Romans 12:11 | All of Jesus for All the World | Nathan Pharr

Good morning, Renovation Church. It is good to be back. We have been on the road most of the weekends for the past, I think, about six weeks. And so it is good to be back where we have been for the past couple of years. It is good to see your faces again if you don't already know us.

I'm Nathan. I have a wife and a son. My wife's name is Jana. My son's name is Isaac. I grew up on the west coast and moved out to the beautiful plains of the Midwest.

Jana grew up in Indiana, near Fort Wayne, and we met. That's another long story. I won't bore you with those details, but Janet and I have. We have a passion for spiritual formation, for member care, for music, for fun, for seeing people come to Jesus and many other things. And so the past three years, we've been in a developmental process here at Renovation Church as we gain more ministry experience, as we gain more tools, and as we work on going overseas.

I became ordained here at Renovation Church, so that was part of the process as well. And we have had a long journey. And so in a few minutes, I'm going to share a few more stories about who we are and the journey that God has led us on. I'm going to be sharing how we're planning on using the gifts that God has given us as we minister in Portugal with the Christian and Missionary Alliance. But before I start sharing all of that, we have something.

If there are any kids left in the room or if you are an adult who just gets bored when people stand up and talk for a long period of time. So if you want to pay attention to something on the screen, I have something for you. You see, there's a story in Portugal. It's part of their culture now. It's about a rooster.

A man was traveling through Barcelos, and he was accused of a crime that he did not commit. So now the punishment for that crime was to be hung on the gallows. And so they brought this man before the judge. The judge apparently was sitting down at his dinner table to eat. And there is a roasted rooster.

I don't know why they're eating rooster, but there's a roasted rooster on the table. So it's dead, right? And this man who is accused of this crime, he protests his innocence before the judge. Nobody believes him, so they send him away to the gallows to be hung. But before that, the man says, I am innocent, and to prove my innocence, if you hang me, this rooster is going to stand up and cry.

They didn't believe him. That seems pretty silly, right? And so they sent him away to the gallows. And just as he's getting the noose put around his neck, guess what happened? The rooster stood up on the table and crowed.

And so the judge quickly ran out of his home. Think of it, it's a small village. He ran out of his home to the town square and stopped the hanging. So the rooster in Portugal, it symbolizes justice, symbolizes protection, symbolizes a miracle. And so as we present, as we tell more stories, kids and adults, we've put a rooster on some of these slides.

And so your job is to count how many roosters are in this presentation.

All right, that's us. I forgot to advance some slides here.

This is a rooster.

Yes, it is part. You'll see roosters everywhere in Portugal. And to continue. When I was growing up, I had this perception that international workers were kind of like the elite Christians, right? Like, here's everyday Christians in America and here's the international workers, or here's the churchgoers and here's the superstars.

They go off and they have fun adventures all around the world. It seemed to me as I was growing up that if you wanted to know what God was up to and the kinds of supernatural things that God does, then you need to listen to an international worker from, say, Africa or from some far off land in the jungle, because, well, you know, you've got these special Christians who apparently have this special connection with God. And God just seemed to be doing things in faraway lands. That was my perception as I was growing up. But the reality I found is that God will do extraordinary things as ordinary people say yes to what God puts in front of him.

We're just saying, I will follow Jesus. No turning back, right? Jesus told his disciples, come, follow me. And what was their immediate response? Immediate obedience in saying yes to what God called them to.

And so Jana and I are not these superstars. We're not these elite Christians. We're just ordinary people like you. And we've tried to say yes to the next thing that God has put us in front of us, no matter what it was. And so over the years, as we pursued God and as we've sought his kingdom, he's allowed us to see some cool things and experience some cool things.

You'll hear more about that in a bit. Alex shared recently about his passion for barbershop quartets. And I'm sure if you asked him a few questions, he would be able to tell you everything you ever needed to know, and then before long, it would be bedtime.

Since I'm from the Pacific Northwest, I'm wondering if you have ever run into somebody who is so passionate about coffee that you just can't get them to stop talking about it. You see, in the Pacific Northwest, you can find coffee stands on almost every corner and scattered through parking lots.

