Vision Sunday: Embracing Our Role as the Body of Christ

Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church Podcast, where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.

My name is Pastor Josh, and I want to thank you for listening to this podcast.

I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen you in the word of God.

Now come along, let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today.

We're going to be learning about Jesus in here as well and appreciate you being here today for our Vision Sunday.

And typically, what happens is that as as a pastor, I pray a lot about where God would have us to go in the next year.

And the reality is, is that to reduce it down to one sermon would not do it justice because I believe the Lord has a lot of plans for Middletown Baptist Church in 2026.

And what I would like to do here for the next foreseeable future, it's become one sermon to a sermon series, is look at what God has for us as a church.

The last two weeks, we've been looking at biblical church culture because it's one thing to say I go to church.

It's another thing to be the church.

It's one thing to say that, hey, I'm part of a church.

But what does a church actually mean?

What.

What does a church actually do?

And what we've been doing is we've been looking at Ephesians, chapter four, and we've been looking at what God has to say about a church.

What God has had to say about a church is that we're to walk worthy.

We're.

We're to walk a certain way in the path that God has called us.

So it starts with faith.

It starts with belief in Jesus Christ.

And in that salvation, in that transformation now we are new creatures.

In him, we are born again.

And as we are born again, yes, we are born again as children of God.

But as children of God, we are planted in the body of Christ.

The church is the body of Christ.

There isn't a passage in scripture that says the church is like the body of Christ.

The Bible says that the church is the body of Christ.

And the reality of that means this.

As we work out in our lives what God has for us, we're essentially working with him and working under him to do the work of the ministry.

Now, the Bible says in that body model that Christianity, Christ is the head.

He's the one in charge.

He's the one that's guiding us.

And the other model is that the church is a building.

It's a spiritual house, not a physical Building as much as a spiritual building.

The Bible says that we're living stones that are built upon the chief cornerstone, which is Jesus Christ.

But in Ephesians chapter four, it says, okay, we start with Christ, but where do we go?

Well, we walk with him.

But walking with him looks like this.

It looks like lowliness of mind, humility.

It looks like patience and, and meekness and unity and peace.

And ultimately to live Christ like with other people.

To live Christ like individually and to live Christ like corporate.

And so when we think about that, we think about, okay, so, so we're to be unified.

That means that we're all supposed to believe exactly the same things in every single element of our lives.

We're all to look exactly the same.

We're all to, all to dress the same.

We're all to talk the same.

No, the Bible says that unity is not uniformity.

Uniformity is we all look the same.

And most of the time it's pastor comes and says, this is the list of rules and you've got to be this way.

No, the Bible gives us the guidebook to life.

I'm happy and I am relieved that not everyone is like me here.

Not, not everyone is called to specific, exact ministries now.

We all are called to the ministry of service.

We, we're all called to the ministry of proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

We're all called to the ministry of glorifying God.

But we're called, as Ephesians chapter 4 says, in different areas, we're different parts of the body coming together in unity.

So how do we do that?

Well, we do that by walking in the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

We do that by walking in the truth of the word of God.

And that's what all Ephesians 4 is all about.

It's all about walking with Christ in a certain way, walking with him individually and walking with him corporately as the body of believers.

And so thinking about where we wanted to go this year, thinking about what we wanted to emphasize as a church, we could emphasize a ton of different things.

Last year we emphasized going right.

We, we, we, we wanted to go and, and not just physically go, but spiritually go into the world and, and share the gospel and, and to share the love of Christ.

And I believe through various avenues that we grew in that area and ultimately built upon that as possibly some of, you know, we're going on a missions trip this year and, and obviously our missions program is, is adding more missionaries and we're growing and we're, and we're serving and those are wonderful things.

But at the same time, we have to think about it from the bigger perspective.

Yes, God calls us to go, but God also calls us to be the church here.

And so what I would like us to do this year is to.

We're going to think about three different words.

We're going to talk about these three words a lot this year.

And these three words are not only a challenge, even though they are a challenge, they're not only an evaluation of where we are through the year, but also what I want us to think about is many commentators call these the rhythms of the church.

Essentially, this is the culture of the church.

This is the lifestyle of the church.

This is not just what we do, but who we are and allows us to check ourselves in our spiritual walk.

And so if you could throw up on the screen, the, the presentation there, I'm going to show you the three words here this morning, and I'm going to build off of each one of these words according to scripture.

And essentially the three words are this up, in and out.

I want us to think about these three words and what they mean for us as a church, what, what they mean for us as individual Christians, what they mean for us as we deal with other people in our midst, as we deal with people in our community.

It really starts with this.

It starts with our relationship with God.

It, it starts with where we stand individually before Him.

There's a lot of people in this world that say, you know what?

I'm a religious person.

I, I'm a, I'm a person of faith.

I, I go to church.

But really, we understand that every one of those statements don't necessarily equate a true salvation.

What brings us salvation?

Not religion, not going to church, but faith in Jesus Christ alone.

And having that relationship with God shows us that we are now his children and we can walk in faith.

