Manifesting God's Kingdom Through Community and Service
Summary
Understanding God's kingdom is essential for our spiritual journey. It's not just a distant reality in heaven but a present mission here on earth. We are called to work towards manifesting God's kingdom in our communities through salvation, baptism, and the use of spiritual gifts. These gifts, which some of you have already identified through our spiritual gift forms, are crucial for serving in the church. They help us understand where we can best contribute to the body of Christ. Our doctrinal beliefs, rooted in our Southern Baptist heritage, guide us, but we are not bound by the Southern Baptist Convention. Our primary focus is on engaging and transforming our local community, with missions to the outside world being secondary but still important.
Serving in the church is about finding your place and using your God-given talents to glorify Him. Whether it's through music, art, or any other skill, the key is to use these abilities for God's glory. For instance, if you have a talent for art, you might not draw anime for the church, but you can create Christian-themed art that communicates God's truth. Similarly, musicians can pivot their skills to serve the church's needs. The essence is to align your talents with God's purpose.
Membership in our church involves understanding and agreeing with our core beliefs. It's not just about attending classes but also about being interviewed to ensure a genuine understanding of the gospel and a commitment to serving. This process safeguards our doctrine and ensures that those teaching align with our beliefs. The congregation plays a crucial role in maintaining doctrinal purity, acting as a safeguard against false teachings.
Our church governance is elder-led but ultimately congregationally accountable. Elders are subject to the same discipline as any member, ensuring transparency and accountability. The congregation has the power to call for meetings and vote on significant decisions, including the appointment or dismissal of elders. This structure ensures that the church remains true to its mission and values.
Finally, as we grow, we aim to plant new churches rather than expand indefinitely. This approach ensures that we remain focused on community and discipleship. We are committed to training and appointing deacons and deaconesses to serve the church, emphasizing their role as servants rather than leaders. This structure supports our mission to build a community that reflects God's kingdom on earth.
Key Takeaways:
1. God's Kingdom on Earth: Understanding that God's kingdom is not just a future hope but a present reality calls us to actively participate in its manifestation here on earth. This involves engaging in salvation, baptism, and utilizing our spiritual gifts to serve and transform our communities. [00:20]
2. Using Spiritual Gifts: Our spiritual gifts are innate and often recognizable even before salvation. These gifts are meant to be used for God's glory, and identifying them helps us find our place in the church. Whether it's teaching, giving, or leading, these gifts should align with God's purpose. [02:00]
3. Church Membership and Doctrine: Membership involves understanding and agreeing with core doctrinal beliefs. This process includes interviews to ensure a genuine understanding of the gospel, safeguarding the church from false teachings. The congregation plays a vital role in maintaining doctrinal purity. [20:11]
4. Elder and Congregational Accountability: The church is elder-led but congregationally accountable. Elders are subject to the same discipline as any member, ensuring transparency. The congregation has the power to call meetings and vote on significant decisions, maintaining the church's mission and values. [37:40]
5. Church Growth and Planting: Our growth strategy focuses on planting new churches rather than expanding indefinitely. This approach ensures a focus on community and discipleship. Training and appointing deacons and deaconesses emphasize their role as servants, supporting the church's mission. [37:40]
Youtube Chapters:
- [00:00] - Welcome
- [00:20] - Understanding God's Kingdom
- [02:00] - Discovering Spiritual Gifts
- [05:30] - Southern Baptist Heritage
- [08:45] - Community Engagement
- [12:00] - Serving in the Church
- [15:15] - Membership Process
- [20:11] - Safeguarding Doctrine
- [25:30] - Congregational Accountability
- [30:00] - Church Governance
- [35:00] - Elders and Congregation
- [37:40] - Church Growth Strategy
- [40:00] - Role of Deacons and Deaconesses
- [45:00] - Final Thoughts and Questions
Study Guide
Bible Study Discussion Guide
Bible Reading:
1. Matthew 6:10 - "Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven."
2. 1 Corinthians 12:4-7 - "There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work."
