Summit Life with J.D. Greear

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Today on Summit Life with JD.

Speaker 2 (00:01):
Greer, people say, yes, what's not my spiritual gift? Yes,
there are certain people who have an extraordinary endowment of
that ability, the gift of the evangelist. But there's a
difference between a gift given especially to some and a
responsibility given to all believers. And that is a command
that's given to all, not a gift that is given
to a few.

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Welcome to Summit Life, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Pastor JD. Greer.
I'm your host, Molly Vidovich. In case you missed Summit Life. Yesterday,
we kicked off a new teaching series called Scent, which
takes a fresh look at what it means to live
life on the mission field. Now, if you're like most people,
you probably think that living on mission is something for
super Christians or those with a special calling or gifting,

(00:52):
the varsity level of Christianity. Right, But the Bible teaches
us that the complete opposite is true. God wants to
use you, use me, and use all of us to
accomplish his purposes. Right now, today, Pastor JD. Is teaching
us a whole new perspective to consider, So get ready
to be challenged we're in the Book of Acts, Chapter one,
verses one through eight. Here's Pastor JD.

Speaker 2 (01:17):
Are we as a church just doing ministry we run
in an institution, or are we part of a movement?
For you personally, the question is is the church a
place that you attend, Is it a place where you
have religious services provided to you, or is it a
movement that you personally are a part of. Movements move
And if you're not moving, you're not part of the movement.

(01:39):
So let's go to the scripture, and I want to
show you how all this started. Acts one. Let's come
down to verse six and we'll start there. Jesus had
just resurrected, and now he's standing from on the hillside
with his disciples, and he goes through this verse sex.
They asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore
the kingdom to Israel? Verse seven. He said to them,
it's not for you to know the times or seasons
that the Father fixed by his own authority. But you

(02:02):
will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.
And you're going to be my witnesses in Jerusalem and
in all Judea and Samaria into the ends of the earth,
and after he'd said these things. As they were looking on,
he was lifted up and a cloud took him out
of their sight. That's where it all began. Two thousand
years later, here we are still reveling in the movement

(02:23):
that was started on a hillside with eleven fishermen, carpenters,
tax collectors, and it's still reverberating. Two important things about
that movement that made it move. Number One, the message
captured their hearts and minds. The message absolutely captured their
hearts and mind And so my question for you is

(02:43):
as it captured yours. They'd seen this Jesus command hurricanes,
they'd seen him converse with angels. They had seen him
controlled demons, walk on water, heal lepers, and raise the dead.
Yet in the hour he needed access to those powers
the most, he turned his back on them willingly so
he could offer his life as a sacrifice for their sins.

(03:04):
And they said, that is a God who needs to
be glorified and known throughout all the world. Right, So
here's my question for you. It's very simple. Do you
actually believe this testimony? Do you believe it? Has it
captured your heart until you can't shut up about it?
Are you willing to go anywhere with it and give
up anything for him, because if not, you're not part
of the movement. Here's number two. The apostles yielded themselves

(03:29):
to the leadership of the Spirit. Have you yielded yourself
to the leadership of the spirit. The assignment they were
given was extraordinary. Never had a more important assignment been
given to a less capable group of people. How would
they accomplish it? The clue, very important clue has given
you in verse one. People always overlooked this word in

(03:52):
the first book, Acts one one. Luke the writer, well,
what's the first book? He's referring to the Gospel of Luke.
Luke Acts as like a two volume compendium. So in
the first book Luke, Gospel of Luke, Oh, Theopholis? Who's Theophilis?
It's a skeptic that Luke is writing the book for
I've dealt with all that. Jesus. Look at this word began.