And so for us to be the type of church that we need to be, for us to serve, for us to go, for us to see fruit in our midst, we must all realize that we all have a responsibility to have our relationship with God and to stand in that relationship and to grow in that relationship.

And so for the first challenge, the first test, the first evaluation, the first rhythm or culture of the church will be this.

Individually, where do we all stand before God?

Am I walking with him in faith?

And it's not just a matter of being, being saved and having faith, but is it a matter of me trusting him in the day to day?

Is it a matter of me communing with Him.

Because if I believe in him and if I trust in his way in my life, I will live in his word.

I will live in communication with Him.

And the Bible says that the word of God is how he speaks to us.

And, and how we speak to him is through a life of prayer.

And how we grow with him is a lifestyle of obedience and yielding ourselves to the Spirit.

And so the first step is, is up.

The first check is up.

But then after that, we know that in the book of First John, it tells us that if we're right with God, we will be right with others.

You know, we, we can't say, you know what?

I love God.

I'm walking with God.

I'm serving God.

I'm reading my Bible.

I'm.

I'm growing in Him.

But I don't like to be around other Christians.

I can't stand other Christians.

I'm.

I'm an individualistic Christian.

That's, that's an oxymoron.

That can't be.

So the Bible says that if we're walking with Christ, we are walking with others in the body of Christ.

You're not designed to be on an island.

You're not designed to be alone.

Yes, we have the Lord with us at all times.

And I'm thankful.

The book of Hebrews says that he's never going to leave us nor forsake us.

And so, yes, we have Him.

But the Bible also tells us in other passages which we're going to look at in the study, that we need.

We.

It's a necessity for us to be planted in a church and fellowshipping with within a church and exhorting and challenging one another in the church and encouraging one another and building one another up.

We need that.

We must have those connections inwardly.

We have to find fellowship, we have to find discipleship.

We have to find growth in our church family.

Is the church family perfect?

No.

Is any family perfect?

If you have a perfect family, I'd love to meet with you after the service.

And I want to know your secret.

Because every family has its quirks.

Every family has its struggles.

And so the reality is, is that we're not talking about having a perfect church and agreeing with everybody on every single thing.

But it's walking in unity, knowing that, hey, that's my brother in Christ.

Remember what Ephesians 4 said.

One body, one spirit, one baptism, one Lord, one faith.

We're walking together.

And so we're in this together.

And the point is, is that we're to have that relationship we see that up in, in the relationship of, of John 15:5.

Jesus says, I am the vine, you're the branches.

He that abideth in me and I in him.

The same bringeth forth much fruit, for without me you can do nothing.

And so you might say here this morning, well, Pastor, it's impossible for us as a church to walk in unity.

And I would say it is impossible in our own flesh, like, like to do church on our own, with our own worldly wisdom, with our own mindset, with our own opinions.

We can't walk in unity.

So it's a supernatural thing to walk in unity.

As John 15:5 says, we trust that he is the vine and we're the branches.

And, and there's a statement there at the end of verse five that is shocking.

And it actually, it ruffles our feathers.

It makes us in the flesh get a little uncomfortable.

But in the Spirit, it should help us and encourage us.

Jesus says, for without me ye can do nothing.

Folks, as a church, we cannot accomplish anything for the kingdom of God without Him.

We can't leave him behind.

We can't forget about Him.

We can't think that our plans and our vision and our opinions trump the power and the purpose and the call of God in our lives.

And so our connection to Christ gives life and fruitfulness.

But again, our connection with Christ brings that personal relationship with not only God, but with others.

I'm going to break off the script a little bit, so, so don't jump around in the PowerPoint.

Maybe you can just go back to the, the, the front screen there.

Up, in and out.

But one of the aspects of finding this rhythm in our church is following the example of Christ, right?

We're to be plugged into the example of Christ.

We're to be plugged into his plan for our life.

I want you to see in Luke chapter six, Jesus living out, up, in and out, right here in one small passage of scripture.

We could go to so many places in scripture to look at this model being lived out in the church.

But the greatest example is Jesus Christ.

The greatest example is to see what he deemed to be important and vital in his ministry.

Because if we're a church and we say anything is important as long as it's something that we like to do, or as long as people will come to the church, or as long as we've got enough money in the bank account, those are all, like, in and of themselves, okay?

Things like, I, I want our church to be financially secure.

I want our church to bring People in from the community.

I want us to enjoy what we're doing in ministry.

But if our priority is anything outside of following the head, Jesus Christ, the chief cornerstone, then we're missing the point.

So we let's look at Luke chapter 6 and I want you to see verse 12.

I believe this is a great outline of how we can live the up, in and out model within the church.

Jesus is going to start with his relationship with the Father.

Now, obviously, Jesus has a unique relationship with the Father.

He's the only begotten Son.

And a lot of people struggle with the concept of the Trinity.

But we know in the New Testament that Jesus spoke to the Father, Jesus prayed to the Father, Jesus submitted to the Father.

Here in his earthly ministry, Jesus worshiped him.