And as I've gotten older, I have become a little bit more passionate about coffee, but there's like a whole nother level that I haven't gotten into. You know, you could ask somebody about the different flavor profiles of coffee, and they could tell you how a coffee bean from South America tastes very differently than a coffee bean from Africa or a coffee bean from Indonesia. Just based on the soil and the PH levels and everything. You could. You could talk to somebody about coffee and they could tell you what temperature your water needs to be and how many grams of ground coffee you need for the specific type of brew that you want.

People are passionate about different things, aren't they? And so I'm wondering this morning, as we talk a little bit about having passion, I'm wondering, do you and I have the same passion about Jesus and for Jesus? When we talk to our friends, our family, and our neighbors, can others tell that we are Jesus followers? When we talk about the people that we disagree with, or when we talk to the people that we disagree with, do others see Christ in us in our daily actions, in what we post on Facebook, in how we talk about other people with our friends?

I want to start this morning In Romans, chapter 12, verse 11, it says, do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Now, this chapter in Romans, it talks a lot about living life in the body of Christ, and it talks a bit about gifts later on in the chapter. But this verse stuck out to me. Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. I wonder what it means to be slothful in zeal.

Those two words don't seem to match up. Those two words don't seem to go together right? Like, either you're passionate about something and you retain that passion, or you have apathy about a particular subject. But slothful in zeal, they don't seem to go together. I think sometimes we get focused on the wrong things, sometimes we get distracted, and we find our conversations are always about the generalities of life or what's happening in our life.

Maybe we get focused on the American dream, or we get focused on our retirement accounts. And the stock market. And we get focused on raising the rising gas prices, price of groceries, our kids, sports, progressing in our jobs, making time for friends and serving. The Lord gets replaced by everyday mundane activities. Our spirits get overwhelmed by our own desires, our own hurts, our own hang ups, our own sin and our own selfishness.

And so our passion for who God is and what he is doing gets replaced by common things that are good things, even things that God has called us to participate in. But in the midst of those things that God has called us to, we can forget who it is that we're serving and we can become slothful in our zeal. You know, there's a man in the Bible who said, indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ and be found in Him a little later, he says, but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. That sounds like passion, that sounds like zeal.

And so renovation church. Let us count everything else as rubbish so that you and I may gain Christ and be found in Him. Let us strain forward, pressing on. Let us stoke our zeal and our passion for who Jesus is and what he means to you. So today I want to encourage you, I want to build you up, I want to provide inspiration.

I want you to be able to grasp a vision of who you are and I want you to capture a vision again of who God is and the kinds of things that God does. At the risk of sounding a little cheesy, I want you to steep in God's word and I want you to filter out the gritty coffee grinds that are in your life so that when people are around you, they taste Jesus.

Who is this Jesus though? Do you know this Jesus that you say you follow? Romans, chapter 12, verse 11. Do not be slothful in zeal. Be fervent in spirit.

Serve the Lord in the alliance. We say the theme for international work and the theme in the alliance is all of Jesus for all the world. Jesus is the author and perfecter of our faith. Jesus died on the cross taking the punishment for our sins, and he rose again three days later and is seated in heaven. If you want to turn with me To Matthew, chapter 4, verses 23 through 24, I want you to get a picture of who Jesus is and what he does we're going to zoom in a little bit on his Life.

Matthew, chapter 4, verses 23 through 24.

And it reads like this. And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people. So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, those having seizures and paralytics. And he healed them. This is the Jesus that you follow.

So Jesus proclaimed, he taught, and he performed miracles. And it makes me wonder, if we believe that Jesus is who he says that he is, and if we believe that Jesus can do the things that he says he can do, then are we providing opportunities for people who do not know Jesus to experience his teaching, his proclamation, and the miraculous things that only Jesus can do? Can I ask you, Renovation, who are you bringing to Jesus? Or if you want to think about it another way, are you bringing Jesus to people?

