Equipping Season: Equipping To Reach

Well, I'm not used to my new mic yet. Have I ever told you my wife is a bit of a meddler? Can any husband identify what happened to a meddling wife? So forever in a day, I don't like to use a handheld mic because I talk like I have three mouths, two in one.

I talk to my hands. And it's a normally I use a clip on right here, but Kristen says every time I turn my head, the mic cuts out and this and that. So she bought me this thing like a month ago. And I told her, I feel like David, one saw, said here, use my armor.

And David said, I haven't tested it. And so I haven't tested this yet. I did a little check, baby, check, baby, one, two, like earlier today. But other than that, I'm just not used to it yet.

So bear with me as I test this armor out. Matter of fact, Jenny, it's like, what's Kristen meddling in your stuff for it? I was like, exactly, exactly. Yeah, we'll see.

I got to get myself out of the hole. So I'm pulling you down with me, girl. You're coming down. I'm going up.

No, I'm just kidding. Super excited today for what God has for us. Hey, did I tell you what season it is? It's equipping season.

It's equipping season. Today we're going to launch. We're launching the new mission statement of City Reach Church. I'm super excited about this.

It's like it's burning in me. And so I tell Pastor Seth this morning, my prayer is that God can get everything that's burning in my heart and pulsing in my veins out of my mouth. So if that happens, when it happens, we're going to get into glory. So super excited about this.

But we're just a couple announcements real quick. Tomorrow night is the well with Curtis Pulaski. So if you'd like to come out for a night of worship, that is at six o'clock tomorrow night. And Thursday, we're bringing our Thursday night service starts this week.

We're going to start a midweek service Thursday night. It starts this Thursday, August 15th at six o'clock. And starting that service is a part of what I want to talk to you about today. So if you weren't here last week, I'm going to announce it again.

It's going to be called thirsty Thursdays. So for you that have that old life, that might mean something different to you. But for us, it means come thirsty. Jesus said, whoever's thirsty, come to me and drink.

And I will give you living water and you'll never thirst again. And so we're going to kick off thirsty Thursdays with root beer floats afterwards. So either a Coke float, a root beer float, orange soda float, whatever kind of float you like. So after the teaching time on Thursday, we'll have some ice cream and then some floats just kind of kick off thirsty Thursdays.

Just to give you the format, it will be not live. So you have to, it won't be live because we'll be here. It won't be live streamed. So you cannot watch this online.

It's really going to focus on teaching, training, equipping, and all of the things that we're going to talk about today. It's going to be informal. And we're teaching as opposed to preaching. So I think it's going to be super good.

And we'll really begin to equip the body to flow in. All that God has designed for us as a church locally and also, I think, globally. Equipping season. When we talk about seasons, a lot of time we think of the word season.

We might think of baseball season or football season or, you know, if you're like me, I grew up. I couldn't wait for hunting season every year. There was only one season that I hated. And I can even tell you until the day it started every year, it was August 15th.

And that was the day that three-day football practices started. That was the start of what we call like Hell Week. It was awful. Three of days, I don't even think they do three of days anymore.

I think they've been outlawed. I think they just do two of days. And the two of days now are just like one with pads and one without. So we're raising a bunch of wimps today.

Like I got one of my old teammates sitting right there halfway back. And he can attest to the truth of my word today. Right? It was definitely a different season.

I'll say that. But this season, the equipping season, is not a season with an end date. It doesn't. It's not like it comes for three weeks.

This series will have an imp. But equipping season goes on and on. As we'll see later today equipping season started the day that Jesus ascended. It started with his ascension and it continues until his return.

So this is not something, oh, you know, we're going to do a little equipping session. We will. But season is either going to last till the day you die or the day that Jesus returns. Whichever comes first.

That's when season's over. And until the day that he returns or the day that I pass or you pass, we will be an equipping church. So if you know anything about City Reach, City Reach, we started about 10 years ago. And we about this time 10 years ago, we were planning for the launch of the church.

We were part of a network of churches called City Reach Network. At one time, we had 120 churches, 20 recovery homes. There are only about three churches left, no longer a network. It's dissolved in.

