In this sermon, the speaker discusses the importance of communication in leadership. He emphasizes that good communication is crucial for effective leadership and encourages the audience to define what good communication means to them. The speaker also provides a formula for introducing speakers, highlighting the importance of a good introduction in supporting the speaker's message. Additionally, he discusses the different communication styles of linear and global individuals and suggests tailoring communication approaches based on the audience's preferences.

That's great. Keep on coming down. This is probably one of the very exciting subjects that I think that we're going to be looking at in our time together. As we begin to move on, thank you, Dale. Thank you, Dale. Great. All right then, we had a little project from last night. How many of you were able to go and find someone and say, I see a gift in you? Did anyone get to do that? Well, thank you. Thank you for doing that. I missed that. What did he say? You were wrong? I think it proves a point. I think you proved the point. The point is that we've done it so little, we don't even recognize it when it comes. And that's one of the sad things about our isolationists and our individuality. And after last night, you know good and well that we cannot be independent and be a disciple maker, right? There's nothing more intimate than disciple making. And there's nothing more opposed to independence and the whole concept than that of disciple making. A very, very special thing. And there's one thing that we need to keep in mind, which I didn't say last night, but I just want to say it because at least I've got you as a captive audience, to say, you know, the beautiful thing, it seems to me, about Jesus was in terms of, if you will, a relative sliding scale of intimacy, you see him preaching to the multitudes, right? Huge groups, 5,000 men plus women and children. And we know that the scripture tells us he communicated to these large groups. I submit to you that that was irrigating when he spoke that way. I lived on a farm in Australia where we used to irrigate and we would open the little docks and away the water would go and it would go across these vast Australian paddocks. But it was very wide, but it was very thin. And Jesus had a ministry of very wide and very thin and in places in the scripture it says he had many followers, many disciples. But then he went from those vast and a descending scale down to his 120 who were intimate enough and trained well enough to go out two by two. And then another time the 70 that he sent out. And then there was the 12 and he was very intimate, as we know, with the 12. And this was now not irrigating, this was now digging wells. When you dig a well you take a small geographic spot and you go down very deep. And that's what he did with his disciples. And within his disciples he had three that he dug even deeper with. Who were they? Peter, James and John. And within that three he dug even deeper with one. Who was it? John. Question. Who did he give the revelation to, the most difficult message? To John. The one that he dug the deepest with was the one he was able to pass on the most profound message of the whole of the revelation. Interesting. And I believe that that says something to us in O.M. God gives us the privilege of irrigating widely when we have citywide campaigns and we have Love Europe and we have all of this. That's a lot of irrigating widely. And that's great. Jesus did it. Let me encourage you. Go on. That's great. But then never lose sight of the next component of digging deeply. And that's where we make the disciples and those who come out of the irrigation system which is wide and thin and they come up to Jesus and they come up to you and they say we heard that but we didn't quite understand what did you mean by that? And that's when we start in the intense well digging and say sit down. I want to tell you. Are you with me? And this is part of the great discipling that we have. So we disciple on different fronts. That's my point. And then God gives you the privilege with your family of discipling very deeply, very intimately for lots of years and that is the high privilege of lifetime. It's certainly been the greatest privilege of my life has been the investment in my family and in my children and what's more what they've invested in me. And I've learned so much from my children and I can't begin to tell you the joy that is mine from the lessons I am still learning from my children. And the fact is as I watch my oldest daughter as she's bringing up her little family she is doing it so magnificently I almost want to start again. I've learned so many things from her and my son-in-law it's just been beautiful to watch. Absolutely, Ruth and I come away and we just rejoice at the way they're doing it. I mean, they seem about six streets ahead of us. That's beautiful. And you know, that's the beautiful thing. We often see the discipling component as the discipler and the disciple and we see it in that kind of hierarchical structure but really it's not that way. It's more for us as humans anyway as we are that we're this way together and we invest. And then suddenly we learn from our disciple things that are profound and we're blessed indeed. I remember as a father has to do once in a while take my daughter aside because she was at university she had failed some exams in the first course and she'd failed some in the second course and the third year was coming up and had to sit her down. In Australia to go to university is kind of a privilege it's not quite God's own right like you have it in the United States and some of these places. And I said, Honey, this is a privilege God has given you. You should grasp it with both hands. I know you've been involved in the Christian student movement but it would be perhaps better now if you just laid those responsibilities aside and got on and got your degree and get on with whatever God has for you then but get this behind you. You know, it's kind of good fatherly talk. And she said, Dad, she said, there are young