The Call of Jesus
Welcome to this lesson 24: How To Grow Up.
Last time we talked about the different spiritual levels we see in the Bible.
We talked about being babies, newborn,
how to grow up and become children in the faith,
and then become parents in the faith.
We need to go out and find a person of peace, as Jesus is talking about,
something we've looked at in this series "The Call of Jesus".
But when we find that person of peace
we need to know how to share the gospel with them,
so they can be truly born again.
But, we also need to help them to grow up.
We need to help them to become mature in Christ.
Like in a family, what we see in a family is that...
In a family there should be babies.
In the natural family.
But they should not remain as babies.
They should grow up.
And by time, they should, actually, grow up so much
that they leave the home and go out and get their own family.
And now we are not parents but grandparents.
As it is in the natural, God wanted to be in the spiritual.
When I take a look at the church today, I just want to say:
It is sad to see how far away we have come from
what God wants us to be,
how few that are really growing up and seeing good fruit
in their everyday life.
There are so many people today in churches who just,
sad to say, continue being spiritual babies the rest of their life.
Why? Why is it like that?
Could it be that we lack discipleship?
I believe that is one of it.
But the truth is also that...
many people in the church are not born again yet.
I want to read a quote here from my book "The Call of Jesus" in this chapter.
"When a person is truly born again, you will see it in their life.
There will be fruit in their life that will show they are a new creation.
When there is fruit in a person's life,
they need milk so they can grow up and mature;
however, if the fruit in not there, that means they are not born again,
and they need something much stronger then milk."
When a person is born again,
we looked at last time, that person needs milk.
But if a person is not truly born again,
they need something much stronger then milk.
What is that? Blood.
The blood of Jesus. They need to be born again.
Because when they are born again,
the life is being transformed,
not from outside in, but from inside out.
1 John 3:6-10 is saying this:
"No one who lives in Him keeps on sinning.
No one who continues to sin has either seen Him or known Him.
Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray.
The one who does what is right is righteous, just as He is righteous.
The one who does what is sinful is of the devil,
because the devil has been sinning from the beginning.
The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.
No one who is born of God will continue in sin,
because God's seed remains in them;
they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God.
This is how we know who's the children of God and who's the children of the devil;
anyone who does not do what is right is not God's children,
nor is anyone who does not love their brothers or sisters."
What we see here is... the Bible is very, very clear
that everyone who is truly born again do not go on sinning.
The seed of God is inside of them and they cannot go on sinning.
We also read that they love their brothers, those who are born again.
If those things are missing in a person's life,
if people are living in sin,
if people don't have the love to be with other believers...
Why? Why is it missing?
Could it be because they are not truly born again?
You know we can know a tree by its fruit.
And if this is not there,
if the longing to live a holy life, if the desire to love their brothers
and being with other people is missing in a person's life,
you cannot disciple a person like that into maturity. Why?
Because they are not born again yet.
And therefore, when we talk about how to grow children up,
what we need to always start with is the gospel.
We need to always go back to the gospel and keep it simple.
Preach the gospel, even to those who come to churches,
even to those who come into your fellowships.
Because if you have a person and you see something is missing,
what is missing is just revealing a deeper problem.
And what is that?
That is the root.
You know we can know a tree by its fruit.
If a tree, for example, produces oranges,
and you want the tree to produce apples instead,
the solution is not to take down all the oranges
and tell the tree: You have to stop producing oranges!
You need to start producing apples! What is wrong with you, tree?
No, the tree just produces what it is.
Orange tree produces oranges.
Apple tree produces apples.
A tree produces what it is.
The same is with a person.
If you have a person who is living in sin,
if you have a person who is not longing for the fellowship,
then I want to encourage you...
before you go deep, deep, deep in and try to disciple them,
and draw them out, and: Come on, you need to stop sinning.
Come on, you need to come to the fellowship.
Come on, you need to...
because you'll get exhausted in that,
than rather take the time to sit down with them and share the gospel.
Because when people truly get that life... Hallelujah!
They don't need anyone around them to:
Come on! You have to live holy! Come on! You have to have the fellowship!
And I remember that.
I was 19 years old when I gave my life to God.
I was the first one in my family who gave his life to God.
I had no, like families, and many friends.
I had one friend who was a Christian. I had no one else.
Right away, without even really being in church ever,
when I got born again, the first thing happened...
What was that?
It was what we read.
One of the first things that happened was I could not go on sinning.
I could not. Like, when I did things I was used to do,
that were sin, I just felt it inside of me.
The seed of God was inside of me.
I could not go on sinning.
And I know for my sake, I did not need a lifted finger and say:
Hey, you are not allowed to do this. You have to do this. You have to do this.
No. I did not need it. Why? Because the seed was inside of me.
God was there.
As we read before.
Another thing was: I was longing for fellowship with my new families.
I was longing for fellowship.
A guy like me, who was born again, when I was longing for fellowship,
I needed more than just one day a week...
to go in and just meet, Sunday was not enough.
I needed more.
And I wanted to live holy, but in the beginning I fell
and I did wrong things, and I felt condemned,
and there I also needed somebody around me,
more than one day a week.
And in my life God gave me somebody.
He gave me my father-in-law
who became my spiritual father, who was there for me.
And my father-in-law helped me to grow up.
He never sat down with me and said:
Torben, now we will have a teaching. This week we are talking about this,
next week we are talking about this, third week we are talking about this...
No, my teaching, the teaching he gave me, milk he gave me,
was on the couch, with him, sitting beside me.
I was sitting there with my Bible, and I was hungry.
And I asked a lot of questions: What about this? What about this?