Here at Renovation Church, one of the values we hold is we are stories. God is writing about Jesus making things new. Stories are important.

They preserve history and culture. They provide connection points between people. They teach truth. They help define social norms.

We see Jesus telling stories and parables all the time in the New Testament, as he teaches, as he proclaims, as he instructs.

Part of our job, part of our development process has been to invest deeply in our neighborhood, to build community, to get to know both Christ followers in our community and non Christ followers, and see what God is doing in our community. And so, as we prayed for our neighborhood on a regular basis, and as we started developing relationships with people that we met, we noticed a family across the street. From the way that they were dressed, we could tell that they were Muslim. And so we started praying for them specifically. Time passed.

Didn't seem like anything was happening. No opportunities to say hi, no opportunities to introduce ourselves. Then one day as we were leaving, you know, we're on a schedule, have to get somewhere. We saw the mom from that family unloading the back of her vehicle. She had a glass bottle in her hands.

And as she was unloading the back of the vehicle, that glass bottle slipped through her hands and smashed on the pavement. So liquid went everywhere. Jana looked at me and said, what do we do? What should we do? I said, go get some paper towels and try and help clean it up.

And so Jana rushed into our apartment, she grabbed some paper towels, went back over across the street to help the woman, and she was able to Initiate a conversation with this woman. She helped the woman clean up, and the woman told her at the end, you know, it's because of this bottle that we met.

We believe it's actually because of Jesus that we had this opportunity to meet with this woman. And since this encounter, Jana has been able to meet several times with this woman.

She's been able to have conversations with her, build some trust and build a relationship. Her name is Fatima. Would you pray for this family with us? We know that lost people matter to God. And I believe that when we are willing to make ourselves available, even when we're on a schedule, when we as ordinary people, make ourselves available to an extraordinary God, then things start to happen.

Here's something else I know. Followers of Jesus are transformed by him as they walk through life's experiences.

Now, throughout the book of Matthew, there are a lot of stories about the things that Jesus did. And so, rather than just say Jesus performed miracles, can we take a look at some of these miracles? We're going to run through them really quickly. I'd like to remind you of some of the miracles that Jesus did. And I want you to put yourselves in the feet, in the shoes, not the feet, that would be weird.

Put yourselves in the shoes of the people who are experiencing these miracles. Put yourselves in the shoes of the disciples. So Jesus healed people who had leprosy. Jesus healed the servant of a centurion who came to Jesus, requesting that Jesus heal his servant. Jesus healed Peter's mother in law who was sick.

Jesus cast demons out of two men into some nearby pigs. Jesus healed a paralyzed man and forgave his sins. Jesus heals blind men. He cast a demon out of a mute man and then the man was able to speak. Jesus taught in the synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every sickness and disease.

Do you know who Jesus is? Jesus gave authority to his 12 disciples to cast out demons and heal every disease and sickness. Jesus heals a man with a withered hand. Great crowds came to Jesus, bringing the lame, the blind, the crippled, the mute and many others. Laid them at Jesus feet and he healed them.

Jesus was raised from the dead. He has all authority. Do you know who Jesus is? Let me share a personal story of who Jesus is and the kind of things that he does. I attended Crown College and I got a bachelor's degree in youth ministry.

I thought I was going to go into youth ministry right after college. Instead, I went overseas to Black Forest Academy. I worked as a resident assistant in the dorms for two years. And it was one of the best jobs that I've had. It was life on life with kids.

It was getting to experience overseas culture, and I absolutely loved it. But during the second year I was there, I received a deep wounding to my core identity, who I thought I was and what I thought I was going to be doing. You know, this wounding rocked my world for a long time. And eventually God brought me to a place where I had to process through it and dig deep down into the roots of what I thought, and I had to pursue healing in Jesus name. Here's what I discovered.

