This this last sermon of the the chapter.
I'm psyched up about this sermon.
A lot of things are going to I think get unpacked for you.
Our church's name, Frontier Church, is going to make more
sense to you. That mural back there is going
to make more sense to you. The mural that Aubrey painted of
the garden that's multi colored, that's going to make more sense
to you. In fact, this sermon is going to
begin the work of bringing the subtitle of the sermon series
into focus. We haven't even touched on it.
The subtitle is Be the the Frontier where Heaven Meets
Earth. And so I'm psyched.
I've been chewing through the leash all week, chewing through
the leash, just excited to get around to this sermon and here,
here we are. But I, I got to say something to
you up front, like a commercial for a medication.
This sermon does come with an important notice of possible
side effects. There are some.
I want you to be aware of them. You might find this sermon
wildly disorienting because it's going to go right down to the
the main framework that you use to make sense out of the Bible.
It's going to provide a lot of clarity, but it also may include
side effects of more confusion too.
It should have a lot of answers, but it will also leave you with
more questions. It'll be a mixture of light bulb
moments and head scratchers. We're going from basically the
first chapter of the Bible all the way to the last chapter of
the Bible because we are tackling humanity's purpose.
I've got a lot of work to do. I've already got my license and
registration out because I know I'm going to get pulled over for
speeding today. So just grab what you can.
On the drive I had, I had somebody from our church say,
dude, I always listen to podcast at double speed.
Not you. You already speak at double
speed this morning. Might be triple speed.
OK, get what you can. Then you can come back around to
it to to talk about purpose. And to talk about purpose.
Well, there's a colossal problem that we are up against in the
modern world, and we at least have to look at it right up
front. The modern world has told us
both explicitly and implicitly that the purpose of our lives is
to look inward and to be yourself and to live a life
that's true to you. That worldview is called hyper
individualism. Hyper individualism.
It's not the same as individualism.
Individualism is important and it's a healthy level of
self-awareness that I'm a fan of.
Now. There are some helpful aspects
to hyper individualism. I like inner exploration.
I think thinking critically about the way that you're wired
uniquely is really, really important.
But the failure of hyper individualism is making that the
main purpose and goal of your life.
Hyper individualism fails measurably and massively as an
ultimate worldview to give us purpose.
It doesn't and it can't. I like the way that Andrew
Wilson describes it in his phenomenal history book OK?
He says one feature of our modern culture is our obsession
with identity. In most cultures, the question
of identity is answered by society as a whole.
You belong to this land, this people, this religion, this
village, this extended family. Identity is usually not chosen,
it is given. But modern people see selfhood
quite differently. Who we are is constructed by our
own actions and choices, economically, sexually,
professionally, religiously, socially, creatively.
And it's our responsibility to ensure that other people accept,
recognize and validate our chosen identity.
Which of course explains the prominence of identity political
discussions. And This is why people say
things like if you don't accept this, then you don't accept me.
Or tragically, I don't even know who I am anymore.
Here's a summary statement. In the modern world, our very
selves are constructions rather than gifts, secured and
maintained by works and not grace.
And this is exhausting. Now giving hyper individualism
the benefit of the doubt, we could ask the question has has
self obsession improved our well-being?
And the resounding measurable answer is no.
No matter what major study you look at, You can look at the
World Happiness Report. That's a fun one to read.
Gallup says the same thing and it's incredibly extensive.
No matter which one you look at, they all show the same trend.
In countries and areas where a hyper individualism goes up,
life satisfaction goes down. Everywhere where self obsession
goes up, life satisfaction goes down.
It's not working. I like the way that author David
Brooks says it. Quote.
Many young people are graduating into limbo, floating and plagued
by uncertainty. They want to know what
specifically they should do with their lives.
And we tell them freedom. The purpose of life is to be
free. We're not going to impose
anything on you or tell you what to do.
But that's nothing but an empty box.
And so the students in the audience put down that empty box
because they're drowning in freedom.
