Preparing to Go on Mission

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So we did take them on a field trip to the wildlife refuge with the school, and I wanted them to tell you about some of the things that we had to do in preparation for that. Because we had to pack water, of course. You don’t go hiking without water. We had to pack a lunch. We had to come prepared in that way so that we could go out and see everything that we were going to see. And with the little ones, they took up on this nature hike. They called the Animal Olympics. And they had to act, do jumping and push-ups and things that were like different animals. And they got to see lizards and bison. We got to see a lot of ragweed, which is why I feel like I’m dying today. A lot of ragweed everywhere. But we had to prepare. And even just going out, before we went out, the rangers were preparing them for how this was supposed to go.

don’t stick your hands anywhere you can’t see thank you okay yeah you were there you you remember i should have interviewed you we’d still be up here though don’t put your hands anywhere you can’t see stay on the trail don’t touch anything you can’t identify these kinds of things they they were giving us instructions giving the kids instructions in preparation to go out and do this this mission this animal olympics hike that they were going on For any time we go out on any kind of important mission, we have to be prepared. And we’ve spent all of Luke chapter 9 with Jesus talking about the mission, talking about the mission that the disciples were about to go on, that 12 of them already had embarked on a little bit. And we come to chapter 10, and now it’s time for him to send them out again, to send them out better prepared, to send out more of them.

And that’s what we’re going to look at this morning, is this preparation that Jesus gave them to go on mission and what it teaches us about being on mission for him every day. Now, his preparation, his instructions were a little bit different from the instructions we were given. As a matter of fact, he tells them, don’t pack a lunch, opposite of us going out to the refuge. But we’re going to learn from the instructions Jesus gave them in preparation for their mission. So hopefully you’ve already turned with me to Luke chapter 10. And would you stand with me as we read together from God’s Word? And if you don’t have your Bible or can’t find Luke chapter 10, it’ll be on the screen for you. But here’s what it says. Now after this, the Lord appointed 70 others and sent them in pairs ahead of Him to every city and place where He Himself was going to come.

And he was saying to them, the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. Go, behold, I send you out as lambs in the midst of wolves. Carry no money belt, no bag, no shoes, and greet no one on the way. Whatever house you enter, first say, peace be to this house. If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him. But if not, it will return to you. Stay in that house, eating and drinking what they give you. For the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not keep moving from house to house. Whatever city you enter and they receive you, eat what is set before you. And heal those in it who are sick and say to them, the kingdom of God has come near to you.

But whatever city you enter and they do not receive you, go out into its streets and say, even the dust of your city which clings to our feet, we wipe off in protest against you. Yet be sure of this, that the kingdom of God has come near. I say to you, it will be more tolerable in that day for Sodom than for that city. Woe to you, Chorazin. Woe to you, Bethsaida. For if the miracles had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, which occurred in you, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you. And you, Capernaum, will not be exalted to heaven, will you? You will be brought down to Hades. The one who listens to you listens to me, and the one who rejects you rejects me, and he who rejects me rejects the one who sent me. And you may be seated.

so he’s preparing them for this mission that he’s sending them on again chapter 9 is all about preparation for the mission it just does not let up and the mission they were given which is the same mission we have today is the mission to tell other people about our king and to prepare them for his kingdom that was the mission they were given that’s the mission we were given as the church that’s the mission that still is our responsibility to carry out. Now, as I mentioned before, when he sent just the 12 out, we have the benefit that we understand more of the message about the king. They were coming, telling people that the king is coming. We get to go and tell people that the king has come and is coming again. We have the understanding that he died on the cross as the perfect sacrifice for our sins. We have the understanding that He rose again three days later to prove it.

We have the understanding and the promise that He is returning. So we have a fuller understanding of what it is we’re supposed to be sharing with the world than they did. But the mission ultimately is the same. We are telling people about our King and preparing them for His kingdom. So He’s given them this mission. He’s given us this mission. And we see some things that we can learn from in His preparation for sending them out. There’s a gap here between verse 16 and verse 17. In verse 16, it closes with the end of His instructions, and verse 17 says, they came back. So in between 16 and 17, they went out and did what He sent them to do. But as He sent them out, He sent them on a difficult task, a challenging mission. And we see right from the beginning there in verse 2 that the mission is challenging, and so we need help.