I discovered that I was trying to enter into youth ministry for some wrong motivations. What happened was, and I'm not trying to shame or belittle the individual who spoke to me, but it was someone who I looked up to and I respected very much in that community. And we were in a van one day traveling somewhere, and he looked at me, told me, because he was the dorm parent, he said, nathan, I don't think youth ministry is for you. I think you need to look for a different career, and I don't think you should come back to Black Forest Academy the next year. And so it was a very, very deep wounding to me at that point.

But as I dug down deep into who I was, who God is, as I dug down deep into my motivations, I realized that I wanted to be popular, I wanted to be looked up to. I wanted to have more influence in people's lives. And so it was all about me and what I was trying to create rather than stepping into what God had for me. And so when that individual, who I looked up to and admired told me that he didn't think youth ministry is the right job for me and that I should pursue a different career path, I was devastated. I stayed there the rest of the year, and then I went back home to Washington State.

And here's where Jesus comes in. You know, as I was pursuing Jesus in the decade after that event, because sometimes healing takes an instant and sometimes healing takes a decade or longer.

As I was pursuing Jesus in the decade after that event and after, as Jesus revealed lies I believed about myself and replaced it with his truth, Jesus did something was pretty amazing. I was at a soul care conference. And what happens at soul care conferences, one of the things that happens is the teacher speaks on healing and then provides opportunity for you to experience healing in different groups. And so he taught, he provided an opportunity. And I remember closing my eyes and seeing if there is something in my life that God wanted to heal.

If There was a memory of something that God wanted to heal. And so I close my eyes, I'm looking through these memories, and one pops forward. Now, I had done a lot of forgiveness, I'd done all the soul work, but this memory popped back into my mind. So I said, okay, Jesus, there's something you want to heal there.

That memory. I'm sitting in the van with this other individual from Black Forest Academy and we're about to have this conversation that wounded me. And then all of a sudden, my memory changed. I saw Jesus sitting in between us. And Jesus turned to me and said, nathan, I have given you everything that you need.

And Jesus turned toward the individual, put duct tape and an X over their mouth. And now when I think about that experience that used to be very painful, it's no longer painful. There's been healing, there's been restoration, there's joy. And when I remember that situation, I don't just remember me and that other individual, now I remember me. I can barely see the other individual.

And I see Jesus in between us. Because Jesus has spoken truth into a situation that needed truth. Because Jesus heals things that need healing. Because Jesus is with us in the midst of painful experiences. He's with us in the midst of trauma.

He's with us in the midst of brokenness, and he's with us in life. Do you know who Jesus is? And now I'm not saying that if you haven't experienced healing, then you don't know Jesus. That's not what I'm saying. But I'm encouraging you to go after Jesus with everything that you have.

Let me share another story with you. For a long time, Jan and I desired to have kids, but it wasn't happening. Now, you've seen a little five year old running around this church for a while now. We didn't adopt him. He's ours biologically.

So what changed for us? You know, we went through several fertility treatments, but it wasn't working. So something obviously changed. Again, we were at a Deeper Life conference at our church in Fort Wayne, Indiana. And again, it was a time where the person taught on healing and provided an opportunity for people to experience healing.

So Jan and I stood up when that opportunity came. We wanted healing in this area of life. Some people came around us and prayed. Jan experienced some emotional healing and a physical sensation of healing. And then there was a couple specifically who were praying for us.

They ended their prayer. They started to walk away. And then the woman turned around and came back and she said, I usually don't do this, but I feel like God is telling me to tell you that you're going to have a kid within the next year. And then that was that. And she left.

And my first thought as I walked away from that encounter was, okay, she's being empathetic. She's trying to encourage us. You know, this happens sometimes in Christian circles. And then another thought came to my mind. And this, I could tell, was not my own thought.

The thought that came to mind was this, Nathan, have some faith. You're at a Deeper Life conference.

And so I literally stopped in my tracks, pulled out my phone, opened up my calendar, went to the next year and wrote a reminder to myself that said, receive prayer from Deeper Life Conference last year that we would have kids. Gal who prayed with us, received a word that we would have a kid by this date. That Deeper Life conference was on September 7, 2019. Isaac was born 11 months later to the day. August 7, 2020.