What they're looking for is direction.
What's freedom for How do I know which path is my path?
So we hand them the empty box of authenticity.
Look inside yourself. You do you.
But this is useless too. The you.
We tell them to consult for life's answers is the very thing
that hasn't yet formed. So they put down that empty box
and asked what cause will inspire me and give meaning and
direction to my life. And at this point, we hand them
the emptiest box of all, the box of autonomy.
It's up to you to define your own values.
We tell them no one else can tell you what's right or wrong
for you. And you will notice that our
common answers take all the difficulties of living in your
20s and 30s and make them worse. They are floundering in a
formless desert, and not only do we not give them a compass, we
take a bucket of sand and throw it all over their heads.
So we need something outside of ourselves, a purpose that can
sustain us and give meaning to life in the modern world,
something bigger than what we can discover within our really
little selves. And so the question we should
all be asking this morning is, does God have a solution to this
problem? Does he have a compass?
Does he have a purpose to give? The answer to that is yes.
So if you're able to stand for the reading of God's Word.
God creates everything, the heavens and the earth, the sun
and the stars, the squirrels, the land and the sky.
Then he creates human beings in His own image.
And then verse 28 and God blessed them.
That's interesting. What have they done?
They just got created. We didn't even know if they'd
taken a breath. And the blessing of God falls on
them. Interesting.
And God bless them. And then God gave them a
purpose. He said to them, be fruitful and
multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over
the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over
every living thing that moves on the earth.
We'll spend the majority of our time in that verse on packing
that. We won't spend a ton of time in
these next couple of verses. They're more self-explanatory.
God said I'm going to give you food.
Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on
the face of all the earth and every tree with seed in its
fruit. You should have those for food.
And to every beast of the earth and every bird in the heavens
and everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has
the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.
And it was. So I think Andrew mentioned in
passing the vegetarianism discussion.
He's like, we can talk about that next week.
I'm not talking about that this week, OK?
Those of you who know me, you know, I'm basically a carnivore,
so I can explain that position in greater detail over a steak
sometime. And God saw everything that he
had made and behold, it was very good.
And there was evening and there was morning the 6th day.
Heavenly Father, we just, we just love you so much.
We love you. We love everything about you.
Everything about you is perfect and good and true and beautiful
and elicits joy and satisfaction from our hearts.
I just love to be in your presence always, Always.
And so this morning as we unpack your word at probably 120 miles
an hour, I pray it wouldn't just be words.
Just me barking endlessly up here.
Pray that you would breathe heaven into our earthly lungs.
Yeah, in Jesus name, all God's people prayed.
Amen. You can have a seat.
Verse 28 here is famously called the Cultural mandate.
The cultural mandate, that's what theologians call, that's
what academics call it. And this mandate or this
commandment is massively important for unlocking the rest
of the Bible. So if you missed the 1st 5
episodes of this TV series. God creates the heavens and the
earth. He molds them into various
things like sun, stars, water, land, animals, and the pinnacle
of his creation is day 6, the creation of human beings.
Uniquely unlike the rest of creation uniquely, humans are
quote created in the image of God.
I'm just going to steal Andrew's sermon from last week perfectly
because that explanation was great.
And if you miss that sermon, go back to it and listen to it.
An image in the ancient world was a statue that a king would
place in the the faraway regions of his Kingdom.
Kings didn't have TV's or Radios.
They didn't have Twitter. I know that's hard to believe,
but in the ancient world, kings didn't have Twitter.
And So what would they do with the faraway regions of of their
Kingdom? They would extend their ruling
reign into the regions that were far away by building statues of
themselves, then placing those statues in those areas.
People would see those statues and go, that's right, that's
what we're doing here. This is his Kingdom and we exist
to extend his reign all the way over here.
And that's what you are. You're God statue.
We're God statues on the earth. What's our purpose?
OK, what what's it mean to be God's statue practically on this
earth? Right?
And the question, what's your purpose?