And so we look at the example of Jesus and we say, okay, if Jesus does these things in his relationship with the Father, so we need to understand that our relationship with God is, is vital and our personal time with him is vital.

Look at verse number 12 with me in Luke chapter 6.

It says, and it came to pass in those days that he went out into a mountain to pray and continued all night in prayer to God.

Right here we see that the priority for Jesus, before he does anything in ministry, is to align himself with the will of the Father.

For him, in this moment, it was a whole night of prayer.

It was a time of communion with Lord.

It was a time of fellowship with Him.

Ultimately, we know that through many other prayers in Scripture, that worship can be done through that time of, of prayer.

And so what we can see here is that Jesus gives us the example that our personal, private time with God, our personal time with him, through fellowship and through prayer and through Bible study and, and through resting in him and trusting in him, is vital to start what we want to do in our ministries.

Let's say, for example, this year you say, you know, Pastor Josh, I really want to start a ministry.

God's pressing this on my heart in the church.

And I would say, fantastic.

That's wonderful.

Have you sought the Lord in that?

Have you prayed about it?

Have you found passages of scripture that align you to that message of the truth of the gospel?

So often we get ahead of ourselves.

So often we think, this is what I want to do, this is what I have planned, and God, you just bless it as I go.

But ultimately, there's a time and a place for us to say, lord, I need you first before I take in anything else in the day, before I move forward in my vision, before I move on in my path of service to the Lord, how I deal with other people, how I deal with the world, I first must stop and say, no, it's my time with God.

And so that first step is up.

But then we see verse 13.

It says this.

And when it was day, so he prays through the night.

And when it was day, he called unto him his 12, excuse me, his disciples.

And of them he chose 12, whom also he named apostles.

So here we see Jesus not only concerned with his relationship with the Father, but also with the relationship with others.

And in this context, it's discipleship.

Jesus is calling certain individuals to come.

And what does he do with his disciples and specifically his apostles?

He trains them for the work of the ministry.

But in the process of training them, he fellowships with them.

Jesus had meals with the disciples.

Jesus spent time with the disciples.

He traveled with the disciples.

There was an intimate relationship there in the body of Christ.

There was a small group that was happening right then and there.

Jesus leaves the time of prayer and he goes and he focuses on those around him.

You know, I've heard sometimes the.

The.

The idea of church is this.

I come into church, I worship God.

I get my shot in the arm for the week, and I go home and I'm waiting for next week.

And we forget that church is not just an hour on Sunday mornings or an hour and a half if the pastor is real excited, right?

It's more than that.

Church is 24 7, 365.

And it's not about just coming in and receiving.

We talked about this last week.

The spirit of consumerism has leaked into the church, and it's about, what can I get now?

Certainly there is blessings in being in church.

I love being in church.

I love to hear the word of God.

I love to worship God together with other saints.

But at the end of the day, church is not just about what I receive when I come.

Church is about what I receive, but also what I can bless others with and how I can reuse the blessings that God has given me and turn that out to others.

That's called stewardship.

It's stewarding our gifts.

If you remember back in Ephesians, chapter four, it says that every one of us as believers have received a gift.

Not to exalt ourselves, but what to edify the other saints, to build other people up, to lead people to Christ.

And we talked about those four E's.

We have evangelism.

We're gifted to lead people to Christ.

We're gifted to teach people in education.

We're gifted to come to a place of edification, to build them up.

And we're called to exhort.

That's challenging and encouraging others.

That's what it means to be part of the church.

So that's the end model.

Jesus comes and he lists these 12.

Simon, who was also named Peter and Andrew, his brother James and John, Philip and Bartholomew, Matthew and Thomas, James, the son of Alphaeus and Simon, called zealots.

Judas, the brother of James, and Judas Iscariot, which was, which also was the traitor.

And we see an interesting element here where they're named.

And though we know that Jesus had multiple disciple, multiple followers, these are the inner circle.

These are the ones that he highly invests.

And so that's a picture, I think, within the church.

I mean, obviously we can't invest into every single person in the church.

It's impossible.

It's impossible for you to say, well, I'm going to disciple every single person.

Even in my section.

That's not going to be possible.

I can't disciple every person for an hour a day.

There's not enough hours in the day.

But the Bible says, yes, we have that kind of love for all the believers around us and we have that type of exhortation and edification, but it's perfectly appropriate to identify certain individuals in our life that we can sow into, that we can invest into, and that we can say, you know what?

Because of what someone has done for me, I want to turn around and invest into someone else's life.

And that's exactly what we see happening here.

There's another passage of Scripture In Hebrews chapter 10, if you want to reference that here.

When it comes to the whole in model, is, is the idea of not forsaking ourselves together and that Hebrews chapter 10, verse 25 is a verse.

It's a proof text.

A lot of times for people to talk about church attendance.

So I could get here in Hebrews chapter 10, verse 25.

And I say, hey, brother, so and so I haven't seen you in church in three weeks.

You're an open sin because you're not coming to church.

Well, we could argue that, you know, a rejection of coming to church is, is not a good thing, right?