As he’s preparing us for our mission, we have to understand that it’s going to be challenging. If we think that it’s always going to be easy, that everything is always going to go according to plan, we are going to be disappointed very quickly. Does life ever go according to plan? No. That’s even truer in ministry. You can make all these plans, and you’ll be lucky if 1% of them work out the way you had intended. But he says in verse 2 that there is a plentiful harvest. When he’s talking about the harvest, he’s talking about the souls of those who are going to hear the message about the king and who are going to respond by receiving Jesus as their king. Those are the harvest. And Jesus elsewhere talks about looking out and seeing the fields white for harvest. When the crops are ready, when the crops are ready, they can’t just sit around and wait for weeks on end.

Usually in farming, you bring on extra help. It’s all hands on deck to get the harvest brought in. Because the harvest is there and it’s ready now. And Jesus said in terms of this harvest of souls, he says, the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. So there are so many people who need to hear about Jesus, and there are so many people who would respond if only they had this opportunity to hear, and there just aren’t enough workers to go out and harvest all that there is to be harvested. And so as He’s sending them out, He’s already preparing them that the mission is going to be a challenge in the sense that it’s going to be bigger than what you can accomplish on your own. Now, we need to understand a little bit of nuance here. That you, each person, each believer who hears this, you are absolutely vital in the work of the kingdom. You are absolutely needed.

And you are absolutely equipped to whatever task God has put in front of you. If He’s called you to it, He has qualified you and He has equipped you to do it. At the same time, you will never be able to do it all on your own. That’s why God puts us together. That’s why He sent these men out two by two. It’s why Paul took somebody with him on his missionary journeys. It’s why God left us together as the church. So we do these things together. He says, pray to the God of the harvest. That may be the other place in Luke where he talks about that. Therefore, beseech the Lord of the harvest. I’m sorry, I’m using a new Bible and Jesus’ words are not in red, so they don’t jump out quite as much as they did last week. He does say the Lord of the harvest. Let’s each beg the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. He’s saying even the 70 of you are not going to be enough.

As you go throughout all of the villages of Samaria, there is such a need. There is such an opportunity here that even sending out 35 teams of missionaries out into these villages is not going to be enough. So pray and beg the Lord of the harvest that he’ll send more people out. And so for us, we understand from that that we’re not going to be able to finish the job all on our own. We need others. However, God has called you to accomplish the mission because it may look different for you than it does for me. I heard a story this morning about somebody leading somebody to faith in Christ on a golf course. I don’t think I could lead somebody to faith in Christ on a golf course because everybody would be laughing too hard. at my golf game. It just doesn’t appeal to me. God has called and equipped each of us to go into different places and to reach different people.

But it’s by working together, it’s by working together that we accomplish the task He’s given us in its fullness. You and I will never reach everybody. But the more believers enlist in what God’s called us to do and actually get off the sidelines and do it, and the more we reach people for Christ and we disciple them to come and be in the harvest as well, that’s how the work gets done. So the work is challenging, but we have to know that that just means we need help. It doesn’t mean we can’t do it. It means we need help. And additional workers aren’t the only help we need because the end of that verse says, beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out the laborers. Ultimately, it’s His help that we need. He’s going to supply us with everything that we need for the mission that He’s given us.

So as we think about what it means to be on mission for the Lord, He prepares us ahead of time to know that it’s going to be challenging. It’s going to be hard work. and so we’re going to need help and there’s no shame in asking for that help he encourages us to cry out to him for his help and for him to send others when we get to verse three he tells them go and then it says behold i send you out as lambs in the midst of wolves Doesn’t that make you want to go? Are lambs threatening? I’m careful to ask that. I asked that one day in a middle school Bible class and had one boy say, I was attacked by a lamb when I was little. Okay, they don’t normally do that. So other than that one case, are lambs threatening? No. That’s kind of the point here. They are not threatening animals. Are wolves threatening?

if you bring a lamb to a wolf fight who’s going to win the wolf it’s not a trick question i promise it’s a wolf and jesus says to his followers go and by the way i’m sending you out as lambs among the wolves that is not very reassuring but it should be. He says, go behold, I send you out as lambs among the wolves. He’s comparing us to helpless animals, and from what I’m told, not particularly smart animals either. And his reason for comparing us to that is something that they would have immediately understood as meaning that we are at risk. There is always a risk to us that there’s going to be a cost that there’s going to be a danger involved in following Him. But when you look at how non-threatening sheep are, lambs, and how vulnerable they are, there is one reason that lambs survive. There is one thing that provides for the lambs and protects the lambs so that they can survive.