If you grew up in the church, you probably know the answer to
that question, right? The purpose of my life is to die
and go to heaven, right? Well, sounds good.
Why is that not the big cultural statement that God gives in
Genesis? I don't think God said anything
about dying and going to heaven. So what?
What's what's going on? That's that's confusing.
OK, let's dig into it. God doesn't say die and go to
heaven. So instead let's look at what
God did say. There are four massive words in
verse 28 forming the cultural mandate.
I want you to circle each one of these if you've got your Bible
open with a pen. If you don't, I want I want you
to sear them into your brain. OK, the four big words that make
up the cultural mandate is fruitful.
Everybody say fruitful. Everybody say multiply,
multiply. Everybody say subdue.
Everybody say dominion. You just told me in those words
the grand overarching purpose of my life.
That's the cultural mandate. Let's start with fruitful verse
28. God says be fruitful.
Now this is a wonderful multi layered word.
The idea here is that we're supposed to look at God's
creation and he has built fruitfulness into creation.
So we're supposed to look at it and see its potentials and
possibilities and then draw even more fruit and life out of it.
Have you ever looked at something or have you ever
looked at someone and and thought to yourself, it's good
and I love it, but man, it could be so much more.
What is that? That voice in your heart is
God's design to propel you towards fruitfulness.
Let's define it this way. The command to be fruitful is
the command to go create life, create more life.
Take what God's made and tap in to its fruitfulness.
And that brings us to our second word also in verse 28.
Be fruitful and multiply. Or to recognize God's
reproductive capacity that He's built into all of creation's
order. Tap into that and then multiply
and make more of it. This certainly goes for the
human capacity for sexually procreating, for sure.
But it also extends to farming and art and culture and poetry
and literature and politics and communities.
Have you ever looked at something, maybe one of your
kids and thought, look at that little booger?
I just love him. And we got to make more of these
things. That's how I felt about our
Sunday church. I remember looking at our Sunday
church and being like, man, this community is amazing.
There's got to be more places like this on planet earth.
What is that? That voice in your heart is
God's design to propel you towards multiplication.
Let's say it this way. To multiply is to spread life.
Which brings us to our third word, subdue.
Also, verse 28, Be fruitful, Multiply, then fill the earth
and subdue it. Here's where things get really
fun. The word subdue here, it does
not have any connotations whatsoever of exploitation.
None. It follows God's pattern in
Genesis 1 of making order out of chaos, arranging things.
So have you ever stood at the doorway of your bedroom and just
taken in the joy of looking at a room that you cleaned that was
messy an hour ago and just been like, oh man, that feels so good
to see chaos turn into order. Have you ever done that?
What is that? Here's what this is that is that
voice in your heart is God's design to propel you towards
subduing creation by cleaning rooms, but also by cleaning
organizations with PowerPoints, reports, blueprints, and Excel
spreadsheets. To organize, to subdue creation
means that we also organize life.
Notice all of these commandments revolve around life and what to
do with life. And that brings us to our fourth
word, which is our most misunderstood word, dominion.
I love that word. That's also verse 28.
Have dominion. Have dominion over the fish of
the sea and over the birds of the heavens, and over every
living thing that moves on the earth.
Again, don't confuse that word dominion with domination.
They sound similar, but they have different meanings.
Doing whatever you want to the earth and its creatures for
selfish gain is not what's being talked about right here.
The word dominion here is actually a royal word, royal
connotations to it. It refers to the rulership of a
queen or a king. So have you ever been a part of
a team or a group that you loved, looked at it and said,
ma'am, I love these people. But with great leadership, it
could become so much more. Have you ever thought that to
yourself? What is that?
That voice in your heart is God's design to propel humankind
to ruling over creation like kings and Queens.
We'll say it this way. To take dominion is to rule life
wisely. How's that for a definition?
You guys with me, We're defining the paint off the walls this
morning. I'm feeling ice cold, so I'm
going to keep going. So here's what the cultural
mandate, the big purpose of God, gives humanity.
