Matt Chandler - Together For The Gospel

If you have your Bibles, go ahead and grab them. Ephesians chapter 5 is where we’re going to camp out. If you don’t have a Bible with you, there should be a hardback black one somewhere around you; please grab that. As always, I just want to lay before you that, really, in churches, what carries the weight is the Word of God and not the one who delivers the Word of God. Ultimately, if those two aren’t woven together well, then I would always encourage you to find another church, including if that church is this one. Our authority comes from the Word of God and the Holy Spirit moving and flowing through the Word of God, bearing weight on our lives, leading us into life and joy.

I want you to see that what I’m talking about here isn’t just something I’m guessing will work but is rooted in something altogether eternal. It’s hard to believe that the fall is gone, that this 10-week series we launched out on 10 weeks ago—in fact, 11 or 12 weeks ago now—is coming to an end. This is our last message in this series, and something switched in me yesterday. I was leaving Fort Worth after speaking at a men’s event, and as I was driving back, I was thinking about the message. I was planning to get here in time to pray with the staff, throw on my mic, and go. As I considered my outline and the different slides I’d sent in, I felt really compelled to scrap that whole thing and instead be far more pastoral than prophetic today.

What I want to do is tell you, coming out of this series where we’ve pressed so hard on what biblical masculinity is and what it means to be a man, and in this series where we defined what it means to be a woman and how we function in our roles for human flourishing, is so that the church, our culture, and our nation might be strengthened according to God’s good design. I thought that instead of going on and on about reinforcing those things, I could just simply say, «Hey, coming out of this series, here are six hopes that I have.»

The reason I was thinking about this is that the «Act Like Men» conference was awesome. I love the different things I get to do. I’ve been president of Acts 29, a church planting network for the last three years, which comprises 529 churches on six continents. We have network directors in Europe, South Africa, and Australia, among other locations. I love that I don’t get paid to do this; it’s a hobby. Some people hunt, some people fish; I like to try to plant churches around the world. I also write books and travel to speak. However, when I’m building out a sermon series or considering the application of the Word of God, I am not thinking about Acts 29, traveling to teach, or writing books. I am thinking about you, our families, and how the Lord has embedded me in this place.

As I look at the trajectory of my life, I know there’s a day coming when I will not be president of Acts 29. I don’t plan on writing another book for quite some time, and so coming home from «Act Like Men, ” which was awesome, I was at the Fort Worth Convention Center filled with men who wanted to learn and hear about the Word of God. I found my heart, as tired as I was, eager to be with you. Issues like the doctrine of complementarianism—they work themselves out on the ground. It’s not just an idea; it’s life. It’s not some ethereal theory that would be great if this were so. No, no, it’s real people—real husbands, real wives, real dads, real moms, real families, real churches.

It’s on the ground that theology must matter; it’s on the ground that the Word of God must be applied, or we’ll be theorists and not practitioners. What I wanted to do is just establish some things early on out of Ephesians 5, and then quickly share with you my six hopes coming out of this sermon series—so no real review at all. Ephesians chapter 5, starting in verse 15: „Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time because the days are evil.“ So, if we just stop there— we’re going to read some more—but if we stop there and consider that sentence backward, I found it to be really helpful. I think there’s an order to it that’s right and good. For me, understanding it was more helpful to go, „Okay, the days are evil.“ When the Bible says that the days are evil, don’t think of a „Walking Dead“ zombie apocalypse or getting your crossbow. Rather, think—and let me just be real frank with you.