Do you know who Jesus is? Are you experiencing all of Jesus? This is the same Jesus that is with you as you follow God. This is the same Jesus that we preach about on Sunday mornings. This is the same Jesus that I hope you are introducing to your friends, to your families, to your neighbors, to your co workers.

This is the same Jesus that the people of Portugal need to know. We say all of Jesus for all the world. And so we do need all of Jesus in our neighborhoods, our workplaces, with our families and our friends. We need all of Jesus in Portugal. In the cities, in the villages, in the playgrounds, and yes, on the beaches too.

We need Jesus to set people free. Remember our verse. Do you have passion and do you have zeal? Are you making haste so that people all around the world can know this Jesus? Let's talk about some of the people around the world.

What is Portugal like? Portugal is in Europe. It's the most western country of Europe. It borders Spain. We will be going to Porto, which is in the northern part of Portugal.

It's the second largest city in Portugal. It's about 1.7 million people who live there. Portugal is a beautiful place. There's a wide variety of geography. There's amazing food.

That bridge is in Portou. They have some islands that are very beautiful. They also have some beautiful blue and white tiles that they often make into murals.

And I told the men's group this, but I think these tiles are a beautiful picture of when two cultures clash at times, but then something beautiful comes out of it. Because these tiles, they're called azulajos, and they were influenced by the Moors who invaded Portugal many, many years ago. And so without that influence, these blue tiles probably would not exist. And I get it. Invasions are horrible, they're messy, they cause a lot of brokenness.

But there is something very beautiful that has come out of it. And so blue tiles, I'm looking forward to seeing more of those. Like I said, it's a very beautiful country. I think there's about sun about 300 days out of the year.

The climate is pretty temperate. These are some of the foods that they have on the left in the middle are called pastel de nadas. That's kind of one of the signature dishes or signature treats from Portugal. It's a flaky crust with an eggy custard in the middle. They also eat a lot of fish, a lot of pork.

And I've heard the food is just really good overall. Although sardines might be something that might take me a little while to get the hang of.

Portugal and Indiana are about the same size geographically. And so if you think of Indiana, I know it's a neighboring state, but if you think of Indiana, pray for Portugal.

There are about 10.7 million people who live in Portugal, a little bit less than 300 million people who speak Portuguese around the world. The majority of that is in Brazil. But because of the trade routes, Portugal used to have a very impactful influence on the rest of the world as they immigrated, as they settled, as they conquered.

You might recognize some of the following from your following names from your history book. If you remember some of the explorers, Vasco da Gama, Bartolome Diaz, Ferdinand Magellan, you might recognize this name from sports. Cristiano Ronaldo. He's from Portugal.

In the southern tip of Portugal, you can find. And if you like surfing, you can find the 100 foot waves that the elite surfers go after. Hundred foot waves. In the north of Portugal, there are smaller waves that you can learn on. And there's also just a little side note here.

There's an international worker who loves to go surfing. And so he would go out, same spot, same time every day, get to know the people who are surfing. And now he has started a small church out of following his passion that God has given him. So apply that here, Use one of your passions, get to know the same people, start a church now in Portugal has a rich history of Catholicism and Christianity. There's also a bit of history of Islam in the country, because I said the Moors invaded.

But the majority of religion there has been Christianity and Catholicism. So why would we Go there. If a nation has had this strong and rich cultural history. Well, one of the reasons is that because While there's about 80% of Portuguese people who identify as Catholic, about 20% of that 80% regularly go to church. So it's a bit more nominal Catholicism and less than 3% of the population are evangelical Christian.

So there is a great need for the Gospel to be proclaimed in Portugal and there's a great need for people to meet Jesus. And so that's part of the reason why Janet and I are going to Portugal. People need to meet Jesus and Jesus is calling us to go there now in the alliance, because Renovation Church is part of the Alliance. Why don't go there? Good question.

Okay, because we're part of the alliance. We're going with the actress Structure. The alliance has four different structures that do overseas work. So the first one that we have on this slide is Access that tends to deal with church planting and church development type of work. And so the work that Jan and I will be doing is partnering with church development, partially because what the alliance has discovered is that it's best if local Portuguese pastors plant a church and not a foreigner plant a church.

