To Do What Jesus Did | Together is the Way | Rick Atchley

♪ Welcome to the Hills Preacher, Rick here, greeting our online family and all of you in person in what is soon to be our five campuses in Dallas, North Richland Hills, Keller, West Fort Worth and Weatherford, delighted that you're with us and you just heard an announcement about our women's conference and I want to take a moment to strongly endorse it. I know something about conferences and I was at one two years ago and I spoke and after I spoke a woman named Tiana Spencer spoke and oh my goodness, one of the best messages I've ever heard. I kept thinking I'm so glad I spoke before her and not after her. You want to hear Tiana. And in Taralee Kabul right now might be encouraging more Christians around the world than any person alive. I know conferences and you won't go to a national women's conference this year with a stronger lineup than our women's conference right here at the Hill. So ladies, get your tickets, tell your mothers and your grandmothers, get your daughters and your granddaughters, get your Mahjong group, get your soccer moms, get all the ladies you work out with and it's going to be powerful, it's going to be wonderful and don't be surprised if I try to sneak in. So we're wrapping up a series called Together is the Way and the simple premise has been together is the only way to follow Jesus. And I want to begin with a question. Have you ever accepted a mission or assignment only to realize later that you needed reinforcements? That you should not have attempted this on your own. So this month, my oldest son, Michael turned 40. Next month is the 40th anniversary of when Jamie and I learned he had been born. And soon after that, we became adoptive parents. And if you've been there, you know the learning curve is steep. Now Jamie, as a first time mom, was amazing from the start, but I had a lot to learn. And so after a couple of months, there was some kind of event for women in the evening and I encouraged her to go.

I said, babe, I've got this. I know how to make bottles and formula. I know how to change diapers. You go have a nice evening. I can do this by myself. And I convinced her to leave and she took off and it went great. I read Michael books. We grabbed things on the floor that we could reach. I fed him his bottle and now I'm on the changing table. I'm going to take his clothes off and put on his pajamas. I unhooked the bottom, got his legs out. I got his arms out. I pulled it up over his head and that outfit got stuck. And when I mean stuck, I mean it would not budge. And his face is turning red and he starts screaming and I am panicking and then I stepped up like a man and did what a man does. I got some scissors and I cut him out of that thing. As far as I'm concerned, I saved his life and he got his pajamas on, got him in bed. Jamie came home later and she looked in the trash can coming into the house and she picked up this brand new outfit and said, what happened? And I explained what a hero I had been. And then she turned it around and showed me buttons all down the back. Now I don't think that's my fault. I don't think buttons should ever be on the back of a man's clothes. It would explain though why the kids were in middle school before I ever kept them alone again. The point is, I thought I was ready to do an assignment all by myself and I wasn't as ready as I thought I was. But Jesus calls everyone to join his mission, but he invites no one to go solo. That's why we say all the time at our church that we exist to make and grow followers of

Jesus and we do this together. That's not an add-on word. That's not a foe-in word. We believe this is Jesus' way. Together, we are with Jesus, we become like Jesus, and we do what He did. The hills is not a place. The hills is a people that meets in a number of places to spend time together with Jesus and to become like Jesus together, and together to live on mission for Him. That we do what we are called by Jesus to do together. Look at how Paul put this when he wrote to a church in Philippi, above all you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the good news about Christ. And then, whether I come and see you again or only hear about you, I will know you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose fighting together for the faith, which is the good news. Paul wanted to hear that they were working together for the mission, for the faith. That we fight as one, but we do not fight alone. Because discipleship is not, and it has never been a solo calling. Discipleship happens in community. And how does community form? Around a common mission. Around a reason that binds us that's bigger than any of us. And this has been from the start, the way discipleship is done. Let's go back to the very start when Jesus called the very first cohort of disciples. Mark 3. He went up on a mountainside and He called to Him those He wanted and they came to Him. And He appointed 12 that they might be with Him and that He might send them out to preach and to have authority to drive out demons. So from the beginning, they were called for a mission. They were trained to do something in Jesus' name.

