Family Business Series 4, Our Values# 2

Family Business Series 4, Our Values# 2
By: Zach Sloane

“Transforming lives to IMPACT their world.” Impact Verbs We Value

Recap:

Luke 2:49 (NKJV)
“And He said to them, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?”

Jesus was engagedin His Father’s business. So are we!

Week #1– we learned that it is the church that He has chosen to be the vehicle through which He wouldfill the Earth with the knowledge of His glory– a decision and a goal born right out of the love of God in the Trinity.

Ephesians 3:10-11
“God’s purpose in all this was to use the church to display his wisdom in its rich variety to all the unseen rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. This was his eternal plan, which he carried out through Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Week #2– We looked at what makes us at Impact Church unique and distinct, our priorities and beliefs that reflect the revelation and impartation of Christ in this distinct body of believers.

1. Authentic Love
2. Amazing Grace
3. Sincere Faith
4. Purposeful Mission
5. Equipping Ministries
6. Vibrant Gatherings
7. Intentional Excellence

Week #3– We looked at the first four of our values and saw how they interact with our priorities, all connected to the cosmological purpose of God.

1. Enjoy
2. Connect
3. Follow
4. Discover

Verb #5 INVITE

Once you have encountered Jesus you want to invite others.

John 1:41-42“Andrew went to find his brother, Simon, and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which means “Christ”). Then Andrew brought Simon to meet Jesus.”

Luke 2:17 “After seeing him, the shepherds told everyone…”

John 4:28-29“The woman left her water jar beside the well and ran back to the village, telling everyone, ‘Come and see a man who told me everything I ever did! Could he possibly be the Messiah?ʼ”

This is the normal reaction of people who have been touched by Jesus; you know that you and your life are not the same… you want to share that news.

What do you typically think of when you think of evangelism?

We live in a secular society… the model of evangelism that assumes you have instant access to people, then immediately communicate the gospel in a thirty-second, cold, first-time encounter, lead someone to Jesus on the spot, and they live happily ever after, happens, but is not the norm.

What do you believe or expect about church?

The church is where you encounter TRUTH!

1 Timothy 3:15 (NLT)
“… so that if I am delayed, you will know how people must conduct themselves in the household of God. This is the church of the living God, which is the pillar and foundation of the truth.”

The church is where mutual strengthening, life-giving relationships and connection are made.

1 Corinthians 14:26
“Well, my brothers and sisters, let’s summarize. When you meet together, one will sing, another will teach, another will tell some special revelation God has given, one will speak in tongues, and another will interpret what is said. But everything that is done must strengthen all of you.”

The gathered Church is where Jesus can be encountered first-hand.

Matthew 18:20 (NLT)
“For where two or three gather together as my followers, I am there among them.”

We tell, we invite, we connect with Jesus. But they have to come and seefor themselves.

John 4:28-29“The woman left her water jar beside the well and ran back to the village, telling everyone, ‘come and see a man who told me everything I ever did! Could he possibly be the Messiah?ʼ”

John 4:39-42
And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, “He told me all that I ever did.” So when the Samaritans had come to Him, they urged Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days. And many more believed because of His own word. Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him and we knowthat this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.”

Harvest happens when all people get to come just as they are and experience God themselves, first-hand, His presence.

Amos 9:11-14
“I will restore David’s fallen shelter— I will repair its broken walls and restore its ruins— and will rebuild it as it used to be, so that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations that bear my name,…“The days are coming…when the reaper will be overtaken by the plowman and the planter by the one treading grapes.”

Invite is also an invitation to be a disciple!

To follow Jesus is to go where he is, to be apart of what he is doing and where he is doing it. Must be added to the church… and coming is the first step in that discipleship process.

Acts 2:47 (NLT)
“all the while praising God and enjoying the goodwill of all the people. And each day the Lordadded to their fellowshipthose who were being saved.”

Acts 2:41 (NLT)
“Those who believed what Peter said were baptized and added to the churchthat day—about 3,000 in all.”

Hebrews 10:25 (NKJV)
“not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.”

For a successful Christian life, some assembly is required!

Matthew 28:19a
“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations…”

Verb #6 GIVE

Pastor Cheryl Thomas
“When Jesus broke the rules, upset the applecart, challenged the status quo, he did so in order to illustrate God’s priorities. The religious elite of his day where masters of marginalization, discrimination, violence, hatred, often dressed up in the sheep’s clothing of legal righteousness and religious zeal …. However one has only look to Jesus, the fullness of God’s self-disclosure and the very explication of God, to find example after example of what Divine priority really looks like.”

Jesus talked much about money.
1 of every 10 verses in Gospels deal directly with possessions.
16 of 38 parables are concerned with how to handle possessions. Bible has 500 verses on prayer, 500 on faith, 2000 on money.

Matthew 6:31, 33 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear? … But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.”

Matthew 6:21 (NKJV) “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Two Basic Approaches To Giving
1. I’ve Got To Give Pay the God tax. Pay the heat bill at the church. Keep God from getting angry.

2. I Get To Give Malachi 3:10 “Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, That there may be food in My house, And try Me now in this,” Says the Lord of hosts, “If I will not open for you the windows of heaven And pour out for you such blessing That there will not be room enough to receive it.”