3. Ephesians 4:11-13 - "So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ."
---
Observation Questions:
1. What does the sermon suggest about the nature of God's kingdom and its presence on earth? [00:20]
2. How are spiritual gifts described in the sermon, and what is their purpose within the church? [02:00]
3. What is the process for becoming a member of the church, according to the sermon? [20:11]
4. How does the church ensure doctrinal purity and accountability among its leaders and members? [37:40]
---
Interpretation Questions:
1. How does the concept of God's kingdom being a present reality on earth influence the way believers should live their daily lives? [00:20]
2. In what ways can spiritual gifts be misused, and how can they be redirected to serve God's purpose according to the sermon? [02:00]
3. Why is it important for church members to understand and agree with core doctrinal beliefs, and how does this safeguard the church? [20:11]
4. What role does the congregation play in maintaining accountability within the church's leadership structure? [37:40]
---
Application Questions:
1. Reflect on your own spiritual gifts. How can you use them more effectively to serve your church community? [02:00]
2. Consider the talents you have. How can you align them with God's purpose to glorify Him in your daily life? [02:00]
3. What steps can you take to deepen your understanding of the church's core beliefs and ensure you are aligned with them? [20:11]
4. How can you actively participate in maintaining doctrinal purity and accountability within your church? [37:40]
5. Think about the concept of God's kingdom on earth. What practical actions can you take this week to manifest this kingdom in your community? [00:20]
6. If you are not yet a member, what might be holding you back from committing to church membership, and how can you address these concerns? [20:11]
7. How can you support the church's mission to plant new churches and focus on community and discipleship? [37:40]
Devotional
Day 1: God's Kingdom as a Present Reality
Understanding God's kingdom is essential for our spiritual journey. It's not just a distant reality in heaven but a present mission here on earth. We are called to work towards manifesting God's kingdom in our communities through salvation, baptism, and the use of spiritual gifts. These gifts, which some of you have already identified through our spiritual gift forms, are crucial for serving in the church. They help us understand where we can best contribute to the body of Christ. Our doctrinal beliefs, rooted in our Southern Baptist heritage, guide us, but we are not bound by the Southern Baptist Convention. Our primary focus is on engaging and transforming our local community, with missions to the outside world being secondary but still important. [00:20]
Luke 17:20-21 (ESV): "Being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them, 'The kingdom of God is not coming in ways that can be observed, nor will they say, "Look, here it is!" or "There!" for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you.'"
Reflection: How can you actively participate in manifesting God's kingdom in your community today? What specific actions can you take to bring about transformation?
Day 2: Discovering and Using Spiritual Gifts
Our spiritual gifts are innate and often recognizable even before salvation. These gifts are meant to be used for God's glory, and identifying them helps us find our place in the church. Whether it's teaching, giving, or leading, these gifts should align with God's purpose. Serving in the church is about finding your place and using your God-given talents to glorify Him. Whether it's through music, art, or any other skill, the key is to use these abilities for God's glory. For instance, if you have a talent for art, you might not draw anime for the church, but you can create Christian-themed art that communicates God's truth. Similarly, musicians can pivot their skills to serve the church's needs. The essence is to align your talents with God's purpose. [02:00]
1 Peter 4:10-11 (ESV): "As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God's varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ."
Reflection: What spiritual gift have you identified in yourself, and how can you use it to serve others in your church community this week?
Day 3: Commitment to Church Membership and Doctrine
Membership involves understanding and agreeing with core doctrinal beliefs. This process includes interviews to ensure a genuine understanding of the gospel, safeguarding the church from false teachings. The congregation plays a vital role in maintaining doctrinal purity. Membership in our church involves understanding and agreeing with our core beliefs. It's not just about attending classes but also about being interviewed to ensure a genuine understanding of the gospel and a commitment to serving. This process safeguards our doctrine and ensures that those teaching align with our beliefs. The congregation plays a crucial role in maintaining doctrinal purity, acting as a safeguard against false teachings. [20:11]
Titus 1:9 (ESV): "He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it."
Reflection: How can you contribute to maintaining doctrinal purity in your church? Are there areas where you need to deepen your understanding of the church's core beliefs?
Day 4: Accountability in Church Leadership
The church is elder-led but congregationally accountable. Elders are subject to the same discipline as any member, ensuring transparency. The congregation has the power to call meetings and vote on significant decisions, maintaining the church's mission and values. Our church governance is elder-led but ultimately congregationally accountable. Elders are subject to the same discipline as any member, ensuring transparency and accountability. The congregation has the power to call for meetings and vote on significant decisions, including the appointment or dismissal of elders. This structure ensures that the church remains true to its mission and values. [37:40]
Hebrews 13:17 (ESV): "Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you."
Reflection: In what ways can you support your church leaders while also holding them accountable to the church's mission and values?