And He never sent them out alone. He always sent them together. You see the same pattern in the book of Acts. Paul, the greatest church planter who's ever lived, never went on a mission alone. He might travel with Barnabas or with Mark or with Timothy or with Silas, but he always went together because, and here's the big idea, doing what Jesus did takes a team. Now you've heard maybe someone say, the church needs a mission. I think it's more accurate to say that Jesus' mission needs a church. Church already has a mission. Jesus asked His disciples, who do you say I am? You're the Christ. You're the Son of the living God. And Jesus announced the mission. Upon this confession, upon this rock, I am going to build a church. I am going to create a community. And through this community, I'm going to pursue my global agenda of taking on the gates of hell, of claiming back for God what Satan has illegitimately claimed. So it's through Jesus' created community that His stated goal gets accomplished. Now I want to acknowledge the church hurt and church abuse happens, and it is inexcusable. But what is equally unacceptable is the idea that I can live for and I can follow Jesus alone. This is why the New Testament never even remotely considers the thought of a Christian without a church. And when I use that word church, I'm using it the way it's used overwhelmingly in the New Testament, not the global invisible church. I'm talking the way it's used mostly in the New Testament, a local, visible, tangible community of people that get together regularly to encourage each other and to serve the mission of Christ together. To say I'm going to follow Jesus, but I don't want a church is like saying I'm going to play football, but I don't want to be on a team.

You can't live the sent life without Christian brothers and sisters. This is what Jesus established at the very beginning. Together is the way to do what Jesus did. Let me show you how that works. Well one thing, together our witness gets bolder. Now, it's true people need the gospel, but it is equally true the gospel needs a people. Look again at what Jesus did. Calling the 12 to Him, He began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over impure spirits, and they went out and preached that people should repent. And so He trained them to send them to live on mission and to be His witnesses. This is our core identity. Before Jesus ascended to heaven, He said, I'm gonna send you the Holy Spirit, and He's gonna give you power to be my witnesses. But isn't it true the testimony of a witness is more powerful when it's not solitary? If you're a lawyer representing a client, you don't want to call one witness. You want to call a lot of

witnesses because the number of witnesses increases the credibility of the testimony. And have you noticed you are quicker to take a stand for truth when you're not the only one speaking up, when you're not the only one saying the same thing? When Joshua and Caleb and the other ten spies explored the land and came back, and the ten gave a bad report, we can't take that land. Joshua and Caleb spoke the truth. And you think it helped Joshua that Caleb was beside him? When I was a senior in high school, I had a lot of credits. I didn't need to go to school days, so I went half a day. And the second half of the day, I had a job loading trucks at a upholstery warehouse. And it was a pretty ungodly environment. And a lot of the men I worked with were members of a radical Islamic faction.

And they were not just bold about their faith. They were angry and accusatory. And almost daily, I was challenged to defend what I believe about Jesus. These are grown men, and I'm a 17-year-old kid. It was intimidating. But what helped is I had a supervisor on the floor, a young man named Daryl. He was a country boy, grew up in a little town. He was a deacon of a tiny Baptist church, and he always had his Bible with him, and he was ready to talk. He did not change any of my convictions about Jesus. But when he was close to me, I was quicker to speak of him because I wasn't doing it alone. We opt out of missional opportunities more quickly when we're alone. But together, we can pour courage into each other, and we can pour courage into those who are on the front lines taking the

gospel to the world because they know they have the support of their partners in the first century. Got all these baby churches, and they need to be taught. And so there were these traveling teachers or prophets that would go around and do this, but someone's got to support them. Listen to what the Apostle John says about that. Dear friend, you're being faithful to God when you care for the traveling teachers who pass through. Even though they're strangers to you, they've told the church here of your loving friendship. Please continue providing for such teachers in a manner that pleases God, for they're traveling for the Lord, and they accept nothing from people who are not believers. So we ourselves should support them so that we can be their partners as they teach the truth.

