May 10th 2020

Ben Hinks speaks at our online 10am (Central) Sunday service. You can find Ben’s talk notes and Bible passages below.

Do What Jesus Did: we're called to continue and join in with Jesus' work of bringing the Kingdom of God to earth.

As disciples of Jesus we’re called and empowered, like trees and plants, to grow, bless and multiply. Growing to become more of who we are meant to be, blessing the world by bringing the Kingdom of God in a variety of ways, and multiplying that by creating a disciple-making culture. 

Jesus’ “Come and follow me” (Matt. 4:19; Mark 1:17; Luke 5:27; John 1:43) to the disciples did not mean them tagging along to watch Jesus’ do some cool stuff, but instead he invited, instructed and encouraged them to do what he did. Jesus called them to join in bringing the Kingdom by growing through training and practice, by doing these Kingdom works in and for the world, and by calling and training more people to join in too (Matt. 28:16-20 – the Great Commission).

Jesus led the disciples all the way through the commonly known stages of learning or training from them watching Jesus teaching and powerfully working (i.e. Mark 1:21-22, John 9:1-7), participating with him (i.e. Matt.14:22-33 or Luke 9:10-17), and then being sent out for themselves (i.e. Mark 3:13-15, Luke 10:1).

John Mark Comer has helpfully picked out 10 things Jesus trained his disciples in:

  • Preaching the Gospel

  • Teaching the Way

  • Healing the sick

  • Casting out demons

  • Eating and drinking with people far from God

  • Doing justice

  • Peace-making

  • Praying 

  • Prophesying

  • Standing up against religious and political corruption

 Obviously, we’re all on a journey towards these things, and we should pursue these things: 

  • in community, together - this is a community endeavour

  • as ourselves - we can only act out of our personal standpoint, capacity and season

  • by starting simple - every small step brings the Kingdom

Desiring and practising these things will not earn us salvation but they will stop us from

  • selling ourselves short of who we could become

  • selling the world short of the blessing we can be

  • selling God short of the glory due to His Name

Rachel Heslop