A Call to the Nations

Speaker 1 (00:02):

Hi, I'm Brian Mosley, our team here at right now. Media loves serving the church and we believe the mission of the church matters and that discipleship matters, and whether you're watching this message alone or with your leadership team, we hope that it's an encouragement to you this session with David Platt Challenges to deepen our focus on getting the gospel to people who have never heard it.

Speaker 2 (00:27):

If you have a Bible and I hope you or somebody around you does that you can look on with, let me invite you to open with me to Matthew chapter 28. If you don't have this passage memorized, hopefully you have this passage memorized, Matthew 28 and the next few minutes, which are the last few minutes of this conference, I want to lift your eyes to people in places that are far from here. And I'll just say from the very beginning, this is going to be challenging to do on a couple of different levels. One, just personally in our lives and our families, among those who are listening right now, I can only imagine all the different things that we're walking through. I know all the things I'm walking through and I'm pretty confident that if we were just to survey this room, that the number of people who are walking through some really heavy things right now in your life or your family heavy to the point of making it hard to wake up in the morning sometimes, that there'd be a lot of people who would say, that's where I'm at.

Speaker 2 (01:41):

And without going into details, I would just share with you that's where I'm at. So there's things we're walking through in our lives and our families and then in our churches and the communities that we're living in, there's all kinds of challenges and needs people we're walking alongside who are walking through those sorts of things, heavy, heartbreaking things. And so I just want us to put that out on the table from the beginning and acknowledge that it's going to be hard to lift your eyes from all that for a few minutes. But I don't want to pretend like those things are unimportant in any way, but I do want to say, praise God that we have a gospel that's sufficient for all of us in those things that we're walking through. Praise God that we have a gospel that meets us in the hard and the heavy and the heartbreaking and has power to meet others in the heart and the heavy and the outbreaking and the heartbreaking, and God is faithful and good and will walk with us through these things. What I want to do over the next few minutes, just for a few minutes, is to invite you to lift your eyes and look to people and places in the world where they've never even heard that gospel.

Speaker 2 (03:13):

It's not that they've heard it and rejected it, no one has ever even told them that the God who created this world loves them so much that he came to them himself to pay the price for all of their sin and to redeem the brokenness of this world and to give them hope that goes way beyond this world. To give them hope in the middle of the heartache that this will not be the end of the story. That cancer and sorrow and sickness and death will not be the end of the story. That Jesus who loves them has written the end of the story and it's good for all who trust in him. So I want you to fix your eyes on people who've never ever heard that and not only have they not heard it, but they don't at this moment have access to that good news.

Speaker 2 (04:19):

So we call them unreached, and just to be clear, unreached is not the same as lost people apart from faith in Jesus are just as lost in Dallas Fort Worth as they are in Somalia or Saudi Arabia just as lost. The difference is there's a few churches in Dallas Fort Worth and Christians in Dallas Fort Worth, so people who live in Dallas Fort Worth have access to the gospel, and that's true for I'm pretty sure most everybody, if not everybody listening right now and you're a part of a church, you're a follower of Jesus surrounded by other followers of Jesus where you live. That's why we don't say, well, why do we talk about unreached people around the world? I mean, there's unreached people in my office. There's unreached people in my neighborhood. It's not true. Those people are not unreached. You say, how do you know?

Speaker 2 (05:18):

Because they're in your office, they're in your neighborhood, they have access to the gospel. You're it. When we talk about unreached people, we talk about people who are born live and die and they never even hear the good news of God's love in Jesus. They don't have a Christian to tell them that they don't have a church around them to tell them that they don't have access to right now media. They don't have access to the gospel. You say how many people like that in the world and as best as we can tell, the number of people who are unreached in the world right now is approximately 3.2 billion men, women and children. I'll show you a map up here on the screen that will give you a picture of them.

