Charles Metclaf’s Introduction During Worship
- The building may be closed, but the church is wide open and it cannot be stopped
- God is ready to do something incredible through our service today
- Social distancing will not stop our community. Belong groups will be led online Transformchurch.us/belong – TC would love for you to be a part of creating community
- For parents: Visit KIDSOnline on the TC website
- Easter at TC is coming up on April 12th
- Lean into this moment, God stands ready to bring peace, start your faith again, and speak to you specifically
- Share the link to this video, whether live, or the rebroadcast
- Some of us feel faith, peace, among other things draining
- The God we serve is the God that brings water out of the desert
- God is going to refresh us
- He’s refreshing marriages, relationships, business ideas
- What the enemy meant for evil, God is using for good
- Let’s pray to be refreshed
- Prayer excerpts: Lord Jesus, we are asking for you. We feel worried, unsure of the outcome, unsure of where the resources are going to come from, Lord it feels like we’re in dry spots. You are the God that brings strength, refreshes us, in the middle of the pain, we see your spirit of refreshing. Refresh our minds and spirits. Let us be encouraged to know you are in the middle of it. You are our source; you are our provider; you are securing us Lord Jesus. Right now our faith and trust go up to you. We call on you Lord God, we submit ourselves to you and we thank you that you are refreshing us. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.
Mike Todd’s Introduction During Worship
- I will agree with God
- When we say “Amen”, we are in agreement with heaven
- We agree with God in this moment
- With long life, you will satisfy us
- We will not be afraid of corona or financial collapse
- We agree with you God
- It is so
- Let you will be done God
- Your plan for our life
- This is a rescue mission, you are pulling people out of the despair and you are giving us the fruit of the spirit, joy peace
- “I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord” – right now the scripture is more relevant than it’s ever been, because we’re at our place of residence. Let’s make our homes the house of God. The scripture says I will bless the Lord at all times and his praise will continually be in my mouth
- Today is gonna be a good day
“Who’s the Minister Here?” (Part 1)
Mike believed God to spend 80k for cameras as his first instruction as lead pastor.
God is trying to pull the attention of his children back on him.
This is on purpose. God made this appointment to remind us that he’s still on the throne.
Our peace, was his job. Your peace, was his job.
He died so that in the moment of crisis, we can focus on Christ.
Mike has been planning this series for 2 years. Mike wouldn’t have known what would be happening right now. God wanted Mike to challenge every person watching to really evaluate if we have truly answered the call that God has brought us to this Earth for.
When you got laid off, you realized you were dispensable there. God is asking, “now can I have your attention to do what I created you for and sent you here for?”
When we think about the question, of who is the minister, we may identify the teacher or pastor instead of the minister.
1. You are the Minister Here
The body of Christ is so fragile because the weight of what God wants us to do has been resting on a few.
There aren’t enough people that are able to hold up the weight when society has questions.
Every child born of Me should be standing up in the name of God.
When society comes to crush, we would be able to stand if we stood together as the church. Then we can teach our children that we don’t lose our faith in times of adversity. That God is our source. That jobs are resources and not sources.
God is saying, will I have to look for another, or can I use you to be my minister? Will you be the minister on the soccer field, online, via text message threads instead of sexting, etc.?
Scripture: Ephesians 4:11-12 New Living Translation (NLT)
11 Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. 12 Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.
The job as a pastor is to equip us to minister to others.
The greatest role of a pastor is a servant. The goal is that other people will be able to do greater works.
You are the minister. Our pastor is our teacher that equips us, like Mr. Miyagi from Karate Kid. Miyagi was trying to give him reps in something he would be able to use later. For example, Mike encourages us to keep on reading our word, stop gossiping, keep tithing during pandemics, and other Godly principles. Therefore, whatever you come up against, the things you do are the practices that will allow you to win the war in the middle of a battle.
Until you get in your place, it can’t begin. Have you answered your call as a minister? Have you pushed yourself beyond the place of complacency?
Pastor’s Job:
Equip God’s people >> Do His Work >> Build the Church
Who are God’s people?
Romans 10:9 New International Version (NIV)
9 If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
What about the naysayers that believe this is not enough?
Mark 2:16-17 New Living Translation (NLT)
16 But when the teachers of religious law who were Pharisees[a] saw him eating with tax collectors and other sinners, they asked his disciples, “Why does he eat with such scum?[b]”
17 When Jesus heard this, he told them, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor—sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.”
This is the good news for all of us who have been far from God. All we have to do is come to God by faith.
Therefore, who are God’s people? – Sinners who receive Jesus as their savior.
The Found: God’s People
The Lost: God’s Passion
That’s why he leaves the 99 to go for the 1.
You can be a minister by the end of the day. Maybe you don’t have to live your life the way you’ve been living it.
God’s passion and God’s people are supposed to be found in God’s church.
What is His Work?
Matthew 28:18-20 New Living Translation (NLT)
18 Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. 19 Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations,[a] baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. 20 Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
When you’re a minister and you’re going out to tell people the good news of Jesus Christ, He will be with you, even to the end of the age.
As children of God, instead of needing to “see” (like Bella walking with Mike in the dark back to her room), we need to know that God is with us. We need to believe that God is with us in faith.
What is His Work? Spreading the Good News of Jesus Christ.
He still built us to be able to share the good news, despite predispositions like shyness, the inability to speak in public, being an introvert, whatever it may be.
The whole world is focused on containing something (COVID-19). God is focused on spreading something, his good news.
This is the perfect time to know that God goes before us and will be our source.
As believers, we have our hope anchored in Jesus Christ.