This is what it looks like from 1000 feet above.
We are to be fruitful or create life and multiply or spread life
and subdue or organize life and take dominion or rule life
wisely. Hear things get really
interesting. This is a spoiler alert and
chapter 2. God, immediately after creating
and commissioning mankind, gives them a little working model for
what their work should look like.
OK, I'm supposed to do these things.
What's that even look like? So God gives them a little mock
up, a little blueprint, a little prototype for the human task.
Do you know what it is called? The Garden of Eden.
That's what Eden is. Eden's a prototype of what God
wants the whole cosmos to look like.
Think about Eden really quickly. Eden has the capacity to be
fruitful, to multiply, but only if humans subdue and take
dominion over and care for it and multiply it.
So humanity's purpose is to take Eden global or one theologian.
I love the way he says it because he makes up words.
I love making up words. He says the purpose of humanity
is the gardenification of the cosmos.
We gardenify this morning or what?
Isn't that such a good made-up word?
It should be real. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Eden's next chapter. We'll get there in a couple
months. Back to the cultural mandate.
Let's make it punchy and
memorable here. Create life, spread life,
Organize life, rule life. That's the job description at
this point in Genesis, though. Have you seen anybody do that
job description yet? The answer is yes.
It's a trick question you have. That's actually what God is
doing the entire first chapter. So God.
God does the job on Week 1, and then he hires somebody to do it
on Week 2. You, me, us.
On Week 1, God models it on week two, He delegates us.
Why? What's the point?
And the point is this. It's because God's ultimate
purpose is to bring heaven and earth together.
And how do humans function in that equation?
Humans are to be the frontier where heaven meets earth.
We are to take the rule and reign of the God of Heaven and
spread it on earth. We're to be citizens of heaven
on earth by being God's statues. That's the cultural mandate in a
nutshell. We are to be the frontier where
heaven meets earth. That's your purpose.
That's your mission. That's your calling, to be the
frontier where heaven meets earth.
To quote NT, right, He says the story of the Bible isn't
ultimately about people going to heaven when they die.
It's about heaven coming down to earth.
But maybe growing up you were told that the purpose of life is
to die and go to heaven. What gives?
What's So what? What's the danger in that?
It has some truth to it. What's the danger in that?
Last week I had a fun conversation with the Poison
Control Center, and I know what you're thinking.
I can see it in in your mind. No, it wasn't Jack, even though
I've had that conversation with the Poison Control Center.
Not this time. What had happened is I have a
really bad habit, OK? I'm trying to break myself of
it, and I haven't been able to broke break myself of it.
I blame my high school friends. My high school friends were this
way. Like anytime we are around a pop
or a soda that we wanted to drink or an energy drink, If it
wasn't ours, it didn't matter. We just take it, a drink of it,
grab it and take a drink of it. And I'm like, I'm in my 30s now
and I haven't been able to break that.
Whenever I want to drink or something, I'll just grab it and
take it. And it's only gotten me into
trouble twice. And I'm not going to tell you
the first time I ever got in trouble because Tracy's doing
this because that's Andrew's story to tell.
You can ask Andrew if he wants to tell you, he'll tell you.
If he doesn't, he won't. I'll tell you about the second
time it got me in trouble, which was last week.
I, I was taken, I'm taking my vitamin D because I'm a health
nut. Thanks for your applause.
I was taking my vitamin D and there was this glass of water
that was right next to the sink. So I took it right.
And I just, I, I hammered, I chugged it because, because when
you're taking vitamins, you're not like sip, sip, sip, right?
It's gulp, gulp, gulp, gulp bulb.
So I just, I gunned the thing down.
I gulp it down with my vitamin D and, and then it hits me.
I feel it. There's a tingle in the back of
my throat and I'm like, I'm like, that tastes like something
I've smelled before. And so I go, oh, man, I'm so
stupid. I go, I go, Chloe, was there
something else in that glass of water?
And she goes, you didn't, you did not drink that glass.