Speaker 2 (06:20):

There's three colors on this map. I think we'll have it up there. There we go. Three colors on this map. The green represents areas that are reached with the gospel in the world. Obviously it doesn't mean that every one in the green areas or followers of Jesus we know that, but it means there's access to the gospel in those places. The yellow areas are less reached by the gospel, which usually means it's going one of two directions. Either there used to be more gospel presence in that place and that's decreased. You see different parts of Europe where that's the case or it's going the other way. The gospel is beginning to spread there, but it's still kind of a weak fledgling church in that place. So there's less access, but there is access. And then you have the red areas of the world that represent the parts of the world that have the least access to the gospel, and it's these red areas where those 3.2 billion men, women, and children live.

Speaker 2 (07:29):

I don't think we as the church least in our culture realize the weight of what this means. And we're talking about 3 billion people being born, living, dying, without ever even hearing the gospel. And we know from God's word that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. If they don't hear the word of Christ, they can't believe in Christ. If they don't believe in Christ, they can't be saved. We're talking about 3 billion people who are born live and die and head into a christless eternity forever, and nobody ever even tells them about how they could have everlasting life in heaven.

Speaker 2 (08:25):

If that's true, then surely we should be talking about this a lot. If that's true, surely this should be infusing our prayer lives. This should be a prevailing part of our church culture. Like how do we get the gospel to billions of people who haven't even heard it yet? But I don't think that's true. I think we are practically ignoring them. I would say that anecdotally, I think it'd be safe to say that most Christians, maybe even most of us in this room, haven't prayed for unreached people groups this week praying for them. I am not talking about them. I don't give to them. Very few of us would even think about going to them, and that's more than just anecdotal. So what does Jesus say where your treasure is? They're your heart will be also. So what does the data show about our hearts? Our money is a reflection of our hearts. So are our hearts focused on these 3 billion people? Well, we as followers of Jesus spend most of our money on ourselves.

Speaker 2 (09:51):

We give some of our money to churches or ministries and a very small percentage. Well, most of that money that we give to churches or ministries goes to making church ministry more comfortable for us and then a very small percentage we give to a bucket we call missions usually and a budget missions. But did you know that even out of now, we're dealing with a very small percentage, even out of the small percentage that we give to missions, you do the research, the data shows out of that small missions percentage, approximately 99% of our missions giving actually goes, can we put the map back on? The screen actually goes to green places in the world, Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, parts of Europe, even over here, parts of Asia. And I want to be clear, I'm not saying by any means that it's wrong to come alongside our brothers and sisters in Christ and other parts of the world, but let's open our eyes. Church, in the name of missions, we are ignoring the people who most need to hear the gospel. We're convinced that we're giving to missions when we're actually not giving to the people most in need of the gospel.

Speaker 2 (11:22):

When I look at all of this, I want to propose you to you today that this is not a missions problem. This is a discipleship problem. I want to propose to you today that there are 3 billion unreached people in the world today because we are not following Jesus. Lemme show you this straight from the mouth of Jesus and in the story of the church. So first, from the math of Jesus, Matthew 28 18 through 20, you know this passage, the great commissions, you just came and said to them, all authority in heaven on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you and behold, I'm with you always to the end of the age, go therefore and make disciples of all the nations.

Speaker 2 (12:23):

The word there, ethnic from which we get ethnic groups, it's not talking about nations in terms of geopolitical entities like we might think of countries today. It's talking about tribes, peoples languages, ethnic groups. Some say there's over 11,000 distinct ethnic groups in the world today. Some say over 16,000. Regardless, Jesus said, I want disciples to be made in all the ethnic groups of the world, among the Berber of Morocco and the Ani of Nigeria and the pashtoon of Afghanistan and keep going on at least 11,000 others. Mark 1615, which I realize there's debate about this is inclusion in the Book of Mark, but these words certainly echo Matthew 28. He said to them, go into the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Luke 24 45, he opened their minds to understand the scriptures and said to them, thus it is written, the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead and repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all the nations.

Speaker 2 (13:34):

This is part of the essence of the gospel according to Jesus in Luke 24, this good news is for all the nation and must be proclaimed to all the nations, which is why Luke picks this up in Acts chapter one with Jesus saying to his disciples, you'll receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you will be my witnesses testifying to the gospel and Jerusalem, Judean, Samaria and to the end of the earth. Now we know this is where the story of the church starts. In the book of Acts. The gospel spreads in Jerusalem, right for the first seven chapters at the end of which Stephen is stoned, which then leads to what a scattering of the church in Acts chapter eight verse one, into where Judea and Samaria, they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, just like Acts one, eight had said, except the apostles.

