The Church of Eleven22 - S02E06 - Instruct One Another

Episode Date: May 17, 2021

Romans 15:14 tells us to "instruct one another." Who are you instructing?

Welcome to deepen with Pastor Joby Martin. The Church of 1122 is a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. And we're praying this message helps you deepen your relationship with him. Now let's dive in. Hey, church family. Welcome to episode six of our deepening podcast. I'm glad you've joined us. You know, this past week we were in John chapter 3, maybe the most famous Christian verse, John 316,

where Nicodemus comes to Jesus at night and ask some questions. And then, if you'll remember, what Jesus does is Jesus begins to unpack the gospel for Nicodemus, who is a Pharisee, who ought to be at, like, graduate-level Bible study. And yet, as soon as Jesus says, you've got to be born again, then immediately just, it goes straight over Nicodemus. his head, which in fact, we find this over and over and over and over and over. I mentioned it, like when Jesus asked the two disciples, what are you seeking? And they just went over their head. He was asking like a deep spiritual question. What is that thing in your soul that you're looking

for to satisfy you? And they're like, what are we seeking? Where are you staying? They miss it. Nicodemus totally misses it. When he says, you know, what must I do to be saved? That's what he's asking. He just says, Jesus says, you've got to be born again. And Nicodemus is thinking like, bottom shelf. He's like physical only, be born again. You mean, I've got to, you know, find my way back into my mother's womb. And Jesus is like, nope, that's not what we're talking about whatsoever. The woman at the well, the same thing. He's saying, I am living water. And she's like, water, you can't even get water. You don't have a bucket. And so what Jesus then does is he takes two Old Testament events that Nicodemus would have been well versed in. And then he uses those things that Nicodemus, that Nicodemus,

already knows Abraham and Isaac and Moses lifting up the fiery serpent. Those two, and again, I don't need to repeat him because we just went over him in church this weekend. And he uses that to instruct Nicodemus, which leads us to our one another. In Romans 15, 14, the Bible tells us to instruct one another. So let's just get a little bit of context here. if you back up one verse, so Romans 50, well, no, we'll start in Romans 15, 14. Paul says this. He says, I myself am satisfied about you, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness,

filled with all knowledge and able to, here it is, instruct one another. Let me ask you a question. Who are you instructing? I mean, if the Bible tells us that we are to be filled with all knowledge and able to instruct one another, then who are you instructing? Now, if you are a parent, let's just start right there. Do you realize that you are the number one instructor in your child's life? I hope and pray, maybe COVID taught you that for real, but it was true before COVID, that you are the number one instructor. And in regards to instructing them with all knowledge and goodness,

then you are the number one disciple maker in the life of your child. You see, one of the things that we've done in our Western society, that is no bueno is we have delegated out instruction to our kids in almost every area of their life. Now, some of these areas, it makes total sense. Like my son's on the weightlifting team, my son plays football, my son fights in jiu-jitsu, and he has coaches for all those things. And I can help him in those things because I have some knowledge in those three things, because I also used to do football, and I would lift weights and do jihitsu.

Now, my daughter is a gymnast. guess who can't teach her anything about gymnastics. So what I do is I take her to the gym and pay these people to teach her how to do gymnastics. Then we also take our kids to school to teach them English and math and history and all of these kind of things. And the problem with that,

it's not a big deal in those subjects. But when it comes to this subject, a lot of times what you can think, what we can think, is that, oh, well, just like I drop off my dog, to the gym to be taught gymnastics, I can just drop my kid off to the church, and they'll teach them all of this stuff. Now, we will teach them that stuff. But we're just not their primary instructors, their primary teachers, or their primary

disciple makers. You are. And that means you're either a good one, or you're either, or you might be a not good one, but you are the primary instructor, the primary disciple maker. And so if your kids are young, I think I've said this before, get the Jesus story book Bible, open it up, you start teaching, you start instructing. Now, and we will partner with you in our kids' ministry and in our student ministry, we will partner with you to help you be the best disciple maker you can be.

But it's not just with our kids. Even if you don't have kids or your kids are grown or whatever the case may be, we are still instructed to instruct one another. So let me ask you this, who are you instructing? and if you're like, well, I don't feel like I know enough to instruct anybody. That may be true, that may be true, but it's not a very good excuse. You see, think about this. The Jesus disciples the disciples for how long before he put him in charge of making

disciples of the whole world? Three years. Three years. So if you're a brand new Christian, I would encourage you. You're not quite ready to instruct one another, although often the brand new Christian, are the best instructors because they have so much zeal for the Lord, they have so much excitement. Sometimes you guys are the best instructors on what it looks like to share your faith because because you're so freshly saved, you just want to share your story with everybody.

But this is a little bit arbitrary. I'm making it up, but I would say if you have been a believer for three years and you are not instructing other believers in what it looks like to be a follower of Jesus Christ, then you're not doing it right. Which is, by the way, why I tell everybody at our church, you got three years to go on a mission trip or you're doing it wrong. And I have even been as so bold to say as you got three years to go on a mission trip or get out. And people get mad at me about that. Well, I don't care because listen to me. I'm not saying you're not a Christian. I'm just saying what we do as believers is we follow in the footsteps of Jesus. And what Jesus did is Jesus made disciples for three years,

is crucified, dead, buried. And before he was ascended to the Father, after his resurrection, he said, therefore, go and make disciples, instructing them, teaching them, to obey everything I have commanded you. And so he instructed them for three years, and then he sent them out as the instructors everywhere there go. Now, you may do that in an official role like I do, but I don't think this is what Paul is talking about in the book of Romans.

