Sermon Transcript
Theology is the systematizing of beliefs about God. And that one, wow, what a song to just kind of bring it all together there and get you sure thinking about Easter, doesn’t it? Just around the corner. I say to people when, you know, they ask me why I’m a Christ follower, I tell them that, listen, when I look at the resurrection of Jesus Christ, I can’t but help come to believe that God made it possible through Christ for us to live forever. And wherever you are in this journey, we’re just glad that you’re here this morning.
We hope that you might be encouraged in your faith wherever your faith is at, at this moment in time. Many of us that are sitting here today do believe in what you just saw there on the screen, and it’s transforming our lives. Every one of us, we hope at some point, will come to a place where we do believe that there is a God And God sent his Son Christ into the world to give his life so that we can have life with God now and forever. It’s amazing that God invites us into a relationship with him. The God of the universe wants to have relationship with every one of us.
What a privilege it is to believe. Well, we’re going to come back this morning again to the book of Acts. So if you brought your Bible, you might open it up with us and turn to Acts chapter 13. We’re gonna just kind of skim through some actual— actually some names, some cities that are mentioned in Acts 13. So it’ll be quick.
And then we’re gonna land this morning in Acts chapter 14. We’ve been doing a series we call Be One, Make One, and it’s focused on discipleship. If you do become a follower of Jesus Christ, it’s the Lord’s desire that you make disciples. And so we’ve been focused on how does that actually happen? What’s involved in discipleship?
And today’s subject got me thinking back to a recent activity event that our family had. We went along with 4 of our grandchildren and their parents, Brian and Mary. Brian’s my son. But we took a trip to Disneyland. It was a 4-day trip to Disneyland that included also California Adventure.
And while we were there, we walked away from the 4-year-old. We We didn’t realize that we had walked away for a few minutes, but he was no longer with us. And if you’ve ever, you know, lost somebody in Disneyland or California Adventure or some other place, or maybe somebody ditched you or whatever it is, you kind of know the feeling that you get at this moment in time. You start freaking out and, you know, fear fills your heart. And even though it’s Disneyland or California Adventure, you still want to be a good parent because you know that good parents don’t just up and walk away from the kids.
And, you know, I hope you make it out here. It’s really been fun having you a part of our life for 4 years, but this is where it ends, you know. So we don’t want to do those sorts of things. So we took off and, you know, everybody was running in different directions. We didn’t abandon the other 3 children that were there.
You know, we kept them with us. And so we were looking all over, and it felt like forever. It was probably just about 5 minutes, but we found Anderson, Short Anders, with another mother, and she was consoling him. He was crying. It was, you know, it was that typical scene.
So we, you know, got him back, and we, you know, comforted him and did all the rest of it. And then we kind of went on with the rest of the adventure there. Well, good parents don’t do that sort of thing intentionally, right? Sometimes it happens, but you don’t intentionally do that kind of thing, because you realize that God, as we saw this morning, has given you this precious gift, and you want to do your absolute best to raise this gift so that the gift ultimately is able to take care of themselves, as we’ve kind of talked about in this series. Well, this really connects with the whole matter of discipleship.
There are babies that are born into the family of God. They’re born through Jesus. You’ve probably heard of the idea of being born again. Well, when you receive Jesus Christ, you’re born again and you’re a babe in Christ. And these babes in Christ need to be cared for.
They need to have others come along and, and guide them and help them and protect them and nourish them. And so this is all a part of the discipleship process. We don’t want to abandon our spiritual babes in Christ. That would be negligent on our part. But the fact of the matter is, you think about your personal experience.
If you’re a follower of Jesus Christ, many of us in the building this morning would say that after I came to faith in Christ, nobody helped me. It was like they abandoned me. It was like I just had to fend for myself. I had to just figure it out because Nobody was really helping me. In fact, I was told to just go read the Bible, and that was kind of the extent of it.
In other words, just go feed yourself, and we really hope this thing works out. Now, in some ways we would say that’s pretty negligent, right? I mean, yeah, you at least told them to go read the Bible, but could have you been a part of discipling them? Could have you been a part of helping them grow up? The focus that we’re having— we’re going to see this morning is actually connected to this whole matter right here.
It’s the 5th component as we’ve been working through our Bridges, which is 7 ways that we can help others in this discipleship process. We begin with prayer. We reach out to unbelievers because discipleship includes unbelievers as well. It includes before they ever come to faith in Jesus. So Matthew 28 talks about going.
