This month we focus on a single question: Who’s Your One? Who is one person you know who doesn’t know Christ as his or her Savior? Will you care enough about him or her to commit to pray for them daily and intentionally seek to speak to them about Jesus this year?

SCRIPTURE REFERENCE

Matthew 4: 18-22

Complementary Reading: 1 Peter 2: 4-10

SERMON AUDIO

Due to technical difficulties, the publication of this sermon audio is not available. Please feel free to read the transcript which follows.

SERMON TRANSCRIPT

Who’s your one? It’s a powerful question that both challenges us and points our way forward in a world full of people who don’t know Jesus. It’s overwhelming to hear how many don’t enjoy the relationship with God that we have through Jesus Christ, who don’t know that they have meaning, value, and purpose because they were lovingly created in the image of God, and who are separated from God without knowing how to reach Him. It’s easy to shut down, throw up our hands, and say that it’s too many to help.

We can’t help everyone, but we can help one. That’s our focus this month and my hope is that we’ll establish habits that wills serve God’s Kingdom for the rest of our lives. Our emphasis this year is to Shine Brighter as the lighthouse for Christ at the corner of Clipper and Mariner. In January and February, we emphasized character qualities praised by Christ to  help us shine brighter personally. Now we want to shine brighter still by being very intentional about our weakest area as a congregation when it comes to Five to Thrive.

Five to Thrive is our recipe for healthy growth in Christ that identifies those things Christians have done to faithfully follow Jesus for nearly 2,000 years: worshiping together, practicing personal spiritual habits, growing in community, serving Christ, and sharing our hope in Jesus. These next five Sundays focus on the bottom right box – sharing our hope in Christ with one specific person.

We’ll talk about the why of that throughout the month, but I first want to share our present status as a congregation. Many of you took our online discipleship assessment last year as part of developing your personal roadmap to growth and discipleship in Christ. If you haven’t, you’ll have the opportunity to do so again in April, so watch for the next running of the “You Are Here” course.

When it comes to sharing Christ, 25% of us agreed, at least somewhat, with the statement, “I intentionally spend time building friendships with non-Christians for the purpose of sharing Christ with them.” 25%. Meanwhile nearly 38% disagreed at least somewhat.

When asked, “About how often, if at all, do you personally pray for opportunities to tell others about Jesus?” not quite 30% answered at least once a week, while nearly half answered rarely or never.

When asked, “In the past six months, about how many times have you, personally, shared with someone how to become a Christian?” we’re divided almost evenly between the 49% who’d shared at least once and the 51% who hadn’t.

Finally, when asked, “In the past six months, about how many times have you, personally, invited an unchurched person to attend a church service or some other program at  your church?” it became apparent that we have a handful of super-inviters while 44% answered 1-2 times and 32% answered 0 times.

We need to change these statistics. As part of our vision to be that lighthouse for Christ, we committed to an initiative to, “Foster a culture in which it is the objective of all members of the Community of Faith to introduce others to Christ.” We want to weave sharing our hope in Jesus into the fabric of our everyday lives, not by arm-twisting, guilting, scaring, or berating you, but by teaching what the Bible says about sharing, equipping everyone to share, and asking everyone here to simply commit to caring enough about one particular person to intentionally pray for them and share the gospel with them in the weeks and months ahead.

Our passage this morning is Matthew 4: 18-22,

While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon (who is called Peter) and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Immediately they left their nets and followed him. And going on from there he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed  him.

This is a story of Four Fishermen Called to Follow Jesus. It takes place early in Jesus’ earthly ministry. He’d been doing some itinerant preaching and teaching and according to John’s gospel, He’d met some folks who’d spent some time with Him apparently before returning to their regular lives. With the arrest of John the Baptist, Jesus began a full-time preaching ministry, proclaiming that everyone needed to, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” It’s then that He invites them to commit to really following Him.

Jesus had a mission and a message, so He began to form His dream team. As Jesus was walking along the Sea of Galilee, verse 18 reports that he saw the brothers Simon, whom we usually call Peter, and Andrew casting their fishing net into the lake. Jesus extends an intriguing, yet mysterious invitation they readily accept, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.“

There’s no telling what the brothers thought He meant, but they left everything familiar behind to follow Jesus. They literally left their nets, their livelihood in the boat and followed Jesus, as verse 20 reports, “Immediately they left their nets and followed him.” Continuing on, Jesus saw another set of brothers, James and John, in a boat with their dad and He called them to follow Him. Verse 22 says, “Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him.” Can you even imagine??? They left the family business and the family behind to follow Jesus! This is extraordinary in a culture that valued community and family over any western notions of chasing personal dreams.

