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FAST Missions

Daniel Vis

Keep and Do

This morning, what I wanna talk about is another seriously under-emphasized topic, at least in my opinion, but something I believe is definitely worth looking at, especially as we start trying to put together a strategic plan for our church, and not just for our church, but for our own personal growth too.

We need to understand God's plan for growth, and I don't think that we've really understood it very well.

I got 1 more topic I'm going to cover next week.

These aren't the only important topics in the Christian life for sure.

And it's sad because they are so powerful.

And I'm personally convinced that these are some of the greatest bottlenecks to growth in most churches because we're just not practicing these things.

In some ways, today's topic is a lot like Bible memorization, which we talked about last week.

It's connected with all sorts of blessings.

And it's something we almost never talk about.

In fact, there are scores of verses where it is directly commanded side by side with memorization, just right next to each other.

To set the context for this morning, I'm gonna look at Gospel of Mark, but before we do that, I wanna begin with a word of prayer, amen?

I just want to kneel and invite the Holy Spirit to help us as we study this important topic.

Father in heaven, we are about to dive into your word.

We dare not do that without pausing for a moment to pray for your Holy Spirit.

I'm praying that you would make things simple and clear and that you would truly speak to our hearts, Lord, that we would hear what it is we need to hear for our church to grow explosively like you want it to.

I thank you and I pray these things in Jesus' name.

In some ways it might seem unrelated to our topic this morning, but I want to start here just the same.

It's 1 of the clearest descriptions, and in some ways, 1 of the most curious descriptions of the process of spiritual growth.

It's found in Mark chapter 4, starting with verse 26.

Let me just read it real quickly, and then we're going to break it down just a little bit moment by moment.

He said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed, where?

And He should sleep and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how.

For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself, first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear.

But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately he put it in the sickle, because the harvest is come." It's only found in 1 gospel right here in Mark chapter 4.

Pretty simple, But if you think about it, there's actually a lot of information packed into this short parable.

In verse 26, for example, we see the seed being cast into the ground.

When you study the parable of the sower, right, the disciples came up to Jesus and they said, well, what does this parable mean?

He said, well, the seed represents the word of God.

When you study the parable of the sower, right, the disciples came up to Jesus and they said, well what does this parable mean?

He said, well the seed represents the word of God.

He said, If you don't understand this parable, how are you gonna understand all the parables?

In other words, the parables have a consistent system of interpretation, he uses the same symbols across them.

When you understand the symbols that are being used, It's consistent across Daniel and Revelation, other places.

When you understand that system, you can interpret the prophecies.

When we understand the symbols in the parables, we can understand what Jesus is talking about.

So he's talking about the word of God being cast into the ground, and we know the different kinds of soils represents different kinds of people, right?

This is the conversion process where the seed has been cast into the ground and somehow supernaturally, miraculously, the seed germinates and comes to life.

You know, I hope you don't mind me telling a little bit of your story, but Greg spent many years of his life kind of wandering away from God.

He knew God as a child, but he kind of wandered away.

And then suddenly 1 day something happened.

And it's like the scales came off his eyes, and he was called back to God.

When I think about Naja and Cameron up there.

They've lived their lives a certain way for all...

And all of a sudden, something happened, and the Word of God came to life miraculously in their experience.

Verse 27 is about evangelism, the miracle of evangelism.

By the way, we're all born again by the Word of God, amen?

By incorruptible seed, the Word of God which liveth and abideth forever, the Bible says.

In verse 28, we see the growth process of the new Christian.

And notice that there are how many stages?

First, the blade, then the ear, you could say that is like when the tassel starts to form and you know something is beginning to happen, you see the ear beginning to form, and then finally the third stage, you have full corn in the ear.

That's where the seed has fully reproduced itself.

Remember, we've talked about this several times.

There are 3 stages in the spiritual life that are described all through the New Testament.

First, you have the spiritual babe, that's the blade.

Then you have the disciple, where you begin to show signs of maturity, spiritual growth, that's the tassel stage, or the ear of corn beginning to form and then finally have the worker stage where the corn itself is reproduced Right spiritual babe disciple You can tell which level you are at by where you are in that gross pot as just a conversion It just started just a spiritual babe or have you grown up into maturity?

You're actually living out and practicing the Word of God, or have you come to the place where you're reproducing and you're leading other people to Christ and helping them to grow?

So in verse 27, we have the miracle of evangelism, and in verse 28 we have the miracle of transformation and discipleship and growth.

By the way, when you have evangelism combined with training, verse 27 and verse 28 together, it's what I've been talking about all this last few weeks, when you have evangelism combined with training, that's what produces the explosion.

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Keep and Do

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