And this whole aspect of going is to be salt and light to the world. So we begin with prayer, we reach out to unbelievers, we invite others into our lives, we invite them to do life with us, to be friends. And through that relationship, hopefully we come to understand what their spiritual need is, where they are spiritually right now. So we’ve talked about all of these matters. Today we come to the G, and the G comes into focus in Acts chapters 13 and 14.
And what I hope you’re going to see this morning is something that’s going to encourage you wherever you are in your spiritual journey to be a part of caring for spiritual infants, spiritual children that need our help. They need our protection. And this isn’t a burden. I mean, yeah, it’s going to require sacrifice. You might miss a few services like, you know, the whole family.
At least the ones that are responsible for the babies, they’re not here any longer. So, you know, it might happen. That sort of, yeah, it requires time and it requires attention and there’s gonna be sacrifice involved, but this is a precious gift. And so we won’t just abandon this gift. We’re gonna do everything we can.
And in the same way, when you have this gift and you’re able to care for this gift, isn’t there joy? Isn’t there joy in seeing a child, a babe grow up? Isn’t there joy in that? Absolutely. Our daughter who has a 4-month-old, her name is Paisley.
Paisley now is, you know, experiencing significant changes. So she’s just about at that place where she’s able to roll over at will. And our daughter keeps on tweeting us, or not tweeting, but sending text messages. That would be for everybody to see. But she sends text messages and she says, look, look at Paisley, you know.
And it’s kind of fun to see if she can get over. And they sent one, she sent one where she rolled over and then she was stuck, you know, or her arms are stuck underneath and all of that. But the point is, is that, yeah, we celebrate the progress that’s made and it brings a whole sense of joy, of joy. Well, Acts 14— Acts 13 first brings us into this context and what you can do, what every one of us can do to help others around us. Who need to grow up, but they need spiritual parents to come along and help them grow.
How does this play out? Acts 13 is the first missionary journey of the Apostle Paul and Barnabas. Actually, it’s Barnabas listed here first and then Saul, so he’s not even called Paul at this point. They’re called out of the church at Antioch, and they take this missionary journey led by the Holy Spirit. We’re just going to show you a map that’ll just simply summarize this because we don’t have time to go through the whole text.
But it begins— the journey begins in Antioch. You see the red line there. And they sail from Antioch. Actually, they come down to Seleucia, and then they sail from there to Salamis on the island of Cyprus. And they land there, and they begin to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, and people are coming to faith in the Lord, and it’s a wonderful time.
They move to Paphos, down to the western southern corner of Cyprus. And they have a ministry there, which is amazing. And finally, they leave the island of Cyprus and they come up to Perga. Another ministry takes place at Perga in Pamphylia. They continue northward till they get to Antioch, Pisidian Antioch, so a different Antioch than the city that they started from.
So they get to Pisidian Antioch, and what happens there is that more people come to faith in Christ, but there are some Jewish people that now don’t like what’s going on. And so they begin to persecute Barnabas and Saul. Ultimately, Barnabas and Saul leave Pisidian Antioch and they come to Iconium. And again, they continue the same ministry. Their pattern was to preach in the synagogues, see if people were receptive to the gospel, turn to the Gentiles as well.
And there were people who came to faith in Jesus, but ultimately what happened was there were some others that didn’t like what they were doing, so they threatened them. So, 2 words you want to keep in mind already. In Antioch, they were persecuted. In Iconium, they were threatened. So, they left Iconium and they came to Lystra.
I’m just summarizing for you what you’re going to see in Acts chapter 13, maybe when you go back and read it, or the beginning of 14. They come then to Lystra. They continue the same ministry, preaching the gospel. People come to faith. Many people came to faith, actually, it tells in Lystra, and having come to faith in Jesus, there were others that actually didn’t like exactly what was going on there.
But in fact, the others— and this is where I want to pick it up, Acts chapter 14, verse 19— the others were Jews that were already against what it was Paul was doing because of the exposure that they had to him in their own cities. So it says, but Jews came from Antioch and Iconium and And having persuaded the crowds, they stoned Paul, and they dragged him out of the city, supposing that he was dead. But when the disciples gathered about him, he rose up and he entered the city. And on the next day he went on with Barnabas to Derbe. Now, if you have your Bible, you’re following along, or maybe in The Message note sheet, you could see what’s going on here.