And I was like, I did indeed drinking glass.
It turns out that that glass had been dirty.
And so Chloe, in order to clean it, made a combination of water
and can you give me a drum roll? Drum roll water and hydrogen
peroxide. I drank a bunch of hydrogen
peroxide. Totally not Chloe's fault.
It was my fault, right? I shouldn't have just got it in
and just drank out of it. I could.
I was just like, oh, my goodness.
But in my defense, have you seen this stuff?
It looks like water. It has the likeness of water.
It has the appearance of water. It's not water.
In fact, if you drink enough of it, as they told me on the
hotline, it will poison you or enough of it, and it will kill
you. But it has the likeness of
water, the appearance of water. But it'll poison you or kill you
if you drink too much of it. That's precisely what withdraw
theology is. Withdraw theology is the name
that scholars give to the world view that the purpose of
Christians lives is to die and go to heaven.
It's like hydrogen peroxide. It looks like Christianity has
the appearance of Christianity, has the likeness of
Christianity, it's not Christianity.
Yes, it has an element of truth to it and I need you to hear me
clearly. If you are a Christian and you
die before Jesus returns, you will go to heaven with Jesus for
a short time. Your loved ones who believe in
Jesus, who have passed away, they are in heaven with Jesus.
But that's just a short stop because Jesus is ultimate
purpose is to resurrect you and bring heaven down to earth and
you will live in heaven and earth for eternity.
That's the purpose. Die and go to heaven.
Looks like Christianity has the appearance of Christianity, but
it's not Christianity. It poisons you.
This is why we have this sinner's prayer problem.
It's just about dying and getting to heaven.
So recite these words, say these exact words.
You don't even need to mean it and you're in.
You're golden. Go live whatever Pagan life you
want and when you'll die you'll go to heaven.
This is a massive problem in the modern church.
It's a massive poisoning of the individual Christian.
This is why they call it withdraw theology, because
withdraw theology results in Christians living a passive life
where I said the thing. And so then they withdraw from
the world and just privately hold on to their faith and wait
to die. And that what why is that so
poisonous? It's poisonous because it
effectively removes the influence of Jesus from the
world and all the spheres of the world, our culture, politics,
poetry, literature, communities, our careers.
And that's deadly for the world. Don't drink that hydrogen
peroxide. Yes, you will go to heaven when
you die. If you're in Christ for a short
time, There's a mission here. Don't make withdraw theology
your goal. Look at the purpose God gave
you. Look at the cultural mandate.
The point of Christianity is not to just go to heaven after all
of this, right? You're not.
You're not born with your neck in a rope.
You're here for a mission and with a job.
It's to bring heaven to earth while you live.
Picture the earth like a chalice.
Can you see that? It is beautiful on its own.
You can look at it and it's stunning, but it's not meant to
just sit on the shelf empty. It's exactly the way God has
created all of creation. It's a chalice.
It's beautiful to look at. You can look at a sunset and see
beauty and grandeur and wonder. But God did not create creation
to remain empty. He created it like a chalice.
You fill a chalice with wine in that exact same way God's
created the earth, like a chalice that's designed to be
filled with heaven, to be filled with God, right?
Habakkuk chapter 2, the prophet says the earth will be filled,
filled. The earth will be filled with
the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the
sea. What did Habakkuk see in that
vision? Where do you get where do you
get that idea from? He got from the Bible.
What Habakkuk saw was the cultural mandate fulfilled at
the end of time, every square inch being recreated into Eden.
Human beings are agents of heaven on earth.
That's what you are, humans. Humanity is God's heaven and
earth project. You guys feeling this if you've
so for some of us, this is disorienting.
So if you've never seen the Bible through a project heaven
and earth lens, I'm just going to tell you right now, dial 911
and when they ask you what your emergency is, you can tell them
that you had your face melted by the Bible.
Here's a quick tour. This is just this is the short
tour. This is the short tour.
OK, you ready? What?
Watch this. The first sentence of the Bible
is what God creates the heavens and the earth.