people at the university who are taking nine years to get their degree so that they can spread the communistic line. Would it matter if I took a few extra years to be a Christian? End of dialogue. Who was discipled that day? Well, I wasn't discipling her even though I thought it started out that way. I was discipled that way. Who wants to miss out on that kind of discipling? I don't. And so this is part of what God has for us as we are recognizing and willing to recognize the giftedness that God gives as we work with each other and learn. Well, we are going to move on to a very, very exciting subject today. It is to me. Which is going to be what? The subject of? Communication. What are the five things, what are the five functions that we are looking at together? The first one is? Vision. Vision. The second one is? Communication. The third one is? Treasure. The fourth one? Management. And the last one? Religion. Great. Isn't that great? You've learned that and you are dreaming it and you are on your way to being able to hang lots of good things now into these sectors of what being a good leader is all about. Communication. Would you take your pen? Would you write down what you would regard as a definition for this? Finish this statement. Good communication is? Would you finish that sentence for me? Okay. Who would like to venture what you've written down there? I wish your name tags were bigger and I could read them and I would say, Olive, what did you write down? You should. Why don't you stand up so we can all hear you. Good for you. Thank you. That's within the context of leadership. That's very, very good. Thank you. Right up the back. Good communication is clear and specific. Okay. That's good. Thank you. Okay. Isn't that good? Right up the back. You sound like a counselor. That's why you learned it. There you go. Great. Well, thank you. That's very good. Thank you. That's pretty simple, isn't it? But if you get your message, if you really get it across, you've done it. Very good. Thank you. Someone else. What did you write down? Yes, please. Right. That's great. You know, this is a great audience to talk to. If we were to count up the number of mother tongue languages here this morning, I'm sure we'd have probably 15 or 16 or maybe 20. And so it's great to talk to an audience where language is something that we understand at a deeper level than just the ordinary congregation in Australia or America or Great Britain where we are so ethnocentric and so linguistically centered on one language that we don't think through other language grids. So it's marvelous to be with you. But have you ever stopped to think of the beauty and the magnificence of the gift that God gave with language? I mean, when you think that I take this morning an abstract thought in my mind through electrical impulses charge the muscles that produce through my vocal apparatus the mechanical effect onto the air that goes through the air to the oral passage that you have and you transmit it through electronic device back to the brain and you receive an abstract. I mean, when you think of that, that is the most amazing gift that God has given to us. To be able to communicate what is on my heart and you've been in places all of you where you have not been able to say a word and you've longed to say a word. How I remember when Ruth and I lived up there in the mountains in Papua New Guinea and we couldn't speak to the people yet because we didn't know their language and they didn't know ours and Ruth's a trained nurse and we were watching little babies die. We didn't have a clue what it was all about. And then you ache. And how you long just to be able to say what happened so that we can begin to work. And when they die to be able to say but there is hope. One of the hardest words to communicate in the gospel is the word hope. As a matter of fact when you think of it as I've looked at the religions around the world it is only the Christian message that talks about hope. Think about that. Now that is something to think about. How many of you could come up here and speak to us this morning for 20 minutes on the subject of hope? I have listened to thousands of sermons I suppose. I don't remember hearing yet a message on hope except the one I gave. We're not talking about hope but this is the unique message of the Christian gospel. What I'm trying to set the stage for is that if we're going to communicate we've got to know what the message is before we even get started. And we've got to know what hope means. That's a very powerful word to study in the scriptures. And I've got a very interesting little picture a series of pictures I'd like to give you sometime but I don't have time this time on what hope is all about. You'll never forget it. But would you like it? No, okay. We don't have time. I'm sorry. It'll have to be after hours. We're going to talk about therefore communication. You've given me some good definitions. Thank you for helping us here. But communication is the effective transmission of ideas. Ultimately, isn't it? The effective transmission of ideas. You could say it another way. A meaningful exchange of ideas. That's what good communication is all about. And so we're going to focus on one of the most exciting components of leadership right now. Would you all stand? We've all read of many leaders. There are many wonderful leaders in the scriptures. And there's leaders in our world today and certainly there has been in both church history and secular history. I want you to think of one person that you regard as a wonderful leader. Anyone you'd like to choose as a wonderful leader. And when you've thought of that person then you can sit down. This is what you call thinking on your feet. Here's my question. The person that you're thinking of right now, was that person a good communicator or not? I submit that if that person was a leader that people were following, he was a good communicator. If we're going to be effective leaders, I do believe that we must be effective communicators. The Apostle Paul, what a wonderful leader but what a profound communicator. And of course, not