A foreigner can plant a church, but then that church will be mostly successful with other foreigners and expats. And so our job is really to come alongside local Portuguese pastors. One of the other structures is Envision that deals more with short term trips and it deals with leadership development, leadership identification. Another one of the structures is Comma, and if you think about disaster relief, but not only disaster relief, community development, that's another one of the structures. And then the last one is Marketplace Ministries, which is kind of taking your professional job overseas and then using that as a way to meet people and then introduce them to a local church.

And so Janet and I, we're going with the Access structure, church development, because we see that God is working among young Portuguese church planters, people like Sergio and Matilda. This couple moved from the big city to a small village in order to plant a church. And so the vision for Portugal is really to assist Portuguese Christ followers to develop not just churches, but to develop a church planting network within Portugal. And so I want to introduce you to Sergio and Mathilde. I want you to see what they are doing in Portugal.

And so we're going to watch a video.

How's it going?

Incredibly well and terrible at the same time.

The idea is typical, you know, like we're here and we're here to help kind of attitude. And we got there and realized that they just had so much to teach us about community, about life, about being a person of your word.

Probably be more of a learning experience than us actually making strides in what we think is the traditional planting of a church. We get to the village and it's about 100 and something people. We went with this perspective of like, let's teach these people how to live in a community environment. And we got there and they just slap us in the face because they actually been teaching us how to live in a community. I don't know if you'd call it a burden or responsibility, but there's just this burning passion inside for a supposed unreached people group inside a first world country that's supposedly had the gospel in.

And you find these small little villages where no one actually wants to go and live. There is no church nearby. There is no opportunity for these people to hear the gospel. And you get and you realize, man, that they're just such incredible people that God loves that are lost and God just wants to welcome them home. And you look at them and you identify so much because of your roots and upbringing.

And you're just realizing, if no one did that for us, where would we be?

In some ways, we expected to probably have more biblical engagement and us talking probably more directly with people and having them over and having the typical kind of service in our home that hasn't happened. And that for us, we look back and we're like, this is a negative. But on the other side, it's probably been the most incredible journey because we start to understand who they are and how they think and what they really cross out for. It's almost like we come there and we say like, here's the solution, but that's not the need.

You go out there and you just think, okay, cool, we're going to plant this church, we're going to do this. How are we going to do it? And you start strategizing and then you're realizing, you know, it almost sounds like you're trying to go and take over someone's land because of your strategies and ideas. And that's not the plan. That's got nothing to do with our plans or our strategies.

We start to think, okay, what can we give to these people? We here, they give us food, they give us trees, they give us seeds, they give us a lot of things. So what can we give? We realize, and God actually explained to us and show us that we've got time to give. So we start to give our time.

And now we're Spending time with people and we we creating bonds that way. So we start to do agriculture and taking care of animals and planting things, and we take our kids with, so they growing in this beautiful environment. It's like not in the city anymore. We're learning that things take time and effort and sweat.

Mathilde from the city would say is going very slow. But now knowing our reality and knowing that we touch people's hearts already just by a small prayer, just by like cooking a cake or just doing some simple things, I think actually we're doing pretty good. Not because we're the best or we're the chosen ones, but because we don't just doing what God tells us to do, just loving these people. The aha moment is when they look at you and they verbalize it. I want what you have.

No one's ever loved me like you've loved me. Why? Why do you forgive these people? Why do you act in a certain way? And when we share what's happened in our lives, questions start to arise.

And that's when we know that there's this difference. I think there's anything that we've learned in the body of Christ. It's great to have all these systems and processes and churches and things, but it needs to be built upon relationships. And I think for us, that's something that's just burning in our hearts. When we look at the village, are we humble enough just to go to the well and speak to the Samaritan woman and share the love of Jesus?