(04:14):
That's a very important word. Began to do and to teach,
began implies continuation. It wasn't that. In the Gospel of
Luke you see Jesus teaching, and now in Acts you
see the church teaching. What you see is Jesus begin
to do and to teach in the Gospel of Luke
through his fleshly body, and now he continues to do

(04:37):
and to teach through his church body. That's why Jesus,
after giving them the great commission in Acts one to eight,
tells them to wait, which I've told you before had
to be the hardest assignment for some of them, because
I mean, when you get that kind of assignment, you're like, wait,
we don't have time to wait. And we got books
to write, we got preaching conferences to organize, Peter and
Peter's got to preach, and we got with you. John's

(04:58):
got to write a book several Let's got to write
a book. Well, what do you mean, Wait, wait, wait
for an indefinite amount of time because I need you
to sit on your rear in and understand that this
is not something you're going to do for me. This
is something I'm going to do through you. And that's
going to be a huge distinction. And so in every
chapter of Acts, as you read it, you're going to
get the sense of the church is just following the Spirit.
The Spirit is the real mover. He's working in people

(05:19):
over here and he's moving believers from one place to another.
They're just yielding themselves to him as he goes about
building his church. So the question is have you yielded
yourself to him to be used by him? You know
I've pointed out to you before that the Book of Acts,
if you read it to the end, it has no
real ending. It's a cliffhanger. You know what a cliffhanger is.
That's how Luke ends the Book of Acts. Why did

(05:41):
he end it that way? Because the movement had just begun.
It wasn't the end. It was the end of anything,
of the beginning. And so the movement continues to move.
The Spirit of God is moving you into people's lives
to complete the great commission. So, believer, I want you
to read Jesus's promise in verse eight as a direct
promise to you. So whenever I get to the word

(06:03):
you and verse eight, I'm gonna read it again. I
want you to insert your name in your mind. Okay,
but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has
come upon and will be my witness. Two ways I
want to identify the Spirit's power comes upon you. The
first one is spiritual gifts. Every believer has one. I

(06:23):
wish I had more time to talk about it, but
I don't this weekend. But it's there are various gifts
and things like hospitality, serving, preaching. God gives every believer
one for the sake of his purposes of the mission.
Here's a question, do you know what yours is? If
you cannot tell me what your spiritual gift is, there
is no possible way you're walking in the power of
the spirit. How could you if you don't even know

(06:44):
what gift He's given you. A friend of mine illustrated
it this way. I don't have time or actually the
ability to do this on our stage. He brought up
seven people from the audience and he had him standing
behind him, and he had him act out a firetruck,
like they all had jobs in the fire trucks. You
got a guy drive in, you get to copil it.
He got the guy with the hose, and then you
got the guy you know in the back who's like
steering whatever that thing is in the back. And so

(07:04):
he goes through and he tells them their signment has
him acted out, and they're looking all ridiculous up there,
and everybody laughing, and then he goes and he goes
one by one. He says, A right, no, know what's
your purpose? I drive? What's your purpose? I steer the back.
What's your purpose? I get, I take the hose and
make sure that he gets to you know, to the fire.
And he goes through all of them and he says, okay.
He says, I actually tricked all of you because your
purpose is to put out fires. And all these different
things that you're doing there are really not into themselves.

(07:27):
They're part of the mission. The most important mission of
that fire truck is to put out fires. So the
purpose of all these spiritual gifts is to propel the
mission of Jesus forward as he makes disciples of all
peoples on earth. The second thing the Spirit of God
did for these believers beyond giving them spiritual gifts. Listen
to this, is he empowered each of them to testify

(07:49):
all of them. The Holy Spirit did a lot of
different things in Luke and Acts, but the main thing
he does is he feels people to preach. In fact,
write it down. Anytime when you see the Spirit of
God fills somebody in the Book of Acts or Luke,
it always comes out here and they start proclaiming the
word of God. When the Spirit of God feels here,

(08:10):
the Word of God starts spouting out here every time.
Luke one fifteen. John the Baptist, being filled with the Spirit,
proclaims the coming of the Lord. Luke one forty to one. Elizabeth,
being filled with the Spirit, proclaim blessing never marry Luke
one sixty seven. Zachariah, filled with the spirit, prophesied about
the coming glory of Jesus. Acts two for the Holy
Spirit filled the apostles, and they declared God's praises in
multiple languages. Acts four eight. Peter is filled with the
spirit and preaches to the rulers that Jesus is our

