FIVE-FOLD PURPOSE OF CHURCH
TO SEND PEOPLE INTO MINISTRY FOR CHRIST
DR. JIM DIXON
MARCH 3, 1991
MATTHEW 10:2-16
The Pool of Siloam was a famous landmark in biblical Jerusalem. The water in the Pool of Siloam came from some distance away. It came from the Kidron Valley, from the spring of Gihon, sometimes called the Virgin’s Fountain. And the water was sent into the Pool of Siloam through Hezekiah’s Tunnel, 583 yards long, built by King Hezekiah 700 years before Christ. For this reason, the pool was called Siloam from the Hebrew word, meaning sent because the water and the Pool of Siloam had been sent by the king into the city, that it might give life.
If you’re a Christian and you really believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, then there’s a sense in which you are exactly like the water in the pool of Siloam. You have been sent by the king. Now, the Greek word for sent is the word “apostolo.” The word meaning to send is the word apostolo. This word in the Bible is used of angels because they have been sent from heaven to earth. Ministering servants sent forth to serve for the sake of those who are to obtain salvation. And this word, apostolo, is used in the Bible of our Lord Jesus Christ because he was sent from the Father to us that we might have life through him. And this word apostolo, is used in the Bible of the disciples because they were sent by Christ into the world that they might take the gospel to the nations. In fact, the word apostle is based on the same root as this word apostolo.
This word apostolo in the Bible is used most commonly of all Christians. It’s used of all Christians because you see, biblically, all Christians have been sent, called by the Father and sent into the world that we might minister for His kingdom. The word missionary comes from a Latin word, which means to send, and you see, as Christians, there’s a sense in which we are all missionaries. A sense in which we are all apostles. A sense in which we are all sent. And as a church, we live to exalt Christ and bring people to Christ, bond them in Christ, build them up in Christ, and send them out in Christ.
Now, some people might ask, well, what are Christians sent forth to do? Why has the Father sent us into the world? And I really have two responses this morning. First of all, we are sent in order that we might recruit as Christians. We are sent forth by the Father in the power of the Spirit, that we might recruit men and women for the kingdom of Jesus Christ.
I know you’ve all heard of Uncle Sam. Perhaps you didn’t know that Uncle Sam died on July 31, 1854. Uncle Sam is buried in the Oakwood Cemetery outside of Troy, New York. Uncle Sam was in the meat packing business. He worked in that business with his brother, Ebenezer Wilson. Uncle Sam was Samuel Wilson, but everyone just called him Uncle Sam. And during the war of 1812, Uncle Sam sent meat to the American troops, and the boxes of meat were stamped with the two letters. U.S. Many of the troops joked that they didn’t know whether the U.S. stood for United States or for Uncle Sam. It’s because of this that the United States government began to be called Uncle Sam. Samuel Wilson died on July 31, 1854, but in a sense, Uncle Sam continued as a personification of the United States government. And of course, Uncle Sam through the years, has been now portrayed in cartoons. He has a goatee, kind of a twinkle in his eye, got long flowing hair, stars and stripes as a suit and for a hat.
In World War I, Uncle Sam was portrayed on posters all over America saying, “I want you.” Uncle Sam recruited people for our service of this country, and today Uncle Sam still recruits. And I think it’s safe to say the United States government will continue to recruit, looking for people who will serve the country and people who would be willing to fight for the country. But look at the world in which we live. We find that most governments recruit, but in all truth, I tell you, there is no government more dependent upon recruiting than the government of Jesus Christ. You see, the very citizens of the Kingdom of Christ are people who have been recruited. And if you’re a Christian, you’re called to be a recruiter, that you might invite more people to join the kingdom, the eternal kingdom, of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
When Christ recruited Peter and James and John by the Sea of Galilee, he told them to drop their nets. He said, “Come and follow me and I’ll make you fishers of men,” recruiters of people. That’s what every Christian is called to be. It’s what you are called to be as a church. We would train you that we might send you out for this purpose.
Now, Harvard University was established in 1636 by the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Its initial purpose was to train people for the ministry as pastors and missionaries. Two years later, in 1638, Harvard was given its name, Harvard, when John Harvard, who was a minister and a clergyman, gave his library and half of his estate to the school. The first president of Harvard was a man whose name was Henry Dunster. And his longing, his desire, was to take Christ to the Indian nations. He built a dorm at Harvard, two-story brick building, for 20 Indian students that they might be trained in the ministry and sent back to the Indian peoples that they might recruit Indians for the kingdom of Jesus Christ. The first Bible printed in America was printed on the Harvard College Press in 1663, and it was a translation of the Bible printed in the Indian tongue.