Speaker 2 (14:32):

So the church, not the leaders, the church broadly scattered and everywhere they were scattered, they went about preaching the word. The word is spreading into Judea and Samaria, more places where the gospel had not gone. That leads to Acts chapter 11 verse 19. Those who were scattered because of the persecution that a rose over Stephen traveled as far as Venetia and Cyprus and Antioch speaking the word to no one except Jews, but there were some of them men of Cyprus and Cyrene who on coming to Antioch spoke to the Hellness also preaching the Lord Jesus and the hand of the Lord was with them and a great number who believed turned to the Lord. You see it, the word is spreading. The gospel was spreading not just to the Jewish people now, but to the Greeks. To the Hellen. Us. Different groups of people are turning to the Lord as they hear the gospel preach to them.

Speaker 2 (15:21):

And then what happens? Just a couple of chapters later here at Antioch, acts chapter 13 verse one. There were in the church in Antioch, prophets and teachers, Barnabas Simeon, who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manan, a lifelong friend of hair of the Tetra and Saul, while they were worshiping the Lord in fasting, the Holy Spirit said, set apart from me, Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I've called them. Then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them, send them off being sent out by the Holy Spirit. They went down to cia. From there they sailed to Cyprus. When they arrived at Salus, they proclaimed the word of God and what happens as a result of this? So we'll just start to fast forward here. Here's a little map that'll show you. This is Antioch over here. This is Red Arrow Paul and Barnabas going out, sent out from the church in Antioch.

Speaker 2 (16:04):

They go down to Cypress here, they proclaim the gospel, they make disciples gather 'em together in a church and then they keep moving on to more places that need the gospel. They make their way up to Pisidian, Antioch, econ, Lira, Derby, and all these places. They're doing the same thing, spreading the gospel, making disciples, gather 'em together in the churches and then the blue heirs of them coming back and encouraging those churches. They come back to the church in Antioch and encourage them on what had just happened. Then we have the Jerusalem Council in Acts chapter 15. Then Acts chapter 16, Paul sets out this time not with Barnabas, little conflict in the church. So it was going on then. It's going on today. But now we've got two mission teams going out and Paul and Silas, they pick up Timothy along the way. They start to head to the same places they've been before.

Speaker 2 (16:50):

They're encouraging the churches. You remember Acts 16, six through 10, Paul starts to go one direction. The spirit stops him. He starts to go another direction. The spirit stops him. He has a vision one night a man from Macedonia which is up here saying, come over here and help us. And so we conclude we're going to new places where the gospel hasn't gone yet. And so they go up here in Troja and all these places we recognize from our Bibles, Philippi, Thessalonica down into Athens and Corinth over in Ephesus, they make their way down to Jerusalem and all these places, what are they doing? They're proclaiming the gospel, making disciples gather 'em together in the churches they make their way back to Antioch, which sets the stage for a third journey. Paul again sets out, but you'll notice on this journey, he doesn't cover any new territory and he gets all the way up here to Corinth where he sits down to write a letter. Anybody know what letter he writes there in Corinth?

Speaker 2 (17:46):

Not Corinthians, that's when he wrote. He didn't write it from there. He was talking to him when he was there. So he wrote Romans at this point, why Romans? Why this awesome book that gives us this majestic picture of the gospel? It's more than just about giving us a majestic picture of the gospel. Look at the very end of Romans. He tells us why he writes it and why does he write it right here? Look at it. Romans chapter 15 verse 19, from Jerusalem and all the way around to the lyric, and I fulfilled the ministry of the gospel of Christ. That's what he's talking about. He's talking about all this ministry he's done in all these places, and thus I make it my ambition to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named, lest I build on someone else's foundation. But as it's written, those who have never been told of him will see those who've never heard will understand. I've been going to all these places where they hadn't heard of Jesus and then he says, this is the reason why I've so often been hindered from coming to you in Rome. But now since I no longer have any room for work in these regions, and since I've longed for many years to come to you, I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain and to be helped on my journey, thereby you. That is an outlandish statement.