We would say that, yeah, you should be in church.

I, I'm all for church attendance.

I'm all for it.

I'm the biggest proponent of it.

But he says more here.

He says it's not just about being in church, even though that's the first step.

You got to be in church to do what he's about to say.

He says there's more to it than just coming together, sitting in a pew and going home.

That's really not the model of church that was happening back at that time.

So what Does Hebrews chapter 10, verse 25 say?

Well, let's just go back up to verse 24 to get context.

He says, let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering.

So he says, individually, hold fast.

Hold on to what you believe in.

And then he ultimately says, how can you even do that?

Well, for he is faithful.

That promise, meaning we're faithful because the one who we're being faithful to is faithful.

So even when we're not faithful, he keeps us and he holds us.

But then he says in verse 24, and let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works.

And so the Bible says here as a church, one of the elements of church culture is to provoke one another.

What I thought provoking one another is a bad thing.

All the word provoke means is to stir somebody up, to encourage them to get them to go somewhere.

Now, in our fleshly mindset, when we talk about provoking, it's usually provoking for bad things.

Like, and that person's provoking me today, that person's stirring me up in a bad way in my flesh.

They're stirring me up in anger, they're stirring me up in whatever it might be.

But the Bible says that as Christians, the church culture would be this, that we stir each other up for what, as it says there in verse 24, love and good works.

How do I do that?

Well, I invest into the life of others.

I show them love and good works.

I, I, I demonstrate what it means in my life to show God that I love him.

Therefore I'm stirring it up.

And the co, it's culture, right?

It's the norm.

If the norm in the church is to be selfish, guess what's going to happen?

Eventually all of us are going to learn how to be selfish.

And it's what we do.

If the norm is to be prideful, like if, if, if I as the leader of the church go, hey, guys, it's all about you, okay?

Get what you can enjoy yourself at the end of the day, that's eventually, if you guys don't leave, which, if a pastor got up and preached that you should leave, but, but if you didn't leave, what would happen?

That would be the culture of the church.

So how do we, how do we flip this?

How do, how do we become a church if we're not already to be a church that's provoking to love and good works, well, it starts with the individual.

Like, what happens sometimes is we want revival, the church needs revival.

And so when the church starts revival, that's when I'm going to jump on the ship.

No, revival starts in my heart.

Provoking to love and good work starts with me.

If I'm the first one to do it, I'm going to start doing it.

And the Lord willing, we see that culture begin to grow.

And then he says in verse 25, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is meaning that there were some that were forsaking the assembly, but exhorting one another.

So we're back to what we're supposed to do when we're there exhorting one another.

And so much the more, as you see the day approaching, exhorting, this challenging exhorting is encouraging.

So it's an environment of love, service and as it says there, encouragement.

Now you would say, okay, Pastor, how am I supposed to love, encourage and provoke into love and good works and all that stuff during your preaching?

It would be really distracting for you right now.

Let's just get like, theoretically speaking here.

Let's say some of you say, okay, Pastor, I'm gonna take it.

I'm gonna take it literally.

I'm gonna get up right now, I'm gonna go try to encourage that person over there.

And we start like that.

I would, I would be like, guys, okay, it's a little chaotic.

I can't focus.

You guys are talking.

Please don't do that.

Say, well then, Pastor, how am I supp.

I'm showing up at 10:30 on a Sunday morning.

I leave at 12 o'.

Clock.

How am I supposed to do all this?

The idea here is this.

The idea is that the actual assembling is not just on the corporate worship on Sunday mornings.

Even though that's vital, we should corporately worship.

But what the Bible actually tells us in the New Testament is that church was happening outside of the corporate worship setting.

So, so the exhorting, the love, the discipleship, the edification that's happening outside, they would have these things called agape feast, love feast.

So what are you talking about?

They would actually get together.

They would say, okay, we're all going to come together.

We're going to have food and we're going to.

And they.

There was worship and all that kind of stuff.

And that was a time for them to get together and talk.

Let's go to the Book of Acts with me.

Go to the Book of Acts.

Okay.

If we want to study early church, what better place to go than Acts?

Acts chapter two.

Peter preaches, thousands are saved.

They, they, they're baptized, they're added to the local church.

What did that look like at that time?

What did that, what did that look like?

Well, Acts chapter 2, verse 42 tells us what that looked like.

It looked like this says, and they continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine, which means they, they were, they were getting taught the word of God.

Going back to church culture, Teaching the word of God is vital for church culture.

It might not be teaching that we want to hear, might be tough teaching, but, but the, but the church, through its leadership and through different avenues of, of ministry should be, must be teaching the word of God and also, as we see here, continuing steadfastly.

So it's not just a matter of teaching it because there's a lot of churches in America that someone's teaching the word of God, but there's a lot of churches that are not continuing steadfastly in the doctrine that's being taught.

So it's a matter of being taught.

It's a matter of being listened and heeded and applied.

But then we see more.

It says that they were fellowshipping.

That word fellowship means coin.

It's the Greek word's koinonia.