The only way this is going to happen, John says, is if we do it together. In fact, look how it says in the NIV. We ought, therefore, to show hospitality to such people so we may work together for the truth. This is how we reach the world. Not everybody doing their own individual thing, but people coming together to see the gospel carried to the ends of the earth. So, I mentioned on our study break, my wife and I visited four of our church planters. And this is the last church we visited. It's a counterculture church planted by Jesse and Becca Lusko. And they're in Portland, Oregon. And it is one of the darkest places we've ever tried to plant a church. They meet in a theater, and it It's impossible to describe the amount of sin that's celebrated in that neighborhood. I preached that morning in July and this is what Jesse had to do the day I preached. He does it every Sunday.

He goes out and he sweeps up all the syringes from the drug users off the street and off the sidewalk. He gets a water hose and he sprays off all the vomit. He often has to go and get paint to cover up all the graffiti. This is what they live with daily and it is hard. Several times they said to us, you have no idea what it means when we get a card from someone at the Hills or a letter or a call or when a community group from the Hills gets together and sends us some gift cards so we can take our kids to eat. We have something every November called Harvest Offering. We support missionaries and church planters across the country and around the world. We are partners together in the truth and we need to keep lifting up the people that are lifting up Christ in some of the hardest places in the world. Together our witness gets bolder and our impact gets bigger. Now what we do for Christ alone is just as sanctified but what we do together gets multiplied. We can simply do things together we could not accomplish if we only do our own things by ourselves. So the first missions church was Antioch. They commissioned Paul and Barnabas and sent them off and supported them to go and here is what happens when they came back. On arriving they gathered the church together and reported all the good that God had done through them and now they had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles. A brand new gospel outreach that changed the world happened because a church and some missionaries worked together. Together gives us the courage not just to be different. It gives us the capacity to make a bigger difference. Now we are not followers of Jesus because we serve. We serve because we follow Jesus. Because we follow Jesus we are salt and light. Because we follow Jesus wherever we go we should be bringing some heaven with us and things should get better.

And while the world may be slow to acknowledge our presence it would be quick to notice our absence. The church's greatest critics today don't want to live in a world without the church. What doesn't make the headlines is the fact that 70% of all philanthropy in America is done by Christians. Or that Christians every year give over $300 billion to fight global poverty more than the U.S. government. Or that when you study the history of the Christian movement it was Christians that introduced the opportunity of education for all. It was Christians who developed institutions to provide health care for the masses. And it was Christians who championed the notion of individual human rights. Something the world never believed before the church existed. I'll say it again. Those that have no use for Jesus' church don't want to live in a world without it. And consider the impact we can have together at the hills. We're currently supporting 20 brand new churches across America. We can only do that together. We're supporting seven new Bible translation efforts right now that can only happen because we're working together. Think about Celebrate Recovery on two of our campuses and the people that are finding freedom from addiction because they're not having to fight the battle alone. Or all the asylum seekers who've come to our country legitimately and legally but they need help and support and it's something we're doing together. Yes, the world needs the gospel of Jesus but that's not enough. The world needs the people of Jesus to come along with the gospel. In fact, we have parts of the world right now where we're supporting missionaries I can't even name because it's not safe. And in those parts of the world, if you don't bring people, they don't accept Jesus. Because in that part of the world, the day you accept Jesus, you get... kicked out of your family, you lose your community, and they're not going to come to Jesus unless

a family comes with the deal. It's together that the impact becomes so much bigger. And think about the impact we have together when we pray. We're not just changing the seen world, we're doing work together in the unseen world. So our Minister of Kingdom Expansion, Chris Shelby, was in Greece recently where we were doing some work helping refugees find safety and well-being. And he met there with some monks at a monastery that has existed for over a thousand years primarily to pray. And one of the monks said this to Chris. We believe that one of the greatest contributions we make to this world is that we stand in the place of prayer. We take our watches in the middle of the night to hold evil at bay through our communities we've dedicated to prayer. You think the world is broken and evil now? Imagine if we were not here covering the world with our shield of prayer. And I believe that's true. That wherever the church exists praying together, the community just got safer. Together we go so much farther and together we keep going. Because not only does our witness get bolder, our impact get bigger, but our hope gets better. Hope is a powerful thing, but hope alone can shrink. It's hard to stay hopeful by yourself. So this past week Dolly Parton passed away and she was beloved around the world and not just for her immense performing talent, but for her big generous heart. And one of my favorite stories I heard, she's from East Tennessee and there was a high dropout rate in a poor county. So she gets all the seventh and ninth graders together years ago and says to them, everyone pick a buddy. And after they had picked a buddy, she said, now, if you two graduate together, I give each of you $500. But if one of you fails to graduate, nobody gets the money.