Speaker 2 (18:57):

I no longer have any room for work in these regions. Are you serious? No more gospel work needed here. He's writing from Corinth for crying out loud. If you've read those letters, place was messed up. There's a ton of work to be done in Corinth. There's a ton of people without Christ in Corinth. There's a ton of people without Christ in this whole region. What do you mean there's no more work for you to do in those regions? Well, what's he saying? He's saying in all these places, there's disciples. Now there's churches there. The gospels come to these places. I'm writing to you because, so why is he writing from Corinth right here? He's on his way to Jerusalem to take an offering there. He says, once I take that offering, I'm going to come to you in Rome. Well, lemme show you the map.

Speaker 2 (19:40):

Here's Corinth. He's writing this. He's on his way to Jerusalem and he is writing a letter to Rome. Why? Because he says, once I go to Jerusalem, I'm coming to you because I want to work with you to help get the gospel. Where to Spain. Why? Because there aren't any Christians in Spain. There aren't any churches in Spain. We got to keep pressing on to get the gospel where it hasn't gone. The church does not have the option of just focusing on where the gospel has gone. Why? Because the command of Jesus was clear. Make disciples not just generally among as many people as possible, make disciples specifically among all the nations and there's nations, there's people groups that have places that have not been reached by the gospel. We got to keep pressing onto them. Maybe as an illustration. It's not perfect, it breaks down, but just I do think it's helpful picture.

Speaker 2 (20:36):

Well, a hurricane and tornado very different. A hurricane hits a large swath of land, just devastates everything in its path and a large swath of land, a tornado is much more selective, right? A tornado hit one house and not the house next to it or one neighborhood and not the next neighborhood next to it. So imagine a tornado comes through an area and ravages this community here and then keeps going ravages another community right here, and then keeps going a little farther and ravages another community over here. And you are head of rescue operations on the ground. You come to the first community and you realize there are more people in need of rescue and just this community than you and your team can help. You're not going to be able to save everybody there and there's these other two communities, but you also know if you send some people to that community that's going to take time, it's going to be hard for them to get there and that's time they could be saving people right here.

Speaker 2 (21:37):

And then you know this other community, not only is it farther away, but imagine you hear that the people in this community will actually oppose you if you try to come bring help even to the point of they'll try to kill you if you try to come bring rescue there. Well, if that's the case, common sense says, what do you do? You just focus right here. I do as much as you can here. The only reason you would split up your forces to go to either one of those places is if your commanding officer said, I want people rescued from every single community. He says that you say, okay, some of us will stay here. Who's going there and who's signing up to go here? Because we've been given a command not just to rescue a lot of people, we've been given a command to proclaim rescue in every single community. This is the command we were given. It wasn't just make as many disciples as possible in DFW or wherever you live, Washington DC Yeah, there's tons of disciples we made. We're talking about 3 billion people who've never even heard the gospel. And Jesus hasn't given us the option of just focusing right here.

Speaker 2 (22:54):

That's what I mean. Are we following Jesus? Because this is the story of the church. They kept pressing on to places where the gospel had not gone. This is actually where the story of the church in the New Testament basically ends. Paul makes his way to Rome, but not the way he'd planned is in chains as far as we know, never made it to Spain. And that's where the story of the New Testament ends until we read John on an island exiled. And what does he write? Well, it gives us this vision. Revelation seven, I looked and behold a grade multitude that no one can number from every nation, from all the tribes and all the peoples and all the languages standing before the throne and before the lambs clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands, crying out with a loud voice. Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the lamb. This is where it's all headed. This is the Holy Spirit inspiring John to say to the church, don't stop. Keep pressing on until every nation and all the tribes and all the peoples and all the languages are singing the song of salvation.