And we have koinonia Sundays here.

And still some people are like, what, what are we talking about?

Koinonia Sunday.

Okay, it's, it's the idea of fellowshipping but being together with a purpose.

So it's fellowshipping, but fellowshipping with unity, Fellowshipping with the purpose of edifying, fellowshipping with the purpose of encouraging, fellowshipping with the purpose of all of these things that are being mentioned here.

So they listened and applied teaching.

They fellowshiped with a purpose.

And then it says in breaking of bread and all good Baptists said amen, right?

We love to eat a good meal, right?

A good potluck meal.

It's a little bit more than that.

Like most commentators believe, that's speaking of observing the Lord's table.

But at the same time, when they observed the Lord's table, it wasn't just a little wafer and a little cup of juice.

They were having a full out meal.

And so I think that's perfectly biblical for us to come together and break some bread.

That's, that's, that's great.

And that's fellowship.

That's where a lot of I, I, one of the things I loved about coming to the church and getting to know certain different cultures, right.

One of the things that I appreciated with hanging out with some of the folks with Pastor Carlos and, and that ministry was they, they like to eat.

All their fellowships had food and I always enjoyed it.

And, and I, I love that type of.

I love spicy food.

Okay.

So I'm like, yes, this is awesome.

So I would look for every opportunity to go eat.

We know that sometimes food can break some down some barriers.

That's a good thing.

Now, if all.

The only reason we get together is to become food critics and that's.

Then we're missing the point.

The point is again, fellowshipping with a purpose, breaking bread with a purpose.

And then we see more here it says and in prayers.

And so not only are they praying individually, which is important, but they're praying together.

There's corporate prayer and there's times where we get together and we lift up our requests to the Lord and we share, and with that comes sharing our needs.

The book of James talks much about this.

It talks about confessing our faults one to another so that we can lift up requests together.

Biblically speaking, a church culture that's working properly in the end stage is going to be a church that prays for one another and is concerned with one another, with one of those needs, with one another's struggles.

So.

So we see there in Acts chapter two, but we see more because again, we're talking about how can we do this in the church context when we only meet for an hour a week.

Well, let's see more of what it says later on down at the bottom, verse 46.

And they continuing daily.

So right then and there we see that the church culture is not just a weekly thing, it's a daily thing.

Now, this isn't to beat up on anybody who isn't understanding this right at this point, but I want you to see in scripture that, that church, the church family, the church culture is more than just a set time.

That's in my schedule.

It's my life.

And so it's as they continuing daily with one accord, that's unity in the temple, breaking bread from house to house did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God and having favor with all people.

And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.

So with this model came fruitfulness, came growth.

Everyone's looking for growth within the church.

We talked about this another time.

You know, there's whole books written and there's a whole library on how to grow a church.

But the greatest model is following what the word of God says, because that's true.

Fruit.

And again, how do we see fruitfulness?

Jesus says, if you want fruit, abide in me, abide in my word.

But we go to verse 46.

It says, they went house to house.

Some of you are like, house to house?

No one's coming over to my house.

That's my sanctuary.

Well, the reality is, is that biblically speaking, Biblically speaking, we are called to do church outside of the four walls that are right here.

I know this isn't necessarily popular in today's teaching.

Teaching.

Today's teaching in American culture is consumerism.

Come to church, we go home.

I have a life here.

And I have a life here.

But I want to challenge you this morning and encourage you this morning that church is more than that.

Now, I'm not saying that every one of you have to open up your homes tomorrow.

All right?

Some of you are like, I got to get some.

I know for us, we got to get.

We got to make sure the toys are out of the way so no one steps on it.

We got to make sure it's not about stressing you out and saying, okay, tomorrow you need to get people in your homes.

What it's saying is it's living a lifestyle that means that, hey, I'm making connections outside of the church.

What does that look like?

Can look as simple as, hey, I'm grabbing coffee with a fellow in on Saturday morning, and we're going to talk about a Bible study.

We're going to pray together.

Or it could be a larger setting, a small group within a home that meets once a week or once a month.

But, folks, what we're talking about is being creative but understanding that we must do this to survive, to grow, to thrive in our culture today, we.

We must understand that we got to take the church and we've got to move it into the world, because the world understands that they can invade the church.

The enemy knows that he's not playing by the rule of saying, well, we're not coming into the church.

The idea for us as Christians is to say, no, this is a daily thing.

And we're going to talk more about how we can adjust this and how we can put this to practice.

And then ultimately, we see the up in and out model.

Out is what?

Out is how we deal with people outside of the church, people that are not part of the family of God.

What do we do?

Well, if they're not like us and they don't believe what we believe.

We're against them.

We hate them.

No, that's not what the Bible says.

The Bible says to love your enemy.

The Bible says to share the gospel.

The Bible says in Matthew chapter 28, Go ye therefore and teach all nations, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever.

I've commanded you.

Our mission to go out is to go out and make disciples.

Well, how do we make a disciple?

Well, first of all, it takes a disciple to make a disciple.