And graduation dropout rate in that county went from 35% down to 6%. And she kept her promise because it's hard to keep hope alive alone. Hope gets bigger and it gets bolder and it gets better when you share it with a brother. That's why the early Christians, when they would see each other, they would say, Maranatha. They were announcing their hope that they held together. The Lord is coming soon. So I want us to do that right now. On every campus, even online, I want you to turn somebody next to you right now and I just want you to say, Jesus is coming back. Do that, please. See? Wasn't that fun? Now, I want you to turn to that same person and I want you to say, but you might die first. And now, I want you to listen to the Word of God that speaks to both of those truths. Jesus died for us so that we can live together with Him, whether we're alive or dead when He comes. So encourage each other and give each other strength just as you're doing now. Speak this truth to each other. This is the hope that we share together. I've said several times that I had part of my college stay rooming with Max Licato, maybe the best-known Christian author in the world. And his books have blessed millions, but the single thing he's written that blessed me more than any was a letter about a year after we graduated. One of our roommates had died in a car wreck. And he reflected on that in the letter and then he signed it, remember, Rick, keep your eyes on heaven. And I have reflected on that at least a thousand times. He was reminding me of the hope we share together. See, our ultimate hope is not resuscitation, it's resurrection. And this hope...

is not based on a wish but on an event. And Jesus knew that hope takes leaps. And so what he did is he got the disciples together around a table and said, now, I want you to do this a lot, often. Get around a table, take some bread, take a cup, and I want you to remember my death and my resurrection. You do this until I come back to keep your hope alive. See, our confidence in what God will do is grounded in what he has done. And let me tell you, if you liked the resurrection of Jesus, you are going to love the sequel. And so what does Paul say? Encourage each other and give each other strength because together we remember that we'll be together again. Why am I taking so much time to talk about this? Because as your pastor, it is my responsibility to prepare you for what's coming. Together is your future. Every glimpse of heaven we have in the Bible is communal. Won't be any hermits in heaven. We're doing heaven together. Listen again to the word of God. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel, with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. And after that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.

And so we will be with the Lord forever. That's good news. But if that is how we're going to live then, shouldn't we start living like that now? Community can be messy. And I am not in any way excusing abuse. But we've all had the experience of trying community, trying a group, trying to serve somewhere, and it just was awkward. I get that. But it doesn't change the truth that this is how Jesus said we follow him. We follow him together. He has come to bring heaven to earth. He's come to push back darkness with light. He's come to bring hope and to raise the dead. And he has invited us to join him in this mission. But he calls no one to go solo. As I was reflecting on that, one of my all-time favorite movie scenes came back to me. It was in the first of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Frodo the Hobbit has a ring. And to bring the world healing and hope and health, he's got to take this ring and destroy it in Mordor. And it is a difficult and arduous journey. And he's traveling with his best friend Sam. And he decides it's too dangerous. So he is going to go on the mission alone. Watch this clip. ♪♪

No, no, no! Frodo! Mr. Frodo! No, Sam. ♪♪ Go back, Sam. I'm going to Mordor alone. Of course you are. And I'm coming with you. I love that. I'm going alone. Of course you are. And I'm coming with you. And if you watched the end of the third movie, you know he does make it to Mordor. But he never would have made it alone. Let me wrap it all up. You need to help somebody follow Jesus and somebody needs to help you and if that's not how you're following Jesus it is time for you to get it together. Let's pray. So God I hope somehow these last few weeks we've moved to Mark and that some who've been comfortable just kind of being lost in a crowd will take a step into the kind of discipleship that Jesus created. We can do so much more for our neighbors and the world together and together our neighbors and our fellow brothers and sisters can see so much more grow in us. So give us this passion God. May our church be a witness to the world of what heaven is going to look like. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.