Plant Churches
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
Good morning. My name is Spencer and I am one of the pastors here. We are in a four-week series called All Nations. In week one, Chet introduced us to the Great Commission again that we center our hope on as Christians, that we are called to go and make disciples of all nations. And one of the things that we're emphasizing in this series is that fulfilling the Great Commission means making disciples of all nations. The Greek word for nations there is ethnos, which is where we get the word ethnicity.
This is all people groups everywhere. And in week one, he introduced this map from the Joshua Project that emphasizes where the greatest amount of lostness is amongst people groups in the world. That red area in the center is typically referred to as the 1040 window. This is the latitude, longitude window on that map that has Christians that not only don't, or has unbelievers that not only don't know Christ, some of them don't have a Bible in their language. Some of them don't have a Christian that speaks their language for hundreds of miles. There aren't churches in these areas.
And if we're called to go and make disciples of all nations, that involves going to those places, the hardest to reach places in the world to deliver the gospel. So Chet introduced that week one, week two. He walked us through a little bit of one of the two kind of big questions that come out of that as we biblically approach this. I would encourage you to go back and listen to that if you missed last week. Today, we're going to take a look at the first missionary journey that went to actually tackle unreached people groups. That went to specifically make disciples and plant churches amongst places that had none.
The first big step in fulfilling the Great Commission, and that is found in Acts 13 and 14 in Paul's and Barnabas, their first missionary journey. So, that means it's Acts 13 and 14. We have two chapters of material that we're working through today. So, typically, we say you can grab a Bible, but we also have the Bible on the screen that you can follow along with us. That is not the case today. We're actually going to have a map on the screen of the missionary journey so that you can follow along.
That will help kind of us see where all this is happening, which means you really do need to grab a Bible. If you don't have a Bible, there are Bibles around you, and the blue Bibles, it's on page 537. But we'd encourage you to have a Bible. You can also pull it up on your phone. Just don't check your email. Don't go to Facebook.
Don't do the things that... It's a lot of material anyways to get through all at once. You don't need anything to distract you beyond that. So, we've got two chapters to work through, and there are three main encouragements that come out of these two chapters that I want us to see. The first is the mission of God begins with prayer. Second, the mission of God invites suffering.
And third, the mission of God plants churches. Okay? We're going to see that in order as we walk through the text. So, let me pray, and then we'll jump in. God, I pray that you would open our hearts to this bold call, this beautiful opportunity to make disciples in places that have none. God, I pray you'd help us see that today in the Scriptures, and that we respond in faith and repentance and worship and obedience.
We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Okay. Verse 1, chapter 13. Now, there were in the church at Antioch.
Okay. So, this is an overview of the first missionary journey that Paul and Barnabas went on. Each of these missionary journeys start in the city of Antioch, which is in modern-day Syria, also known as ancient-day Syria. It has not changed its name for 2,000-plus years. So, they're in the city of Antioch. In the previous chapters in Acts, you see God is doing a great work.
They're in that city. And then, it says, they were at the church at Antioch, which, by the way, the next slide, just to help us a little bit. It's going to be hard to see, I know. The gold star. That's going to be Paul and Barnabas trucking along the way. So, you see the gold star.
Follow the gold star. You know where we're at. Okay. So, now, there were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon, who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manion, a lifelong friend of Herod the Tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, set apart for me Barnabas and Saul. Okay.
So, the book of Acts is going to shift from calling him Saul, which is his more Jewish name, to Paul, his more Gentile, Greco-Roman name. But this is Saul, Paul, the apostle Paul. Set apart them for the work to which I have called them. Then, after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them off. So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia and from there sailed to Cyprus. Okay.
The first thing I want us to see is that the mission of God begins with prayer. The mission of God begins with prayer. The early church believed this. They believed this. They lived this out. In verse 2, it says, while they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, that doesn't seem to be something that they did especially for this.
