NNCC Plenary Session 2 - Ed Stetzer

Note...this message alone was worth the trip...

A new church will move beyond addition by being MISSIONAL.

"You shall be my witnesses..."

Acts 16:7-10 When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, "Come over to Macedonia and help us." After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.

1) COME OVER TO MACEDONIA

- John 3:16 leads to John 20:21

- sometimes even Paul didn't know where to go

- DON'T GO AND PLANT A CHURCH IF ALL YOU HAVE IS A VISION FOR THE CHURCH. YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE A VISION FOR THE PEOPLE

- You've got to love your community, not someone elses

- too many planters are in love with someone else's community

- Planting the gospel will lead to planting a church which will lead to changing the community

- Make Christ preminent -- not your church

2) HELP

- the most important help you can give is to remind people that it's all about JESUS

- the proclamation of the gospel has to be preminent

- IT'S GOT TO BE ABOUT A BLOODY CROSS AND AN EMPTY TOMB!

- the HELP we've got to bring is the help of the gospel

- we've got a problem when relevance becomes the goal in our churches...RELEVANCE IS SIMPLY A TOOL...NEVER THE GOAL...THE GOSPEL IS THE GOAL

HOW DO WE EXPRESS A LOSS OF CONFIDENCE IN THE GOSPEL?

- when we focus on personal transformation and not gospel transformation

- when sermons become so practical, they lack any gospel

- when the approach makes you the hero and not God

- when your outreach demeans others who are sharing the gospel

- when attendance is a bigger value than conversions

- when the cross gets less focus than the church

- when not offending seekers is more important than telling the gospel...we need to shift from being seeker sensitive to seeker comprehensible

3) US

- us is the lost world around us

- we've got to get desperate about reaching the lost

- John Knox's prayer to God, "Give me Scotland or I die."

- MAKE THE HARD CHOICE...go after those without Christ