only did he preach and use the spoken word but he also used the written word and realized how powerful that was as a communicator. And he's still communicating to the church today through that very powerful medium of being able to write. Very, very impressed to be able to do that. I have also met some very brilliant people, people who I regard as having the capacity to be great leaders who will never lead because they can't communicate. Have you ever met those kind of people? You kind of just ache inside because you see someone who, when you sit down and you kind of work it with them and massage the message that they're trying to give to you, you say, boy, that is powerful but they can't tell anyone. They can't do it themselves. That's really sad. They need a lot of help. And so, for us who, God has given the responsibility to be leaders, then I want to tell you that we need to work hard and have a passion to learn to communicate. And we're going to be looking at some elements of this and we need to understand not only the message we want to give but we need to understand the audience. One of the things that I want to share with you right now is perhaps one of the most exciting things that we in Wycliffe have been exposed to and we're kind of in the communication business. And I'll give you the stage set because you see, people not only hear a message but there is what we call cognitive styles. People learn in different ways. And some people learn one way and some people learn another way. In fact, there's probably six or seven major ways in which people learn. Some people learn just by listening. Some people learn just by looking. Some people learn tactile by actually doing things. And so it goes on. And we could list all those. We don't have time. It would be great just to make a study of those because these are very important as you meet up with people. The fascinating thing is that as you go from ethnic group to ethnic group you can find that there is a major kind of overarching way in which people learn. And sometimes in a village in Africa they will learn through one way whereas you will learn in the United States another way. That's very fascinating. And I want to get right inside this as fast as I can and as quickly as I can. It will be kind of a bird's eye view because we don't have time to take a whole semester on the subject which we ought to do. In Great Britain we have our school where we train in the Summer Institute of Linguistics which is our sister organization and where we train not only our own workers but folk who are going out to learn another language and folk who are going out to analyze another language or to do translation or just to be able to effectively preach or whatever. And at our schools there we have in more recent years judging from what I said last night begun to be training some of our national brothers from across Africa and Asia and we bring them into our schools. It so happened that in our British school we were training as we had always trained through the same curriculum and we had young people from Africa and from India who had their degrees incidentally from Paris and Cambridge and London. These were very sharp young people but at the end of the course they had missed the point and we thought this is terrible. And so we thought boy, you know they just maybe don't have it. But after we'd done this for three years we began to realize if you start to get real honest after because maybe we weren't teaching it too good. And so in God's kindness we had three of our ladies who had been involved in the psychology of curriculum development and had specialized in cognitive styles meaning how do people learn. And so they began to analyze this. And as they did this it became very, very clear that what we were doing was teaching a way which is grown out of the United States shall we say because that's probably the place on the face of the earth where it's focused more today just by dint of size and volume of teaching that goes on. But in the western world primarily we teach a given way. And this is really not the learning style of our brothers in Africa which all adds up after a while to say well how are we doing Bible teaching out in Africa or in some of these places. So we need to say let's wait a minute where are our audiences come from? What we began to put together which is not entirely new but for us it was a new development of this and I'll try and put it into layman's terms for you this morning and get away from the technical terms but our learning style is on a continuum. And at one end we will say we have people who are linear. Can you read that? Now that's an interesting technical development. Maybe I need to get closer to the middle. That's about as good as we can get. Can you all read that? I'll try and do it a little bit bigger. We'll call this linear on this end and we'll call this up this end here global. Can you read that? Okay. They are the two extremes if you will on a continuum. Now let me hasten to say that no one probably is totally linear and no one probably is totally global. In other words we're somewhere along that line but to try and illustrate I will try and epitomize what we would say the ultimate of a linear was and the ultimate of a global. Okay? The linear guy is the guy who or the gal who is what we might call the absent minded professor. So we'll put the professor there. Now the absent minded professor is interested in details but interestingly enough is not very interested in people. And the absent minded professor is the kind of guy like our Dr. Kenneth Pike who is one of the most brilliant linguists at 80 years of age he's still steaming up a track. He was a linguist and has led our field just in the most amazing man and at the age of about 60 decided he would study mathematics so he started to read mathematics going to bed at night time and he through this interest in mathematics ushered us in to the computer age which is so much part of our work today. And it's like our right hand today. Now he's finished all of his teaching and so he's now studying philosophy so that once more he