This wasn't like a prayer meeting that they came together for, which those are good. But that doesn't seem to be what's happening. This seems to be a regular rhythm of what the church did at the time. They were praying and they were fasting and they were worshiping. In the midst of that, God speaks to them in a powerful way and says, set apart for me, Paul and Barnabas, for the work to which I have called them. And this is to make disciples amongst unreached people groups.
To go to the Gentiles. To go to those who don't have the gospel. To go into the darkest places of the world. Brothers and sisters, if we want to reach Casey, which we do. If we want to reach Columbia, which we do. If we want to obey the Great Commission and make disciples of all nations to go into the darkest, most remote parts of the world that desperately need Christ.
It begins with this rhythm of normative, dependent prayer. That we do over and over and over again. But we overcomplicate this sometimes. We will, listen, we will strategize the heck out of anything. Like that's something that we as Western American Christians will do. We will find a strategy or a program or, you know, a series, right?
To tackle this. But it begins with normative, dependent prayer. John Piper says, a prayerless Christian is like a bus driver. A bus driver who's in a ditch trying to get out of it. But he fails to see that he has Clark Kent on board.
And he's pushing the bus to get it out. But he fails to see that Clark Kent Superman is on board. That's us as prayerless Christians. We fail to see that if we want to be obedient to this calling, we have the Holy Spirit at work in us. We have the God, the universe behind us. And it begins with normative, normal, dependent, regular prayer.
Praying for the nations. Praying that God would do a work in the city. Praying over and over and over again. And in the midst of this type of prayer in this church in Antioch, the Holy Spirit says, Set apart for me Paul and Barnabas to be sent out. So they lay hands on them.
The Holy Spirit sends them through his people out. And they're off. And they travel down to, say, Lucia, port city. And then they're off to Cyprus. Verse 5. When they arrived at Salamis, which is the port city, they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews.
Now, you can notice that's a normative pattern that happens in the book of Acts. They go to the Jewish synagogues first, proclaim Christ, and then it expands out from there. And they had John to assist them. This is John Mark, the writer of the Gospel of Mark. He's along with them for this part of the journey. Verse 6.
When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos. So, all across the island, sharing the Gospel, they get to the other side of it at Paphos. They came upon a certain magician. Verse 6. A Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus. Now, Bar is Aramaic for son of.
Son of Jesus. This is not our Jesus. Jesus was a common name at the time. So his father was named Jesus. We're going to learn in a moment. His name is Elimus, the magician.
This is Elimus, son of Jesus. So, he was with the proconsul, Sergius Paulus. He was to be the Roman leader of that area. A man of intelligence who summoned Barnabas and Saul and sought to hear the word of God. So he hears about the Gospel.
He wants to hear about this. But there's this Elimus, the magician, who's in his ear. Think less Harry Potter, more Jafar in Aladdin. Kind of working behind the scenes, whispering evil into the ruler. Verse 8. But Elimus, or Elimus, sorry.
The magician, that is the meaning of his name. Opposed them, seeking to turn the proconsul away from the faith. So, this is the classic evil magician in your ear. This is Lord Voldemort in the ear of King Theodon using the force to keep Thanos on the iron throne type of magical story. Not really. That's just a troll.
A lot of the nerds that we have here. Quite literally, this is what's happening. This is satanic forces of evil at work to oppose the Gospel. So, when tapping into those forces to oppose the work of Christ with false teaching. And Paul, don't play. Like, he's not having that.
He aggressively combats that in verse 9. But Saul, who was also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, looked intently at him and said, You son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, full of all deceit and villainy. Will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord? Will you not stop getting in the way of the Gospel going forward? And now, behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you, and you will be blind and unable to see the sun for a time. So, he strikes them blind, which I wish was a spiritual gift that still existed.
Then I could just, like, turn on TBN or get on a YouTube channel and just strike false prophets blind. Because, you know, good hobby. But, because they're the worst. Okay. Immediately, mist and darkness fell upon him. So, they strike him blind.