(08:31):
only hope of salvation. Acts four to thirty one. The
disciples are filled with the spirit, and they speak the
word of God boldly in the face of severe persecution.
Acts nine to twenty. Saul, who's been saved about two weeks,
is filled with the spirit, and immediately he begins to
preach in the synagogues. You got to kind of getting
the point there is that you is that you do
you regularly proclaim God's word to others, and do you
bring them to Jesus Because listen to me. If you

(08:53):
are not, you are not filled with the spirits, because
the spirit of God never fills here without the Word
of God coming out here. Now, I'm not even been
pastor a long time. Okay, I'm relatively very young, so
i have not been a pastor a long time. But
I've done this long enough to know what the excuses
I get. I'm going to go through a few of them.
I just don't have what it takes. Yes, you do,

(09:17):
because you've been given the spirit of God. That's what
it takes. Peter's sermon and Acts two was that the
spirit of God had come according to the prophecy of
Joel on your sons and daughters, who will prophesy. Being
a prophet in the Old Testament was a big hairy deal.
Your name was Elijah and Elishah, and you got books
written about you. Peter said, listen to this. God promised

(09:40):
that every Christian, every Christian, your sons and your daughters,
all of you are going to prophesy like they did
in the Old Testament. See that which was reserved for
heroes in the Old Testament becomes the standard fare of
believers in the New. In fact, Jesus would say this,
here's a question, who's the great prophet who ever lived?
Not counting Jesus Bible trivia time, who did Jesus say

(10:04):
was the greatest prophet who ever lived? John the Baptist?
Exactly right, John the Baptist, and the Gospel of Loot.
Jesus said, John the Baptist was the greatest prophet who
ever lived. But I'm telling you, the least in the kingdom,
his kingdom is greater than John the Baptist. When you realize, okay,

(10:25):
least in the kingdom, somebody here is the least capable
and least talented in our church. I mean, just mathematics
tells you that has to be true. Right. Some of
you are like, I think that's me, and God up
in Heaven's going yep, that's you. You are the least
in the kingdom, right, I mean it has to be true.
If everybody turn and point to the person, you think

(10:46):
that is true. Now I'm kidding, but Jesus said that
you are greater than John the Baptist. Why, because you've
seen Jesus and because you have the spirit of God.
So do not tell me you have what it takes.
Because you are greater in your potential than John the Baptist.

(11:10):
Rupert Leary, one of our pastors on staff here, says
there are only two convictions of an effective witness, only two.
Once you get these two things, piece of cake, He says.
Their first conviction is that the spirit of God is
constantly a work around you, preparing people. He's always working,
and so you're just figuring out where he's going to work,
and you're going to join him, and you're asking questions
to figure out where that is. He said, Number two,
the spirit of God uses you to speak the word

(11:31):
of God. If you are convinced the spirit of God
does at work around you, and you are convinced the
spirit of God is in you to speak the word
of God, he said, you'll become a natural and very
effective witness, regardless of your personality or how awkward you
fill around people. A right people say this, well, it's
not my spiritual gift. Yes, there are certain people who
have an extraordinary endowment of that ability, the gift of
the evangelist. But there's a difference between a gift given

(11:54):
specially to some and a responsibility given to all believers.
And that is a command that's given to all, not
a gift that is given to a few.