These four left everything behind to follow Jesus, but they didn’t JUST follow Jesus. There was a critical second part to His invitation in verse 19, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” The ideas are related because Following IS Fishing! Let’s look at each half of verse 19.

The first half is “Follow me.” This was the invitation of Jesus to everyone He encountered, and it’s His invitation to us. We’re called to follow Jesus, not merely like Him. There’s a huge difference and unfortunately, North American church culture has often lost sight of that different. Jesus didn’t say to just, “make a decision for me”, “raise your hand for me”, “walk the aisle for me”, or “come to church for me.” He said to “follow me.” That’s still His invitation to all who believe in Him!

Following is active, not passive. To follow Jesus is to imitate Him. As we see with the disciples it involves leaving behind certain things we like which are comfortable and familiar. Following Jesus wasn’t comfortable for Simon, Andrew, James, or John. They devoted their remaining lives to following Jesus. 3 of the 4 would die because they followed Jesus. We aren’t called to comfortably cheer Jesus on from the sidelines, we’re invited into the ongoing discomfort of following Jesus every day.

I promise you that I’m often uncomfortable at what I must do to follow Jesus, but that’s what He calls us to do. In fact, that’s one of the greatest blessings – meeting Him in our discomfort and relying on Him in our weakness! To truly follow Jesus, we must be actively committed to imitating Him, becoming like Him, and shining brighter by His power. Our focal verse this year is 2 Corinthians 3: 18, “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.“

There are five glorious truths packed into that little verse! 1) Transformation is for all of us, 2) Transformation comes as we lovingly gaze ever more deeply  upon the beauty and glory of Jesus, 3) Our transformation is into the likeness and character of Jesus, 4) Transformation is step-by-step, and 5) Transformation is only by God’s power as we follow Jesus.

This transformation we’re ALL called to, following Jesus ever more closely, is called being a disciple. The Bible doesn’t call us to be Christians, calls us to be disciples. The rewards of truly being a disciple are enormous, because we’re invited to follow Jesus by faith right out of this life with all its brokenness and pain and into eternal life.

Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, lived the perfect life of obedience to God that we’ve each failed at, then He sacrificed Himself on the cross suffering, dying, and rising from the dead to pay our debt of sin to God, restore our relationship with the Lord, wash away all our guilt and shame from a lifetime of selfish and hurtful choices, and lead us into a glorious eternity in God’s presence. All we have to do is believe in Him, but belief that does all that is belief that shakes us out of our seats and compels us to follow Jesus. We’re called to follow as disciples, not sit in comfort as Christians.

If we follow, we fish, because Followers Fish for More Followers. The second part of Jesus’ invitation was to become “fishers of men.” That meant that as they followed and watched Jesus they needed to do what He did, calling people to repent of their sin and enter the Kingdom of Heaven by following Jesus.

This invitation to fish for men applies to us today. We aren’t supposed to be quietly following Jesus – we’re supposed to be fishing! Unfortunately, as the statistics at the beginning revealed, too many of us are reading about fishing rather than grabbing our roads and reels! How do I know we’re supposed to be fishing?

• Mark 16: 15, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.“
• Acts 1: 8, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.“
• Philippians 3: 17, “Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us.“
• Matthew 28: 18-20, “And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.‘”

Matthew 28: 18-20, the Great Commission, is a mandate passing from one generation of Christian to the next. Jesus commanded those present to make disciples who obey everything He commanded, which includes making disciples. Friends, fishing is our mandate. We don’t get to sit on shore and cheer on the pros!

The Great Commission is breathtaking in scope, which is why we each need to be a part of making it happen. However, we don’t have to reach everyone ourselves. We aren’t individually called to stand on the street corner evangelizing all of Lake Ridge. We aren’t called to reach all of Woodbridge single-handedly, but we are all called to be part of the Great Commission one person at a time – Who’s Your One?

What is Who’s Your One? Simply this: we’re asking everyone at LRBC to commit to one person who doesn’t know Jesus whom you’d really like to see embrace Christ as their Lord and Savior. Take a moment right now and think about everyone you know who doesn’t know Jesus. Who’s Your One?