He went about seeking people to lead him by the hand. Then the proconsul believed when he saw what had occurred, for he was astonished at the teaching of the Lord. So, this sways the proconsul. It's the miraculous work that they just did combined with the Gospel, the teaching of Christ. He believes. It's almost as if, if you remove a false teacher from somebody's ear, they can clearly hear the Gospel and respond in faith and repentance.
That's what happens. So, this happens, and then they're off. They leave Cyprus. Verse 13. Now, Paul and his companions set sail from Paphos and came to Perga in Pamphylia. Okay.
So, now they're in Perga. That is modern-day Turkey. That's where the majority of the rest of this mission is going to be. It's in modern-day Turkey. So, this is the pattern of Paul. They were in Cyprus.
They made disciples, establishing the church, and they're out. That's part of what he does, is what Chet introduced us to in week one. They make converts. They plant churches. They're on to the next unreached area. And then it quickly says, and John left them and returned to Jerusalem.
So, John Mark leaves them. We found out a couple chapters later that this was not a good leaving, because when they go, gear up to go on a second missionary journey, John Mark wants to join them. Barnabas says yes. Paul says no. They actually have a sharp disagreement and divide, and don't do mission work together again. We know from the rest of the scriptures that reconciliation happens, that Paul, in his final letters, is writing, asking John Mark to come and see him.
But this is a painful experience, nevertheless. Now it's just Paul and Barnabas as they continue. And now they're going to go to Antioch in Pisidia. This is a different Antioch. Same name, different city. Now this group of cities up here is in a region called Galatia, which should sound familiar if you know the New Testament.
That is the letter that was written to the Galatians. So the letter to the Galatians, the book of Galatians, was circulated amongst these next four cities that we're going to see. Verse 14. But they went on from Perga and came to Antioch in Pisidia. And on the Sabbath day they went into the synagogue and sat down. After the reading from the law and the prophets, which that's a normal thing that happens in synagogues, have a reading from the law, have a reading from the prophets, the rulers of the synagogue, were in verse 15, sent a message to them saying, Brothers, if you have any word of encouragement for the people, say it.
Which I'm sure Paul was delighted to be asked. I know as a Christian when someone says, Hey, tell me about what you believe. Tell me about what it means to be a Christian. Like my little heart just flutters. Because I'm like, yes, this is my moment. I will.
You've teed it up. I grabbed the driver. I'm going for this. And that's exactly what Paul does. He launches into a sermon. So verse 16.
So Paul stood up and motioning with his hands said, Now, for the sake of time, we're not going to go through what he said. It's a great sermon. Traces from the Old Testament. Christ from the Old Testament all the way to the New Testament. Where you have the death and resurrection. And he preaches the gospel.
And then people start to place their faith in Jesus. Skip down to verse 42. Verse 42. As they went out, the people begged that these things might be told them the next Sabbath. And after the meeting of the synagogue broke up, many Jews and devout converts to Judaism followed Paul and Barnabas. Who, as they spoke with them, urged them to continue in the grace of God.
How good is that? They preach this gospel and people start placing their faith in Christ. So much so that they begged them to come back next week. We want to hear more of this. And when you talk to people who do mission work in areas where God is going to do work in. This is a little bit of what Chet was getting at last week.
That when God has elected believers. When there are believers that are there to be, the harvest is plentiful. And they're called to go in there and see this happen. When this happens, the response is profound. That they are so hungry. They've been so deprived of the gospel, of the word of God.
They hear it and they believe. Verse 44. The next Sabbath, almost the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord. The whole city is beating down the door to hear more of this. But, verse 45. When the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy.
And began to contradict what was spoken by Paul. Reviling him. This is going to be a common theme that continues throughout the rest of the book of Acts. That Paul over and over again, a Pharisee, a teacher of the law formerly. Is going to be heavily persecuted and reviled by the Jewish people. They do not believe.