What's how's the Bible end? Read the last chapter of the
Bible Revelation. It ends with heaven coming down
to earth. That's the plot line of the
entire Bible. First page to last page.
What are humans made of? Spoiler alert, we'll see this in
the next chapter. God takes a scoop of dirt earth
and then he breathes his breath heaven into them.
That's what you are. You're you're designed literally
as a heaven and earth creature to mediate heaven and earth.
We can keep going. What happened when Jesus died on
the cross? The temple curtain was ripped in
half. Why?
So that heaven could once again invade earth and overlap with
earth. We can keep going.
Is Jesus's nature human or God? Trick question.
He's 100% God the heavenly 1 and 100% Man the earthly one.
Jesus is quite literally heaven and earth with arms and legs.
He's what heaven and earth coming together looks like with
skin on. We can keep going when the
disciples asked Jesus to pray. What's the summary line of the
Lord's Prayer? God's Kingdom come your will be
done on earth as it is in heaven, even when Israel is
enslaved in exile. Look at Jeremiah 2029.
What does God tell Israel to do when they're enslaved by the
Babylonians? Listen.
See if this sounds familiar. This is Jeremiah 29, verse 4.
Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of all Israel.
To the Exiles who are in exile in Babylon, he says, build
houses and live in them, Plant gardens and eat their produce.
Take wives and have sons and daughters.
Take wives for your sons, and give your daughters and marriage
that they may bear sons and daughters.
Multiply there and do not decrease.
Seek the welfare of the city where I've sent you into exile,
and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you
will find your welfare. Does that sound familiar to you?
That's the cultural mandate. In the desert, in exile.
Where's our citizenship as Christians?
The New Testament says that our citizenship is in heaven.
That's Philippians 3. What are Christians?
Citizens of heaven, Living on earth.
Literally the frontier where heaven meets earth.
We can keep on going. We keep on moving.
You ever notice what the Bible calls the effects of obedience
to God? It's called bearing.
What all bearing fruit. That's Galatians 5.
Why fruit? Because our obedience to King
Jesus brings the Garden of Eden to earth.
Obedient Christians are like little pockets of heaven,
popping up on earth like flowers we can keep going.
What's weekly communion? It's God's heavenly banquet
bursting forth on earth. What's the big deal in the Old
Testament with tabernacles and temples and Israel building
them? Well, that's clear by the
architectural plans he gives. God commands makeshift trees and
flowers in the temple, even if thrown for the heavenly God, and
he even commands Israel to build 2 cherubim guarding the throne,
exactly like we'll see in a few chapters for where two cherubim
guard the Garden of Eden. It's supposed to be Eden.
Temples were meant to be the frontier in the Old Testament
where heaven breaks into earth. And what, by the way, does Paul
call every Christian a temple? You're frontier, where heaven
meets earth. This theme literally takes you
from the first page of the Bible to the last page of the Bible.
It's massively important if you're in Christ.
Is God going to take you to heaven?
Yes. But before God ever puts us in
heaven, He first puts heaven into us.
You guys hanging? So how do you do it?
Genesis is clear. 4 things. Create life, spread life,
organize life, and rule over life wisely.
OK, what's we don't use those words in the modern world.
So what's that look like? Luckily for you, this isn't the
last time we're going to see the cultural mandate.
Right before Jesus ascends to heaven, He does exactly what God
does in Genesis 1. He gives a massive overarching
Commission to his people to give them work to do while he's gone.
It's called the Great Commission.
Listen carefully to the Great Commission.
I'm just going to read it. I want you to listen to it.
Ask, ask yourself, does this sound familiar?
Jesus says in Matthew 28. And Jesus came to them and said
to them, all authority in heaven and on earth.
There it is, the heaven and earth theme again.
All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.
So go therefore and make disciples, create life, make
disciples of all nations, spread life, baptizing them in the name
of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Organize this new life into the Church, teaching them to observe
all that I have commanded you. Over this life wisely.
