the Lord's Supper or communion, whether he's talking about spiritual gifts, whether he's talking about the resurrection, whatever it is, it's a Christ-centered, a Christ-focused spirituality that is concerned about others, believers and the world. And he preached it relentlessly.

[45:35]
And that's what we have to do. That's what we have the opportunity for doing. So may God give us the grace to do it. Amen.