can get inside how does the mind work so that this will help us with our translation. He doesn't know whether it will help us or not. He didn't know whether mathematics would help. It did help. He feels God's leading him into it. So now he's teaching at a university in philosophy just to get insight so that he can help us. Fascinating kind of guy. But he's the kind of guy that walks around as George was talking about where Dale and George were at the kettle down there in Mexico and he's walking around with his baby under his arm hanging over his arm and is saying has anyone seen joy around? And the kid's under his arm. And he can't even see it. Well I mean it's one thing to be looking for your glasses having them on but it's another thing to have the kid draped over your arm and he's looking for the kid and I mean he didn't know. So there she is. Well there she is. And there he is and he will be teaching up a storm in linguistics and he's writing all this stuff on the blackboard and suddenly he stops and he's like got it. And he'll race over to the next blackboard and all the time he's been teaching over he's been thinking about something else and he starts putting all this new stuff he's just discovered his brain body is working over there. Unbelievable kind of a guy. Now you can tell a linear guy mostly because when they speak to an audience they speak like this. Well now ladies and gentlemen I want to talk to you this morning about something that's very important to all of you and it's like this you know and away he goes and he could care less whether he's looking at the audience. You see a guy doing that and you know probably you've got a linear guy. Probably. High probability. The fact is my friend was teaching at one of the theological colleges right here in Holland. He was telling me that they brought this scholar across from the States for one summer and there was this great sign up sheet for those who would like to take this special course and so he came and he started teaching and one day he heard this guy preaching up a storm to this class and he thought I can't believe that many people signed up. I mean he was just going to it and so he thought I'm going to see how many and he looked around and in the corner and can you believe it right at the back of the room is one lady and he's just going through the whole deal as though he had a thousand people in front of him and he said to this lady sometime later he said you're the only one to sign up and she said yes she is and I'm too embarrassed to pull out and she said I don't even want to be there but the guy would have no one to talk to. My friend David said I'm not convinced he'd quit even if she wasn't there. Now that's a linear guy. Now this guy here to talk about the speaker who's a global guy this is the guy who has to have total control and eye contact and if someone fidgets he's lost the whole thing. If a kid starts crying he's lost his bundle right there and he can't handle any kind of thing that distracts because he has an intense intensity to communicate the global guy. The linear person up here is the kind of person who learns the computer so we put the computer down here and this is what happens. You sit down with the linear guy and you say he says teach me the computer and you do this and this and this and this and if you lose your way it's on page 156 you can read it on from there and the guy says look just leave me with the book let me read the book I don't don't show me anything just let me read the book by myself that's what I want. The global guy you teach him the computer and what happens is you say well this is what you do you do this and you do this and you do this and you're out of trouble look up the book and the guy says why did you do this and this and this I must know why and the guy says well I don't know why just do it I can't do it and if I'm going to learn you better get someone who can tell me why because I must know why look at this in the children here the linear child is the child you say go and do your homework and a kid goes in and he does his homework and he never moves until he's finished his homework and he's done it this one here does his homework and he goes in five minutes later he comes out mum he says could you help me with this son I you went to school not me you've got it all there you can do it I can't do it I need your help all the time all the time this happens and so she sends him back in the room again five minutes later he goes out he's going out hey where are you going I'm going out to talk to my mate because my mate won't be able to tell me how to do it because I need his help the global child has to work with this kind of help this kind of person here wants everything written down this one here wants to hear it and it has to be spoken to him this one here wants it written down in prose this one here would prefer to see it in pictures they love things drawn out and you sit with a global person and the first thing they want to do is pull out their pen pull out a bit of paper and start drawing diagrams you ever sat with those kind of people sit with me sometime have to have a pen have to draw a picture and the global person says look don't worry about the pictures just give it to me in the prose I had a professor of mathematics from the Melbourne University on my council in Australia and you know what that man brilliant though he was he couldn't read a flow chart you know what I'm talking about a flow chart you've got the picture of the director up here and you've got all the departments down here he couldn't read a flow chart and he would reject a flow chart or anything that I put in a diagram form that came to the board he'd say it has to be in prose so send me away and I'll have to come to the next board meeting and have it all written down astounding a brilliant, brilliant man but he couldn't read pictures and he wanted it this way so he was a very linear kind of a guy this kind of person here the linear guy is the person who plays the piano but is stuck completely to the music and would love to be able to play by ear but can't play by ear