And we really have the only continuing city reach hope homes in existence that I'm aware of. But the mission that we inherited as a church was the mission of City Reach Network. And that mission statement was this. It was to reach the one that's far from God and help them become a passionate follower of Jesus, to reach the one that's far from God and help them become a passionate follower of Jesus.

And as Seth and I have been talking and praying over the last several months about what's God saying to us and what does God want us to do? We started asking questions. Remember, last fall, we said ask better questions and get better answers. And so we started asking ourselves questions.

Well, if I'm looking for a place to be a part of in the mission of that church is to reach the one that's far from God, what if I'm not far from God? What if I already have a relationship with Jesus? What if I just need to grow in the relationship that I already have? Well, why would I go somewhere that's reaching the one that's far from God?

Because what's that say about me? I must be far from God. And so we started like, well, that's a good question. And then helping somebody become a passionate follower of Jesus.

What if somebody just needs Jesus but isn't ready to become a passionate follower? What if we're like Paul that says, I plan to Paul as waters, but it's God that gives me increase? What if our function in that person's life today is just to plan a seed? It's just to administer healing physically, emotionally, and they go on and are discipled elsewhere?

So we started asking questions like that. What if the person doing the reaching needs reach themselves? How many times do you try to help somebody out of a pit and they pull you in the pit? And so those are the types of questions we started asking.

And so as we prayed through it, you know, God really unveiled what is going to be our mission going forward. And so on the next slide, it's still reaching the one. That's what we do. But we're going to reorder things biblically.

It's equipping the one that knows Jesus to reach the one that needs Jesus. Equipping the one that knows Jesus to reach the one that needs Jesus. See, we're going to equip people that know Jesus. Well, a lot of people know about Jesus, but Jesus said this in John 17.

He says, this is life eternal that they know you the one through God in Jesus, whom you've sent the word know means is a Greek word that means to have a relationship with. It means to have intercourse with it's to know experientially. And so that if you know Jesus, you have a relationship with Jesus, you're the person that needs equipped. That's the only qualification.

Do you know Jesus? See what happens is a lot of times when we're just trying to reach the one that's far from God, we miss the one sitting next to us in church. Because there's people that need Jesus that are already saved. See, the unsaved needs to know Jesus as a savior.

But saved people still need Jesus too. Like, I need Jesus. Like, if I'm sick, I need Jesus the healer. If I'm stuck in a situation in bondage, I need Jesus to deliver.

If I'm alone, I need to be introduced to Jesus, the one who will never leave me nor forsake me. If I don't know what to do, I need to know Jesus, though, the wisdom of God and the power of God. Like, there's all these aspects of Jesus that believers need as much as the unsaved. And so, as I said last week, we're refining our mission, but simultaneously expanding it.

And so, when we adopted the new logos about six months ago now, we didn't intend for the logo to actually God knew when we did the logo that it was going to fit with the mission he gave us this month. Do you see what's inside the church? The one. Look at the logo.

And where does the one go? Out. But where does the equipping start? Here.

See, I get all about you. I get outside the four walls. I get it. But if you don't get in the four walls to get equipped, you're going to stumble when you go out the four walls.

See, we got too many believers trying to pull somebody out of the pit and like a bunch of crabs, and then they just pull you right down in the pit. You're going to be equipped to the point to where you can not just reach people. Here's what I want to say. We're going to reach people effectively.

We're going to do it with excellence. We're going to do it as if it mattered, as if Jesus designed it this way. It's going to be different. I went to Birmingham, Alabama Wednesday.

I flew back Friday. And I fly a good bit. I got a lot of meetings and trips and whatnot. But, you know, you can kind of get lulled to sleep by the stewardess.

Hey, have you ever been on an airplane? Anybody ever listened to the directions? Oh, I got one hand. One, I want to talk to you about lying.

We'll cast that lying devil out. No, the stewardess, he's like the Charlie Brown, the teacher. Well, one thing they do say, and I paid extra attention to it this week. They say, I like how they say, they say, in the event of an unlikely loss of cabin pressure.