Speaker 2 (24:11):

So why are we not doing this? Why have we become content in our church culture with 3 billion people in the world having little to no knowledge of the gospel? We're missing what it means to follow Jesus. It's happening on our watch. Do we realize there are more unreached people today in the world than ever before in history? Think about it. World population is increasing, including population among the red. And if we're not getting the gospel to them, that means there's more people today on our watch church that are being born, living and dying and going to an eternal hell without ever even hearing about heaven.

Speaker 2 (25:10):

What will it take for the concept of unreached people to become totally intolerable to us? What's it going to take to lead us to change the way we understand what it means to follow Jesus? I'm not saying I hope it's just obvious, but I just want to make it clear. I'm not saying that if we're not running after the nations, if you're not running after the nations, you're not saved. I praise God. Our salvation is not based on what we do, based on his grace and his love for us. But I am saying the Bible's saying, surely those who have experienced this salvation are not going to turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to 3 billion people who haven't even heard it. Surely God has not sidelined most of the church in this mission and a few people who are really passionate about this to give their selves to it. No, it's not a missions front. This is a discipleship. What it means to be a follower of Jesus. It means you are a disciple maker for the nations.

Speaker 2 (26:22):

That's unquestionably true and clear according to the Bible, but it's not unquestionably true and clear in our church culture and the version of Christianity that we have bought into. And I just want to exhort you based on the word of God in your personal life. One, to be a disciple maker for the nations. Our churches will not be disciple makers for the nations, be filled with disciple makers for the nations if the leaders of those churches are not disciple makers for the nations. So let this be the moment where your prayer life totally changes from this point forward. And the Berber of Morocco and the Alani of Nigeria and the poston of Afghanistan and thousands of other people, groups like them are a part of your daily intercession. Just download unreached for the day by Joshua Project every day. We got so many things we do on this device.

Speaker 2 (27:28):

Surely 60 seconds is worth praying for people who've never even heard the gospel every day. You got to do unreached people group and it's just simple. And then leave church to pray for people who've never heard the gospel intercede for them and just start doing that. And then, yeah, I just start to think about our treasure and what if God actually wants his glory and gospel known among all that red? Might he give his people unprecedented wealth in the history of the world to get the gospel to them? It's what he's done. So let's stop wasting on that one. Just going to burn up. Let's stop living like everybody else around us is living. Let's start putting our treasure and that which is going to last forever for billions of people in need of the gospel to come alongside our brothers and sisters who are struggling in the red.

Speaker 2 (28:29):

I can see their faces right now that we're coming alongside and there's so much opportunity to come alongside them and say, let's work to spread the gospel to those who've never heard it with our resources and then to let it change the way we live right where we are in our communities. So the command for how to get the gospel to them is to make disciples who make disciples. So let's give ourselves to this mission and let's open our eyes to the opportunities we have to make disciples of the nations in our communities. And God has brought people from the red to our front doors

Speaker 2 (29:10):

And I've learned a lot pastor in metro dc. Once you start to step into certain areas, you feel like you got to give a ton of caveats. But I'll just say, why is it that statistically evangelical Christians are the most resistant to people from Red Nations moving to our nation? God's bringing people who've never heard the gospel to our front doors and we are fighting against that. What do we want more? The preservation of our nation or the proclamation of our God and his glory to all the nations. What really is driving us here? Open your eyes to the opportunities there are to make disciples of the nations right around us. And as long if we're just making disciples among people who look like us, if our churches are filled with people who look like us and think like us, we're missing the whole point from the start.

Speaker 2 (30:11):

Let this transform in the way we're making disciples right here for where we live. And then to be open to making disciples wherever, however he may lead us realizing. So there are more unreached people today than ever before in history. At the same time, we have more opportunities to reach them than ever before in history. Did you think about Paul writing these letters, traveling from it took him weeks if not months, to travel from one city to the next and sailing and it didn't always work out very well, and he never could have fathomed a machine that can pick you up, carry you through the air just about anywhere in the world in a day. What a miracle. And you and I have that available to us. We can go anywhere in the red or how long it would take him to write a letter or dictated and have it sent and delivered and then get a reply back and you and I can communicate with people around the world in real time in multiple languages through a device in our pockets.