I’m not exaggerating when I say that the purpose of Harvard when it was established was to recruit people for Christ and to teach people to go out and recruit others for Christ. Obviously, that is no longer the purpose of Harvard or any other Ivy League school, but it remains the purpose of the church of Jesus Christ. And it is the purpose of this church that we might recruit people for Christ, that they might come to love Christ. They may find the joy of Christ. They might find the life that only Christ can give, the purpose that only Christ can give, but they might find forgiveness of sin and they might find eternal life. That is the purpose of this church. And our purpose is also to train you that you might go forth into Denver and into the world and invite others to become citizens of the eternal kingdom of Jesus Christ.
In this church, we have a program called MMP, which is our Missionary Monitoring Program. Through this program, we are capable through four stages of taking laypeople and training and preparing them for missionary service and sending them forth. We have missionaries that we support as a church who were once laypeople in this church, and they sat in the pews, many of them for years, as some of you have. And they felt the call of the Holy Spirit to go forth as a missionary. Be sent, that they might take the gospel to other people. And we’ve trained them and we’ve sent them forth, and it’s just possible that there are men and women in the sanctuary this morning, some of you who feel so called and so led of the Holy Spirit. And we want to be faithful as a church to prepare you, to confirm your call, and to send you in the power of Christ.
We also want to invite you to support those missionaries who have been sent. We have a photo display of our missionaries out in the narthex, and we have newsletters out there that are available in the narthex. We also have prayer calendars that are available at the information booth every Sunday. You can pick these up, and you can become part of this missionary work as the gospel goes forth. And as people are recruited for Christ, you are part of this as you pray, and as you support those who have been sent, we also want you to know that you have been sent right here to Denver.
There are men and women in the city of Denver at your workplace or in your neighborhood, people who surround you, to whom God would send you, and we hope you take this call seriously. We want to prepare you. As a church, we want to prepare you to be able to share your love for Christ with others, and I know this is hard. I think it’s intimidating for many of you. I think the problem isn’t so much that you are afraid people will reject Christ, as you are afraid people reject you. And of course, none of us want to be obnoxious, and Christ doesn’t want us to be obnoxious either. But He wants us lovingly and gently as the Spirit leads us to share our faith in Jesus Christ with people who are lost and people are hurting. And I can tell you on the authority of the word of God, that you are called, and you are sent for this purpose into this world.
You know on television last night, there was, I noticed, there was a movie on. It was obviously a strange movie. It was called The Invasion of the Space Preachers
There’s another purpose for which we are sent forth, and this is that we might transform the world. As Christians, we are sent forth by Christ to recruit and also sent forth to transform the world, that the world might somehow be a better place. The Bible is clear that as Christians, we are called to heal the sick. We’re called to love the unlovable. We’re called to feed the poor, and we’re called to fight the demonic. We are called to fight the forces of darkness. We’re called to seek, to make the world in which we live a better place. And this is the charge that has been given to us as Christians.
Now, there was a man born in 1853 whose name was Bartholomew Masterson. He said his name was William Barkley Masterson. He was commonly known as Bat. Bat Masterson, made famous I suppose in the television series starring Gene Berry many years ago. Bat Masterson was a buffalo hunter and an Indian fighter, and at the age of 22, in the year 1875, he also became a gunfighter. Bat Masterson didn’t want to be a gunfighter. And, he found himself, however, in Stillwater, Oklahoma, having a fight with a man named Sergeant King over a young woman named Molly. One thing led to another, and pretty soon they drew on each other. Sergeant King was faster than Bat Masterson, outdrew him, and Masterson would’ve died. But Molly jumped in front and she took the bullet and she died. And the bullet passed right through Molly and hit Bat Masterson in the pelvis. And from that day fourth, he walked with a limp, and he walked with a cane. He managed to get a shot off and kill Sergeant King. And he became famous. His fame spread, and of course, as legends go it exceeded all reality. And pretty soon, Bat Masterson was viewed as a great gunfighter, and he was offered the job of sheriff of Ford County, which he accepted at the age of 24 in the year 1877.