THINK. Have you got one? Do you need another moment? THING.

Now, I want you to pray every day, EVERY day for your one. I want you to commit to having a conversation with your one in which you’ll share your hope in Jesus. That conversation doesn’t have to be this week or this month – use the whole month to lay a foundation of prayer if you need to. But commit yourself that sometime in 2020 you’ll have a conversation in which you share your faith in Jesus with your one and also invite them here if they’re local.

It’s that simple: Commit to pray daily for their salvation and openness to the gospel, commit to share Jesus with them, and commit to invite them to church. I firmly believer everyone here of every age and situation can do this. EVERYONE. We each have one person in our life with whom we can share our hope, I just know it!

As simple (or as scary) as this sounds, this is fishing. It isn’t easy – I get that. This is a significant spiritual act, but this isn’t a random stranger – this is someone with whom you already have a relationship and presumably care about and are trying to help! This isn’t throwing a net into a huge lake like Peter and Andrew were doing when Jesus called. This is fishing in your bathtub with a rod and reel for a fish you can clearly see! You can do this!

In your seats you each have a 30-day prayer guide to help. Starting tomorrow, pray for your one each day this month using the guide. Fill in the blanks with your one’s name and pray for him or her. There’s room to journal your thoughts and prayers each day. Pray for God to open their hearts and minds to the gospel and pray for your boldness and sensitivity to opportunities God creates to share.

Pray, then share your hope in Jesus. If you truly don’t know what to say or how to share your hope, sign up for lunch after church in two weeks, on March 165 and we’ll teach you a simple way to share your hope. It’s not the only way or the LRBC-approved way, it’s simply one way if you don’t know what to say.

Now I want to emphasize something very important: we want to celebrate all throughout Who’s Your One, so please share your stories – good and bad, victories and defeats – so we can celebrate your faithfulness. Please text me, call me, or email me when you take even the smallest of steps, discover prayer insights, meet with your one, talk about Jesus with your one regardless of how it goes, or get questions from your one indicating openness to the gospel. My contact information is on the slide, please us it so we can celebrate together in worship. I hope we’ll have things to celebrate next Sunday! By the way, if you text, which is the best way, please be sure to say who you are!

We also want to pray as a community in days to come. We want to pray for you and your one as you do the Kingdom work of fishing for men, one person at a time. The names of all our ones will be posted inside the main entrance so we can please pray for each other’s ones whenever we pass by.

We’ll celebrate in our LRBC Community of Faith Facebook Group, which everyone should join and we can help you with that. Please post stories, steps taken, prayers answered, and prayers requested, preferably using the hash tag #WhosYour1 in your post. I’ll post the daily prayers there every morning this month.

If your one accepts Jesus, that’s awesome! We’ll rejoice and hopefully you can even bring them, baptize them, and then commit to a new one! If your one rejects Jesus, don’t give up on them, but eventually  you may need to commit to another one. there’s no time limit on Who’s Your One! While I’ll be preaching on it this m onth, we’ll talk about, reinforce, and celebrate for months to come. I recently saw a tweet from a pastor baptizing someone’s one they had worked on for a year! My hope is that we’ll each always have one we’re praying about and sharing with, because Following IS Fishing!

Now I want to give time for us to commit, as a congregation, to our ones. I’m going to pause to let you pray, reflect, and commit in your heart. Use this time to ask God to confirm the name of your one and commit to Him that you’ll do this thing for His kingdom.

If you aren’t quite sure who’s your one yet, you can decide t his week and commit next week. However, if you know and you’ve now promised God that you’ll do this thing, take out the bookmark in your bulletin, tear off the end with the fill in the blank, and write your one’s FIRST NAME ONLY. Please don’t include last name, because we’re going to hang these inside the main entrance for everyone to pray for.

When you’re ready, please come to the front and place your one’s name in the basket. If you aren’t able to come forward, just raise your hand and an usher will come and collect your one’s name for the basket. This is your symbolic commitment to your one before God and your brothers and sisters in Christ. So please, make your commitments now…

Let’s close with prayer:

MAKE US DISCIPLES,
WE WILL FOLLOW,
WE WILL FISH FOR MEN
LORD< GIVE ME THAT ONE