Speaker 1 (12:03):
Thanks for listening to Summit Life with Pastor JD. Greer.
In case you haven't heard yet, we have a brand
new premium resource for all of our gospel partners and
financial supporters this month. It's Pastor JD's newest book, Twelve
Truths and a Lie, and it comes with an accompanying
discussion guide crafted to help you talk about the book
with those around you. Just like the title suggests, Twelve

(12:25):
Truths and a Lie tackle some of the biggest questions
we all face, like how could a good God send
people to hell? And how should Christians handle political differences?
And can I know that I'm going to Heaven? I
mean talk about some hot topics. Anyone who gives thirty
five dollars or more to this ministry or joins us
as a monthly gospel partner this month will receive not

(12:45):
only Pastor JD's new book, but also the discussion guide.
Take time to dig into your questions because the answers
are there. Don't wait another minute. Join us as a
Gospel partner or give a one time gift today by
calling eight six, six, three, three five fifty two twenty
or by heading to Jdgreer dot com. Thank you for

(13:06):
your ongoing support that makes this program possible. We couldn't
do it without you. Now let's get back to today's
teaching once again. Here's Pastor JD.

Speaker 2 (13:16):
People say this one. I hear this one all the time. Oh,
I witness with my life, and I always want to
be like, how do you do that? Because the gospel
is not like a message about how awesome you are
as a person. The gospel is a message about what
Jesus did two thousand years ago. It's the story of
what Jesus came to do that you couldn't do. So

(13:38):
how do you demonstrate it by what you do? Right? How?
I mean? I realize you can, you can be a
good example of it, but you can't actually preach it
without doing it. Trying to be a witness with just
your life is like trying to watch a newscast with
the sound turned down. I'm like, that dude's excited about something,
but I don't know what he's talking about. Right how?

(13:58):
It's a message. You can't do it if you're life.
You know the statement that always gets attributed to Francis
I of a CC preach the gospel. When necessary, use words.
I've told you. That's like me telling you tell me
your phone number. If necessary, use digits. Your number is

(14:18):
a series of digits. You have to use digits when
telling me that you see the gospel is a message
that you have to use words. Yeah, I'm glad that
you share your lunch. I grew up with Christians who
are like, yeah, the way a witness is not drinking
beer at dinner in front of my business coworkers. I'm like, yeah,
that's supposed to tell them about the sacrificial death of
Jesus and now he resurrected from the dead, forgive their
sins and put their lives back together. If that makes sense,

(14:38):
don't drink your beer. You're doing your job. What is
they talking about? I'm gonna get angry. How about this one.
I don't have time. I don't have time. I get up,
I go to work, come home, try to play with
my kids, watch a little TV, go to bed, get up,
do the thing the next day, watch rans repeat. I
don't have time. Love what Daniel Simmons are North Raley

(15:01):
Campus pastor? Hello Daniel, He says, Oh, you're busy, really
Jesus was busy too, saving the world and everything. Wat
so this is a great statement, but he was busy
with people. He was busy with people. In fact, when
Jesus gave the Great Commission, the way it literally reads
in Greek is as you're going, as you're going throughout life,
make disciples as you go. A friend of mine, Tim Chester,

(15:23):
says this, Yett, write this down. Evangelism is doing normal
life with gospel intentionality. Evangelism is doing normal life with
gospel intentionality. Does it makes sense? I want to her
to lady say this one time. She's like, yeah, I
quit being able to take my son to soccer practice
because I had too much ministry to do at the church.

(15:43):
And my response to her is, why don't you look
at taking your kid to soccer practice with all the
unbelieving people you're gonna meet as the ministry of the church,
Because you know what I mean. You can hang out
with save people all day long, but that's not the
Great Commission. That's why we don't try to hyper schedule
you here at this church. We don't want you involved
in eighty five different programs here at the church. I'd
rather you be hanging out with people who don't know Jesus.

(16:05):
I already know Jesus. I don't want you to hang
out with me. I mean I like you, and we'll
hang out sometimes, we'll do this. I love this, But
why are we going to hang out with that when
the great Commission is out there? Right? So yeah, go
be busy, but be busy with people and be making
disciples as you go. All right? How about this one?
Talking to other people about Jesus makes me feel weird?