What is that? A shepherd. The only reason the lambs survive is because of the shepherd. Now, he could have used any number of helpless animals. I think at that nature hike thing, they were talking about frogs. Everything loves to eat frogs because they’re non-threatening, they can’t fight back. He could have said, I’m sending you out as frogs among the wolves, but he didn’t because frogs don’t have a shepherd. He’s not only telling us that we’re vulnerable on our own, he’s pointing to the fact that we need him. We need him for provision. We need him for protection. This animal only survives because it is faithfully shepherded. And so it’s a reminder for us that we are faithfully shepherded. And the only reason that you and I will survive the mission that he sends us on, the only reason that we will be successful in the mission that he sends us on, is because of Him.

And this is also a reminder that we represent Him. Because He’s also identified in Scripture as a lamb, not in the sense of being helpless, but in the sense that He didn’t fight back when they came for Him, in the sense that He was offered as a sacrifice. Now, you think about some of these men who were about to go on his behalf. You think about some of the people like we just talked about last week, who said, I will follow you, because he was going to Jerusalem, and they thought he was going to Jerusalem to set up the kingdom. And so they were ready to take the sword and the spear and the slingshot and whatever else they needed, and they were ready to go to Jerusalem and whoop up on some Romans. They were ready to go and start an uprising. They were ready to go and fight and fight and conquer like an army.

If his followers thought of him as a conquering king, they thought of themselves as an advancing army. But here they’re being compared to lambs. I’m not sending you out like soldiers. I’m sending you out like lambs. Lambs don’t conquer anything. At least not by force. If they were going out as lambs and being sent out to conquer these villages in Samaria, it wasn’t going to be through traditional weapons, through human warfare. They were going and representing a different kind of king. And it just showed them again that he was a different kind of king. His kingdom was not of this world, and that what they expected Him to be was not who He was. But throughout this mission, we have to rely on Him. If we go out and try to reach people for Christ without Him leading, we’re going to frustrate ourselves. We’re going to talk to people who aren’t listening.

We’re going to stumble all over our words. It’s much better to be led by Him. I’ve told you before, I was way older than I want to admit before I realized the Holy Spirit has a role in evangelism. It’s the Holy Spirit who convicts. It’s the Holy Spirit who draws. I don’t understand how all that works. But the Bible teaches it, so I know it’s true. We go out not as a conquering army, but we go out as lambs to the slaughter and let Him lead us, let the shepherd guide us.

then we come to verse 4 and he tells them about all the things that they don’t need to worry about all the things that on paper we should do like when we were preparing for our preparing for a hiking trip you’re going to make certain provisions so that you don’t get out there and dehydrate to death or if you’re going on a transcontinental flight you’re going to prepare certain ways There are certain things that are just wise to do in preparation for any kind of trip or mission or journey. I don’t care what it is. And he tells us not to worry about those things because the mission is urgent. And so he wants us to keep our priorities straight. Look with me again at verses 4 through 9. He says, don’t carry any money belt. Meaning don’t worry about how much money you’re going to take for the trip.

Don’t carry a bag, meaning I don’t want you carrying a whole lot of stuff around with you in preparation for the trip. No shoes. Now, he’s not saying go barefoot. He told him not to carry any shoes, meaning don’t take an extra. Don’t take 57 pairs of shoes for the trip. Just take what you’ve got on and go. And greet no one along the way. Now, that sounds hateful, but we’ll talk in just a minute about what that means.

and he gives them instructions of what they’re supposed to do when they come to each house and they’re not supposed to worry about where they stay and what they eat what is he talking about here he’s talking about keeping our priorities in the proper order don’t burden yourself with a lot of provisions that’s why he says don’t don’t worry about the money belt or the bag or the extra shoes don’t don’t carry a bunch of stuff that you’re going to have to worry about that you’re going to have to transport you travel light so you can move quickly when the lord leads you’re able to respond quickly and go where He goes, or go where He sends you. And don’t waste time on things that don’t advance the mission. That’s what He’s talking about here when He says don’t greet anybody along the way.