Like it's not likely, but just in case, in the event of a likely loss of cabin pressure, a mask will drop from the paint. And then they tell you this, secure your mask first before helping those around you. See, it seems selfish, but it's not. Because if I begin to help those around me, I'm going to be unconscious in seconds.

I'm not going to be any good for the long term. But if I take a minute and equip me first, I can help a lot more people to safety than if I just jump in without my own mask. And so the focus of equipping the one that knows Jesus is for the ultimate goal to reach the one that needs Jesus. And so we're going to be putting our mask on first, not for the sake of being selfish that other people don't matter, but so that we can help people better, so that we can do it more effectively, so that we can do it and not get stuck in the very thing we're trying to help somebody out of.

That makes sense? Good. You guys with me. All right.

I got one part. Tara is with me. Hey, I just need one. I need one.

There's a church across town called Central Assembly. No, I'm just kidding. I love Central. I came from Central, so good friends.

But if you want to go there, you know, I'm sure they have a great mission too. I better stop. I just better stop. Kristin said stop.

So our theme verse that we're launching from is Ephesians 4 verse 12. And I'm just going to give you a phrase out of it. Don't talk to you about the word equipping. First, it's for the equipping of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the work of the ministry, that we're equipping the ones that know Jesus to reach the one that needs Jesus.

Equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry. What's the word equipping mean? The word equipping the noun, caddartesmos, and the Greek is only used one time. It's used only in Ephesians chapter 4 verse 12.

And it means a fitting or preparing fully, a perfecting or a complete furnishing. It means to be completely furnished, to be completely fitted. You think about like, I'll just go back to, I don't know which way Fort Hill is, which I always want to go that way. I think it's because I'm standing, yeah, that way.

But when we would be getting equipped for football season, right, you go through the equipment room, there'd be an equipment manager, and the manager would give you a helmet, and it'd give you a chin strap, and you'd get shoulder pads in a jersey, and pants, and thigh pads, and cleats, like all those things. You did not want to play the sport unless you were fully equipped. Because if you're not fully equipped, you're going to get hurt. You're going to get hurt because that equipment serves a purpose.

And like if I just went out and played with just a set of thigh pads, but no helmet, no shoulder pads, I'm not going to last very long. If I go out with just a helmet, I'll be protected here, but not here. So God wants you to be fully equipped. It's important.

We're fully equipped. So the word to equip the word catarteedzo, catarteedzo, it means this, it means to mend what has been broken. It's actually a medical term that means to reset a broken bone. It means to reset.

It's to put something back to restore back to the way that it should have been. It means to repair, restore, to fit out, put in order to arrange, just prepare ethically, morally. It means to strengthen, perfect, complete, to make one what he or she ought to be. That word is used when Jesus called his disciples in Matthew chapter 4.

It says that he saw James and John on the shore mending their nets. Catarteedzo. So you want to, when a net gets a hole in it, you don't throw it out. What do you do?

You mend it. You restore it back so that it becomes a useful utensil to be used again to catch more fish. Too often in the body of Christ when somebody gets a tear in their life, we toss them aside. What Jesus wants us to do is to mend the people.

He wants us to fix people. He wants us to restore broken people. Like he came and already paid for it. But you can't restore if you need restored.

Like you need to be equipped. It says in Galatians 6-1, I'm just going to mention this, it uses the word catarteedzo again. It says brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, you who are spiritual restore such a one with the spirit of gentleness, but consider yourself, let you be tempted. Hopefully we'll get to that verse today.

I don't know. We're already running out of time. This might be a couple of week message. But I really want to spend some time laying the groundwork for this.

We're going to read today, if you have your Bibles. I'm going to read the entirety of the text, Ephesians 4, verses 7, down through verse 16. We'll probably preach out of this for the next couple of weeks. Let's just read this.

We're really going to focus on verses 11-13 today. Let me read this verses 7-16. It says, but to each one of us, grace was given, according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore, he says, when he ascended on high, he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men.

Now, he ascended, what does it mean? But that he first descended into the lower parts of the earth. He who descended is also the one who ascended. Remember I said this started equipping season started when Jesus ascended.