According to King Jesus's teachings, and behold, I am with
you always to the end of the age.
Does that sound familiar? Make disciples.
Create life of all nations, Spread life, baptizing them,
Organize life into the church, Teach them rule over life.
The Great Commission is exactly the Genesis 1 cultural mandate
repackage for you. In Jesusy language, that makes a
little bit more sense. That's what That's what the
Great Commission is. It's the cultural mandate remix
by DJ Jesus, that's what. Where are my dogs at?
Are we eating good this morning? That's what's going.
On here. They always tell me never.
Go full coal. I'm going full coal this.
Morning. This is why you exist though,
and this is how you fulfill your God-given purpose.
You become where heaven invades earth.
You become the frontier where heaven meets earth.
How do you do that? Do you want to be that?
Do you want to see the fruit of Eden grow wherever you plant
your feet? If the answer is yes.
Here's how you do it. Fill the earth with Jesus,
people. That's literally, that's
literally the Great Commission. Fill the earth with Jesus,
people. Go and fill the earth with
statues of Jesus to spread his rule and reign in his Kingdom.
Take your faith and be fruitful with it, Multiply it, subdue
with it, and take dominion with it for Jesus.
It's all about Jesus, Amen. All about Jesus.
He's the heavenly 1. He's the fullness of joy.
He's the pleasures forevermore. He's the desire of the nations.
He's the alpha. He's the Omega.
He's the beginning and the end. He's your purpose.
He's your goal. He's your mission.
He's your heavenly reward on earth and beyond.
That's what this is about. We want to see the world be
transformed into the image of Jesus.
We're not. Gosh, I just never tire of
saying stuff like this. We're not just trying to
moralize the world and make a bunch.
Of converts to empty. Morality.
Right. The world looks at the.
Church sometimes. And they think that our end goal
is to just make a bunch of well behaved little girls and boys
who don't cuss, don't chew and don't date girls who do.
Right. Just make a bunch of boys and
girls who aren't naughty. No, that's not what this is
about. We want to fill the earth with
Jesus because we love Him. I saw it man.
I. I read a quote, heard a quote
this week. I can't remember who said it,
but it dropped my jaw. The speaker said.
The only way to possess God. Is to be constantly giving.
Him away. You do that.
There's nothing like it. There's like.
There's nothing like it like. 11 years ago, I remember I was at a
small group in Cedar Falls and we were telling our salvation
stories and like half of the people in the group mentioned
how God had used me to bring them to Jesus.
And I don't even know, I was like shocked by I was just
enjoying Jesus publicly in front of them.
I had no idea that that had happened.
And do you want to know what I felt in that moment?
Three or four years ago. When we were still at the
wedding event rental spot for gathering together as a church,
I baptized a handful of my wrestlers.
Literally guys who I had headlocked.
You don't know what that felt like for me.
Or here's one last Easter. I got to baptize my.
Oldest son, You know what that feels like Each of.
Those moments provided me. With what no achievement or
salary increase ever could, right?
Every one of those moments made me feel oh.
That's why I exist. That's why I.
Exist to make. Jesus, people, let me be.
This is practical as I'm going to get this morning.
If God took a worldwide poll of all Christians everywhere and
asked them who led you to Jesus or influenced you to be more
like Jesus? And if.
Not one soul. In the world mentioned your
name. What would that mean to?
You it would mean that though you're loved by Christ and
valued in Christ and have worth in Christ, it would mean that no
matter your salary, no matter how many items you checked off
your bucket list, it means no matter how cool things you've
accomplished, you're not living out your purpose.
And so if you're. Like, yeah man, I don't.
Think I've influenced anybody to become more like Jesus or been
the person who led somebody to Jesus.
If that's you, here's what I would do.
I would find two or three people and I would say can we meet
together and just disciple each other on a weekly basis.
We call them fighter groups at Frontier.
You can just literally start one and.
