Our Vision - What and Why

Text: Proverbs 29:18 // Exodus 3



Intro:

How many of you would say that vision is kinda important? I mean, let's try a test. I need two people to come up here. One you stand here and the other stand over there about 10 feet from us. Now here's a frisbee. I want you both to toss it back and forth. Try it out... pretty easy right? Now let's take away the vision part and see what happens. Kinda poor results that time around but at least no one died or got hit...

Our vision is pretty important to get through life. Now, it's not absolutely critical and there are lots of people even here in Fayetteville that excel at life despite poor or non-existent eye sight. I mean, I'm really blind without my glasses but can fumble my way to the bathroom at 2 AM without them and only hit the dog once or twice. But it's a heck of a lot easier when I can see clearly where I'm going.

Proverbs 29:18 tells us that vision is crucial when it comes to the Church. "If people can't see what God is doing, they stumble all over themselves." Think about that - when we have no clue what God has set before us to do, we just stumble all over ourselves. Solomon kinda nailed that one on the head didn't he? When we get our lifes completely wrapped up in ourselves, we forget that God is the centerstage of this thing called life. And that He did call us and give us a mission, a dream, a vision to accomplish while we can.

Remember last time how we look at the vision of the Church - to go and make disciples, to train Christ followers? This time we're going to take a look at the community we have here at eXodus and the vision God's called us to. But first, lets look at a guy in a situation similiar to us.




Part I:

At the end of Exodus chapter 2, we find the king of Egypt dead and the Israelites, God's people, cying our for relief from their slavery. The Word tells us they were groaning under their chains. And God heard their cries, saw what was going on with Israel, and it says simply "God understood." Now on a side note, isn't that awesome how God not only saw but understood what was going on with Israel? That God sees the current state of Fayetteville, of America, of the world, and understands something must change?

So from God's point of view, you're people are in chains in Egypt yet you have a redemption plan, a deliverance mission, and you're looking for a spokesman to take your agenda to the most powerful man in the most powerful empire on Earth; who do you choose? And how do you train them? And then He notices this stuttering shepherd with little to no self-esteem on the downslope of life who for years had been on the run from the one man you need him to talk to. That's right... you guessed it... God chose Moses. And that bush starts shooting up flames.

Now that He had Mose's undivided attention, God laid out His vision, His plan. "I have indeed seen the misery of My people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers and I am concerned about their suffering. So I have come down to rescue them and bring them into a good and spacious land. The cry of the Israelites has reached Me and I have seen the way the Egyptions are oppressing them." Notice all the first-person pronouns... the I thing? God's mind was set. His plan was in motion. Failure was not an option. God had sized up Pharaoh and decided to use him as a pawn in His story. The redemption mission would go on as planned. Mark it down - it was going to happen.

And then, without taking a breath, God added, "So now Go, I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people out of bondage." Wow.. so all of a sudden, the first-person God is going to do something amazing through someone else, someone small, someone as in Moses. The I and Me evaporate and become marching orders for Moses: "Now you go." As if God was saying, "I am going to do this with or without you Moses but I've been searching for just the right partner, a regular guy who will believe that I am able to do exactly what I have said I will do. You just need to get on board with My plan and watch Me go. Don't deviate from the course; trust Me, follow Me, without fear of any man. This is going to be amazing! Oh, I could do it all by Myself but I'm choosing to use a human vessel. And I'm choosing you Moses so GO!"




Part II:

Just like God chose Moses, a regular guy, who turned out to be just the right partner for this mission, God chose us here at eXodus to do something amazing. The things we're going to finish talking about are huge things but that's because we believe that God is a huge God with huge plans for us. He's going to do it with or without us but for me, for every leader here, we are excited that He wants to use us, mere flesh and blood, to bring these things into reality. You know how things turned out for Israel and Egypt - simply put, God + anybody else = an overwhelmingly powerful team.

So let's talk about the vision here for eXodus. Remember, just like it took time for Israel to reach the promised land, especially after having to spend 40 years in the desert, these things will take time, dedication, and God to bring these dreams into reality.

Our Core Vision for Exodus is to see God transform us into a community of followers of Jesus Christ, committed to live by faith, to be known by love, and to be a voice of hope. See 1 Corinthians 13:13. So let's break that one down a little bit.

First, we want to see God transform us into a community of followers of Jesus Christ. One where we act as a community, relying on each other, supporting each other, helping each other. Life isn't something we can get through alone - there are no individuals as a solitary island. Second, we are committed to live by faith. No matter what we go through, no matter how fortified the city or large the opposing forces, we live by faith that God will enable us to go where He's told us to go. Third, to be known by love. To actually show the love of God through our actions each and every day from serving in soup kitchens to shipping water to hurricane victims. And last, to be a voice of hope. Fayetteville desparately needs a voice of hope, that single solitary cry that it can and will get better. We need to be that voice of hope.

This is the Core Vision of Exodus - the one that serves as a foundation and guideline for our direction. The rest of our vision falls under that core.

We envision a place where faith, love, and hope take priority in our lives.

We envision a place where the hurting, the lonely, the confused, and the depressed can find love, hope, forgiveness, guidance, and encouragement.

