Multiplying Workers

Fulfilling the Great Commission: Multiplying Workers

Welcome! Today is our final message in this series entitled “Fulfilling the Great Commission.” Today’s message is entitled “Multiplying Workers.” As I have mentioned throughout this series, this series is based in part on the book “What Jesus Started” by Steve Addison.

I want to start today with a review of where we’ve been, and to also specifically ask the question, “Is this really what Jesus started?”

Our first message was entitled “Seeing the End”.  We started with the following passage from Mark 9:

Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When He saw the crowds, He had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then He said to His disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into His harvest field.” – Matt. 9:35-38

Jesus really saw the end. He was filled with compassion. He saw the crowds, people who didn’t know Him and didn’t know His fledgling disciples, not as just random people to ignore, but as lost sheep. He reoriented the eyes of His disciples to likewise see these people with compassion, as those who are lost, as those who need help to learn who the Good Shepherd is so that they too can follow Him. He pointed out how huge the task was, far bigger than any person or group could accomplish on their own, and so He encouraged them to pray for more workers.

How do we get more workers? Through multiplication. As people learn about Christ from other Christ followers, some of them will repent from their past approach of doing what was best in their own eyes and now begin to follow Jesus, making Him the Lord of their lives. These Christ followers make the next generation of workers who go out into God’s harvest field. As more people become Christ followers as a result of their work, they too become workers who go out into His harvest field. This is the method by which this prayer is answered.

Does God expect every new believer to become a full-time missionary? No, not in the sense of choosing a life of evangelism to be what you do in place of school, or in place of some other form of employment. But does God expect every new believer to care deeply about seeing God’s message of the gospel go out into the world, to reach people in every crowd? I believe so, yes. Does He expect every believer to pray for more workers in the harvest field? I believe so, yes. Does He expect every believer to be a faithful worker in the area and to the people that God shows them to work, whether that is particular members of their immediate family, certain ones who call themselves their friends, certain coworkers who reveal themselves to be receptive to discussions about God and faith, or even to strangers around them? I believe so, yes.

Does every person have the gift of evangelism? No. But everyone should be asking God to lead them, to show them who they should talk to, befriend, and among believers, disciple, so that more and more workers are raised up to go out into His harvest field.

In our second message, we talked about connecting with people. We looked at examples of the Samaritan woman at the well and the demon-possessed man of the Gerasenes. In both cases, Jesus chose outcasts, people who, whether through their own sin or through other causes of social stigma, would be the last people you might expect to become people who shared about Jesus. But in both cases, this is exactly what Jesus sent them to do. Precisely because of their pasts, their messages were powerful and compelling. Jesus also found people with good reputations and brought them to faith as well.

One of my favorite examples of Jesus connecting with people is the story of Zacchaeus. 

Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see Him, since Jesus was coming that way. When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.” So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly. – Luke 19:1-6

Was Zacchaeus someone with good reputation or bad? I think it depends on who you ask. He was someone who had become rich through a method that many considered questionable at best – and it was questionable, as the profession encouraged dishonesty and over-charging. Zacchaeus also had a lack of respect due to his short stature, which I would assume was not just slightly short, but really short. And his climbing a tree was highly unbecoming and inappropriate for a person with any kind of honor. What would be the expected response of Jesus seeing Zacchaeus up in that tree? Laughter! Put downs. Zacchaeus was playing the fool.

But Jesus did none of these things – quite the opposite. He announced that He would be honored to spend time with Zacchaeus at his home. He declared this publicly so all could hear. He bestowed great honor on someone who, due to both his profession and his behavior, was completely undeserving of such honor.  What a wonderful example of Jesus connecting with people.

But the biggest example of how connecting with people was “what Jesus started” are the examples of the disciples themselves. He called each one of them out from what they were doing, people with diverse backgrounds, people who normally would spend no time with one another as a group of 12. And He truly connected with them. He spent time with them, teaching them about God, and showing them what it means to obey the teachings of God. What He shared and demonstrated was caught as much as it was taught.

Our third message focused on sharing the gospel. We mentioned two ways this is done: sharing your story and sharing God’s story. Sharing your story involves explaining how you personally have come to become a follower of Christ. Jesus started this too – not in the sense that He had been transformed by Himself, of course – but in that He told some of those He had impacted to tell others what they had seen and experienced. And after the resurrection, personal testimony of what the disciples had seen – Jesus die and rise from the dead – was the hallmark of their message.