But what I don’t want you to miss is exactly what is taking place. I mean, this is fascinating, because the Jews who were in Antioch that persecuted him, The Jews that were in Iconium that threatened him, they’ve now come from their cities to Lystra, and they are able to persuade a multitude of people to turn against Barnabas and Saul to the point that now they almost kill Paul. They almost kill him, right? They stoned him. So now they’re stoned.
It was so bad that they drug him out of the city. They thought that he was dead. His disciples, those who had come to faith in Jesus, gathered around him, probably maybe saying last rites. I don’t know what was going on. All we know is, is that they thought he was dead.
But miraculously, Paul’s still alive. He rises up and he enters the city. And on the next day, he went on with Barnabas to Derbe. A couple things to note there. If you had just been beat up to the point where you were almost dead, would you go right back into the city that beat you up?
I know what I would do. I’m not going back into that city. I would find another city to go to. I mean, hey, come on, Barnabas, there’s a lot of other cities out there that need the Lord. They went right back to this city.
And then it says, and on the next day they went on to the next city, to Derbe, And they preached the gospel there. And I think that would be different than a lot of us because, you know, if we take it on the chin, usually what we’re going to say is, I think I’ll take a few days off. You know, this Christian thing, this is like way too much. I’m not going to, you know, keep going at it. I think I need a vacation, maybe 2, 3 weeks, maybe a year.
I don’t know what it is. I’m just going to get away with it. Get away from it. But that doesn’t happen here. Do you notice this?
The next day, beaten almost to death, beaten, they go on to the next city. And if you read the account, what happens is Paul continues to make disciples, and it says in verse 21, many more disciples— after he preached, there were many more that became disciples of Jesus Christ. Now that’s wonderful. But let me ask you this question. We’re going to read on.
Would you now do what it is that Paul then does? It says, after there were many more disciples that came to the Lord there in Derbe, they said— Luke tells us, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch. So, they’re having a great ministry in Derbe. But now they say, well, time to go back to Lystra. What happened at Lystra?
Paul almost died. And then they went back to Iconium. And what happened in Iconium? Hey, if you guys keep after this, we’re going to kill you. They were threatened.
And then they went back to Antioch. And what happened in Antioch? They were persecuted for their faith. So here’s my question. Would you go back to the cities where possibly you were putting your life at risk?
Would you go back? Probably not. We’d probably say, I think I’ll find some other place to go, you know, preach Jesus. And the question that I want to ask and answer then is, why? Why in the world did Barnabas and Paul think it was that important?
Why would they go back? And we’re told, verse 21, the last part, just to pick it up there again. It says, then they returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch. Verse 22, strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. This is what they said, we must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.
Verse 23, Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church. And with prayer and fasting committed them to the Lord in whom they had put their trust. Now, what do you see there? You see 4 tasks that they had on their to-do list that from their perspective, first time through in these cities, these had not been accomplished. And so they felt an urgency.
They felt the responsibility to go back to these— listen— go back to these towns where there were spiritual babies and do what was necessary to help these babies grow up in the Lord. And so what did they do under the threat of death? Okay? What did they do under the threat of death? And what this tells me is that if they saw that this was vitally important in the making disciples process, then guess what?
I better believe this is vitally important as well, and it would be wrong for me to walk away from a spiritual infant and not give them the help that they need. So what was it that they did? Well, actually, they did something that all of us could do. You’ll notice, first of all, the word strengthening. They strengthened the disciples.
I’m gonna give you 4 images that might help us remember this. They returned as strength trainers. They returned as strength trainers. You know what a strength trainer is? It’s that person at the gym that wears the red shirt that says master trainer on the back or whatever.
But this is a person who helps you become stronger, and they have some intentional ways of going about that. They put you under tremendous pain and everything else. But, you know, how did they strengthen these new believers’ faith? Well, they strengthened their new believers’ faith by the faith, by By the Word of God. Later in Acts, chapter 20, Paul goes back and he’s speaking to the elders at the church at Ephesus, and he says this to them: So be on your guard.
Remember that for 3 years I never stopped warning each of you night and day with tears. Now I commit to you God— excuse me— now I commit you to God and— here it is— to the word of his grace, which can build you up— that means strengthen— and give you an inheritance among those who are sanctified. What was the primary means by which Paul built people up? It was with the Word of God. So the Word of God was primary in the food that he gave them to nourish them and to grow them up.