And I think for us, it's been something we never thought of prior to going out there. And then through all the things that have taken us in these three years of process, we've met so many Samaritan women, people that probably in our mindset, I think, actually treated us badly or made things more difficult for us and humbling ourselves and realizing actually they deserve the love of Jesus as well. And trying to learn through that. Now we are not there yet, and we're still growing to be there, but I think it's one of the things that accomplish out this journey as well.

Our absolute, absolute vision is hearing testimonies of people being like, wow, someone told me the gospel while I was living in this village, and I'm gonna go now to the next village and do the same. And that for us would be just absolutely incredible.

I don't know if we'll ever get to work with Sergio and Mathilde probably, but they are similar to other young Portuguese church planters that we anticipate coming alongside and helping develop and mentor and provide spiritual formation. And I have a suspicion as well that like Sergio and Mathilde said, they are probably going to teach us more than we'll teach them. In Portugal, many Portuguese pastors are quickly approaching retirement age and the church overall is in decline. And so we really can see that God has provided a door of opportunity for us to walk alongside the church in Portugal, to walk alongside young Portuguese church planners as they follow what God has for them. So some of this could include teaching them to be face to face friends with God as they develop their identity in Christ even more.

Some church planters may need healing from past wounds or freedom from fear, while others may need to practice repentance. For some, the next step is building deeper trust in God or moving beyond head knowledge to a fuller spiritual life.

The rest of the ministry we'll be participating in is a little bit of a mystery to us because our first year to two years is really devoted to learning the language and learning the culture and then seeing what God has for us. A lot can change in a year to two years. And so we can have these plans, but they can always change. Recently at the national office, they have said, all of Jesus for all the world takes all of us.

What does it look like for all of us to take all of Jesus to all the world? What does it look for us to serve the Lord? Since we've been looking at Romans, I think there's a clue in Romans 16. I'm not going to take time to read all of it. I'm not going to ask you to turn there.

But In Romans chapter 16, you'll see a long list of names that Paul mentions. Names like Phoebe, Epenetus, Aquila, Ben, Mary, Julia, Urbanus, and on and on. There's something powerful in the body of Christ comes together and things become personal. You begin to know how to pray for us, we begin to know how to pray for you. And so as we talk about being engaged in the work that God is doing around the world, and as we talk about how taking all of Jesus to all the world takes all of us, then we have found the following categories to be helpful in terms of engagement.

And so if you're looking for a place to start engaging in kingdom work, engaging in overseas work, because God has a heart and a love and a passion for the nations to come to him, then I'd encourage you to start with one or two of these. These are six ways of engagement. To learn is to gain deeper understanding and knowledge about God's global Mission and how one can be involved. You can pray. You can commit to praying for specific international workers.

You can pray for ministries, you can pray for unreached people groups around the world. You can go. You can be directly involved in serving God in a different culture by being. By going as a messenger of the gospel to people who haven't heard it. This can be short term, this can be long term, this can be now, this can be when you're retired.

There are many different ways of doing this. You can send. You can support international workers through providing encouragement, through providing financial resources, logistical help, and you can help effectively send them to the field overseas. You can also welcome, you can show care and befriend people from other cultures who've come into your community for work, for study or for a new life. There's people all around us.

Let's welcome them. Well, you can also mobilize. What does that mean? That means actively sharing the vision and importance of God's mission with others and helping them find their role in these strategic activities. That might mean connecting people with other people that you know who have a passion for something.

We have been building relationship with you over the past couple of years and we are inviting you into the work that God is doing in Portugal and around the world. To me, it doesn't matter if you partner with Portugal or not. What matters to me is that you partner with God who calls you to something specific. If it's not something specific, then let's talk more about that.

I would love to have a chance to talk with you after the service. We do have a table in the entryway and so there are little goodies on the table you can take. If you want something. You can also sign up for our Kind of Prayer newsletter. I'll talk about that just shortly.

But I want to remind you of kind of the vision for Portugal.

We want to see a church planting network rise up in Portugal led by Portuguese people like Sergio and Mathilde that reaches out to Portuguese people and to other ethnicities. Because it's not just about the Portuguese people, it's about them taking the gospel across countries as well. Do you remember what they said at the last part of their video? They said they would love to see people receive the gospel and then take it to the next village. What does that mean for here for us?