Over and over and over again. 46. And Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly saying, It was necessary that the word of God be spoken first to you. Since you thrust it aside and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life. Behold, we are turning to the Gentiles. So because you've rejected it, it's now going to the Gentiles.
For, so the Lord has commanded us saying, I have made you a light for the Gentiles. That you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth. Paul says, because you have rejected it. Just as the Jewish people have done for hundreds of years at that time. They rejected living in the covenant of God. They were supposed to be a kingdom of priests.
A royal priesthood. They were supposed to be a light to the nations. Where the Jewish people fell, Jesus steps in and succeeds. And now becomes a light to the nations with his people. Not just Jews, but non-Jews, Gentiles. God is coming for everyone.
Everyone's getting the gospel. That's the point that's being made here. Verse 48. And when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord. And as many as were appointed to eternal life, believed. How good is that?
That is what you want. As many as were appointed to eternal life, believed the gospel. They are rejoicing that they now take part in the covenant faith. They are a part of this new family of God. Verse 49. And the word of the Lord was spreading throughout the whole region.
It is spreading like wildfire throughout Galatia. So, verse 50. But the Jews incited the devout women of high standing and the leading men of the city. So in Antioch, you've got the movers and shakers. You've got the devout women of high standing. You've got the leading men of the city.
They stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas with these people. And drove them out of their district. But they, this is Paul and Barnabas, shook off the dust from their feet against them and went to Iconium. So, that's something that Jesus actually taught in the gospels. He says that they reject the message, take off your shoes, dust it out, get the sand out, and move on to the next city. That is partly judgment against those who have rejected it.
But also, quite literally, that's moving on. Like the Holy Spirit leads. You don't have to, you have to go with his leading. He doesn't call you to stay in the same place. Sometimes he calls you to go to the next place. That happens with Jesus.
That happens with his apostles. They're going to the next city, which is Iconium. So, now they've traveled. They're now in Iconium. And the disciples were filled with joy and the Holy Spirit in the midst of this. The second encouragement I want us to see from this missionary journey is that the mission of God invites suffering.
The mission of God invites suffering. Paul understood this, what Jesus taught when he said, If the world hates you, you know it has hated me before it has hated you. That what you stand for in Christ, the world stands against. The very nature of the world is opposed to the very nature of Christ. It's very clearly taught in the scriptures. So, it should come as no shock that the Jews are raging against them.
When you preach the gospel, opposition comes. And when you do it in cultures, you don't have the gospel, the opposition can be heavy. Ben Johnson, one of our church members, director of missions organization 1040 Hope. He was in Sudan a few weeks back and he was talking with a Sudanese pastor. And this pastor was in prison for three years for sharing the gospel. He was in prison for three years.
And when he got out, actually America offered him asylum. That he could come here and not get killed. And he said, no. He stayed. He stayed because in Sudan they need the gospel. And those are his people.
And he ain't leaving. And out of that, he got some street cred. And he's planted five churches since then. And the work is continuing. And Ben got to go see that firsthand. That oftentimes when persecution begins and opposition to the gospel begins, God starts to work boldly through it.
When Christians are imprisoned overseas, those are opportunities. That's what we should pray for those disciples. Not just for their safety. But so that the gospel might spread. Because often historically, God uses moments of persecution and suffering to advance the gospel. Those are the moments where we should be sending money and resources.
And everything we can to see those churches advance. That's part of what's happening here. That's part of why the disciples in this city are filled with joy. God uses temporary suffering to bring about eternal glory through belief in Christ. Over and over and over again. And if we American Christians could see suffering as a weapon.
If we could see it as a weapon that spreads the gospel more as these early Christians did. Goodness. The dent and lostness that we could make here and abroad. If we just owned that as an opportunity. So, they convert new believers. They're kicked out of the city.
They're filled with joy. They move on to Iconium to preach Christ again. Verse 1, chapter 14. New chapter. Now at Iconium, they enter together into the Jewish synagogue.