And some of you know this by experience, right? Because you’ve read the Word of God and you’re committed to reading the Word of God. And you know that when you read the Word of God, it strengthens you and it nourishes you and it changes you and it gives you wisdom and perspective and hope and it builds you up and it makes you strong. Well, that makes sense. That’s why Peter said, grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
That’s why Peter earlier in 1 Peter 2:2 said, like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the Word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation. We need the Word of God if we’re going to grow up. And these young believers didn’t have enough of it, and so Paul and Barnabas go back to give them more. Of the Word of God. By the way, in terms of your relationship to the Word of God, you are showing by your relationship to the Word of God your low— this would be this way— low, your low view of Scripture or your high view of Scripture.
If you have a high view of Scripture, you are constantly, like here today, coming back to the Word of God, seeking to understand it because you know it’s absolutely essential to your strength and your growth in Christ. Absolutely essential. I just received an email from a woman in our church who just found out a couple days ago that she has cancer. Some of you know her, Nancy Carpiano. And she wrote her family and friends, and she said this in her email.
She said, my pilgrimage with the Lord is deepening once again. That’s incredible. I mean, that almost took my breath away. When I read those opening words in the email. This is a woman that just found out she has cancer.
She has no idea how this is going to turn out, and she begins her email with, my pilgrimage with the Lord is deepening once again. And then she said, I’m so privileged and thankful to have Jesus as my dearest friend. I feel his presence mightily. He has already strengthened me. And I was thinking about this message, so I’m very interested to see what she’s going to say next.
He has already strengthened me with his word just as I received the biopsy results. And then she quotes Deuteronomy chapter 3, verse 22, the Lord God himself will fight for me. And then she said, I’ve been diagnosed with cancer. I appreciate your ongoing prayer support. And then she quotes James 5:16, the effective prayers of a righteous man avails much.
Now, what’s she hanging on to for her hope? It’s the Word of God. The Word of God strengthens us. Paul knew that. Barnabas knew that.
That’s why they put their lives at risk. They had to go back and strengthen these young believers in the faith. Are you experiencing the same kind of thing in your life? Not only that, but they returned as encouraging cheerleaders, I’m going to call them, encouraging cheerleaders. Some of you say, I don’t like the idea of being a cheerleader, so this isn’t going to work for me, Dave.
Okay? So you call yourself an encouraging booster, all right? Whatever you want to call yourself. But I want you to notice the word encouragement here. Do you see that second word there?
Encourage. He went back to encourage them to remain true in the faith. Now, why would he need to do that? Well, they’ve just watched this guy get persecuted. They just watched this guy get beaten, almost killed.
And so perhaps now at this point they’re thinking, I don’t know if this Christianity thing is for me. I’m not sure that I’m cut out for the faith. Maybe, you know, it’s for somebody else, but I’m not really sure about that. So what Paul does and Barnabas do is that they come back and they encourage them and they give them a perspective on trials. And I think this is so important because some of us who’ve come to faith in Jesus Christ never had anybody sit down with us and tell us, by the way, you know, part of the Christian life means you’re not going to eliminate your problems.
It’s not going to take away all your problems. Sometimes you, you almost get the impression, just become a Christian, you won’t have any more problems. No, that’s not the case. All those who are godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, the scripture says. We have a whole different perspective on our problems.
We have a whole new resource on getting through our problems, but problems are a part of life. And so he encourages them with an understanding in that regard. We’re going to all go through how many hardships? Do you see it there? Many hardships.
Many hardships. Not a few. Many hardships to enter the kingdom of God. Before we get there, it’s going to be hard here. And he says, but don’t let that in any way deter your faith.
Don’t let that weaken your faith. But he says, but you remain true in the faith when you go through these hardships. It’s been said we’re either in a crisis, we’re coming out of a crisis, or we’re going into a crisis. Crisis is just a part of life. And what Paul does is he goes back and he encourages them in the midst of problems to remain true to the faith.
Now, what does encouragement do for us? Encouragement, listen, is a hug for the soul. And we all need our souls hugged a lot, don’t we? Because problems are a part of life. In fact, in the book of Hebrews chapter 3 and verse 13, it says, how often should we encourage each other?
Not hard, not a hard question. How often? Daily. Yeah, daily. We need this every day.