His brother, Ed Masterson, was Marshall of Dodge City, which was in Ford County. One day Bat and Ed were walking down the street of Dodge and two drunks shot and killed Ed. Bat Masterson, in shock, pulled his guns and he killed those two drunken men, and his fame spread all the more because now Bat Masterson had killed three people in gunfights. And of course, he became a legend, but the truth was that those were the only three people Bat Masterson would ever kill in gunfights, the only three people. Of course, the legend grew that Bat Masterson killed more than 30 people in gunfights. It isn’t true. He only killed those three people, but he became so famous, his legend so great, that all he had to do was just walk down the street and whatever evil anyone was doing, they would stop. He just had to show up, and justice was served.
He cleaned up Dodge City in 1879. The James Brothers, Jesse and Frank fled Dodge rather than face Bat Masterson. In 1881, he cleaned up Tombstone, Arizona with Wyatt Earp. Bat Masterson never even had to draw his gun. He was an imposing figure with his sombrero and his rattlesnake band, and he had a silver studded belt and ivory handled pistols and a crimson Mexican sash. And he was pretty, kind of awesome, I guess, as he walked down the streets of a town, and no one dared face him. In 1882, he was hired in Trinidad, Colorado, right here in Colorado, to be the sheriff of Trinidad. And he was given the incredible salary of a thousand dollars a month just to wear the badge, and he cleaned up Trinidad and never drew his gun, just walked down the street.
Just the sheer fame of Bat Masterson did the job. He became so famous that he frequented the White House. As he began to be invited to Washington DC from 1901 to 1909, Theodore Roosevelt had him time and again at the White House. Bat Masterson died at his desk of a heart attack, 1921 in New York City, having served the last 14 years of his life as the sports editor of a New York newspaper. And here’s a man who according to historians probably did more than any other man to clean up the American West. He’s one of those so-called heroes that were used to clean up the old West.
Certainly, as Christians, were not called to be gunfighters. But I must say there’s a sense in which we’re all called to do what Bat Masterson did. There’s a sense in which all of us are called to clean up the world, and we’re called to clean up the West and the East and the North and the South. We’re called to make the world a better place. And our weapons are not guns, but our weapons include the Bible and prayer and the Gospel of Christ, the power of the Holy Spirit as we go forth and we seek to make the world a better place. I think a lot of Christians do not take this call seriously. I think evangelical Christians know that they’re called to recruit people for Christ Kingdom, but they hesitate to really go out and try to transform the world. Of course, we know we’re never going to make the world perfect. That won’t happen in this age of the world. Only Jesus Christ, when he comes again, will make the world perfect. But until he comes, we are called to seek, to make this world better. And as you have been told many times, and we all have been told by the word of God, we are called to be light in the darkness, and we are called to be salt in the earth.
Certainly, throughout history, there have been Christians who have abused this call and, in their quest to fight evil, have used improper methods and means. And perhaps Carrie Nation was one of those. If you took history in school, and you remember your history, you remember Carrie Nation. She was born in 1846 and born in Kentucky in Jared County. And when she was 21 years old in the year 1860, I believe it was in 1867, she married a man whose name was Dr. Charles Lloyd. And he was an alcoholic. He died of alcoholism just shortly after their marriage, and from that point on, Carrie hated alcohol. And in 1877, she married David Nation, who was a lawyer and a Christian minister. And in marrying him, her commitment to Christ deepened, and she began to be a very spiritual person. She began to have visions. She began to believe that her new name, Carrie A. Nation, was actually somehow preordained of God. And she was called to carry this nation somehow morally.
In 1890, Carrie Nation began to pray outside of saloons in Kansas and in some other states, and she did this throughout the states. By the year 1900, she’d begun to smash saloons, and it was in June 7th, 1900 that she, at Dobson’s Saloon in Kawa, Kansas, that she left a sea of broken glass and broken mirrors as she basically just destroyed that establishment. She stood six feet tall. She weighed 175 pounds. She could do a lot of damage, and if you look in encyclopedias, you’ll probably see her portrayed there. There’s a famous picture of her holding a Bible in one hand and a hatchet in the other hand, and she used that hatchet wherever she went to destroy bars and saloons. And it was the work of Carrie Nation, which led to prohibition in the year 1919. And I think today, Carrie Nation has become probably something of a joke. And people mock her methods and understandably so because she did much that was wrong. And certainly, her purposes were not entirely correct, and prohibition was not the solution to anything.