If sale shopping (e.g. 50% off) is good news that we can share with others, then why is God’s news not regarded as good news? It’s our job as ministers to share it.
Nevertheless, we can’t share what we haven’t caught. We need to spend time in the word and with God.
Too many people think the person on the platform is the minister. We haven’t owned that we are the ministers in our own arenas.
Until we get this, we can’t be the full expression of the body of Christ.
How Do You Build the Church? –
The church is not an organization. The church is an organism. The church is you.
It doesn’t matter if the building never opens back up. The church is still expanding. It’s about building people – minds, bodies, and souls.
We can’t keep blaming organizations, when it was really 1 or 2 organisms that caused you to refrain from church. We can’t blame it on the organization, it was a person. Allow forgiveness to flow through your heart. It wasn’t “the church”, it was one person or group of people. Let it go. Allow God to use you as a minister and go back and share the good news that God took away grief and shame on the cross.
How Do You Build the Church? – Matthew 16:13-16 New King James Version (NKJV)
13 When Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying, “Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am? 14 So they said, “Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” 15 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16 Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
If you are going to be the minister, you need to be open.
God is asking you to be a minister to represent God, but are you even open to it? Are you open to being a minister with arts and crafts, music, judicial system, amongst the crowd?
Simon was open. If you are going to be a minister, you have to be open.
Matthew 16:16-17 New King James Version (NKJV)
16 Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
17 Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.
He is looking for people who are open; not people who are perfect. When you let God use you, he will reveal stuff to you that your education and pedigree couldn’t bring to you.
Your revelation will come from God, not from man. You will need to be open in order for God to reveal what he needs you to do when you get there.
If you are going to be the minister, you have to hear from the originator.
You won’t be effective if you say “your opinion”. You can be effective when you hear from God. Start your day in the word of God. If you focus on the promises of God, you will increase your faith and efficacy, as opposed to fear.
Matthew 16:18 New King James Version (NKJV)
18 And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
God changed his name, and up until this point, he was called one thing until he was open, and heard from the originator.
God says, can I call you something different, and can you own your calling?
Would you own it?
If you are going to be the minister, you have to Own Your Calling.
When God called Mike to be the “pastor”, not “big brother Mike”, Mike was allowing the title to keep him from owning what God called him for. He was still allowing people to call him “big brother Mike” because he didn’t want to own the calling.
God factors in all of your flaws, quirks, and nuances – You better own the calling.
God has changed your name. Don’t shrink back.
Anecdote: when Mike was young, his mom called him Mookie. When others called him that, he didn’t respond.
God says, “It doesn’t matter what I call you, but what you respond to”. God tells you to stop answering to things. We’re answering to mad, but need to answer to masterpiece, to angry, instead of anointed – we’re answering to average, when God wants us to know we’re accepted.
I’m the minister here. When you decide to own your calling, you start living offensive.
If you are going to be the minister, you have to live offensive.
Matthew 16:18 New King James Version (NKJV)
18 And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
It says the gates of hell. Meaning, hell has set up protection around certain things. Hell has set up gates around the entertainment industry, music, schools, your family with generational cycles, etc. Hell has gates because it doesn’t want God’s ministers to get in. If we ever penetrate the gates of hell, we can infiltrate it and make a difference.
God invented us to score; to live offensively; to go in and release ministers into the gate. We’ve been playing defense and only hoping that the enemy doesn’t try to play us. We haven’t gone up and tried to get in. We aren’t living offensive enough.
God is waiting for somebody to get the keys God already stole from the enemy. He did this during the three days when he was on the cross.
You are in the industry, you minister in it.
Matthew 16:19 New King James Version (NKJV)
19 And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
From now on, in the name of Jesus, when we go into our jobs, social media, education, it tells us that the gates that are set up around it – we have the keys. We don’t even have to fight for it. We can go in to every area, we can move it, and take it by force. In addition, we can invite other believers into it.
When ministers take their place, and when they’re open and get in a place together, they get into education, the entertainment system, etc., the gates of hell can’t keep us out if we would own being the minister.
Whatever you bind, whatever you loose, has to happen. Bind infidelity; loose restoration.
If you are going to be the minister, you have to be ordained.
Today, this is an ordination.
You are officially ordained. Today you are the minister!
You will own your calling and claim your ordination to minister.
Today, we will stop chasing things distracting us from our calling. He called us to spread the gospel. You are officially ordained. God will fill your mouth if you step up and be open.
Ministers are in every gate that the enemy thought he had locked. The “gods” like sports, movie theaters, finances, are being taken down. This is the time for us to look to Matthew 28:18-20.
Matthew 28:18-20 New Living Translation (NLT)
18 Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. 19 Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. 20 Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
If you are going to be the minister, alone is never an option
You can step forward boldly and say, “I am the minister here”.
We will not be lulled to sleep anymore thinking it’s somebody else’s job to minister. Just like the coke bottles under cement blocks, the weight of the world could be on our shoulders, but if all of us are in our spot, nothing can stop us.
Summary
- You are the Minister Here
- If you are going to be the minister, you need to be open.
- If you are going to be the minister, you have to hear from the originator.
- If you are going to be the minister, you have to own your calling.
- If you are going to be the minister, you have to live offensive.
- If you are going to be the minister, you have to be ordained.
- If you are going to be the minister, alone is never an option.
Link to full Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s51DqZGK5vw
Thank you for the in-depth break down and summarization of this sermon! Your notes and clear and concise and detail nearly everything that was stated. Please continue to work for the Lord and provide insight to other’s through your note taking. God bless you.
Thank you Deva! ❤️