(16:25):
Of course it does. I I alread evangelism defined before
is two very nervous people talking to each other. Right,
that's true for me. But see, here's the thing. It's
you got to ask. This is the message important enough
to be worth a little weirdness, to be honest, Sadistically,
I'm kind of looking forward to hearing you explain that

(16:46):
excuse to Stephen or Paul and when you get to heaven.
Oh why why didn't you bring you by Christ? Just
let me feel awkward and weird? Oh yeah, well I
got stunned, I got beaten with rods three times, got
my head hacked off. She felt weird. Yeah, that's a

(17:07):
good excuse. Evangelism is always uncomfortable. But it's worth it.
It's worth rethinking your career, it's worth rethinking where you live.
People that go into places like Afghanistan and Turkey and
Indonesia don't go there because they have a flair for
living overseas. They go there because they know that they
could live fifteen minutes from their parents. But they know

(17:30):
that there are people around the world who've never heard
about Jesus, and it just seems worth it to them.
When I thought I was called to the mission field,
I told my mother, I'm like, you know what you
and dad you love, and you know Jesus, and there's
a bunch of people around the world who've never heard
about him. We get eternity together, we get to rejoice
in eternity forever. And if God is going to take
me to a place where we've got to tell other
people about Jesus, it just seems like it's worth it

(17:51):
to go through a lot of weirdness and a lot
of discomfort down here so that we have eternity with
the souls of people there. You see, once all the
excuses have been brought forward and vetted, the real question
that remains as simply this, do you want to bring
other people to Jesus, because if you did, you figure
it out. If you did you figure it out. You
ever heard the statement the necessities the mother of invention.

(18:13):
That's true in evangelism too. To be honest with yourself,
it's not a technique problem. It's a belief problem, or
it's an apathy problem. How possibly could you say you
believe the gospel and had even the slightest shred of
compassion and be quiet about it. Charles Spurgeon said this,
If Jesus is precious to you, you will not be

(18:35):
able to keep your good news to yourself. You'll be
whispering it into your child's here, You'll be telling it
to your husband, You'll be earnestly imparting it to your friends.
Without the charms of eloquence. You will become more than eloquent,
because your heart will start to speak, and as you do,
your eyes will flash as you talk of His sweet love.
Every Christian here is either a missionary or an impost.

(18:57):
You either try to spread abroad the Kingdom of Christ,
or else you do not love him at all. Movements move,
and if you're not moving, have you really believed the message?
Those are the two principles that launched the movement, radical,
deep seated belief in the message, and yielding themselves to
the spirit who move them. So in light of that summon, listen,
here's how I see our church. We want to be

(19:19):
a movement, plain and simple. And by the way, let
me go and let this cat out of that. I
don't care if we grow huge doing it, because movements
tend to become huge, right, Listen, Then they're all in
a small church. A lot of churches in Acts start small,
but when the movement starts to move, they tend to
grow big. I don't like being a part of the
big church. Well, you wouldn't have liked being a part
of the church in Acts two, three, four, and five. Either,

(19:39):
Peter's preaching the three thousand people are getting saved. They're
trying to figure out how to baptize them all. Then
then by the time they get that under wraps and
they got half of them baptized, five thousand more people
get saved. They're like, Peter, would you stop preaching? Right,
we're trying to get organized here. You wouldn't have liked
it then, And by the way, not to be unfair,
you're probably not gonna like it, Inaven either. I don't
like worshiping in large crowds. Have you read Revelation five?

(20:06):
We want to empower and release you to follow the spirit. Yeah,
I've told you before that there are forty miracles in Acts,
thirty nine of them happening outside the church. I'm glad
you think the power of God annoints my sermons. I'd
much rather I see thirty nine out of forty miracles
on the summit church happen outside these walls. So my
point is not for you to just come sit here
and listen to me. Be filled with the spirit of God.