Now, can I just make an observation? I don’t mean to be critical here, but I think there’s room for improvement on this one. I really do. I think that all of us could do more to encourage each other, more than we’re encouraging each other right now. And quite frankly, I really don’t, I really don’t understand this.
I really don’t understand this. I— we’ve now lived in Central California, we’ve now lived in Southern California, we’ve now lived in Phoenix, and now we’re here in Northern California. And I gotta tell you, and you don’t usually want to compare, but I’m gonna do it right now. When it comes to encouragement, encouragement is at the lowest in Northern California than any place we’ve ever lived, ever.
And I think that’s tragic. I really honestly do. But in some ways I think it’s connected to the competitive culture that we’re in, that if I encourage you, then you might get ahead of me, and I don’t want that to happen. So I’m not going to, like, come alongside and tell you, hey, you’re doing a good job, man. Keep it up.
You’re doing great. I love working with you. Listen, we all need encouragement, and there’s so much room for encouragement here. Now you tell me, can you come alongside somebody and encourage them? Could you do it?
I know it’s going to be different for you maybe because you never do this. That’s probably not true, but But you get the idea. Could you come alongside somebody and encourage them? Could you hug their soul with encouragement? What— encouragement, what does it mean?
It literally means encourage, in, I-N, courage. It means to give the other person courage in the circumstances that they find themselves in or the circumstances that they’re excelling in. There’s also a third matter here. They went back as foresighted arrangers, as foresighted arrangers. Paul and Barnabas, it says in verse 23, appointed elders for them in each church.
I mean, why would they go back to all these churches that have now been founded? Well, because they realized that they needed spiritual leadership, that people needed to be connected to a church. By the way, that passage there suggests that these new believers are already connected to a local church. If you’re not connected to a local church, that’s something to think about, because a local church is a place, as many of you know this morning, it’s a place where you’re going to be strengthened in your faith, and it’s a place where you’re going to be encouraged in your faith. Good thing to be a part of a local church.
So they go back and they raise up leadership called elders for each one of these churches so that these elders would do what they could not do now that they’re going to be going back to Antioch. They couldn’t be there, so they made arrangements. They made arrangements, or they appointed elders for them in every church who could care for them spiritually. Now, can you do that? Yes, we can do that.
We do that all the time. You make arrangements for whatever. You know, I’m making arrangements for the company party. How you doing that? Well, I’m buying food and, you know, the deal.
You’re making arrangements. If you’re a parent, you— if you ever go out and leave the kids at home, you make arrangements for them to be taken care of. It’s the same idea here. If they’re in high school, you have a talk with them. Please, when I come back, let the house be here.
Come on, you know. I can remember one time we came back, we left our kids, they were in high school at that point, you know, how did things go? Well, we only had one fire. It was only one, you know, but everything’s okay, I guess. So, you know, so, but anyway, you get the idea.
We make arrangements and that’s what they did. They made arrangements. We have a mother in this church who has made arrangements for some high school students over in the Palo Alto area. And I think they kind of rotate homes now, but I had the privilege recently of being a part of one of their meetings. Where these students get together, and the reason they’re getting together is to encourage one another and strengthen one another before they graduate from high school.
And this mother saw the need to do that, to make it possible for them to get together as friends. They call their group the Bible Buds. Some of you are saying, oh, you know, Bible— that’s a weird name. It doesn’t matter the name, okay? The point is, is that she got together with somebody else and they made arrangements.
They made arrangements for these students to meet together And part of the arrangements were making sure they always had food. So they always have food, and you can bet they come, and they have a great time together, and they’re encouraged. And when this mother did this— listen, here’s what I want you to see. When this mother did this, this mother was a part of discipleship. She was discipling.
And when you make arrangements for the care of somebody else, you are a process— and a part of that process is a discipleship process. So, last thought here. They went back as fervent intercessors, as fervent intercessors. They went back to pray over them, and they went back to fast over them, and they went back to commit them to the Lord in whom they had already put their trust. Can you pray over somebody?
Maybe you prayed over somebody this morning. You’re with a friend and you— and the friend’s going to leave, or you’re going to leave, and you say, hey, listen, before I go, could I pray? How about this one? Would you ever pray over somebody and also fast for them because you believe that prayer makes that much of a difference? And you’re going to turn up the frequency, or you’re going to turn up the intensity by fasting for them as well?