I can't go and lead someone to Christ if I don't know Christ.

I can't go teach someone how to be a follower of Christ if I'm not a follower of Christ.

And so it takes individuals to have that up relationship with God where it needs to be, to have the in relationship with other Christians within the church where, where it needs to be.

And then ultimately we're able to go.

So last year we said go.

But if we're, we don't have the upright and we don't have the in right, how can we go?

Because we're going divided, we're going without a purpose, we're going without unity, we're going without passion, we're going without the motivation of loving God and ultimately sharing him with others.

And so what we see is something called the Great Commission.

Matthew, chapter 28, Go ye therefore into all the world.

The word there in the idea of teaching, the first idea of teaching is, is making disciples.

And so as a church, I believe we should go as a church, we should have a relationship with the unsaved community, particularly in the Middletown, Odessa, Townsend, Newcastle area.

People in our community should know Middletown Baptist Church and they should know us for a specific purpose.

You know what a lot of times churches are known for?

You've heard me say this before.

That's the church that's against.

And then they list all the things which we should be known for, what we're against.

I understand that and I'm for that.

As a Christian, as a believer, as, as someone who follows the word of God, we should be against things, particularly against sin of all shapes and sizes.

But at the same time, I think another good thing that we should be known for is what we're for.

We're for Jesus Christ, we're for the gospel.

We're for his transforming power.

We're for taking care of those folks in our community.

Because if we say we love somebody, I love you in Jesus Christ, amen, and I'm going to give you the gospel.

But if I love them enough to give them the Gospel, I should love them also to help them in times of need, in times of struggle.

What does the book of James say?

Don't be the type of person that sees someone come in and they don't have the proper clothes.

They're hungry.

And we say, okay, we'll pray for you, Be warmed and filled.

We're having one of our agape feasts over here.

We've got all the food we need.

But hey, you know what?

We love you and we send them their way.

That's not showing love.

How we show the love of Christ is by saying, this is something that God has blessed us with.

We want to bless you.

And in the same time, that's not where we're going to leave it.

Because some churches, I'm going to speak real here.

Some, some churches stop with the social gospel.

Some churches stop at just feeding people and say, we're going to feed you.

Amen.

See ya.

But at the end of the day, we should feed people then physically, but then most importantly, we should feed them with the word of the gospel.

We should feed them with spiritual food that will never leave them hungry again.

And so in tandem, we show them the love with the material, but at the same time, we show them the love even more so by giving them the truth.

If you remember one of the principles in Ephesians 4, to speak the truth in love.

We should love our community enough to tell them the truth.

We should love our families that are unsaved enough to tell them the truth.

We should love our co workers enough to tell them the truth.

Folks, you don't have to beat them over the heads and be rude and be arrogant and be in a place of anger constantly.

But folks, if we don't share what with the people that we love, the greatest news ever.

Do we really love them?

And that's the question that we see throughout Scripture.

And so the up in and out rhythm, it's not something that's a magic formula.

It's just helping us align ourselves with the scriptural truths that are given to us in scripture.

I can't be the right evangelist.

Like, I can't share the gospel with someone if I'm not where I need to be with my relationship with God.

If I'm walking in rebellion, if I have no private time with Him.

I can't love the unsaved if I can't love the saved.

And so it's a building model that we get to a place where, yes, I'm walking with Christ, yes, I'm walking with others.

And now I can walk into the world and reach people for the cause of the gospel.

And so here in 2026, that's going to be our goal.

See, that's.

Pastor, I thought you were going to give us a vision of like, we're going to build buildings and we're going to go here, folks, we'll get to that.

It is my vision.

It is my plan.

Now, by the way, let me be clear when I say vision, because some people were confused about that.

Like, Pastor, so when did you get this vision?

Were you in the middle of the night and you saw it come up on the wall?

But when we talk about vision, we're talking about direction.

We're talking about God's leading in our life.

And folks, it shouldn't just be my vision.

This isn't pastor's vision.

If I get up here and tell you all the things that I want, most of you are going to be like, well, you know, I want the bucks to win the Super Bowl.

None of you guys would want that.

Okay?

That's the reality.

There's a lot of things in my life that I want, but it's not, it's not God's will for it to come to pass.

So, so it's a following God's will and then really it's God's plan.

It's God's vision for the church.

You know what, let me just talk to you materially, just for a moment.

Yes, it is my vision for this church to be in a place where everything we got everything paid off.

We're debt free and we're building a new building.

Folks, I believe in one day of expansion.

Growth of physical expansion.

If we have enough people, we got to build it.

There's was that.

There's like, you know, if you build it, they'll come.

There's that philosophy.

I'm not so much saying that, but what I am saying is this.

Some of you know, I'm just going to speak in the practical here for a minute.

On Sunday mornings, every single room for our Sunday school classes are filled.

Not, not the rooms aren't filled, but we're using every room.

Now.

Let's fill up all of those rooms and hey, that's great.

I would love it for the fact that like, we can't even fit everyone into this building.

And so those, those material things come, but those material things mean nothing unless we're where we need to be.