Day 5: Church Growth through Planting
Our growth strategy focuses on planting new churches rather than expanding indefinitely. This approach ensures a focus on community and discipleship. Training and appointing deacons and deaconesses emphasize their role as servants, supporting the church's mission. Finally, as we grow, we aim to plant new churches rather than expand indefinitely. This approach ensures that we remain focused on community and discipleship. We are committed to training and appointing deacons and deaconesses to serve the church, emphasizing their role as servants rather than leaders. This structure supports our mission to build a community that reflects God's kingdom on earth. [37:40]
Acts 14:23 (ESV): "And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed."
Reflection: How can you contribute to the mission of church planting? Is there a specific role you feel called to in supporting new church communities?
Quotes
"Yeah, so the key takeaways for each week, Xander, can you put me up a little bit? Thank you, sir. The key takeaways from each week, first we need to understand God's kingdom and the fact that God's kingdom is here on earth we're working towards god's kingdom here on earth it's it's not um just in heaven but here on earth what that means um definitely salvation baptism and the spiritual gifts some of you filled out those spiritual gift forms um and uh sent those in we thank you for that if you have not done that please jump online and do that that helps us as your pastors to kind of gauge what your spiritual gifts are so that as we're praying what areas of the church you can serve in we have a better idea of what your wheelhouse is what you would be good at um we definitely learned about our doctrinal beliefs and our southern baptist heritage and again we stress that while we are we have a strong southern baptist heritage um we are not uh beholden to uh the southern baptist convention in any way but we do have a strong heritage um we engage in our community uh transformationally um and that our our community comes first and then missions to the outside world that's not to say that this is the outside world is not important because you've heard us talk about um pastor phil and i maybe a couple members of the leadership team who are a little brave um are going to try to go to vietnam and we're going to do some stuff there then we're going to figure out a hard place for us to go to um but that is all secondary to what we are doing in our own community first um and then finding a place in the church um for you to serve and what that means what that looks like giving church membership all of that we covered in week four" [00:02:08]
"I think that the most important thing to know, and this might not be answering your question, but I think the most important thing to know is that it's kind of innate to you, like you, it shouldn't be something that comes as a major surprise, like there are some things, you'll take the spiritual gifts test, and then you'll be like, oh, I didn't think I would score as strongly in that, right, but there shouldn't be anything that is like, what? They're saying I should be a preacher, like that should not come as a surprise to you. For me, the, like, one of my strongest spiritual gifts is just giving, like nothing in this world makes me happier than to give, and I saw this spiritual gift used improperly even before I was saved, I had the spiritual gift, I just used it improperly before I was saved, now that I'm a born -again Christian, I, I, I use it for God's church, and rather than buying people some of the things that I bought them before, but it's one of those things that even before you're saved, I think you, you kind of have an idea, like, oh man, teaching just comes natural to me, or, or, um, shepherding kind of just comes natural to me, I'm a natural leader, I, I, I think it's, if that answers a question, I'm not sure." [00:05:48]
"oftentimes what you can, is there a need for the Crossroads Community Church to have you and Xander draw anime for the church? Probably not. But can you use your art in certain ways that will promote the church? Absolutely. could you draw a Christian anime or a Christian manga or manga or I don't know what that is but like could you draw one of those that's Christian in nature?" [00:09:07]
"that could give the truth of God's Word to people. You can absolutely do that. I mean, God gave you those abilities for you to glorify Him in it. So if you're using any of your abilities to do anything other than glorify God, you're not doing it right anyway. So yeah, absolutely, you guys can make music and you can make it in a Christian way. As far as the church is concerned, we need musicians. You play like a trumpet or something. We don't need a trumpet, but if you already know how to play a trumpet and you can figure out how to pivot that into playing a guitar or a bass or piano or something, we could use that. And if you've already got a natural music bent, that's where you would go with that. Same with art. We may not need anime art, but you can pivot into helping Pastor Phil do all of the cool crossing stuff and making logos and building things." [00:09:40]
"a good, that is a good question. So we've done these four basic classes and if you've missed one, we need you to see all four. So if you've missed one, what we ask and you want to become a member, what we ask you to do is to go to the crossings .cc and find the membership tab. It's under the about us. And what you're going to do is you're going to find the weeks that you've missed and there's some questions there. We'll ask you to answer those questions and watch the video and then shoot the answers to the questions off to us. That gives you credit for having seen that class, right? So if you've seen all four classes, you've been through all four of the Sundays that we covered this, you're going to give us your name and you're going to say I'm interested in membership. The next step is we're going to do a membership interview. And this is, I've had some people who really gave me the caca face when I said that. Here's what this means. We're going to do a membership interview. We're missed time yet. We're going to sit down together and we're going to, now I've heard your testimony." [00:15:24]