We envision spreading God's Saving Message throughout the Middle Tennessee area.

We envision training and developing Christ Followers for frontline Kingdom work.

We envision sending out leaders into the domestic and foreign mission fields.

We envision focusing on the individual with the belief that one changed life can impact another and ripple outwards.

We envision building a training center with facilities including a worship center, a counseling and prayer center, classrooms for training, housing for those that need it, and a resource center.

We envision starting "mini-gatherings" in local communities that will serve as life groups.

We envision creating "change agents" throughout the community that possesses wisdom, understanding, and training to have the maximum impact in the community and the Church.

Closing:

I know these things seem like a lot. Even overwhelming at times. But imagine how Moses felt standing before that bush, feeling the spirit of God on that mountain side, seeing the flames leap higher and higher without consuming the bush itself, all the while knowing that God had just chosen him to face the one man he'd been running from for large portion of his life. Knowing that he was to be the Creator's spokesman even though he stuttered to now end. He must have felt overwhelmed by this mission, this vision that God had just laid out for him.

We all know what it's like out there beyond these four walls. That's why God has chosen us to be His spokesman (and spokeswomen). That's why we're chosen to be agents of change throughout our lives. That's why we've been brought together as a community of Christ followers, one that is committed to live by faith, to be known by love, and to be that voice of hope in the wilderness. This is the mission, the vision, for us here at eXodus.

The Need for Vision

Intro:

Last time, we look at Jesus at the Garden in Gethsemane, one of His most intimate moments with God. And we saw how Jesus remained steadfast in His determination to finish the mission God had laid out for Him. His Father had set before Him a specific mission, a purpose, that directed every action and moment of His life.

After His resurrection, Jesus gave the Church a simple mission, found in Matthew 28:18-20. It's widely known as the Great Commission and it gives a purpose and direction for the Church as a whole. It gives them an identity. READ MATTHEW 28:18-20.

Pretty simple, right? The Church is to go and make disciples, baptize them, i.e. bring them into the Church, and train them as Christ Followers. But let's look at what Paul encounters as he is pursuing this direction, this mission, this vision from God.



Part I.

Let's take a look at Acts 16 starting in verse 6 and running through verse 10. READ ACTS 16:6-10. Paul and Silas started out with a great idea. They knew the Commission that Jesus had given the Church and so they decided to take the Message to Asia. It seemed like a great plan that lined up with the vision and purpose of the church. Right idea, wrong place.

See, as they traveled over land towards Asia, the Holy Spirit told them not to go there at this time. So Paul turns towards Bithynia, but again, the Spirit of Jesus stopped them from going. Imagine Paul, traveling along, simply wanting to spread the Message, and finding that every idea he got turned out to be the wrong one. I imagine him telling Timothy, "I thought we were supposed to go to Asia but lets go to Bithynia!" And they get close and Paul says, "Wait Timothy, it's not Bithynia either. On to Troas!" And they end up in Troas, that place where we go when we have no idea where else to go.

Alot of us are in that spot right now. We thought God said go this way only to have ourselves stopped. So we go that way only to have ourselves stopped again. So we resign ourselves to going to Troas to wait and see what's going on. And where we're supposed to be heading next. We all have our Troas, this place we go when we have no where else to go. And that's where it gets interesting...



Part II.

READ ACTS 16:9. Paul is in Troas, no clue as to where to head next. And what happens? He has a vision. A dream. No we all have dreams. Imagine waking up in the middle of the night after having a dream. And you run to your parents or your spouse and tell them, "Look, I just had a dream that laid out my vision, my mission, my identity. I'm supposed to go out west, buy a farm, and become a potato farmer!" At that point, whoever you just told would probably look at you and say, "That's great. Now go back to bed and have a different dream..."

This idea of God giving Paul a vision, a dream that explains his next steps goes against every grain and fiber in our body. We want plans, outlines, step-by-step programs that lay out the next year, two years, or five years. Paul tried that. He laid out the plan for his second journey that was supposed to head to Asia. But that turned out to be the wrong plan. And he ended up in Troas for it. Waiting and watching for God.

So Paul goes to bed and God gives him this vision, this dream, of a Macedonian man saying, "Come here and help us!" And the passage wraps up with Paul telling his ministry partners of this dream and they "concluded" and "decided" to go to Macedonia at once. Now that word "decided" translates in a way that means they reasoned, they intellectually concluded. So they rationally concluded this was the plan from a very irrational starting place - the dream. How ironic is that?!



Closing

Too many of us not only here at eXodus but in the Church at large seem to be stuck in Troas with no sense of where to go from here. We keep plugging away trying to do good things but we don't know if this is what God has placed in our souls as our vision.

Like Paul, we keep taking the Message to new places that need it but it seems like God steps in and turns us in a different direction at the last moment before we reach our destination. So for the next few weeks, we're going to be look at vision, purpose, direction, identity. We saw at the beginning how the Church has one mission - go and make disciples, Christ Followers. But we fit into this bigger puzzle differently with unique purposes. Like a mosaic, we all fit in differently to the bigger image.

You have a specific vision, dream, and purpose in this life. Let's find it.