So we have a lot of teaching in the body about Jesus laying aside his God likeness and coming to the earth as a man, living as a man, dying as a man. We have teaching at the resurrection. But this took place at the ascension. This is when the season started, started the ascension.

It said he descended as the one who ascended far above all the heavens that he might fill all things. He himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. Until we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro, carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men in the cunning craftiness of the siepile plotting. But speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him who is the head Christ, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself.

So, three things I'd like to get to, I may just cover just number one today, but from this text verses 11 through 13, I want to talk about the equipping as far as the process, the process. I want to point this out that the process begins and ends with Jesus. The process begins and ends with Jesus. I want to talk about the people that are being equipped, what it means to be a saint.

We're equipping saints. Depending on the background you came from, you may have the wrong opinion of what a saint is. We're going to talk about that. I want to talk about the purpose of equipping.

The purpose of equipping is for the work of the ministry. The word ministry means to serve or service, so that we're equipping to serve. We're equipping to reach others, to serve people the way Jesus did. So, we're going to look at the process, the people, and the purpose.

So, let's start with number one. Equipping the process begins and ends with Jesus Christ. I want to read verses 10 through 13 again, because sometimes what happens is God uses what we typically call the five-fold ministry gift as his mechanism of equipping the saints. Often, we get hung up on the five-fold ministry gift, and I don't know if I'm going to teach on that today, but I want to just drill home that it begins and ends with Jesus Christ.

It's not the person. It's not the ministry office. It's Jesus. Look at this.

It says verse 10, it says, the one who ascended far above the heavens that he might fill all things. So, right away we see, knowing what Jesus' goal was, when he ascended, it says the one who ascended, he did it wide. That he might fill all things. So, understanding his purpose in the ascension will give us a better understanding of why we need to be equipped.

It says he ascended, that he might fill. Well, in order to fill all things, guess what you've got to be. You've got to be full. Like Jesus can't fill everything unless he's full of everything.

It says in Colossians 1,19, it says, it pleased the Father that in him, Jesus Christ, all the fullness should dwell. In Colossians 2, verse 9, it says, in him dwells the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and you are complete in him. So, if Jesus bodily when he was on the earth had the fullness of the Godhead, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, in him, and we are now, he's ascended, and we are now his body on the earth, wouldn't it make sense that his body on the earth would also be a representation of the fullness of the Godhead bodily? See, we read through it.

You're going to see that as his design. It says that he might fill all things, and he gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors, some teachers, for the equipping of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of what? The fullness of Christ. So, here he is.

He's ascended. He's releasing gifts to the church for the purpose that he might fill all things, so that once we're equipped with the gifts that he's given through those offices, that we might actually measure up to the standard of his fullness, which was where he started. He released his fullness so that we could eventually measure up to his fullness. It begins and ends with Jesus Christ, but what happens?

We can hung up in the middle. We forget that it's not about the apostle-profit of angeles, pastor, teacher. It begins and ends with Jesus. It's about Jesus for a certain reason.

It's about that he wants his body to fully represent him. It says in Ephesians 1, I think it's verses 22 and 23. The next slide, maybe. Yeah, so it says that when we talk about the resurrection, we talk about the power of God.

And Ephesians 1, 19, it says, what is the power that is toward us? Right? It's talking about Deuteronomy, American working power, that God wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand, far above all principality, power, might in dominion, in this world and in the world to come. And it says, and he put all things under his feet and gave him to be head over the church, his what?

Over the church, his what? His body, and then it goes on to define his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. So he puts everything under his feet. He's seated, the power, the same power that brought Jesus from the dead is the same power that's seated him as Father's right hand.

He becomes the head. We're the body. We're seated at the right hand of the Father with him with all things under our feet. It says he gave him to be the head of the church, his body, the fullness of him.

Who does the filling? What do you think that God's intention is for his body? To be full of his fullness. And in order to get us there, he designed this mechanism of the fivefold ministry gifts to equip us with certain aspects of the very nature and character of himself.

See, it says that he himself, let's go back to the last slide. It says verse 11, it says, he himself gave. Do you realize if I give Seth this water? I can't give Seth water unless I have what?