2 Corinthians 9:6-7 (MSG) “Remember this—a farmer who plants only a few seeds will get a small crop. But the one who plants generously will get a generous crop. You must each decide in your heart how much to give. And don’t give reluctantly or in response to pressure. “For God loves a person who gives cheerfully.”

The Get To Give Approach Has:
1. Purpose

Engage Myself In BIGGER!

India: Pastor Koshy and New Life Ministries
Aberdeen Public School: Smart boards & sports uni’s and equipment, host graduation.
Haiti: Pastor John Dieubon, church, and orphanages.
Kids Camp: Local Community
Jamaica: tent, chairs, roof for the church building.
Barbados: Mentor leaders and bought chairs.
Christmas Hampers: Serve local community
Oneida House of Prayer: building repairs and fix broken windows.
Joshua and Janet Mills
London Pregnancy and Family Support Services
Teen Challenge
Youth For Christ: serving local youth
London Food Bank: donations and hosting
Western University Chaplain Services: partnership to serve students
Impact Church in Houston, TX.: Hurricane Relief
Impact Church Bridgewater, Nova Scotia.

Express Obedience/Faith Tangibly

This act of obedience has opened the door to the joy of obedience in other areas of my life. It builds my faith, expresses faith, and helps me demonstrate and document His goodness.

Connect With His Heart
I love why He loves and I love as he loves. John 3:16“For God so loved the world that He GAVE…”

PRIVILEGE – Partner in His redemptive plan.
God doesn’t desperately need what you have … you desperately need what he has. Don’t be generous emotionally … be generous intentionally.
I have been given an opportunity and not an obligation. I can rest and enjoy what he has given me, while being deeply engaged from my heart.
Pattern
1 Corinthians 16:2

“On the first day of the week let each one of you lay something aside, storing up as he may prosper, that there be no collections when I come.”

– Regularly – Proportionately – Passionately

2 Corinthians 9:8 (NKJV) “And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work.”

Ways to give:
Website: www.impactlondon.ca
E-transfer:cheryl@impactlondon.cawith Password: giving
Debit or Credit Card at Bookstore or Welcome Counter
Cash in envelope – in envelope
Tithe number found in bookstore or welcome counter.

Verb #7 SERVE
Matthew 20:25-28“But Jesus called them to Himself and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave— just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”

Servant leadership – we are all called to greatness.

John 13:3-5 (NLT)“Jesus knew that the Father had given him authority over everything and that he had come from God and would return to God. Sohe got up from the table, took off his robe, wrapped a towel around his waist, and poured water into a basin. Then he began to wash the disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel he had around him.”

We serve because like Jesus, we know who we are, what we are equipped with, what we are equipped to do, and we know where we are going.

Viktor Frankl in Man’s Search For Meaning– “Being human always points, and is directed, to something or someone, other than oneself—be it a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter. The more one forgets himself—by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love—the more human he is.”^[1]

To be fully activated and engaged inside and out, you need to be engaged in serving others and God’s cause.

Galatians 5:13 “For you, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.”

Jesus is building His church: Matthew 16:18“I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.”

But, he wants to do it by His Spirit in us and in partnership with us. Therefore, what God is looking to accomplish is going to take everyone fully engaged in serving.

Ephesians 4:15-16 “…grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ—from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share,causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.”

The Pareto principle(also known as the 80–20 rule, the law of the vital few, and the principle of factor sparsity) states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20%of the causes.

We want to remove that principle from our IMPACT church world … 100% moving together causing His glory to reach maximum effect.

Jesus has a place for each one of us. Know your self, know God, know your gifts, callings, and own them!

1 Corinthians 12:15-18 “If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I am not of the body,” is it therefore not of the body? And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I am not of the body,” is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where would be the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where would be the smelling? But now God has set the members, each one of them, in the body just as He pleased.”

We all have a ministry and gifts. Don’t despise or marginalize you and yours!

1 Peter 4:10 (NLT)“God has given each of us a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.”

S.H.A.P.E – the importance of Discover:

Matthew 11:28-30 (NLT) “Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.”

Don’t compartmentalize. Embrace all you gifts and all that you are.

Colossians 3:17 (NLT)“And whatever you do or say, do it as a representative of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through him to God the Father.”

Exodus 31:2-3 “See, I have called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah. And I have filled him with the Spirit of God, in wisdom, in understanding, in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship…”

Bezalel is the first person in Scripture to be described as “filled with the Spirit of God.”

1 Corinthians 12:1
“Now concerning spiritual (gifts), brethren, I do not want you to be ignorant:” (Pneumatikos:—spirituals- so much more than just gifts. Be the spiritual being you are, get engaged and serve!)

Donʼt be ignorant about your role in the Body of Christ and how it functions.

^[1]Viktor Frankl in Man’s Search For Meaning. Quoted by Adam Grant, “The No. 1 Feature of a Meaningless Job” in Psychology Today online. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/give-and-take/201401/the-no-1-feature-meaningless-job. Accessed July 23, 2019.

Jul 24-19 Family Business Series 4, Our Values# 2, notes to print, PDF