I think of the opening to I John:

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. – I John 1:1-3

What can you proclaim? How has a relationship with Jesus changed your life? This can be a paralyzing question to answer. We don’t know where to start, and we don’t want to trivialize something that we know is deep but we cannot put into words. I want to give an example, a testimony from Barry Couts. I like this testimony because I think, if you are someone who has grown up as a believer, it has elements you can identify with and use. I have shortened this testimony for the sake of time and keep it something that is simple and could be shared at a moment’s notice. Yes, it is word-crafted better than you could do on the fly – but just focus on the ideas that are being conveyed. I’m not asking you to copy this or sound like this, but just to think about the message.

My mother was widowed when she was three months pregnant with me. So I never knew my father. Never met him. But I’ve always had this sense that God was looking out for me; that a higher being, way beyond myself, was always looking out for me. And I think it kind of came because of the fact that my mom believed in God; she trusted in Him. I felt as if God was very close to us at home, and all my life.

But then as I started to grow and, specifically when I hit the seventh grade, I understood that I was missing something. I knew that if I kept doing what I was doing, I was going to be like one of my uncles who had been in prison and had a rough road. Others also told me: “If you keep doing what you’re doing, you’re going to end up like him.” This created a need in me because I didn’t want to do that; I didn’t want to be a menace in society.

Around the same time, I attended a […] church […] and a preacher there was preaching to young people. He was saying that all our righteousness is as filthy rags unto the Lord, unless we ask Him for forgiveness and come to a personal relationship with Him. “It’s just filthy rags, what we’re doing on our own. We need to give our hearts to Jesus!” That kind of struck a chord in me and I felt that was what I needed for a deeper life. So I did that. I asked Jesus to forgive me of my sins, which were many, and I asked Him to come in and be Lord in my life.

I didn’t know what that meant exactly. But, little by little, I started to understand that there were things I was doing that weren’t according to God’s Word and weren’t according to His blessing. That’s what Jesus did for me when I realized I needed a deeper walk with Him. He started to speak to me about things in my life that I could align to His Word, and He helped me to do that! I couldn’t do that myself. There were things that were just beyond me.

He started to reveal to me my own selfishness – times when I was just thinking about myself, or using my time selfishly. He revealed those truths to me. Then, because He revealed them to me, I could see that I didn’t want to be like that; I wanted to change!

To me, that’s how Jesus is able to [personally] help me […]. In my own eyes, something can seem right, but Jesus is able to peel back the cover so I can see the truth.

Maybe I was motivated by jealousy or envy, even though I didn’t know it at the time. He peels it back and then I start to realize that because others weren’t thankful for what I did for them or didn’t say anything about my “good works,” I feel insignificant, or feel like what I did wasn’t good. That just means that I didn’t do it for His sake.

He can reveal my motives to me through His Word and Spirit, so I can change from doing things for myself and start doing things for Him and for […] others. […] That’s what Jesus is able to do. Not just to forgive me my sins, but give me a new life. […]

If someone wants to be a doctor, then they have to go into the training of a doctor. You can’t want to be a doctor and go to clown school and think that one day you’ll be a doctor. If you want to be a doctor you have to be in that training for a doctor, and that’s really what it’s like. It’s not that He’s showing me what I need to do to make it hard for me. It’s just the calling that He has for me, that He wants me to be like Him! All the virtues – goodness, mercy, love, longsuffering, patience, goodness, kindness. If I submit myself to the truth (God’s Word) and to His chastening, then little by little, I’ll experience that I am being changed into what He wants me to be and that makes me happy. […]

And when I partake of a life with Jesus and start to experience that I’m not tempted in the same way that I used to be tempted, then that’s proof that I’m learning of Him. I’m learning to go the way that Jesus went. In life, to be able to love from my heart and to be who I am in God, so that I’m not just doing what someone else expects of me or just being what I think is good. I’m able to get a relationship with Jesus where He can tell me, He can speak to me, and I can see where to lay my life down. And I can become [more and more] like Him. […]

Sharing God’s story is to tell of who Christ is and what He has done for all of us. There are many ways to do this, from the Four Spiritual Laws to the bridge diagram to the Three Circles, and your phone can help you with any of these – they can all be effective, and it is really a matter of personal preference. I mentioned a particularly simple method using five verses:

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. – John 3:16

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. – Romans 3:23

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 6:23

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. – Romans 5:8

If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. – Romans 10:9

Whatever method you use, when reading a Bible verse, I encourage you to let the person you are sharing with read the verse himself or herself, and then ask them what they think it means.