This is not telling us that somebody says hi to you, you just ignore them and walk on by, because He said don’t greet them. Now, in the ancient world, in this culture, they would go through these elaborate greetings where they’d meet along the side of the road, and they would, who are you? Who are your people? Who’s the leader of your people? Let me hear the history of your people. Who are your enemies? What news do you have from where you came from? They would try to work out business deals. It became this elaborate thing anytime you met somebody along the road. And he’s saying, don’t do that. You’ve got places to be. Now, I think if the Holy Spirit led somebody to, led one of these men to stop and share the gospel with along the side of the road. Yeah, obviously, you’re not just there to ignore people.

But he’s talking about not being focused, as we tend to do, on things that may not be bad things, but they don’t contribute to the mission. And that is a convicting point. That’s something I have to come back and ask myself all the time. There are things that are good that we can get focused on that do not contribute to the mission. And if they don’t contribute to the mission, they’re not something we ought to spend a lot of time or energy on. And then don’t get caught up in earthly pursuits and comforts. This is as we move into verse 5, whatever house you enter first, say, peace be to this house. If a man of peace is there, meaning somebody who’s open to receiving you, your peace will rest on him, but if not, it will return to you. He’s saying here, if it does, stay in that house eating and drinking what they give you, for the laborer is worthy of his wages.

And he says, whatever city you enter and they receive you, eat what is set before you and heal those who are sick and say to them, the kingdom of God has come near you. He talks about not moving from house to house within the same town. I think you could offend people doing it that way, but you can also get focused on, oh, these people have a nicer house. I started out in ministry as pulpit supply, and sometimes you’d end up going to some random little town, and I use the word town generously, somewhere in Oklahoma that nobody’s ever heard of. Rodney knows what I’m talking about. And sometimes people would invite you to stay the night, and sometimes some of them had really nice houses. Other times, not so much.

But if you accept an offer from somebody to stay in their house, and then you find out Brother So-and-so’s got a really nice house, you say, you know what, I’m going to go stay over there. You’ve just offended some of the people that you’ve come to minister to. Not only that, the eating, I use this story all the time with my kids. There was a little, again, not even a town, just like three houses and a church up on a hilltop over in eastern Oklahoma that I went and preached at. And they were probably 30 or 40 minutes from the nearest town that had a restaurant. So after church on Sunday, they were insistent, we’re going to take you back home and we’re going to feed you. Okay, I’m used to feeding myself, but that, okay, is the way it was said, we’re going to feed you. So I went, and you may recall from previous messages that there are two things that I will not eat.

Raw onion and American cheese. And I sit down at this lovely farmhouse table, and the lady has obviously gone to a lot of trouble and made a casserole that just has American cheese baked over the top in a layer about that thick. And once it came out of the oven, sprinkled raw white onion all over the top. And I use this as a story with my children. They’re picky, and some of them, some of them are picky. I can’t eat that. I’ll die. You ate it yesterday. You’re just not in the mood for it today. You will not die. And I tell them about going to that couple’s house after I had preached at their church, and they served that casserole. And you know what I did? I learned how to swallow without chewing. and I ate the casserole and I asked for seconds of the casserole because that’s what you do. Now some of y’all are going to bring me American cheese and onions just at the next potluck.

If you do it just for spite I might not eat the casserole. But that’s the kind of thing they’re talking about here. That’s the kind of thing Jesus is talking about. You put you aside, you put your comfort aside. Now, have I always done that perfectly? No. But you put you and your comfort and your preferences, you put those things aside for the good of the people you minister to. Don’t get caught up in earthly pursuits and comforts. Like, I’m going to stay here because it’s nicer. Oh, they have better food over there. He says just pick a place, stay there, and minister to the people in the village. For most of you, that won’t be an issue of having to stay with people as you’re going around doing ministry. But the lesson here is that we don’t focus just on our earthly pursuits and comforts.