Unless we're aligned with scripture, unless we're walking in unity.

Folks, I'd rather have a million miles deep and 2 inches wide than think that we're so wide and we're not deep at all with.

With spiritual things.

What I would encourage you guys to think about is this and encourage myself to think about is this year my goal should be.

Our goal should be as a church, not to just get things, even though getting things is a great thing, but to say, where can we grow in the Lord?

And that's why I put up there growing together and then going together.

We can't go together unless we're growing together in Christ.

And so what I would like you to think about here as we go through this study is where am I at on the model of where I'm at with my relationship with God?

God.

Where's.

Where's my up.

Where's my in.

You might say, well, I don't know any.

I. I come to this church, I don't know anybody else.

I come into my pew, I go home, I don't know anybody.

Let's change that, guys.

Let's like, let that not be so.

The only person that should not know anyone is someone who doesn't want to know anyone.

Like, let, let, let, let's.

I'm just going to be real here.

Let's.

Let's be kind and gracious to people when they come in.

Let's treat everyone like they're our family.

Not some of us are more social than others.

I get that.

So you guys know that I can stand in front of a group of people and like, I'm okay, but you put me on a one on one.

I'm.

I'm scared, I'm nervous.

I don't know why.

That's the way that God wired me.

I'm super nervous when it's one on one.

I understand there's a.

There's.

I'm not condemning being introverted and extrovert.

I'm not talking about that.

Talking about just living the love of Christ out where God calls you to live it out.

For some people that's in certain capacities of greeting and some people that's behind the scenes.

But everyone has the opportunity to live that way and to live openly and boldly for the love of Christ.

And so what I would say is this.

There shouldn't be an excuse for anybody that comes to Middletown Baptist Church to say, I don't know anybody, or I can't find a place here.

Folks.

We've got so many opportunities for service this year.

We're going to be talking about multiple small groups that are going to be starting within our church and not just small groups within the buildings, but in homes and in, in the community.

And what I would encourage you to do is find some area, not all areas.

We can't get into every area.

But what I would encourage you is to find at least one area for you to find connections within the church outside of the Sunday morning service.

It could be a small group, it could be a Sunday school class, it could be a service ministry.

But folks, I encourage you to, and I'm encouraging myself to find relationships outside of the Sunday morning.

That's where it starts.

Maybe that's where the invitation comes.

But I'm going to encourage you and challenge you to get to that place where the inward relationship is as vital as any other relationship that we have within our Christian walk.

And then, then we get to a place where we're challenged to go out and, and, and then go and serve to the community and how we're dealing with those around us.

And so it's a time where the mission of God can materialize and we can see folks coming to Jesus Christ.

And so that's a lot to be said.

Next week, we're going to come back in each.

For the next three weeks.

What we're going to do is we're going to break down each one of these categories.

And so next week we're going to look at how we can grow in our personal relationship with Christ.

What are some things, scripturally speaking, that we can do to strengthen our walk with Him.

Some of you might say, well, Pastor, I'm not where I need to be.

And I think that's a vague statement, because really, are any of us where we need to be?

Well, none of us are where we need to be, because we all can grow.

But there are some true tests that we can take in our life scripturally to say, you know what?

I'm at least on the right path.

I'm at least walking worthy of the vocation, which I'm called.

But I can tell you this, and I don't think this is taking too much of a risk, but the reality is that if we are Christians, but we're not reading our Bibles, we're not praying, we're not finding any private time with God.

We're not.

We're not talking about him, we're not thinking about Him.

I would venture to say that we're not in a growing relationship with Him.

What if I told you I love my wife?

My wife and I are the closest we've ever been.

I. I love her to death.

I'm I'm a wonderful husband.

She loves me.

And.

But I was like, yeah, it's been like.

It's been like two or three months since I've, like, talked to her.

You know, we just have different schedules and we just.

I'm not worried about it.

Well, what's going on in her life?

I have no idea.

She's great, though.

Some of you would say, pastor, we need to have some really serious conversations right now, right?

Because that doesn't make sense.

That doesn't even make sense to the person who is unsaved.

Like, how can you say you love someone but not spend time with them?

How can you say you love somebody and not know anything about them?

And I know that it's a little bit pressing and stepping on toes to a degree.

And so it's not a matter of you being a bad Christian or a good Christian.

It's just a matter of growing in our relationship with him.

So next week, what we're going to do is we're going to isolate that relationship of up.

How can I grow in that?

First of all, how can I be initiated into the family of God?

But then how can I grow in that?

And then next week after that, we're going to look at the idea of that relationship within.

How can we grow, like, physically speaking, how can we get into a place where I'm meeting and studying and discipling and being a part of that relationship?

And then ultimately, the third week, we'll talk about how we can go out.

And so it started with one sermon, and it's now morphed into four in a sermon series.

But I hope that it's something that you come back for and you say, you know what?

I want to be a part of this.

I want this to be the rhythm of my life.

I want this to be the rhythm of our church.