And when I was fighting he was always there.
When I was doubting and asking questions - he was there.
This is what a newborn believer needs.
They don't need to just come to a meeting.
They need family.
They need 24/7...
somebody who is there, who is ready to share life with them.
And this is how we really see children grow up and become strong.
In 1 Corinthians 4:14-16 Paul is saying this:
"I am writing this not to shame you but to warn you as my dear children.
Even if you had ten thousand guardians in Christ,
you do not have many fathers,
for in Jesus Christ I became your father through the gospel.
Therefore I urge you to imitate me."
There was many guardians, or many leaders, let's say like that, in the church today.
But there are not many fathers.
Paul was really a father for some of those people,
and I encourage you out there, when it comes to how to grow people up in Christ,
when a person is a newborn and experience Christ,
they need more than to just be invited to a meeting.
They long for fellowship. They want to live holy.
They need somebody who can just be there for them,
somebody who can share life with them,
somebody who can love them.
They need more then just to be invited to a church.
They need to be invited to a cup of coffee, or for a dinner.
And this is what I encourage you to do.
When you start to work with people...
and you start to see people come to Christ,
open up your home.
Invite them for a dinner.
Sit down with them in the sofa. Talk about life.
And there answer some of those questions people often don't get answered in the church.
I know when I was a newborn believer and sat in my father-in-law's to be house,
he did not put up a teaching, as I said,
but he answered those questions I had in that moment.
Hey, I'm fighting with this. What about this?
What about this?
And he gave me so much more, to have somebody
to answer those questions I had in that moment,
than going to hear a sermon 45 minutes,
with something that was not working in my life.
But I want to say, it is not always easy to find those right people,
people who are mature, who want to help people.
It is not easy outside the church or inside the church.
I remember some years ago, I was in a city and I led some people to Christ.
There was no church in that city, but there was a small group
of Christians gathering. There were six Christians gathering.
And I tried to take some of those new believers into that group,
but it was not easy, because in that small group there was six people,
and when I looked at them, there were two who were amazing,
who loved Jesus, amazing, on fire, it just came out of them always.
Another two were more neutral, and like: who are they?
They are good and not bad, but they love Jesus, so it's fine.
But then there were two that were worse poison ever.
Two very religious people who just take out every life out of a new believer.
It was very difficult for me, because how do I bring people to that small group,
and I wanted them to connect with those two,
or maybe those two, but not with those two.
And it's not easy.
Since I had those experiences, I stopped just...
taking people to church,
because I did never know who they will meet in church.
So, instead of just saying: come to church
and let them connect with everyone,
because one of the first one I really led to church,
she connected with wrong people in church,
people who were living lukewarm,
and they ended up going to city, and that girl fell away again,
because they were out drinking.
We see so many things today.
It's better, instead of just leading people to church,
to just lead them to one or two people who are on fire.
And I hope that is you, that you are on fire.
That you will take the time to meet with people.
Or, if you cannot, than find somebody else who live the life, who's on fire,
and try to introduce those new believers to them.
Somebody who can help, somebody who can take care of them,
somebody who can help them grow up.
And I believe this is how it should be for all of us.
I know it's not always easy, because who to connect with,
but I've also seen it again and again that God is in control.
So, if you don't have anyone,
then start to pray that God will send the right one to those people.
And this is what He did with me. When I look at my own life,
I did not have anyone who could help me, who could take care of me,
but then God gave me my father-in-law.
It was not just accident. It was God who ordained it.
It was God who took care of it.
I remember one night we were in a meeting, a prophetic meeting.
A prophet called him up and said: you have one son.
He said: No, I have three daughters. You have a son.
No, I have three daughters. You have a son.
He's like a son for you and your job is to be there for your son.
And he knew who he was talking about.
Me.
So, God has called my father-in-law to be there for me.
My father-in-law is not a big minister.
He's not somebody who's speaking in churches and who's all over.
This is not also what you need and what other people out there need.
We do not need a big minister who doesn't have time to take care of people.
We need people who have time.
We need people who can just give what God has given them.
And I share much more about that in my book "The Call of Jesus",
where I talk about how we can be there for other people.
And if we don't have anyone ourselves, what we can do,
and how we can pray and ask God to lead us to somebody.
So I want to say this: when we start to work with discipleship,
the best discipleship is to become family and friends with people,
to walk with people, to share life with people.
To be there especially for those new people who come to faith.
The best teaching how do you get people to grow up
is just to sit down with them in a sofa, over the coffee table,
listen to their life, listen to their story,
listen to what they are fighting with right now,
what are they struggling with,
what questions do they have,
what did they read in the Bible during the week, they don't understand,
and then be for them and answer their questions.
And then pray for them. And then help them.
This is how we get people to grow up.
Not to just invite them to a meeting and give them 45 minutes of teaching.
No. Invite them to your home. Go to their home.
Be there for them.
And I encourage you, if you start to do that,
if everyone start to do that, when we reach people,
and we take the time, and again, we don't need a big minister.
You don't have to be a pastor who's doing all of it.
It's something you and me can do, each of us.
We can help people. We can take care of them.
So this is how it is.
Be there. Love people. Invest in them. Spend time with them.
And this is how we get people to grow up.
And then you will see fruit in their life.
Next time I'm going to do a video here called "Dear Pastors and Leaders",
because next time I want to talk to all of you who are pastors and leaders out there.
I'm not against the church.
But I want to challenge you.
I want to challenge you to really take the call of Jesus
and give it to the people in the church,
and see a movement from God, there where you are.
So, I look forward to see you next time.
Bye-bye!
The Call of Jesus