And he tells us in verse 9, we do things that the world thinks are just a little bit weird because the mission comes first. But you have the opportunity to go to the nicer house. You have the opportunity to minister over here where the fringe benefits are better. You have the opportunity to do this, but you’re not going to do it because you’re focused on the kingdom. That’s exactly what he tells us to do in verse 9. He tells them just heal the people who are sick and say to them the kingdom of God has come near to you. This whole thing about our priorities means prioritizing ourselves lower in our list than we think we ought to go. And then we come to verses 10 through 16, and I’m going to try to wrap this up quickly. But he talks about what happens if they don’t receive the message. Now, again, most of you will not necessarily end up going village to village and town to town.

So how does this apply to you? It applies to you because every day in our daily lives, we have the opportunity to share Christ with people, and some of them will receive him and some of them will reject him. When you get excited about evangelism and you go out and share Christ, and you think everybody’s going to respond to the gospel, and that first time somebody rejects it, it’s discouraging. Because we think, well, everybody should want what I’ve found. Jesus prepared them for the reality so that they wouldn’t get discouraged, so that they wouldn’t give up. As a matter of fact, he spent a relatively long time in this, preparing them for opposition and rejection. And the reason is because they were going to experience both. If you’ve never had anybody reject the gospel as you’ve shared it, it’s probably because you hadn’t shared the gospel or certainly hadn’t shared it very many times.

He tells them in verses 10 and 11 that some people, some villages, were going to reject their message outright. They didn’t want to hear it. What do you think are the chances of running into somebody today that you share the gospel with who they’re not going to want to hear it?

are people out there who don’t want to hear it yes there may be people who don’t want to hear it today but maybe the next time the holy spirit’s working on them so we don’t just write them off either but they were reminded these disciples were reminded that god was going to deal with this because we immediately think what is it that i did wrong maybe if i’d said it this way or maybe if i’d approached it that way and the reality is there’s probably nothing you did wrong Now, if you gave them a false gospel Or if you were deliberately offensive That’s a different story But you could present the gospel faithfully And persuasively You could present it lovingly And still there are people who are going to reject it Even if you did nothing wrong in your presentation Don’t worry about that God will deal with that. That’s what the whole thing about wiping the dust off of their feet was.

I told you before the last time Jesus said this in Luke, that when the Jews would walk through a pagan area before they would cross back in to Israel, they would wipe the dust off of their feet as a symbol of I’m not carrying that pagan dirt into Israel as a sign of God’s judgment against that pagan nation. And so when they’re wiping the dust off of their feet when leaving a village, it’s a sign the judgment of God is here. You didn’t want God’s mercy. You’re still under judgment. God is going to fix that. We look at verse 10. We also look at verses 12 and 15, where he talks about these cities in the day of judgment who had the opportunity, they heard the message, and they wanted nothing to do with it, that God was going to deal with it.

And some of the cities, some of the cities had seen enough miracles and heard enough about what Jesus had done that other wicked cities like Sidon and Tyre and Sodom even would have repented if they’d seen the things these cities had. And still, with seeing Jesus Himself, it wasn’t enough to convince them. If Jesus appearing Himself and doing miracles among the people wasn’t enough to convince some people, you and I need to understand it’s not us. People were going to reject Him. but the mission is necessary so we persevere there are still people who need to hear there are still people who may well respond to the gospel if they hear it one more time so we persevere we keep sharing the message in spite of the closed doors in spite of the rejection in spite of the opposition in spite of the hostility we continue on this mission. Why would we do that? Why should they continue? Why would we?

And it’s because it’s not about us. It’s about Jesus. It’s about finding someone in that crowd who listens to our message, but hears His voice. It’s about finding someone in that crowd who comes to the Father through him. That’s what verse 16 says. The one who listens to you, they’re not listening to you. If they’re listening to you, they’re listening to me. And if they receive you, they receive me. If they receive your message, they receive me. And if they receive me, they receive the one who sent me. If they reject you, they didn’t reject you, they rejected me. And they rejected the one who sent me. It’s all about glory to the Father and glory to the Son. And so we press on with the message of our King who has come and who has taken the penalty of our sins and paid for it in full on the cross, where He shed His blood and He died.

And we continue to take the message that that Savior rose again three days later to prove it, and that He promises to come back, and that we’ll be with Him forever. We persevere in that mission because it’s about Jesus.

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