He's talking about people within the church instructing one another. You see, and ultimately what Paul is saying is, good job church in Rome, because don't you remember the Great Commission to make disciples, teaching them to obey everything as I have commanded you and baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit? Now, when you think, when Jesus said, make disciples, do you think he just meant go find people who already believe in me and tell them more things to believe about me?

no, no, no, no. He said, go find some people that haven't even heard of me before and share the gospel, but not just so that they will get saved so that when they can go to heaven, but invite them to be Jesus followers and take step after step after step in what it means to believe in the Lord. And then Paul goes on to say this, but on some points, I have written you very boldly by way of a reminder. Listen, as an instructor in the Bible for many, many years, Do you know what it means most of the time to instruct people? You rarely share with them new information. You almost always just remind them of some things that they already know.

One of the places that you could do this is in a disciple group. I would love to encourage you to be a part of the disciple group because it's not only the person that's like leading the group that is the instructor, but everybody that opens their mouth is often the people that are instructing one another. Let me give you another one. way you can instruct one another. If you've never been baptized as a believer, you should take a step and get baptized,

and let me tell you why. You say, what does that have to do with instructing one another? First of all, physically, you instruct us all by proclaiming that Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior, and you demonstrate what it looks like to be buried in Christ and resurrected to newness of life. And you have this incredible opportunity at our church

to share your testimony on camera, and we will show it at service. or show it online, and I can't tell you the number of times people have sat through my incredible Bible teaching, but the thing they really were spoken to by the Lord in was your testimony. So, instruct one another. Paul says, but on some points, I have written to you very boldly by way of a reminder, because by the grace given me by God to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles and the priestly service of the gospel of God, so that the offering of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit. In Christ Jesus, then, I have reason to be

proud of my work for God. You see, what he's saying here is he's saying, Paul is saying, I am proud of my work for God, not because what I have done, but because what Christ has done through me, and the fruit of what Christ has done through me is that you are instructing one another. He says, for I will not venture to speak of anything, except what Christ has accomplished through me to bring the Gentiles, as people far from God, to obedience by word and deed, by the power of signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God, so that from Jerusalem and all the way to Lyricum, I have fulfilled the ministry of the gospel of Christ. 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. So, here's a part of what Paul is saying. When Paul says he has fulfilled the ministry, of the gospel. That doesn't mean that every person on the planet is now a follower of Jesus Christ. It just meant that he has fulfilled his part in the ministry of the gospel. And his part was to plant churches and to raise up or disciple people that made disciples, that made disciples, that made disciples. So once again, who are you discipling? Who are you instructing? And again, if you say, well, you know what, I don't feel like I know enough to instruct anybody, well, then learn. because here's what happens. You learn the things that are important to you.

There's all kind of things at work that your boss tells you that are important, and guess what you do? You become an expert in those things. Where your boss, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, has told us that it is very important. In fact, it is the great commission that we are to therefore go and make disciples. And here's what I can tell you from firsthand personal experience. You want to grow up.

you want to grow in your faith, you want to grow in your wisdom and knowledge of the scripture, then you pray for and you engage with your one more. You get in a disciple group and you begin to think, okay, if given the opportunity, not from a place of ego, but from a place of humility, I am, when the opportunity arises, I'm going to try to instruct one another towards gospel living.

Because here's what happens. When you know that you have to answer questions, when you know that you don't have to just read the scriptures for your own edification, but you've got to try to understand it enough that you can instruct one another, then that's when you start growing. A catalyst for your own deepening with Jesus Christ is the mantle of leadership of trying to instruct somebody else. One of the ways I like to say it around here is the best way to deepen your relationship

of Jesus is help other people discover theirs. In fact, if you look through all of the New Testament, anytime the disciples got hyper-focused on the inside on themselves. I mean, think about Mark chapter 9. This dad brings a son to Jesus or to his disciples to heal him, and they couldn't heal him because they get in this denominational argument. You see, they were just focused on themselves. There was the time in Matthew chapter 20 where two of the disciples,

the sons of Zebedee come, they said, I actually send their mom to Jesus, and they say, hey, see if we can be like on his right hand and on his left hand. They got real insider focus. And every time that happens, Jesus would admonish them. He would rebuke them. He would say, how dare you? This is not how it works.

But you know when the disciples got encouraged, they got high five, they got way to go from Jesus? It was things like the feeding of the 5,000. Remember, it wasn't Jesus that actually fed the 5,000. Jesus took the fish and the loaves. He broke them, gave thanks, handed them to the table. disciples and then the disciples were the conduit of God's grace to the people. When we instruct one another, we are conduits of God's grace to the people.

Church of 1122, may you instruct one another. Let's pray. Jesus, I thank you so much that you are not just a philosophy to be believed. You're not just an ideology to agree with. You're not just a sociology to understand. stand. You're not even just a theology for us to get our mind around. You're a savior to be loved. And Lord, I thank you that you have called us to know you. And as we walk with you and as you have instructed us on what it means to glorify God and to love Him with all our heart and our soul and our mind and our strength, Lord, we pray that we would be condiments of your grace to one another. And then we would dive into your word and the spirit of God would do exactly what you said

he would do that he would teach us the things from your word. And that God, we would not be cul-de-sacs of what you've taught us, but we would instruct one another in life and in Godliness. And God, we're honored to play that role. And we thank you. We thank you for all those that have come before us that have instructed us. And we pray it in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you for joining us for Deepen with Pastor Jobi Martin. If you're looking for additional resources to help you further deepen your relationship with Jesus Christ, visit co-e-22.com slash resources. We're praying this message you heard today helps you experience God in a unique and fresh way.

And as always, be free.