Right, you can't give what you don't have. And so the fact that Jesus, it says he himself gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and she teachers means that if he gave those five guess what he had to have before he gave them. He had to have the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, the pastor and the teacher in his fullness before he released those gifts. Not that he doesn't have it now, but he can only give what he has.

And so when we look at the fivefold ministry gifts, if Jesus gave them, then we need to realize that when Jesus was on the earth, he actually operated in all five. Hebrews chapter three, verse one, it says, consider the capital A, consider the apostle and high priest of our confession, our Lord Jesus Christ. The writer of Hebrews calls Jesus the apostle. I'm not going to teach on fivefold, but an apostle basically means one that's sent out.

They're sent out with authority. They create, they develop, they bring order, they bring correction, they establish and found churches. They kind of put things in order, set things in order, keep them in order. The prophet is the one that's releasing the heart of God to the body of the church.

They're giving revelation, they're giving interpretation, they're giving understanding, they're even giving the timing of things. The evangelist is the one that has the passion for the lost, that they preach with the intention of bringing people to a saving knowledge of Jesus. The pastor is that shepherd, the one that cares for the sheep, nurtures the sheep, feeds the sheep, protects the sheep, and then you have the teacher, the one that gets down in the word that brings understanding and gives light to things that might seem difficult to understand. Actually creates a love for God's word through teaching.

And so we see if Jesus gives these five gifts to the church, then they were existing in him before he gave them. So he's an apostle, Hebrews chapter 3-1. He's also a prophet. You remember in Mark chapter 6 when Jesus, he's preaching and he's healing people and all of a sudden people are like, oh my gosh, who's this guy?

And they're like, how does he speak with such wisdom and how does he do these miracles? And they're almost to the point of putting their faith in him like, oh, wait a minute, oh that's Mary's son. Oh, that's Joseph's kid. And we know his brothers and sisters.

And it goes on to say later in Mark 6, it says that Jesus could do no mighty work there except heal a couple sick people because of their unbelief. But right before that in verse 4, Jesus, he alludes to the fact that he is a prophet. He says the prophet is not without honor except in his own country, in his own relatives, in his own house. So that Jesus is not only an apostle, Jesus is not only a prophet, Jesus is also a pastor.

He says in John chapter 10 verse 11, he says, I am the good shepherd, I lay down my life for the sheep. Oddly enough, in Ephesians chapter 4 verse 11, the word pastor is only ever used one time in the New Testament. All the other times it talks about being a shepherd. Oddly enough is we attach the office of pastor to 90% of everybody that does some kind of ministry office in the body today.

But for some reason it was only used once in Ephesians chapter 4. But Jesus was nonetheless a pastor, a pastor, a shepherd. He would care for nurture his sheep. He said, I know my sheep by name, I call them, they hear my voice and they follow me.

He said, I am the good shepherd, I lay down my life for my sheep. Jesus was also a teacher. Did I miss evangelist? I missed evangelist.

That Jesus was an evangelist. After Jesus is anointed with the Holy Spirit in Luke 4, he comes out, he quotes Isaiah 61, he says, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me to do what? To preach the gospel to the poor. He's not talking about poor, financially, he's talking about poor that they're broken, they need a Savior, they're sick, they're poor in spirit, they're poor in body, they're poor emotionally.

They need to be set free. Jesus' first message is repent, March chapter 1, repent and believe the gospel. Like he had a passion for preaching and seeing people put faith in what he was preaching. Jesus was also a teacher, he says in John chapter 13, 13, he says, you call me teacher and Lord and you say right for so I am.

We can give all kinds of examples of the teaching, the preaching, all those things that Jesus did. But my point is to tell you this, that those five gifts that Jesus gave to the church were from him. They emanated from him. He lived all five when he was alive and in his body the fullness of the God had dwelt in him bodily.

And he wants for us as a body to have the fullness of him in us. I was praying about this morning, I was praying about it, I was like God give me an example of this. I woke up early this morning, I lay in bed very early on Sundays and praying and just meditating. God gave me a, I won't call it an open vision but he gave me a picture.