And spoke in such a way that a great number of both Jews and Greeks believe. Again, this is the pattern. They go into a city. Go to the Jewish synagogue. Preach the gospel. God starts moving from there.
But, the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brothers. The unbelieving Jews poisoned the well. Opposition. Verse 3. So, they remained for a long time. Speaking boldly for the Lord who bore witness to the word of his grace.
Granting signs and wonders to be done by their hands. So, they stay longer. They stay longer. They continue to preach Christ in this city. Verse 4. But the people of the city were divided.
Some sided with the Jews and some with the apostles. Which happens if you preach Christ. You make enemies. You make converts. That is what happens. Verse 5.
When an attempt was made by both Gentiles and Jews with their rulers to mistreat them and to stone them. They learned of it and fled to Lystra and Derbe. Cities of Lyconium and to the surrounding country. And there they continue to preach the gospel. So, when they're about to be murdered for preaching Christ. They move on.
It's not their time to die yet. That's coming. Paul will be eventually executed for preaching the gospel. It's not yet. So, they're going on to the next city. Which is Lystra.
Where they're going to preach Christ. Listen. I have been belittled for sharing Christ in the past. That people make fun of me behind my back. I'm not saying that's not fun. It's not fun.
But, compared to this. Compared. Sometimes American Christians, we get this complex. Like, oh, we're suffering. It's like, yeah, but comparatively. Like, keep things in perspective.
No one's grabbing a stone to just absolutely pummel you to death. That's not. A mob of people is not about to execute you. But that does. That happens all across the world with our brothers and sisters in Christ. All over the 1040 window.
Now, verse 8. Now, at Lystra. So, they're in this new city. There was a man sitting who could not use his feet. He was crippled from birth and had never walked. He listened to Paul speaking.
And Paul looked intently at him. And seeing that he had faith to be made well. Said in a loud voice, stand upright on your feet. And he sprang up and began walking. So, they enter Lystra with a bang. With a miraculous healing.
And it sets the city on fire. Verse 11. And when the crowd saw what Paul had done, they lifted up their voices, saying in Lyconian, The gods have come down to us in the likeness of men. Which is not the response I think they expected. It says, verse 12. Barnabas, they called Zeus and Paul Hermes because he was the chief speaker.
So, if Chet and I went to a foreign culture and we went and preached the gospel and this happened, I guarantee you there would be an inside joke. Going forward. Because Zeus is the chief Greek God. He's like the king Greek God. And Hermes is lesser than. The inside joke would be, hey, you know, I got called Zeus and he got called Hermes.
How's that? You can speak on my behalf from now on. I'm better than you. That would be our inside joke. They were more mature than us. That is not how they responded.
In verse 13 it says, And the priest of Zeus, whose temple was at the entrance to the city, brought oxen and garlands to the gates and wanted to offer sacrifices with the peoples. So they are Greek pagans. They interpret this through their Greek pagan lens and say, The gods have come down before us. And Paul and Barnabas' response was aggressive. Verse 14. When the apostle Barnabas and Paul, when the apostles heard of it, they tore their garments and rushed into the crowd.
So there was no inside joke yet. I like to think maybe later, but not yet. They tear their garments and run into the crowd. Okay? Tearing your garments was a deep sign of lament and grief. Okay?
It doesn't really convey for us anymore. Only people that tear their garments now are in the WWE. That's for different reasons. But they tear their garments. They rush into the crowd, crying out. Verse 15.
Men, why are you doing these things? We also are men of like nature with you. And we bring you good news. That you should turn from these vain things to a living God. So they preach the gospel.
Who made the heaven and earth and the sea and all that is in them. In the past generations he allowed all nations to walk in their own ways. Verse 17. Yet he did not leave himself without witness. For he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons. Satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.