Then I would give. Myself over to discipling those
two or three individuals and you'll be surprised because
you'll recognize that every other goal in your life feels
hollow compared to that. To discipling people.
Introducing people to Jesus. Man, I was I was having coffee
with Augie this week. Is Augie here?
Good. I was going to ask him
permission to share it and if he said no, I still would have done
it. No, that's.
Not true, but I was. I was some of the Augie over
coffee and he asked me the question.
I couldn't shake it this week, he said.
If Paul wrote a letter to Frontier Church, what do you
think it would say? Right. 1st letter to the
frontiersman, second from Tyrion.
I don't know what it would be called.
What do you think it? Would say I wrestled.
A lot with that question. Here's.
The answer Augie gave me. He said.
I think the letter would say I think you're great and I love
you a lot and blessings and peace to you from our God in
Jesus Christ. There's a lot of peace and a lot
of joy and a lot of Jesus loves you in this church and that's
great. But if you.
Notice that it's not. Reaching the neighborhood
that's. What?
He said. I think he's.
Right. I think that'd.
Be the thing. I think that'd.
Be the eye that. Paul would poke.
I think he's right. And if that hurts, hurts.
Me a little bit, if that hurts, I would just begin to ask what's
it look like for? Me to pray daily.
That your Kingdom come, your will be done in Des Moines as it
is in heaven. And then I start to.
Think about my spheres of. Influence and I would pray until
God started to give me an image of what would it look like for
heaven to invade that sphere of influence.
That's what I do. Let.
Me. Stick the landing here and I'll
be done. I've said a lot.
I've been preaching at 120 miles an hour.
You guys done a great job staying with me.
Let me just say this one important thing though.
The cultural mandate is the antidote to the anxiety of hyper
individualism. I believe that 100%.
I've never met a Christian who made a lot of disciples and LED
a lot of people to Jesus, who said, you know, I just don't
find my life very satisfying. I've never met her.
I've never met a Christian like that ever.
The cultural mandate is the purpose of your life, but it's
not your worth in life. I wonder if you noticed?
That in the. Text Did you notice what came
first in the text before the task, the blessing, verse 28,
verse 28 And God blessed them. And then he said to him, do this
stuff before the mobilize, fill the earth.
So let me phrase the question, Let me rephrase it.
What did Adam and Eve do to earn that blessing?
What did they accomplish to gain that blessing?
Nothing, not squat, not a zilch. This is the gospel hiding in
Genesis 1. Before Adam and Eve do anything,
before they take a step towards taking dominion, they already,
by grace alone, have the blessing, the acceptance, and
the friendship of God. They already have it.
Yes, fill the earth with. Jesus, people, yes, be the
frontier where heaven meets earth.
But don't forget the gospel. Don't forget that Jesus died for
you apart from works. Don't forget that Christ was
crucified for your sins and to cover you in his righteousness
and clothes you in worth. And he does that by faith alone.
Apart from works of the law, apart from the cultural mandate,
apart from discipleship statistics.
That's your worth. Before you share the gospel,
before you make disciples, before you tell anybody about
Jesus, know that Jesus loves you unconditionally, madly, and
eternally because of Christ Jesus.
But you need, I know this is self-explanatory.
You need to be filled with heaven first if you want to go
be the frontier where heaven meets earth.
Heavenly Father, thank you for. Your cultural mandate, your
Great Commission, all of the Bible just makes so much more
sense when you see it through that lens.
There's. Work to be done there's.
A mission. There's a purpose, and yes,
there is peace and hope and joy in the knowledge that if death
comes before resurrection, we will be in heaven with God.
But we're not going to sit on the sidelines and wait and be
passive and withdraw. We're going to go be fruitful
and multiply and fill and subdue and take dominion over creation
for the glory of Jesus. So what would that look like in
our lives? Lord, bring that to mind.
Help us visualize it until we can see it with clarity.
It's in the precious. Name of Jesus, that all.
God's people prayed. Amen.
Let's. Stand and worship the.
Heavenly one right here on earth.