Our fourth message focused on training disciples. We talked about how this, at its essence, involves helping people to learn how to become obedient to apply God’s Word to our lives. This begins with repenting and believing the good news that Christ died for our sins and rose again to prove that His sacrifice on our behalf was accepted by God. It also involves becoming baptized, regularly partaking of communion in remembrance of Jesus, learning to love God and one another, praying, giving, and ourselves becoming a part of the process of passing on our faith and obedience to the next “generation” of believers – being disciples that make disciples.

In this message we also went through the entire book of Titus. One of the big takeaways was the emphasis placed on growing in character. This is what the various groups were told to teach to those they were responsible for. Doctrine is also to be taught, but the clear emphasis was on the application of doctrine in the area of character, topics such as being temperate, worthy of respect, faith-filled, persevering, reverent, non-slandering, non-addicted, teachers of good, pure, not idle, pleasing, not talking back, not stealing, avoiding worldly passions, upright, subject to those over you, loving, avoiding ungodliness, and being self-controlled.

Did Jesus start this? Absolutely. Not only did He instruct His followers to baptize and partake of the bread and cup, He taught extensively on love, prayer, giving, and He is the one who gave the Great Commission to His followers. He also emphasized character throughout His teachings, both in formal sessions such as the Sermon on the Mount but also frequently in response to various events that happened as He and the disciples traveled together. Beyond this, Jesus taught character by His very life. He lived it. Perhaps no example is more poignant than that of Jesus at the cross:

When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified Him there, along with the criminals—one on His right, the other on His left. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” – Luke 23:33-34a

This is astounding. He is praying for those who are killing Him, mocking Him, casting lots for His clothes, saying things like, “If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself!” Even one of the criminals who hung there beside Him hurled insults at Him. At the very end, Jesus said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” This so moved a centurion who witnessed this that he remarked, “Surely this was a righteous man.”

Growing in character is an essential fruit of being a follower of Jesus. It is this growth in character that adds powerful testimony to what we say with our words. Imagine promoting a diet without losing any weight. Telling of Jesus when we don’t submit to Him so that He can transform us is similar.

It seems like recently even the secular world is becoming more enamored of old-fashioned character in some circles. In the area of psychology, for example, there is a bit of a crisis over the realization that more and more people are being identified on a spectrum of personality disorders that include narcissism and sociopathy. This involves people who don’t feel like other people do – they don’t have a small voice of conscience that tells them when they are doing something wrong. People in the field of psychology have previously viewed psychiatric disorders as things that cause the people having the disorders pain or suffering of some kind. The problem with narcissism and sociopathy is that these people often do quite well in life! From a strict interpretation of psychiatric disorders, this means that there is nothing wrong with them! Many psychiatrists are uncomfortable with this, but they also don’t want to resort to what they see as giving preference to one definition of right and wrong verse another. Thus they are stuck. In any case, there is apparently a growing voice in psychology promoting treatment based on character values, but, again, some find this controversial.  

The final topic we looked at in this series was gathering communities. We looked at Acts 2:

Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. – Acts 2:43-47

Here in the West we have managed to somehow separate following Jesus from living and serving one another in Christian community; such an idea would have been unthinkable to the early church. They lived life together, rejoiced together, wept together – they were truly family to one another together. At this point in Jerusalem, they had a combination of small group and large group meetings; in other areas and at other times, particularly where and when there was persecution, only the small group meetings in believers’ homes would take place.

Did Jesus start this? Yes. His disciples traveled with Him, ate with Him, rejoiced with Him, grieved with Him – they were a family together. And they participated in the sharing of the good news of the kingdom with Him. At the Last Supper, He taught them the importance of being servants to one another by washing their feet.

Ironically, the conveniences of the modern world have made being in Christian community more difficult than ever. We live farther apart from one another. We are busier. There are far more distractions available. We must make special effort to maintain and grow our bonds together in Christ. Being together in our modern society is a sacrifice. But it is one that Christ would have us make so that we could be known by our love for one another, as Jesus prayed for us shortly before His crucifixion.

These five practices, seeing the end, connecting with people, sharing the gospel, training disciples, and gathering communities, naturally lead to multiplying workers. But I feel like they are a rarity in the western world today. It is so easy to fall back to just showing up to church on Sunday and keeping to oneself during the week.

In places and among communities of faith where this vision is passed on, absolutely amazing multiplication can take place. In 2009, after spending ten years spreading the gospel among Tibetan Buddhists in Northern India and Nepal, Jeff Sundell moved back to the United States with his family (including his parents) and they all settled in an old mill town in North Carolina. Like many such towns, there was a sense of stagnation there, a sense of hopelessness. Unemployment was high, drug and alcohol abuse were rampant, and the people who lived there were not particularly open to outsiders.  He found a few established believers in the region, men and women, who were open to his ideas, and he trained them in the basic things we have talked about through this series.