this person over here plays by memory or by ear and has a struggle to read the music met those kind of people you know what I'm talking about now I'm talking about the extremes and there are people who will find themselves in the middle and these this is the way we see the whole operation here and we start with the big picture and once he's got the big picture he goes out from that and everything that he learns from that is like the little segments in an orange the little quarters they all come together and every little bit he gets just fills out the picture more but he got the big picture to start with and so in our orientation we need to be thinking are these people predominantly global well then start with the big picture if you're talking with our group most of them linear people then you don't worry too much about that you say well this is the way it is brothers and sisters step by step by step by step and they love it that's the way they want to hear so there's some things to think about and to ponder and I trust it will be a helpful start I've said that right up at the beginning because you might like to ask me questions about it as we go around because I'm sure that it's probably sparked some new thoughts and new ideas for you what makes an effective communicator let's move on to another subject what makes an effective communicator what is or who is an effective communicator I submit to you that the Greeks the Greek philosophers analyzed what made a good communicator and they happened to be very much into communication as you know they were philosophizers they were very much into the abstract and if you want a very interesting little linguistic sideline which you might like to dilly dally while you're on some time in your quiet time think about this it's to me a very profound thing that God gave the message to Israel as He was setting the stage for the message of redemption He set the stage in the Hebrew culture now the Hebrew culture and the Hebrew language are inseparable just as your language and my language are totally inseparable from our culture and indeed our language changes proportionately to our culture change is there anyone who can tell me what a cropper is good English word cropper C-R-U-P-P-E-R can you tell me what a cropper is fascinating can you tell me Olav excuse me to become a cropper no not a cropper C-R-U-P-P-E-R yes yes it is to do with the horse's heart stand up let's look at you you've just dated yourself there's a special lady yes it is to do with the horse's harness why didn't you know about a cropper I'll tell you why because it's not part of your culture anymore it is part of the equestrians culture still today so they know what a cropper is but you don't the language for the equestrian needs cropper because that's part of your culture your grandfather or your great grandfather certainly didn't know what a valiant was as a noun they knew what a valiant period was as an adjective a valiant soldier a valiant warrior but not a valiant period why did we get the word valiant well because Mr. Chrysler wanted to identify his bit of rust bucket over against Mr. GM's and so he called it by the name of valiant he just took a word and gave it and so valiant became a noun because it now belonged to part of the culture are you with me that's why words are very important they're important within the context of culture it has to be that way so as you go out I thank the Lord for George's challenge to you the other night the importance of language the ultimate of communication has to be in language and that I need a week to talk about and you might gather that it's very central to my thinking and my whole drive in life language is so important culture and language go together and they change together you see we sent a man off into space he happened to be a a very sharp ace pilot he was also an engineer he was a mathematician but we don't say remember that ace pilot mathematician etc. etc. etc. no because he was now new in our culture we grabbed a piece of linguistic blob gave it to him and called him an astronaut so that from here on out this new component of culture would have a linguistic blob that belonged to him and so he was an astronaut now it so happened that across the Bering Straits here in Russia on this continent they did the same thing and they called their man a cosmonaut exactly the same thing but it was a linguistic difference for a cultural difference for the same thing isn't that interesting same thing cosmonaut astronaut because they needed it for their culture as you go to communicate the gospel you are introducing words and if I were to make and I wish we had time to do it and if you want a little fascinating thing to do for homework in fact you might like to do it tonight since we're talking about communication in your quiet time just take your time and write down all in your English language or your German language whatever language you speak write down all of the words that you regard as being absolutely essential to communicate the gospel like sin and hell and heaven and hope and go on and put down the list that you say are really the cardinal issues put your list down have a go at it it will be rather revealing and then remember that as you go to communicate the gospel if you're going to be effective then you're going to need most of those words or at least to ensure that those words have clearly communicated awesome thought awesome to think that God has given us the responsibility to communicate this gospel message now back to the Hebrews God used the Hebrew language of course to be connected to the Hebrew culture and it was God who introduced the artifacts into the Hebrew culture of the temple and the tabernacle the show bread the lamb and all of these things these were very concrete very tangible things and so the Hebrew language is a very tangible language dealing with those tangible things now isn't it fascinating that when it came to the new covenant that God didn't go on using the Hebrew think about that he chose another culture we often say well it was Hebrew in the Old Testament it was Greek in the