So this is a little bit tied to some of the things that were said last week. We don't have time to get into this. But he's just giving them a bigger picture of God's redemption and what he's doing here. And then in verse 18 it says, Even with these things they could scarcely restrain the people from offering sacrifice to them. They could barely keep them from offering sacrifice and being treated like gods. Now, in comes the curveball in verse 19.
But Jews came from Antioch and Iconium. Now we're starting to get a picture of what happens in this region. There's a Jewish network of angry Jewish persecutors that do not like the work that is happening. They're traveling from city to city following Paul and Barnabas. Trying to stir up opposition against them. And in this city they are very successful.
And having persuaded the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city supposing that he was dead. So that's mob rule right there. Mob violence. In one moment, they're about to worship them as gods. Then all of a sudden these Jews come in and they start stirring the crowd against them.
When I went to India years ago, they said, Stay away from the large crowds because they quickly can turn on a dime. And that's what happens. They stir the crowds against them and they stone him to death. They stone him, y'all. They took heavy objects and beat him and broke his... Like this weekend I was trimming a tree limb and foolishly didn't think about how angles work in geometry.
And it came back and it swung and it hit me in the shoulder. Like I just... That's painful. My brother did the same thing when I was 15 or 14. I was on an ATV and he took a large tree limb and he broke it over me. Not a stick.
A tree limb. Which for context... Okay. Not the brother you know that's part of this church. Because he's like 15 years older than me. And that image, if you just had that, was super weird.
That was a grown man striking a child with a tree limb. Not that brother. My older brother who's a few months, 18 months older than me. That hurts. That's painful. That's one object.
They took stones and they pummeled his body until he was bleeding internally to the point of death. They drag him out of the city and leave him for dead. His body is lifeless. Verse 20. But when the disciples gathered about him, he rose up and entered the city.
And on the next day he went with Barnabas to Derbe. So presumably the disciples gather around him, pray over him. Now the text doesn't tell us if he was completely 100% dead and was raised or was at the point of death. Nevertheless, this is a miraculous event. You don't just spring up and walk into a city after your bones have been broken by stones. They were very good at stoning.
Okay? You don't just pop up and walk in. This is miraculous. He raises up. And listen, I feel like he could have just said, you know what? It's been a long day.
I'll go ahead and grab my stuff. I'm going to camp out here. We're going to Derbe anyways. I'll see you all tomorrow. No. He walks straight into the city where the people just stoned him.
What a G. That is Paul. He is just fierce. He walks right back into the city. Grabs his stuff. They're off to Derbe.
On to the next city. So, continuing to preach Christ. Verse 21. When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples. That's it. That's all we get in Derbe.
It's like Luke. It's like you get the picture, right? This is what they do. They come in. They preach the gospel. There's opposition.
Scores and hundreds of people come to Christ. Like, it's just like that's all you get. This is what happens in Derbe. We're moving on. They returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch. Strengthening the souls of the disciples.
Encouraging them to continue in the faith. And saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God. And when they had appointed elders for them in every church with prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. This is the third encouragement I want us to take away from this. The mission of God plants churches. The mission of God plants churches.
Listen, they doubled back and went through the cities that they did work in. They went through all these cities. Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, Antioch. And they ministered to these churches. If the mission of God is the great commission to make disciples of all nations. Okay?
Part one. And Paul's missionary journeys give us a template of what that looks like. Part two. It is clear that the ultimate mission of God is to plant churches amongst all peoples. Paul proclaimed Christ. He got beat around.
He made converts with Barnabas all over the region of Galatia. They preached Christ. Moved to the next city. Preached Christ. Moved to the next city. And they planted churches.
And they go back through. Let me show you this next slide. Actually, no. Don't go there yet. They plant churches in these areas. Galatians.