"I know, but there's people in here, I haven't heard their testimony, right? And so we're going to ask, what's your testimony? What do you, we're going to make sure, you know, because I said, what do you have to do to be a member? You have to be a follower of Christ, right? So we want to make sure you understand the gospel that you're, first of all, really saved. And if you're not, we want to, we want to talk to you about Jesus. We want to help you get saved. But then we want to hear your testimony. And then we got, we want to talk about spiritual gifts." [00:17:00]
"What are your spiritual gifts? Where do you think you're going to serve? What do you think you'll be good at? Whatever. We're going to talk to you through those things. It's basic stuff that we've already kind of covered. We want to now hear from you. And then once we're done doing that, then we are, for the first class, actually, that's a good question, how that's going to work. Because starting after we already have members, then we have our membership body vote on you. I guess um we just you go through and we just we vote you and we say" [00:17:00]
"The answer to that is, first of all, membership class and membership. We are not going to let just anybody come in and start teaching. In order to come in and to teach even anything down from kindergarten class up to anything, if you're teaching, you've got to be a member of the church in order to teach. In order to be a member of the church, you have to have gone through this membership class and know and agree with everything that we're talking about. Then, once the membership class is done, we have to interview you, and we're going to talk to you, and hopefully in that interview, if you believe something weird, if you're like, well, listen, I kind of believe in modalism, that's going to be an issue. We're going to not let you, we're going to probably not let you be a member. We're definitely not going to let you teach." [00:21:57]
"And so that's the way we're going to safeguard who we're letting come in and who we are teaching things, right? Now, as far as Phil and I are concerned, the elders, even when we bring on other elders, who is the safeguard there? You guys. You guys are the safeguard. If me and Phil get up and we start talking crazy, you guys are the safeguards. You guys are the guys who say, wait, hold on now, Pastor. That's outside of what is sound doctrine. What you're saying there doesn't match up with what I see in Scripture. I need to talk to you about that. And remember, we talked about the proper way to do that, right? You come to me first and say, I get up here and I just start talking crazy one Sunday. And Charlie's like, yeah, I don't know about that. Well, Charlie, then you pull me to the side and we have a talk alone. And if after that, it's still like, I don't think Pastor Justin's understanding me. Well, then you go and you get two other guys or women, no patriarchy. You get two other good Christian people and you come back to me and you come to me again. And if after that, I'm still not doing what's right, I'm subject to church discipline the same way anybody else is. Pastor Phil's subject to church discipline the same way." [00:22:57]
"anybody else is you call us before the church to repent and if we don't repent you dismiss us as elders and you find new elders so this church is elder led and we ask you to please let us leave don't shackle us to where we can't do our job but at the end of the day although it's elder led it's really congregational led in the sense that if elders don't do what we're supposed to be doing you guys as a congregation can come together and uh tell us to kick rocks" [00:24:17]
"Right now the elders are Pastor Phil and myself and our third elder is the elder board of Hagerstown Church because they're our sending church. elders. We've signed a covenant with them or an agreement with them that we will keep them on as our third elder and we'll run major decisions and stuff through them until we have a third elder. So if there are any men in the congregation who have read Titus and Timothy and believe that they meet the qualifications of elder and would like to come forward and say, hey, this is a situation where I might like to be thought of and, you know, figure out whether or not I could be an elder or not, we would absolutely be open to them." [00:34:43]
"Yeah so even if we didn't hire somebody so let's say again I'm going to pick on Charlie and Charlie says I'd like to be an elder I think I meet the qualifications I'd like to put myself forward as an elder right so Charlie would come and he'd talk to Pastor Phil and I and there would actually be a a period of probably months and months of talking to Charlie and just doing some discipleship and just really figuring out if that's right then there would come a point where we would have a members what we used to call business meetings are now just called members meetings right and at that point we'd have a members meeting and we'd bring Charlie forward and we'd say hey we've been talking to Charlie for the last four or five months we think he meets the qualifications and so we'd like to put Charlie forward as a a non -paid elder and then the church membership would vote on that." [00:36:42]
Chatbot
-
I'm an AI bot trained specifically on the sermon from Mar 03, 2025. Do you have any questions about it?