Do you have the vision to see the gospel go from your house to the house across the street to the house a couple streets down, to the next city to the next state and across the world?

I'd love to talk to you about that too.

Now, there are a couple of ways that you can be supporting us and encouraging us. One is obviously through prayer. One of the ways that you can receive our prayer request is through an email program called Epistle and you can sign up for that. We have a sign up sheet at our table. It also includes different stories, includes videos and pictures of our work that we'll be doing.

We'll post prayer requests there and it's a great way to interact with you and send messages back and forth. If you have questions or just want to have an online conversation with us, that's okay too. Another way that you can support us is through financial support. There are a couple of categories that need to be filled and I'm going to skip through a couple of these.

There are a couple of different categories that can be filled. First, I just want to say, if you are not already tithing to Renovation Church, that is your first priority because this is your community right here. And so my encouragement to you is to, if you're not already tithing, make tithing here your first priority. Give to your local church what God is asking of you. And second, we encourage you to give to the Great Commission Fund.

What is the Great Commission Fund? That is a fund within the Christian and Missionary alliance where a lot of different churches, a lot of different individuals donate to the same pool. And then international workers are supported through that. Different ministry initiatives are supported through the Great Commission Fund. And so it provides support to staff international workers and other ministries in the United States and all around the world.

And so I encourage you to give to that. That's a little bit of an undesignated fund that a bunch of people can pull from the designated fund. We have a designated fund. And so you can support us directly by giving to that.

And so these are some of our needs. There's kind of the. I'm going to talk about number two first One Time Gifts. That's kind of our launch fund that helps purchase airplane tickets, visa appointments. It does a lot of different things, outfit fun like getting furniture once we arrive, all that.

That fund has been completely filled right now. So that is great. That's good news.

Our greatest need right now is for people to say, I want to partner with you on a monthly basis. So long term, sustained partnership, this will help keep us on the field. And right now I think we are about 30% funded on that. And so we really do need people to come along side of us on a monthly basis. We need to have in order to go, I Think we plan on going in late July.

In order to go by that date, we need to have our monthly support by mid May, I think. And so pray about that. Ask the Lord what he wants you to do and we'll go from there. The last fund vehicle fund that we're starting to work on, that that's not required for us to go overseas. The top two are.

But it would be great to have a vehicle there as it makes things a little bit easier for us to travel around the country.

All of Jesus for all the world takes all of us. We've tried to make this point several times. And so when you do think of us, I'd ask that you also remember people like Sergio and Mathilde. We need to train more people like Sergio and Mathilde so that they can be planting churches in Portugal. And so just like I want to see God's kingdom advance here in the United States, I want to see more kingdom engagement from the American church.

I also want to see a multiplying, vibrant, healthy Portuguese church that's following Jesus with all that it has. And so my question for you this morning is, what is your part? We all have a part to play. After all, Jesus has a calling on your life, too.

Maybe you've ignored that calling.

Maybe you're pursuing it with everything that you have. Maybe you just don't know what the next step is. Let's have a conversation. Because taking Jesus to all the world takes all of us. And so when we say yes to what God puts in front of us, then we get the joy of seeing God do extraordinary things in and through ordinary people.

If you've been counting roosters, the number is eight.

But let's pray. God, I thank you for the work that you are doing around the world. And I thank you for the work that you are doing here in this community. I thank you for the growth that we've seen. I thank you for the miraculous things that you only you, can do.

I thank you for this opportunity to be with this congregation for the past couple of years. Thank you for the encouragement that they have been. Father God, I ask that you would bless them. You would bless them with a deeper, richer knowledge and experience of you.

May their roots grow deep in you. And may your fruit, the fruit of the Spirit, be evident in their lives.

May their communities be blessed by interactions that they have with this group of believers. Jesus, may your name be glorified here. May it be glorified around the world.

We pray this in your name. Amen.