But you have to admit this about Carrie Nation, when she saw what she perceived to be wrong, at least she’s willing to do something about it. When she saw what she perceived to be evil, at least she was willing to fight against it. And God wants each and every one of us to know that whenever we see evil, whenever we see what truly we believe is wrong, we’re called to fight against it. Not with hatchets, with the love of Christ and with the power of Christ.
The Lord knows there’s so much in this world that is wrong, so much for us as Christians to fight against. I mean, we live in a nation where abortion is rampant, and we live in a nation where pornography is a multi-billion-dollar business. And we live in a nation where crime is constantly increasing and our sexual morals are eroding, and we’ve been called to go forth. We’ve been sent out in the name of Christ that we might seek to make what is wrong, right. There are so many hurting people in our world and so many people who are poor, and so many people who have pain. Some people are in poverty and they don’t even have enough to eat. And as Christians, we’re not simply called to go forth and recruit people for Christ. We are called to do that, but we’re also called to go forth in love and compassion and seek to make the world a better place.
I got a letter this last week from Ted Vail, who’s a member of our church and one of our missionaries. And Ted is beginning a new service with Food for the Hungry, which is an international, Christian relief and development agency that serves Christ in 20 different countries. And Ted will be going to Kenya, to Nairobi, where he’ll be working with the poorest of the poor. He’s doing this in his love for Christ and with the compassion of Christ. And we need to pray for Ted, and we need to support Ted.
Now, there’s a lot of poverty right here in Denver and there’s a lot of people hurting and in pain and suffering right here in Denver. And each of us are called as Christians, we are sent as Christians, to help. You can help through the Manna Food Bank and our Manna Ministries, and we have a yoked relationship with New Life in Christ in the inner city. We have various programs to help people who are hurting, and each and every one of us as Christians are called to this ministry.
You know, I’m reminded of the words of our Lord Jesus Christ. And I’ve got to say, honestly, as I look at scripture, I don’t think there’s any passage of scripture more convicting. I don’t think there’s any passage of scripture scarier than Matthew 25, where our Lord Jesus Christ tells us he’s going to come again. He says, “When I come, I’m going to sit on my glorious throne and before me are going to be gathered, all the nations, I’m going to separate them one from the other as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. I’m going to place the sheep on my right hand and the goats on my left. And I’m going to say to those on my right hand, ‘Come oh blessed of my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from before the foundation of the world, for I was hungry and you gave me to eat and I was thirsty and you gave me to drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me. I was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and imprison, and you visited me’.”
And they’ll say, “When, Lord, when were you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or imprison and we did these things for you?” He’ll say, “In as much as you have done it, unto the least of these, my brethren, you’ve done it unto me.” And he’ll say to those on his left hand, “Depart from me you workers of iniquity into the lake of fire prepared for the devil and his angels, for I was hungry, and you gave me not to eat. I was thirsty, and you gave me not to drink. I was a stranger, and you did not welcome me. I was naked. You did not clothe me. I was sick and imprisoned, and you did not visit me”.
Those are hard words. They really are hard words. The call of Christ is clear now, warning is clear. As Christians we’re sent forth. He says, “You’ve not chosen me. I’ve chosen you and appointed you to go and bear fruit.” And as he sends us forth. He sends us to recruit people for his kingdom, that they might have eternal life, and he sends us to fight the darkness. He sends us to make the world a better place. To feed the hungry, to heal and minister to the sick, to fight what is evil or demonic. As a church, we want to be faithful, want to exalt Christ, bring people to Christ, bond them, build them up in Christ. We want to send you out in Christ. We trust and we pray that our desire is your desire, and you want to exalt Christ. You want to serve Christ in this community and in this world.
Let’s close with the word of prayer. Lord Jesus, we come to you, Lord, most of us believing in you, some of us having believed in you for many years with great joy. Lord, we asked you to come into our heart. We remember our joy, the joy we felt when we knew that you had forgiven our sin, given us eternal life, and received us into your heavenly family. Lord, as we grow in you, we begin to understand that we’ve been saved for a purpose. You’ve called us into ministry. You want us to serve your kingdom. You want all of us to be, in some sense, an evangelist, that we might share your love with people who are dying. And Lord, that we might go into this world and fight what is wrong by your grace and by the power of your Spirit, that we might stand against what is evil, not acquiesce. And Lord, that in love and compassion we might reach out to people who are hurting and less fortunate, that with all of our strength and with all of your strength in us, we might seek to make this world a better place. Lord, help us as a church to be faithful to this call. We pray these things, Lord Jesus, in your great and matchless name, amen.