New Testament it's more than that it was the Hebrew culture in the Old Testament with it's language it was the Greek culture with it's language and the Greek language was designed and had been prepared for 400 years plus before Jesus came to be moving towards a philosophical language and they had come to the point of just loving to hear new ideas and that's why they wanted to listen to Paul on the Areopagus they wanted him to go up to Mars Hill because he was a man who was saying ideas that were different and they wanted to listen because here was a man who was talking about things that were kind of in the abstract it was dealing with spiritual components they wanted to be in on that and this language could handle it and so God in his sovereign plan changed and there was a paradigm shift to a new culture and a new language because he wanted to say something that was utterly profound he wanted to say those things which were indeed concrete and tangible you could touch the altar you could touch the labor you could pour the water into the labor you could change the show bread these were all tangible things and then we come to the book of Hebrews and he says that which was the physical indeed that has been replaced by the mystery of the spiritual and it is more real than what you could touch isn't that interesting and so into the philosophical language he puts the spiritual components of the message I think that's wonderful and it's all I mean that excites me as a communicator and thinking of communication and so as you go to another language as you go to another culture you need to be thinking they are not thinking through my grid I have to think through their grid and that's a painful thing to have to do through an interpreter but for some of you that's the way you're going to have to work but I encourage you to work hard at the language to understand the culture so that when you say for God so loved the world you have enough time to get the feedback to ensure they're not saying your message can't be right because God wouldn't do it remember last night must be God's older brother who did it or his uncle unless you've got that sorted out then maybe you haven't communicated and so communication is very important now it was the Greeks who had studied communication and they said there are three elements to effective communication three elements the first he said the Greeks said and they come interestingly enough in this order the first word was ethos the ethos of the message the second word that they gave was pathos and the third what do you think it might have been you Greek scholars what do you think the third might have been logia yes logia so the first was ethos and the Greeks said unless you have those three things coming together you are not communicating you will not be excuse me you will not be an effective communicator you must have those three things together let's talk about that ethos from which we get the word ethics what they were saying was if the communicator is not an ethical person then don't listen isn't that interesting isn't that true if you know a guy is a liar do you take much notice of his words no so ethos is very very important a man of ethics a woman of ethics but if you know the person is an ethical person you are ready to listen I don't think I will ever forget being at the Urbana conference and as you know most every Urbana conference Billy Graham comes along and takes one session I happen to be very interested in the subject of how people are introduced I've had some very wonderful introductions I've had some very lousy introductions if you have a good introduction it means you're kind of 15 minutes down the road in your communication right because a good introduction helps you be established either as an ethical person or something less than that and if you can establish for your audience who don't know you that this is an ethical person you've closed the gap half way there think about some of these things I would like to give you a little formula later on as to how to introduce people because I think it's one of the most courteous things that we can do to a speaker in fact I think it's one of the most helpful things we can do because there's nothing worse than getting a bad introduction or a poor introduction because that doesn't help you or your message and it's like the guy that was introduced at the men's rotary meeting and the guy stood up and said well it's really great to have Mr. Brown with us here today he said we're really honoured to have him with us he's a very fine man and you've probably read of him in the newspaper recently he's the man who made two million dollars in oil he comes from Texas and we're delighted that he can be here with us and so he stood up and he said well he said thank you very much for that very fine introduction he said it was substantially correct but there was one or two things I perhaps should just correct he said actually my name is Smith and he said I really don't come from Texas I come from Oregon and the money that was in focus it wasn't in oil it was in coal and it wasn't in Texas it was in Kansas and he said it wasn't me who made it it was my brother and he didn't make it he lost it it's kind of important to get your facts right I thought to myself if there's one job I wouldn't like at Urbana Conference it would be to introduce Billy Graham I mean a guy who stood up and introduced him I wouldn't know him from a hole in the wall I don't know who it was I don't know his name to this day in other words what do you do when you introduce a guy who's a household name like Billy Graham I'll never forget his introduction he said young people he said we're honored to have our guest speaker here this evening whom I am delighted to introduce to you he said you know here in America every year there is a survey made of the top ten citizens of our country and those top ten citizens represent people who have made their mark on our country presidents lawyers educators and he went down a whole litany of people who find themselves in that list he said tonight I had the privilege of introducing to