And one of the things that we see very clearly in the first two verses of the letter of Galatians is that these were established churches. Galatians 1 verses 1 and 2 says, Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul, Paul, an apostle, Paul, Paul, an apostle, not from men, not from men, nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead and all the brothers who are with me. Hear this. To the churches of Galatia. That is, next slide, all of these cities in the north and the churches they planted before. But the writing, the letter of Galatians is written to these established churches in these cities that they planted.
And they go back through and they start to give these churches structure. They appoint elders, which is what we're called to do. That's why we're elder led as a church. There are four elders in this church. They appointed elders in these cities, in these churches in these cities. They give structure to them.
They minister to them. But that was Paul's mission, was to plant churches where there were none. That's why in week one, when Chet mentioned Romans 15, when Paul says, but now since I no longer have any room for work in these regions, you look at that and it's like, no, that doesn't make sense. There's plenty of work to do in these regions. There's lots of lost people in these regions. But that wasn't his primary aim.
His primary aim was to fill the Great Commission, making disciples of all nations. Certainly, the rest of the New Testament bears that we're absolutely called to continue to minister to Christians. That's what we do here. Make converts, we minister. That's what Paul did. Part of establishing these elders was to minister to these churches.
But the Great Commission aim was to plant churches where there were none. That doesn't mean that we don't do the normal things that we're called to do as Christians. That doesn't mean we don't care for one another. That doesn't mean that we don't do things like combating sex trafficking, which is great work, or orphan care, or adoption, or all the good endeavors that God calls us to, the good ministries that we can take part in, that the church should be leading the way on. But I want to be very clear that fulfilling the Great Commission is not primarily that.
That is the overflow of doing it. The primary aim of the Great Commission is to plant churches amongst every people group where they don't have the gospel. And that's what Paul and Barnabas do. They retrace their steps and they continue all the way back. It says in verse 24, Then they passed through Pisidia and came to Pamphylia. When they had spoken the word in Perga, they went down to Atilia.
And from there they sailed to Antioch where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work that they had fulfilled. Verse 27, And when they had arrived and gathered the church together, they declared all that God had done with them and how he opened a door of faith to the Gentiles and they remained no little time with the disciples, which is a convoluted way of saying they stayed there a long time. So, we did it. We just walked through the entire missionary journey. Two chapters in 30-ish minutes. Okay?
They get back to Antioch and I can imagine sailing back to Antioch in Syria. They had stories. That when they finally showed up two-ish years later, the people were like, Tell us what happened. And they said, It was amazing. We planted churches. We saw thousands of people come to Christ.
I got murdered. It was amazing. This was incredible. And here's the deal. It's like the end of a superhero movie. They're celebrating.
They beat the bad guy. And then all of a sudden, the post-credits. You see, Oh, wait. This is a sequel. This keeps going. There's going to be more of these.
And that's what happens. There's a second missionary journey. They go further. There's a third missionary journey. Historically, it's debated, though I agree, there's a fourth missionary journey, just not in the scriptures. Okay?
And then the book of Acts, after the third missionary journey, it just ends. It just stops. There's no conclusion. It just stops. Luke just stops writing. And that's because the story keeps going.
It keeps going. The work continues. We are part of two church planning networks. We're part of the SEND church planning network with the North American Mission Board. That's our Southern Baptist network. We're part of Grassroots Church Planning Network.
That's a local network. It's Midtown Church. Some other churches are in that network. Smaller. We're part of those two networks. We have no plans to add anymore.
Okay? There is a network out there that has the best church planning network name, period, end of discussion. And they're called Acts 29. That is an amazing smaller church name. Okay? You know why it's 29?
Because there is no 29th chapter of the book of Acts. They're continuing the work of planting churches. That's what we're called to do. Listen. If we want to be obedient to the Great Commission, we're either Paul and Barnabas going into the frontier seeing churches planted where there are none. Or we're Antioch.
And we're sending. And we're praying on our face. And we're funding. And we're sending missionaries. And we're taking trips with them. And we're praying as they suffer that the gospel go forward.
We would need to do all of the above if we want to be obedient to the Great Commission.