That’s what they did. They went back and they believed that God would do something even more in their lives, and so they prayed over the protective hand of God over them. Why did they go back? Well, there were some undone tasks on their list, you might say. And think of these tasks again.
Could you do these? Could you help somebody grow in the Word of God through what you’ve learned in the Word of God? As a strength trainer? Could you go back as an encouraging cheerleader or booster? Could you go back and could you help somebody just be encouraged in the faith?
Even right now you know they’re going through problems and you can encourage them in the midst of those problems. Could you be a foresighted arranger? Could you be a fervent intercessor? Absolutely. And when we do this, we do the G here.
We’re growing them up. We’re growing them up. We’re helping them grow up in the Lord. We’re not abandoning them. We’re not saying, hey, man, it’s so cool that you came to faith in Jesus Christ.
Now I really hope you make it.
And actually Steve talked about that in his introduction to this family here and what he was saying about the importance of the involvement that we have in this, that we as a congregation aren’t just going to say, well, I hope you make it. Are you kidding? We’re going to practice spiritual pediatrics. We’re going to do our absolute best to be a part of the process of raising these children to grow up and to love the Lord. I talked to Jim Stump about this recently.
Jim I wanted to have at the service this morning. Some of you know the name Jim Stump. Jim Stump is kind of an unofficial chaplain. I mean, Stanford didn’t ask him to be a chaplain, so you would call him unofficial chaplain over on the campus of Stanford. He meets with football players, tennis players, and baseball players.
Okay, those are his primary guys that he disciples, and he does disciple them. He helps many come to faith in Christ, and then he doesn’t abandon them. He starts discipling them. And others who he doesn’t help come to faith in Christ, who already have faith in Christ, he takes them from where they are, determines their need, and he helps them grow up in the Lord. And he’s been doing this now, listen, for 44 years, 44 years on the campus of Stanford.
And he has an amazing approach because he typically does this one-on-one, a one-on-one relationship. And it happens most of the time, at least in the actual discussions, it happens in the sports café. If you’ve ever been over at Stanford, he has a table. They’ve actually made it sort of Jim’s table over there, and he meets with these athletes 5 days in a row, one athlete for an hour every week. He’ll meet with these athletes, and it turns out at times to be about 35 athletes a week.
So I wanted to ask him about this matter of growth and our part in this, this whole equation. And so we did just a quick interview. Why don’t you watch the screen and catch what it was that he shared?
Well, it’s a privilege to talk to Jim Stump today. Jim, thanks for taking the time to be a part of this interview. You bet, absolutely glad to do it. And we’ve, you know, known each other for 5 years now, so for 5 years I’ve seen what you’re doing over at Stanford working with the athletes over there with the baseball team, the football team, the tennis team, and you’re into the whole thing of discipleship. And so for us to be able to hear your your thoughts on this matter of growth are really important.
You’ve been doing this for 44 years. Correct. That’s amazing. Tell us why this is important. Why is it important to help people grow up in Christ?
Well, because we represent Jesus and we can’t really represent him properly unless we’re maturing in our, in our walk. One of the things that guys struggle with is before they become believers is I don’t want to be a hypocrite. And they’ve seen new believers who don’t really have their feet under them spiritually. And so they write them off as, well, that’s just a typical Christian, even though they’re immature in their walk yet. So we need to help people grow up in their faith so that the world would see a true picture of who Jesus is.
Okay, now, so in terms of, you know, our typical pattern though, we maybe help somebody come to faith in Christ and then I hope you make it. You know, we don’t do spiritual pediatrics, you might call it. But you are involved with athletes, Stanford athletes nonetheless. Couldn’t they just do this on their own? Well, they’re bright guys, but no, they, they’re 18 to 22-year-old kids, and they need someone in their life that they can meet with, bounce ideas off.
You know, that’s the reason I’ve chosen to meet with them for an hour each week on an ongoing basis, because stuff happens in their lives. One of the kids just found out that his brother overdosed with drugs, and he just didn’t know how to handle that. Of course, he didn’t know how to handle it. Another one found out his parents were getting divorced. And, you know, so stuff happens in life, and they need someone solid in their lives they can come to and say, well, what does the Bible have to say about that?
And what— how do I— how do I get through this? My girlfriend just broke up with me. How do I handle that? I want to be nice to her, but I’m really mad. Yeah, you know, stuff like that.