you the only man who has been on that list for the last ten years I introduced to you Dr. Billy Graham the place exploded I mean they stood to their feet and clapped their hands they were saying this is an ethical man and he is isn't that beautiful what an introduction to those kids I'm sure some of them were listening to him for the first time even though he comes from there but he is an ethical man so there was the first thing ethics is important we have lived sadly through this last decade a list of people who have named the name of Christ who have proved not to be ethical it has brought the stain to the name of Christ the sad thing is it rubs off on you and me to the point when you don't know me and I stand up before you today there is a cloud over my head because of others and you say I wonder if he has that kind of background too and we just don't know about it isn't that sad terribly sad so we start with ethics the second thing that they said a good communicator would be would be involved with their Greek word pathos from which we get the word empathy and sympathy which bespeaks a concern for the people to whom we're speaking love it isn't that great and if we're concerned for our audience it doesn't take long for it to show through does it but if we are not then we're not going to communicate if in other words you're just another audience you're just another group of people that have come to listen to you and to your rhetoric then that's not going to go anywhere question how long does it take to develop empathy with your audience that's going to change from place to place I believe that in this one is embedded the component of time it takes time to understand where your audience is at I was really encouraged by one of the brothers who's from Uruguay just a simple little thing but it was a blessing to my heart he was telling me that he had listened to the tapes of what I said when I was on the ship in Belfast and we'd never met but he said it's interesting one of the things that you said on that tape God used to bless our ministry in Uruguay I told there the importance of being able to know your audience in other terms than what I'm saying today but the same kind of focus and I was saying how that I remembered the request I had the first request where a church paid my way which is not always the done thing in Australia to be flown from Melbourne to Sydney to speak at a church so I was excited to go they obviously wanted me when I got there as I was going into the service just as we were going into the chapel the pastor said you'll have seven minutes to speak and as I flew home that afternoon the Lord really opened up a whole new vista for me and I went to the staff when I got home and I said never ever book me up for a single meeting again I don't want to do that I've realised I must take time and out of that evolved a program which we call our missions dynamic or seminar for missions education where we don't want to go into a church unless we can be there for a whole week of meetings and that's turned around for us in Australia and we're still doing it and we're doing it in other places around the world of Wycliffe today and he was telling me down at Europe Way that's what they're doing down there now they go to the church and they say well we really can't come for one meeting we have to I could be here for a week and here's our program it's turned around now what does that do by the time you've been there for a week we have made some fabulous relationships in a week which we could never do in 20 minutes in 20 minutes I end up raising more questions than I give answers and you can do that in OM too you can burst in with all your enthusiasm and go boy that was a whirlwind now what was that all about we need to think of the time that it takes for empathy I guess a profound lesson in my life has been to watch my sister who God is really gifted as a teacher just loves people and God used her in India for 10 years and then his lovely sovereign plan for her was to be married to a farmer up country in New South Wales where they have those farms that you hear about in Australia you know you start early in the morning and you drive and you drive and about the sun going down you get to the other side of the property well I know you've got trucks like that too but seriously it's a very big farm and it's in one of those kind of communities she's been there now for 13 years and in 13 years a person who is gifted as a communicator it's taken those 13 years and she's still breaking into the community I mean she speaks the language we're on a farm so it's not all new to her to be on a farm it's taken a brush with cancer it's taken a lot of time to become ethical and for her to be able to listen and understand where they are isn't that interesting she knows the language she knows the culture but it can take a long time in some kind of communities as some of you know in the Islamic world how long it takes to be accepted God give you grace to understand that in all of those things it's those things of empathy I sat with the bishop there in Hyderabad in Pakistan he told how it was when he was a little boy the early CMS missionaries came up to the north where he lived and he the early man that came in was a doctor they didn't want him around they called him a man who had black magic in that little bag they didn't know what it was but they didn't want him around and he just lived there trying to find an entry point in those days a long time ago now they weren't interested one day outside his home there was this huge dog fight this bishop was telling me and in the dog fight the fellows came out and they heaved these big rocks and they dispersed the fight and left whimpering on the ground was this little dog so after everyone gone no one cares about a dog in Pakistan as many of you know the doctor went out picked up this bundle of crushed flesh took it in found out really that all was wrong was some bruises but he broke his back leg and so he went about putting on to his leg a plaster cast to a dog and when it dried he let the dog go and so for the next six or eight