(20:27):
And my point is that you fill the spirit of
God and take his healing power everywhere in our community
that it doesn't exist, right. I heard old Southern Matters
pastors saying this the other day. He said, he meant well,
I mean well, he was on a radio and he
said he said, to church, he's not a cruise ship.
Totally agree with that. Church is not a cruise ship.
Then he said this, he said, the church is a
battleship almost because a battleship, what's to do? It goes

(20:52):
and parks itself in front of an island and then
obliterates the island. Right, that's not what a church does
a church. If you're gonna choose a ship, I would
say an aircraft carrier, because an aircraft carrier equips planes
to go to the battle somewhere else. When the battles
are happening on an aircraft carrier, that's bad, right. The

(21:13):
aircraft's purpose is to equip and sin so that the
battle is taken to where the battle needs to be fought.
We never want to become just a Christian ministry that
takes care of our own needs or a place that
people attend. It's why we end every one of our
services by standing you up and not saying you are dismissed,
but you are well. That's right, you are sinn. It's
why we push our small groups to multiply. I realize

(21:34):
it's more comfortable for you to get to know one
group of people and hang out with them for the
next thirty years while you sit around and stare at
your navels. I know that that's more comfortable. But we
also know there's a lot of people in our community
that don't know Jesus, and it's worth going through uncomfort
because God is God's like a spiritual cyclone. He never
draws you in without propelling you back out, and that's

(21:55):
never comfortable, but the message is worth it. It's why I'm
challenging your small group to go on a mission trip
this year together that you become you become a small
group that is committed to being sent. Are you engaged?
Are you moving? And by the way, it's not always
in an organized ministry. Talking to a church member the
other day, he was talking about a homeless guy that

(22:17):
he met, led to Christ and has seen his life
get put back together. He didn't do that for the
homeless ministry. He did it because he loves know Jesus
as access to the power of the spirit and saw
a guy in need. Are you engaged? Because he this
There is nowhere that's going to be revealed more accurately
than in how you pray. When you're following Jesus, your

(22:38):
prayer ceased to be Can I say it stupid? And
they start to become about the mission. If God answered
all the prayers that you prayed last week, here's aubascity.
If God answered all the prayers you prayed last week
in one fell swoop, how many new people would be
in the Kingdom this week. See that's a barometer. It
shows you where your heart is and all this.

Speaker 1 (23:00):
The church is a movement and guess what movements move.
If you're standing still, have you really embraced the message?
Let me encourage you to engage in the mission of God.
Today you're listening to Summit Life with Pastor JD.

Speaker 2 (23:14):
Greer.

Speaker 1 (23:15):
If you missed any part of this first message in
our new teaching series, you can listen again free of
charge at Jdgreer dot com. Like I shared earlier in
the show, We've got a brand new premium resource for
all of our gospel partners and anyone who gives to
support Jdgreer Ministries this month. It's Pastor JD's latest book,
Twelve Truths in a Lie, along with the bonus discussion Guide.

(23:38):
It's a perfect fit to parallel our current teaching series
for two reasons. First of all, Pastor JD wrote the
book to include some of the most frequently asked questions
that he receives as a pastor, which means that it
can help grow your faith or help answer some of
the tough questions you may hear from non believers around
you as you strive to live sent And the second

(23:58):
reason this combo pair so well with our Scent series
is because the discussion guide is designed to help unpack
the questions and answers from the book in a conversational,
family friendly format, which is perfect for your discussions with
your older children or small groups, or again evangelistic conversations
with someone who's exploring Christianity. We'll send you twelve Truths

(24:19):
in a Lie and it's a companying discussion guide With
your gift of thirty five dollars or more to this
ministry to give call us now at eight six six
three three five fifty two twenty that's eight six six
three three five fifty two twenty, or visit us online
at Jdgreer dot com. I'm Molli Vidovich. Be sure to

(24:40):
join us tomorrow as Pastor JD talks about the coming
of the Holy Spirit and the birth of the Church.
We'll see you Wednesday on Summit Light with JD.

Speaker 2 (24:48):
Greer.

Speaker 1 (24:53):
Today's program was produced and sponsored by Jdgreer Ministries.