And he gave me a picture, all I can describe it, anybody ever hear Pink Floyd? Oh yeah, yeah, Pink Floyd. You remember the album where the light was going through the prism and then it went, yeah, the dark side of the moon. So when light passes through a prism, it's called the dispersion of light.

And so as I lay in bed and I get to when we think of the rainbow, we think of remember you go to art class Roy G. Biff, Red Orange Yellow Green Blue, and go violet. You remember that? Anybody ever go to art class?

Okay, maybe you just didn't remember Roy G. Biff. Go look it up. Well, so I started wondering if light, I'm like some pondering this, if light passes through a prism and is reflected in a spectrum, what if that spectrum then passed through another prism, would it return on the other side as light?

Now it's white light, you can't really see white light, but it becomes white light. And so I do whatever good student does, I went to Google. And do you know, do you remember a guy named Sir Isaac Newton? Sir Isaac Newton did this experiment in the 1660s.

Very well documented. He took light through a prism, matter of fact his works that he printed in 1672 are where we got Roy G. Biff today. That's where it started at with Sir Isaac Newton.

He puts light, white light through a prism, and it reflects in what we would call the colors of the rainbow. He then takes another prism invert it, I don't know what side the moon that would be, but he invert it. And then when that spectrum of color passes through the inverted prism, it comes out on the other side in white light. If you want, if you have a fact checker, fact check me.

But I wrote this down because I can't remember it, but I want to read it to you. He said, if you block any of the beams, this is why I think God gave me this picture today. If you block any of the beams, he's talking about the color beams, right? You got white light coming in, the color coming out, and then going through an inverted prism and white light on the other side.

If you block any of the beams, you will not get white light, duh. Like, I don't have to be Sir Isaac Newton to figure that out. Or at least you're not going to get the same white light. You're going to get a mixture of the remaining colors.

Go to the next slide. John chapter 8 verse 12, Jesus said, I am the light of the world. Light is the presence of all color. That's why when it's diffused through a prism, you see the color spectrum.

Now I get this as a perfect example because we only have five colors here, not seven. But Sir Isaac Newton said, if you remove one or more of the colors, you don't get white light. You get something less than white light. See to the degree that we eliminate or remove or ignore one or more of the fivefold gifts, we end up with something less than Jesus wants us to be.

See, why do you think Jesus started out and said, I am the light of the world? But then in Matthew chapter 5, 14, he says this, you are what? The light of the world city, Saturn, it cannot be hit. Like he's light.

In him is all color. In him is all ministry gifts. He spreads them out, diffuses them, gives them to the church, and then once the church equipped with all of them, so that once we're equipped, we end up being the same light and manifesting exactly like he looked when he was on the earth. If you eliminate one of the colors, you end up with something less than the light that was intended to be.

You just end up with a mixture of something less. Well, I just like listening to teachers. Great. I do too.

Well, I follow the apostolic. Great. I do too. Well, I just want to know what the prophet said.

Great. I do too. See, unless we incorporate all five, we miss out on the fullness of what he intended. See, it starts with him and it ends with us looking like him.

A fully mature and equipped body will fully manifest the fullness of Christ. Next slide. So how long does this last? I told you this.

Oh, man, we're out of time. I'm just getting warmed up. We'll be here a couple hours today. I still got stuff in a tank.

Man. He says, but he himself gave some apostle, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors, some teachers for the equipping of the church, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ until. Until. Until what?

Until we all come to the, I'm going to quote the New King James. I know I got the Phillips up there. Until we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a complete man to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. When it says, until we all come to, that means attained.

What do we have to attain? So season is open. The season started when Jesus ascended. Jesus gives of himself gifts.

And he said, those will be in operation until. Until we all, not, not me, not Seth, not Brenda, but we all. See, when I said equipping the one, it's just not one individual. Earlier in Ephesians 4, it says we're one body.

It's not getting one individual there. It's not taking one person to the mountaintop. It's what we're all being equipped. See, the teacher needs apostolic grace.