weeks it limped around the village and everyone knew what had happened this guy with his black magic had put this on a dog then he caught the dog cut the plaster off and within a week or so the dog was running around like every other dog they finally said if he would do it for a dog what would he do for us that was the entry point and he had empathized with the dog but for the sake of the people and the last word is love here and we need to have our words then and we need to be able to speak clearly and speak well we need to know the gospel message we need to know it clearly we need to be able to know why we are there if i were to say to you today what is the function of the church what is the church here for in the world today what would you say write it down take a moment why is the church here today this is basic if we don't know what it is we need to know exactly what the role of the church is i believe that there is great confusion throughout christendom as to what the role of the church is alright what do you got as an answer someone i answer assuming that you are talking about the local church what is thank you yes i was talking about the local church i should have perhaps given that descriptive the local church what is the function of the local church okay to worship god and extend his kingdom very good yes very good yes okay yes yes okay that's great that's great his eternal purpose yes okay that's okay nothing right okay that's that's that's that's that's that's yes let me give you frank thank you frank thank you can walk out this morning and say this is what the church is here for. Three things. First of all, we are here to worship God. That's what the church is here for. We're to worship Him and to worship Him in His way of worship, which I think is what Romans chapter 12 and verse 1, 2 and 3 is all about. That's the worship. Let me just pause a moment here since I've been reminded of that verse and let's just take a look at this. You know, that's a very powerful, powerful passage of Scripture. The book of Romans, of course, is the great theology book. It starts off with a whole message of sin. It moves into this described salvation. After salvation it deals with sanctification and after sanctification it deals with the sovereignty of God and then at chapter 12 it moves into our service. Paul was a great communicator. Not only did he give the content, he gave the application. And we come to chapter 12 and he says, therefore, in the light of understanding what sin and salvation and sanctification and the sovereignty of God is all about, he says, therefore, in the light of that, he says, I want you to present your bodies a living sacrifice. Sadly in our English language we do a poor job at translating the aorist tense. And this is a very interesting passage because in chapter 12 it starts out with one aorist tense followed by 36 present tenses. So it kind of highlights it as we look at the original. The aorist tense is a tense when something is done in the past, an action that's completed in the past, but the result of which is going on to the present. Are you following me? So it's something that's finished but yet the effectiveness is still going on. And if that is in focus, then you use the aorist tense. And here Paul says, that's how we should make our sacrifice. And really what he's saying is, if I were to translate it in, to expand it out to give the meaning, in context he says, Paul says, I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God that you present your body once and for all. A living sacrifice. And the result of that sacrifice will go on. The problem is in our evangelical Christendom we've made it that you make a decision and you can go back and you can do, you can have a recommitment and a recommitment and a recommitment and a recommitment. They missed out on Romans chapter 12 verse 1. And we need to preach the kind of aorist tense which says that when we make a commitment to Christ it's an all deal. It's a one-off deal. We wouldn't have the humbug in Christianity today if we understood that. We wouldn't have it. Because we would know the aorist tense is in focus. I wish we did a better job translating in the English from that aorist tense. That's how we're to worship him because that's what Paul ends up saying, that is your spiritual worship. The commitment of the totality of your life that you made back there at Calvary and you're letting the outworking of that be going on until God takes you home. So that first thing that the church, the local church is here for is to us to worship together. The second thing that we're here for is to make disciples. And the third thing that we're here for is to be on mission. Jesus has given us a mission to reach the world. They're the three things. To worship, to make disciples and to be on mission. Would you say that with me? To worship, make disciples and to be on mission. Again, to worship, make disciples and be on mission. Is that helpful? You can cut it other ways but that's a very pertinent way, a very powerful way to be able to look at that and to think of the work that we have to do. And that's the message we have to communicate as we go to the end of the line. You're communicators and you're telling that new little church that's planted you, you're here for three things. The problem is that so often in the church they're not taught that they'll be making disciples. They're not taught that they'll be on mission. The moment they come into being they'll be on mission. We think they've got to be 30 years old before we start talking about mission to them. No. They're on mission the moment that they're here. They are the new community in that area, God's community, which took place by the old Israel. We are the community to get this job done. You had to lay aside Israel because they didn't do it. Interesting. He said now you are the mobile ones to go do it. I mentioned last night, but I think the importance, the great importance is for us to understand it's the totality of life and the words. We need exegetical living, I think I said last night, isn't it? We need exegetical living.