So I get to help them walk through that, that growth pattern. Now, I know that you don’t use anything, you know, scholarly, I guess. Thank you, Dave. Just to be helpful here, you basically just have some material. I’ve seen your binder, and you put different little stick notes in it that says, this is where I left off with so-and-so, because you’re meeting with a lot of athletes in a week.
Yeah. But it’s just, it’s nothing, you know, amazing in terms of the material. It’s very basic. Talk to us about how you go about actually using some material to help people grow up in Christ. Well, we need someplace to come back to.
That’s why we have those stickums. But inevitably, guys come in and they have questions, and they want to ask those questions and get answers. So, we get into the scriptures, and they begin to grow through the scriptures. Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the Word of God. So, we want to dive into the scriptures.
And I tell the guys, if I can’t back up what I say from at least 2 different passages of scripture, don’t listen to me. Because anyone can take a verse, take it out of context, and make a point. That’s just not fair. It’s not right. So, I challenge them with that.
Then, again, inevitably, one question leads to another question. So, we’re always in the scriptures, but we’re always in their life, as well. Are there basic topics or themes that you’re working through? Not necessarily. Okay.
No. Different guys. Some have some really deep apologetical questions, and so we deal with those. Other people, you know, more, how do I do this whole thing? You know, I’ve always tried to be good, but I couldn’t.
So, what’s this Holy Spirit thing? How does the Holy Spirit fit in with the fruit of the Spirit? Love, joy, peace, patience. I, you know, I can’t do that. Well, you don’t have to.
That’s the Holy Spirit’s job. Our job is to let him be in control of our lives so he can produce that fruit in us. So what you’re saying is, is that you tailor-make the conversations to the needs that they have at the time. That’s correct. You do have some things that you can continue to come back to.
I mean, in terms of studies and the scriptures and that sort of thing, but you’re really trying to zero in on what are their needs at this moment. Right. Exactly. Absolutely. So, for us, you know, not having the opportunities that you do on a Stanford campus, but yet called to disciple, to help people grow up in Christ, what would you suggest to us?
How do we help others? I mean, in some ways it kind of seems a little bit prideful to go to somebody and say, hey, let me disciple you. Let me help you grow up. You know, I’m the guru of discipleship. So, how do we go about doing that?
This? I think a real simple but effective way is to just say to someone, if you see someone that you think you’d relate well with, just go to them and say, hey, why don’t we grab a cup of coffee sometime? And then if that goes well, say, hey, this was fun. Why don’t we do this again in a couple of weeks? And if that goes well, say, why don’t we do this on a regular basis?
This has really been good. And it’s not like me grabbing someone and saying, open your mouth and let me cram all my wisdom in. It’s just doing life together, and questions will come up as you earn the right to be heard. And so that’s, that’s the most effective way I’ve found.
I so appreciate his wisdom, and really he is just summarizing through his life and his ministry what we’ve been talking about. Bottom line of today is it all Christ followers should practice spiritual pediatrics. It’s not something that, you know, should just be left for a Jim Stumpf. It’s not something that should be left for pastors. It’s something that all of us as Christ followers should be practicing, spiritual pediatrics.
We should be helping each other grow up in the Lord. Now, can you do that?
Maybe the better question is, will we do that? You know, will we carve out time in our schedules? Will we respond to the people that God’s placed into our lives. You say, well, I haven’t led anybody to the Lord. Well, there are still other people around you and connected to you that maybe God wants to use you to help them come to the Lord or to help them in their spiritual journey.
I was speaking to a couple, a couple days ago, and they were telling me about their pest control man, a guy that just comes to their house, you know, monthly and just sprays for insects. And they’ve got to know this guy, and this guy knows that they’re Christ followers. And they got to find out that this guy is a Mormon. That’s his spiritual practice, is the Mormon faith. But here over just the last few months, he did some more reading and investigating about his faith, and he came to believe that what he believed was not in accordance to what Jesus Christ taught.
And so he ultimately said, I want what it is that Christianity offers. And he gave his life to Jesus Christ, and now he’s a Christ follower. And the first person, or the first people, that he wanted to share that with were my friends, the ones that he, you know, goes over and sprays pests at their house. And so he got ahold of them, he got over, and they connected, and he told them about how he’s come to the Lord and now how he’s just trying to read the Bible and understand the Bible. Well, hey, you know, if you’re my friends at this point, the light bulb should be going on.