The apostle needs teaching grace. The evangelist needs prophetic grace. See, God gives grace to individuals so that it doesn't all reside in one person. Now, just because I'm this doesn't mean I can't operate in that.

You can take Paul and courage, Timothy. Timothy was a pastor in a bishop of the Church of Ephesus. And he said to Timothy, he said, I want you to do the work of an evangelist. So just because you flow in one area doesn't mean that you don't have grace to do other things.

And just because you prophesy doesn't make you a prophet. Those are two different things. I'm open at all kinds of doors that I want to go out today. It's just refine the focus today.

That's what I want to do. So this continues until we all come to the unity of the faith, which means we as a body need to start believing the same. It doesn't do me any good. Like if you go out in the football team, you go out on the field and you don't believe that this play does this action, you're going to fumble.

See, we need to believe the same. We need to believe that when we lay hands on the sick, they will recover. It's tough to all come to the unity of the faith if we don't believe the same way. It says that also that we come to the unity of the knowledge of the Son of God.

That word knowledge, epicnosis is precise and correct and exact knowledge that actually is birthed out of experience. Well, I don't rely on experience. I only rely on the Word of God. Do you know anybody like that?

Do you know that your experience should corroborate the Word of God? Like it should. It's like Bill said, why don't rely on feelings feelings can lie. Right feelings don't lie.

Hebrews says that you can actually exercise your senses to discern between good and evil. So I rely on my feelings because God gave them to me as long as my feelings are aligned with God's Word. Till we all come to the knowledge of the Son of God and arrive at real maturity, that measure of development which is meant by the fullness of Christ. Until we all attain.

I'm not there yet. Are you? Anybody there yet? I just want to know because I want to shake your hand if you're there.

Because I haven't met anybody yet that's there. Oh yeah, I made all that mad and they left. That's what happened to them. I just need one.

Just one. I got Tara. How anybody else? Come on.

Until we all come to the unity of the faith and the unity of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect. That word means mature man or woman to the measure of the fullness of the stature of Christ. Like we're not there yet. I still got some rough areas in my life.

I still have some areas that need smooth off. I venture to say you do too. I don't need to operate in the prophetic to say you got some issues that probably need soften up a little bit. The way you talk to people, the way you act, the way you minister, the way you do life.

See, the work of the ministry is not for just working here. Like, oh, well, I'm not in the ministry, so I don't need to be equipped for the work of the ministry. Do you realize your job is your ministry? Raising your kids is your ministry.

See, my equipping with apostolic grace and prophetic grace and evangelistic grace and pastoral grace and teaching grace is not just for here. It's for when I got a butt head customer that doesn't want to buy a car and I need to convince him. Not that anybody's a butt head. I'm in.

Or I got an employee. I got an employee that their wife leaving them. They need counsel. I bring out some pastoral grace.

I get that you think a car dealer probably doesn't have any pastoral grace. But I got some. That's why I hang around pastor Seth. See, I need it to rub off on me.

I need that impartation because ministry just doesn't happen here. See, we're equipping here the one that knows Jesus so that we can reach the one that needs Jesus. Let's stand. I'm done.

Let's put that last slide back up there again. The last, the very, all the way to the very, very end. The slide that has, man, not that. One before that, maybe.

The one that has our new mission on it. Let's say this. We're equipping the one that knows Jesus to reach the one that needs Jesus. I'm going to ask you just today.

When you go ahead. I've got so many more things we need to talk about in the church. Thursday nights. Thursday Thursdays.

Equipping night. We're going to be teaching through. Seth and I are going to start it. But we're going to be teaching through the book of Ephesians.

You're going to get grounded with a good foundation of who you are in Christ. We're going to build upon that foundation. You're going to be equipped to share your faith. You're going to be equipped to do the supernatural.

You're going to be equipped to have a good testimony. You're going to be equipped to have a good attitude. You're going to be equipped to have a good marriage. Like it's just not just here.

It is, but it isn't. This is life. We're living, like we're living the life of Christ. Paul says, I am crucified with Christ.

Nevertheless, I live. In the life that I now live in the flesh. I live by the faith of the Son of God. Who loved me and gave Himself for me.

Like you're living His life.