I. I know for me, this is where I want us to be, because a word that you're going to be hearing a lot this year and to a point where I, you know, if you get sick of it, that's okay.

But it's going to happen is you're going to hear the word discipleship a lot.

Because discipleship is the purpose of the church.

We need to disciple others.

Guess what's going to happen if in 20, 30 years, we don't disciple the church?

We're not going to have a church.

We're not going to have ministry leaders.

And so I'm thankful for folks in the past who have discipled people here today, but we have to Take the initiative to start discipling the next generation.

We have to disciple Christians.

And so we.

We'll talk about what that means in the discipleship model.

But what we need to do as a church is we need to say, look, not pastor, not deacons, but look to the place where the Lord is our guide.

And if we go to His Word, I guarantee you you're going to see these models over and over again in the New Testament.

You're going to see it over and over again in the early church.

And I would encourage you to pray about this and to go through this process.

If you're not a member of Middletown Baptist Church, or maybe you're coming today and you're skeptical, maybe you've never trusted in Jesus as your Savior.

The best decision that you can ever make is to start the life of being a child of God.

The Bible says, for by grace are you saved through faith and then not of yourselves.

It is a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.

It's such a freeing, empowering feeling to know that I am not in control of my life.

But God is a control.

I can't do enough.

I'll never be able to do enough.

But God has done everything for me so that he's guiding my path.

Just as much as he saved me, he's guiding me.

And then if I feel like I'm out of control, if I feel like I'm overwhelmed, the beauty is, is that I don't have to bear those burdens.

The Bible says I can lay those burdens at the foot of the cross and say, lord, you take control.

And the Bible says we have victory.

And so if you're here today, and that's something that you need, we're going to have a few moments of invitation here.

And I want you to think about that.

I want you to come forward and know that the Bible says, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, we've all fallen short and there's a price to be paid for our sin.

There's a payment, the Bible says, for the wages of sin is death.

But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ.

Our Lord Jesus offered that gift of grace.

Jesus died on the cross for our sins.

And folks, I'm going to tell you a church that is marked by the fruitfulness of God.

As a church that rests in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, unapologetically, we celebrate, we talk about, we live in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

If we ever get afraid to mention the Blood of Jesus Christ.

If we ever get afraid of mentioning the sin that we are plagued with, if we forget to mention that it's only through Jesus Christ that we can be saved, we've missed the mark, we've lost the picture.

We have to go back to the gospel.

Always.

You say the gospel is for the unsaved, the gospel's for the unsaved, but the gospel is for the saved.

We need to be reminded every single day because we're tempted to drift back.

We're tempted to drift back into that place of apathy, to that place of bitterness, to that place of loneliness.

And the Bible says that the gospel is what drives us back to the love of Christ.

And the love of Christ drives us to the love of others.

The love of others drives us to a place of ultimately walking in the will of God.

And the so here this morning, the gospel is not just for those that are unsaved, even though the gospel is what changes a life, but also the gospel is for all of us.

Sometimes we just need to be reminded of that.

And so here for the next few moments, I'm going to ask you to if you're able to stand with me, every head bowed, every eye closed.

The music's going to play here for the next few minutes.

And what I'd like to do is just send out an invitation, an invitation for you to respond to the preaching of the word of God here this morning we talked a lot about a lot, a lot of topics have been brought up here this morning.

But here this morning, maybe something spoke to you.

Maybe it was a matter of the up relationship, my relationship with God in an individual level.

Maybe you recognize my spiritual walk has been lacking, my personal prayer time has been lacking, my Bible study's been lacking.

I just really haven't had those desires.

Maybe come back this morning to rededicate yourself to the Lord.

The Bible says draw near to the Lord or draw nigh to God and what he will draw nigh to you.

He will draw near to you.

And so here this morning, maybe it's that or maybe it's secondly, I, I, I love God, but I'm having a really hard time with my relationship with others and finding connections within the church.

Maybe come forward here this morning and ask God to renew your heart in that desire to make connections with the family of God.

Maybe it's a challenge of going and proclaiming publicly what Jesus Christ has done for you in, in the matter of going out.

I don't know what it is here this morning, but come today.

Respond to Him.

Ask him for strength.

Ask him for clarity.

Ask him for purpose.

Ask him for you to be able to be used by Him.

He's ready and willing to use you.

He's looking for willing vessels.

And here this morning, Nicole this morning, the the Challenge of the Gospel Are we willing to follow and proclaim the Gospel in our lives?

Lord, I pray that you be in this time of invitation, working hearts and lives.

I pray that things need to be dealt with today that they can be dealt with.

Lord, help us to get to where we need to be this year.

The Rhythm of Up, in and out.

Lord, may we be the church that follows the biblical culture and not the culture of this world.

We ask all these things in Jesus name.

Amen.

As the music plays, follow as the Lord leads here this morning.

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church Podcast.

I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.

You would like to find out more information about our church or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org or find us on Facebook or YouTube.

You could also email me directly at Josh Massaro at middletownbaptistchurch.

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Thank you so much.

God Bless.

Have a wonderful day.