Speaker 2 (31:32):

What are we waiting for? We done so many opportunities, travel, technology, urbanization, the movement of people to cities. When you look at the trajectory of human history, most people have not lived in cities, just a tiny percentage. The beginning of 1800, a little bit more in 1900 now we've now passed over 50% of the world's population living in cities. Acts 17, 26 and 27. God is orchestrating the movement of peoples where they can hear the gospel. He's bringing people to places where they can hear, making connections with opportunities to get the gospel from two rural areas, from cities, globalization of today's marketplace, the opportunities there are for us and for people and our churches to work around the world. I am not getting into most of these countries with my application for visa. Author of radical, these degrees from seminary. That's an easy no. But teachers, engineers, all kinds of people, all kinds of different gifts. I could just go down the list of vocations. There are nations in the red that will pay Christians to come spread the gospel there. They don't know they're doing it. But that's kind of the point.

Speaker 2 (32:49):

If we'll open our eyes and realize the purpose of my life is not just to be comfortable here to coast this thing out here, a nice comfortable Christian spin on the American dream. We're created for so much more than that and not just in our lives, in the lives of those who are coming after us in the next generation. Are we teaching our kids? Is this the Christianity that we're immersing them in kids from the very beginning? Let's pray for people around the world who've never heard the gospel. We talked about this lack of resources going in the red is the great imbalance. I was tucking my 10-year-old in the other night. He was like, dad, have we rectified it yet? I'm like, whatcha talking about? He's like the great imbalance. Is it rectified? It's like, not yet buddy, but we're working on it. What? So let's raise our kids to think about, pray for dream, about how can I get the gospel to reach people? This is not what we're doing. It's not what we're doing. This is what Mormons are doing it. It's the video I come across on social media of a 17, 18-year-old girl.

Speaker 2 (33:58):

She's shaking, smiling, she's reading this letter, just an iPhone video. She's reading this letter about where she's going to spend the next two years of her life on mission, and she gets to the point where she reads where she's going and the camera just kind of pans out. She's in her backyard and it's filled with family and friends who start jumping up and down, just cheering, celebrating how she's going to spend the next two years spreading a false gospel that condemns all around the world. Then I go to college campuses and I'm trying to cast biblical vision for college students and they're looking at me and they're saying, one of the greatest discouragements or hindrances to me going is my Christian parents who don't want me to go to places in the red.

Speaker 2 (34:58):

What are we raising our kids to do? Make disciples of all the nations or not to follow Jesus or not. They're not going to be reached when a couple of missionaries finally get it all figured out. They're going to be reached when the church of Jesus Christ decides we're going to follow Jesus. This is what Christianity actually is. It's being a disciple maker for the nations. No matter what vocation I'm in, no matter how old or young I am, I'm not on the sidelines of this thing. I'm in this thing and it's changing the way I pray. It's changing the way I use my money. It's to change the way I prioritize my life and everything in it. In other words, deny yourself, take up your cross. Follow me. Where are you going? I'm going to the nations repentance. Forgiveness of sins must be proclaimed to all of them.

Speaker 2 (36:00):

I've given you a command right before I left the earth. Go make disciples of all of them. I've put my spirit inside you for this purpose. I've given you my Holy Spirit. You have supernatural power not to sit in a seat on Sundays. You have supernatural power to reach the nations with the greatest news in the world. So at the conclusion of these few days thinking about discipleship, I just want to ask you two questions. Here's the two questions. One, what needs to change in your life in order for you to be a disciple maker for all the nations? What needs to change personally for you in order for you to be a disciple maker for the nations or for you to follow Jesus? And then second, what needs to change in your leadership in the church in order for you to mobilize disciple makers for all the nations and whatever influence God has given you, maybe it's a position with a lot of influence. Maybe it's just influence with a few people. Regardless, stewardship, what needs to change in your leadership in order for you to mobilize disciple makers for all the nations

Speaker 1 (37:44):

As disciples of Jesus? Our calling is to make disciples of all nations. How can you direct more energy towards making disciples among people and people groups who have no access to Jesus's good news? Take a moment to pray and ask God to show you how you and your church can do that.