Wait a minute, I can help this person. I can help this person grow up. I can do what it was Paul did when he put his life at risk and he went back to these cities. I could do the same thing. I could help them understand the Scriptures.
I could encourage them. I could encourage them even in the midst of problems to not abandon the Lord. I can make arrangements for them so that what I can’t do, others perhaps could come alongside. I can suggest certain books. I could suggest maybe you should also get connected to this church.
And, yes, I can pray over them. I can pray that God would take care of them and that God would lead them and God would multiply their faith. I can do all of that. You can do that. Do you understand?
This is not something that’s for everybody else. This is something that God wants to do through us. And there are people right now in our lives that we could be discipling. When we found Anderson at California Adventure, we made a change in how we were going to take care of Anderson and the kids from then on, which was kind of a smart thing to do at that point. What I didn’t tell you was part of the reason they brought us on the trip was because they needed some help with the kids.
And not only did they bring this set of grandparents, but they also brought the other set of grandparents. So, in other words, there were 6 adults who still couldn’t keep track of 4 kids.
But we made a change. And you know what? We didn’t lose one more kid the rest of the time we were there. We made a change. Thank God, you know, there was somebody else who came along and assisted in that time of need.
And sometimes that’s exactly what God does.
When the parents or those who could be parents to someone have neglected their responsibility, maybe even unintentionally, and God brings along somebody else who could be a help at that point of need. Wonderful. But when we realize that we haven’t done what it is that we need to do as parents, it says, let’s make a change. And if right now in our lives we’re not involved in a spiritual parenting way of others, it’s time to make a change. It’s time to make a change.
And so my encouragement to you this morning is, God, who is it that you’ve put into my life? It could be your children. Of course it’s going to be your children, your neighbor, friends, a work associate, schoolmates. So many people that God has put into our lives. Who is it that God has put in my life that I could be a spiritual parent to?
There’s someone. Let’s pray. Lord, thanks for this time this morning. Thanks for the encouragement that you give us. Thank you, Father, for the privilege of being a part of this spiritual parenting process, that you didn’t say, I’ll take over, but you said, I want to join with you to help others grow up in me.
And so I pray that we would see that privilege and we would receive that challenge if it is, and we would find the time to responsibly parent these babes in Christ, these infants, these children in Christ. And for some of us, that’s going to be different because nobody’s ever parented us spiritually. But God, may the cycle break now. May it begin to go in a way that perhaps it hasn’t gone before. And let me just pause and say, if you’re here this morning and you’ve never been born again, you’ve never received Jesus, that invitation is still there for you today, even now.
God longs for you to be a member in his— of his family, and he invites you through his Son Jesus. To come into his family, to be forgiven of your sins. Your sins separate you from God, and Christ, when he died on the cross and rose from the tomb, paid for your sin. And he wants to give you a gift, the gift of life now and forever. He wants to give you the help in this life to live in ways that would honor him.
And if you want that gift, tell him that right now. Lord, save me. Forgive me. Begin to change me. Make me a member of your family.
Perhaps you’ve invited Jesus into your life, but you know what? You’ve never told anybody you’re a Christ follower now, and, and so you’re kind of still doing this alone. Tell somebody so they could help you. Lord, thanks that wherever we are spiritually, you are there with us, and you’re willing to help us if we just simply turn to you. And so we ask for your help even now, in Jesus’ name.
Amen. Well, we’re going to have our team come back up and finish off the service this morning. And let me just say this as they’re preparing to do that. We want to be available to you to help you in any way we can. But we also this morning have a resource.
We’ve got Jim Stump’s brand new book. It’s the first book he’s written. It’s called The Power of One-on-One. And we just have a few copies over there on the table. We had 50, but the first service pretty much bought most of them.
I’ll just say it that way, which is great. And so if you’d like to purchase that book, we’ve got them over there at discount, $10. It’s a wonderful book to help you be a better disciple maker. In fact, it’s being used by God to actually bring some people to faith in Jesus Christ. So Jim teaches through the principles that he uses in terms of the power of one-on-one discipleship.
He writes in such a way it’s a lot of fun to read. He tells a lot of stories about athletes at Stanford, so it’s a joy to read this book, and I encourage it to you. So you can get it online, of course, but we’ve got a few copies here this morning, and if we run out, we’ll be happy to take your name and get some more copies back next week.