Their initial approach was to “prayer-walk” throughout three neighborhoods, the three with the toughest reputations of all, and to talk to those they might come across. They met a man named Randy sitting on his front porch drinking at 10 am. Randy’s porch turned out to be the place for locals to go if they wanted to party. They shared with Randy a bit of why they were there and why they loved Jesus, and they offered to come back to share some stories about Jesus from the Bible. Randy accepted their offer.

Some members of the team also met Ruth, who asked them to pray for her as she had severe pain in her chest. They also met Annie, who asked for prayer that God would provide a stove for her and her family. A few days later, a friend of the Sundells heard about the need and donated a stove. The next week, after installing the stove, Jeff’s parents were at Annie’s house enjoying cookies she had baked. Ruth banged on the door and came in, telling them that her doctor had told her that the pain in her chest was breast cancer. They prayed for her, mourned with her.

On subsequent visits they continued to meet and pray with Ruth and Annie. They also met with Randy and his drinking buddies and started to go through short passages from the gospel asking simple questions like “What does this say about God? What does this say about people? Is there a command to obey? An example to follow?” They read the story about the four friends who lowered the paralyzed person through a hole in the roof. Thinking about being an example to follow led them to realize that they could and should help Ruth. She had missed all her medical appointments since learning about her cancer through a combination of fear and her own drinking problem. So the night before her next appointment, Randy and his buddies stayed up all night to watch over Ruth and make sure she didn’t get drunk. The next morning, she made it to her appointment on time.

The Bible studies continued to take place on Randy’s porch. One day Jeff’s dad got a call from Randy saying, “I believe! I believe!” Ruth also gave her life to Christ. Fast forward a few months: Randy’s porch became known as the place that “church” happens. The place where people partied and got drunk now had a rule that no one could drink on that porch. People who still wanted to drink and also hear the Bible studies would bring benches as close to the porch as possible and drink from there. In a short amount of time, more than 20 people were baptized as new believers in Christ, and the “churches” went from one to three. After two years, over 350 people were gathering in 73 groups. Most attenders were new believers in Christ. Some of the groups were “fourth generation” groups – groups led by people who got saved in “third generation” groups. And so on.

To even more fully grasp the power of multiplying workers, let me tell you the story of Ying Kai and his wife Grace. He had been planting traditional churches once a year in Hong Kong, resulting in linear growth. But a Hong Kong businessman challenged him to go to a restricted access, unreached area in Asia. The businessman showed them around the region. The rapidly growing urban center in this region had 20 million people and was growing every day. Ying saw that his linear growth model was completely inadequate for this, and he turned to prayer and the Scriptures and came up with a plan quite similar to what we have discussed in this series. He called his process Training for Trainers (T4T).

He began by training a group of 30 trainers. After six months, there were 4000 newly baptized believers in 327 small groups. After twelve months, the numbers had grown to 12000 believers and 908 groups. In the most recent survey, more than 1.7 million people have come to faith out of Kai’s ministry, meeting in more than 140,000 groups.

Now, I share this to show you what God can do. Will God do something like this with us? It would frankly shock me if He did. But my point is that He can.

Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.” Jesus answered: “Don’t you know Me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in Me? The words I say to you I do not speak on My own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in Me, who is doing His work. Believe Me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves. Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in Me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.  – John 14:8-12

Let me say that I do not believe in formulas. But I do believe in Biblical principles. And most of all I believe in the power of God. If we seek Him, and follow Him, and remain faithful to Him, there is no reason that we cannot see multiplicative growth. The whole reason I have done this series is that I believe God wants us to try. The resulting growth or lack of it is up to Him. But I believe that God has blessed us so that we can try to connect the multitudes of lost sheep, even here in the Upstate, even in 2019, with their Shepherd.

Trying does have a cost. It can cost us time, money, and perhaps much more. But throughout the New Testament and even throughout the persecuted church today we find examples of people who faced and who face far, far worse than we do, and they joyfully chose Christ above all. I want to close with a passage from 2 Timothy. I pray that it will convict you as it convicts me.

You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others. Join with me in suffering, like a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer. – 2 Tim. 2:1-4

Nothing would please our Commanding Officer more than to have His heart towards the lost, to see the end, to connect with people for the sake of Christ, to share the gospel, to be involved in training disciples, to be a part of developing loving communities of believers, and to be multiplying laborers for the gospel. Let us seek the Lord together and individually to see how He would have us serve.