This is the third post in our ongoing Church Near Me series. We are asking what does it look like to be the church in Manchester? What will people find when they search “church near me”? What will they see?
In this instalment, we look a bit more into our words. 2 Corinthians 4 teaches us that the church is a people who have Jesus in their life. Their whole life. That means He will be present in the words we use. Jesus allows us to speak words of life into a world of death.
We speak because we believe
Paul, in verse 13, tells us that if we believe we speak. And by “speak” he means to talk about Jesus. The One who died for us, the One through whom His resurrection gives us new life. This is a present and active reality for all of those who believe.
Throughout any given day we use so many words, how many of them are orientated around Jesus? What do you speak about? When we are passionate about something, we talk about it. If our heart lights up, our mouths move in response. If we believe that the story of Jesus is the most important thing in the universe, how will we pass that important news along? It is impossible without words. So because we believe, we speak.
Some say talk is cheap. Belief without talk is even cheaper.
We speak because of the resurrection
Paul gives us another reason why we speak: because of Jesus’ resurrection. The hope of Jesus’ resurrection becomes a reason we speak, that’s what the “because” is there for in verse 14. How is this a reason?
If Jesus has been raised from the dead, that changes everything. How we live, how we make decisions, the relationships we have, how we spend money, how we spend free time, and yes, how we speak. If Jesus has been raised from the dead, that changes how we speak.
This is where the resurrection ceases to become just a good idea or a theological theory and breaks into our real, present life. Two truths we can glean from this verse:
Because of the resurrection, Jesus is present now
You don’t have to be Jesus, you get to bring Him with you through the Holy Spirit. That means when you speak, it’s not all on you. You aren’t saving anyone. Don’t try and take that role from Jesus. You are inviting Jesus into the conversation.You bring with you, wherever you go, all the power of the resurrection. You, if you have faith, have been turned from death into life. That by itself is powerful! And that same power works through you through the resurrected Jesus. Jesus is present with us.
You don’t need to be Jesus, but let’s also not block him in our conversations. If we don’t use our words and bring Jesus into the conversation we’re effectively putting him on mute. He’s there. Because of the resurrection, Jesus is present now.
Because of the resurrection, we will be presented
For Christians, we have a hope in a a resurrection into a new world. God will raise us, and we will be presented before Him.
At the end of our lives, we will all be presented to God. How are we preparing for that? Speaking is one way. God cares about other people knowing Him and He’s chosen you (yes, you!) to do it. Let’s not try and prevent or slow down the advance of God’s love in this world. Let’s not live with regret at the end of our lives as we are in front of God Himself. He has chosen you to uniquely present His love to the others.Jesus is present with us, and we will be presented to Him. If we believe in the resurrection, this becomes a reason we speak.
The resurrected Jesus, present with us, allows us to speak in ways beyond our own ability. We will also find ourselves in situations where we won’t have the right words, where we’re in over our head, where we feel inadequate to speak words of love and grace to others who don’t yet believe. This is good news for us inadequate humans: the present, resurrected Jesus allows us to speak words of life into a world of death.
We speak to join God's mission
Verse 15 tells us that all of this is for our benefit. Whereas we might often first think of the people we’re speaking to as benefitting from this, Paul tells us this is first for us.
When we speak these words of life in this world of death, we join God’s mission in this world. That means not participating is to miss out. And, really, what I’ve seen in my life is that not participating in God’s mission through our words makes for immature Christians. We get stuck. We’re like spoiled rich kids who hoard riches to themselves.
Mission isn’t a separate part of being a Christian. It’s not like an option, or the second level Christian. It’s basic and fundamental. Mission is a fundamental and necessary aspect of your discipleship.
But let’s define something here: what is mission? As a church in Chorlton, Redeemer talks about mission a lot. Mission is speaking Jesus’ words and inviting others into Jesus’ family. Words + actions (we talked about this in this first message of the Church Near Me series). Mission is not making people surrender to Jesus’ words and it’s not making people embrace Jesus’ family, that’s God’s work. Mission isn’t selling Christianity to someone. Mission also isn’t just being nice.
Our work, our ministry, our mission is speaking Jesus’ words and inviting others into His family.
When we speak we join God’s mission in making everything sad become untrue. We get to speak words of life. Don’t tell me you love someone if you have this and never talk to them about it, firstly: all of this is for your benefit. It’s for your benefit because it will make you lean on Jesus to give you a heart that will desire that others know Him. It will make you pray more often for real opportunities to speak. It will make you search the Bible more when situations or questions come up. It will make you rely more on the Holy Spirit in the moment to enable you to do what He wants. Joining God in His mission is first for our benefit.
But this is what we get to do: we get to play a role in people coming to life. In God recreating people to become humans fully alive. To see how that changes families, friendships, work. Everyday it’s God’s version of bring your kid to work day, and we get to be a part of making this world new.
Making all things new
In Revelation 21, the end of the Bible, there is this vision, there the curtains of this world are pulled back and we get to see the reality underneath. And part of that vision is Jesus Himself, sat on a throne, telling John, his disciple: “Look! I am making all things new!”
How do you think He’s doing that? Jesus chooses to make all things new through you! We’ve received grace, we get to give it! And in doing so, more and more people get to receive grace and more and more glory goes to God. This is what we get to do when we speak. We join His mission.