Speaker: David Platt
Text: Revelation 5
Title: Divine Sovereignty: The Fuel of Death-Defying Missions
Find the sermon online here.
For those of you who have been following these posts, this is my final one. The more beady eyed among you will know that there were 9 main sessions at T4G but I only took notes for 7. Unfortunately, I was not there for John Piper’s gig, and for some reason the notes from Al Mohler’s talk seem somewhat sparse (he was either really good or really bad – I can’t remember!).
David started off his talk with 3 fundamental presuppositions. They were:
- Local ministry & mission are necessary.
- Global mission is often neglected.
- Pastors have the chief responsibility to lead the way in global mission.
He then brought us four theological truths:
- Our sovereign God holds the destiny of the world in the palm of His hand (v1). Man is responsible IN human history but God is responsible OVER human history. God allows us to be part of his sovereign plan, not because He needs us but because he loves us.
- The state of man before God, apart from Christ, is utterly hopeless. John weeps over this truth in the book of Revelation. There is a real, eternal wrath waiting sinners and John knows and feels this deeply. We have over 2BN people on our planet whose knowledge of God is only sufficient to send them to hell!
- The great news is that the slaughtered lamb of God reigns as the sovereign Lord of all (v5). (This was too powerful to take notes at this point!)
- The atonement of Christ is graciously, gloriously and globally particular (Vv9-10). He has ransomed those he has chosen before the foundation of the world! He has done this from every tribe, nation, clan and housing scheme (that last one was my addition). Our salvation is a particular, purposeful action of His will – He planned it! (This is why we need to go to housing schemes – God has a people there and we must go, proclaim the gospel and make disciples)
Do we believe that our king deserves glory from every single people group?
4 Practical Implications
- We must lead our churches to confidently pray for the spread of the gospel to all nations (Rev. 8v3). God has sovereignly ordained the prayers of His people to bring about His kingdom.
- We must lead our churches to give sacrificially.
- We must lead our churches to go intentionally. Are you going as pastors? Are you involved in short-term and long-term missions?
- Lead your churches to die willingly. Reaching the unchurched is dangerous and they will oppose you!
This was a supremely challenging message and caused me to reflect on our own church situation here at Niddrie. It is easy to excuse a lack of international missionary interest because we are a new church plant. However, upon reflection the elders and I will be discussing our ‘giving’ toward the establishment and/or development of international church plants, particularly focusing in on Brasil. Please pray for us in this.