Pastor Tyler Pease is the director of global outreach at Sunset Bible Church and Tacoma, Washington.
Tyler is also the Northwest Regional Director of Perspectives USA on the global Christian movement.
And time is short.
And so we need to get the word out, right?
I believe this Perspective is really an opportunity to fulfill the great commission that Jesus called us to.
So please welcome Tyler Pease.
I serve as the regional director for Perspectives in the northwest. So I cover five states in the northwest, including
Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon, and Alaska. So just a small chunk of the country, really.
And yeah, I was a pastor for 15 years. Still I'm a pastor, but just not paid to be a pastor anymore
at my church. And perspectives is one of those things that I was introduced to about 10 years ago.
And it just messed me up, but in a good way.
And when I say that, it's one of these things that I went into it,
not really understanding what it was.
And yet, God had used it in our church to change how we look at the world.
But what's really interesting is it changed how we look at our own community
and radically changed how we did outreach as a community.
And it began to unite the churches in our community and allowed us to have greater ministry impact
working together than any of us working alone.
And so I became passionate about perspectives and was asked to step into this role.
And so this morning, what brings me here is we are trying to launch a perspectives movement
here in Idaho Falls.
And it is a challenging endeavor because this ministry is one that has a huge impact in the world,
but it's one the enemy doesn't want to have happen.
It's also a huge endeavor because we do crazy things.
Like we offer graduate level college credit for taking the course.
Now, not everybody who takes it, takes it for credit, but it's a big endeavor.
And so Michelle and Brandon, who are pioneering this movement, are undertaking something
that's a challenge.
So we're excited about it.
And one of my goals in being here this weekend is just to help with the launch of something
that will be what we pray in ongoing movement that will have a similar impact in Idaho
Falls that had.
in my own community.
Now, my goal this morning is not to talk about perspectives.
You'll get a preview of kind of what we're all about,
but my goal is really to open the Word of God
because I hold this time as a sacred thing
when we open the Word of God.
So I'm not here to give you a promotional speech or anything of that nature.
But my heart is this morning that you would see more clearly the heart of God,
that even as you see God is great, that today you would see him as even greater.
And that's really our goal anytime we open the Word of God, isn't it?
So this morning, it's my privilege to open God's word with you,
and I'm going to invite you to really open your Bibles to Psalm 67.
Now, I have to admit, usually I'm more of an expository preacher,
and I stay in one text.
That's not going to be the case this morning.
Psalm 67 is going to be more of a springboard for us.
but it's really where our focus is going to be this morning.
And the reason I turn here is partly to, in a way,
a preview why we even do perspectives, what our ministry is about.
One way I could describe the ministry of perspectives is to say it's a discipleship course
that brings a global dimension into a person's spiritual journey.
You might wonder, why in the world would I want a global dimension to my spiritual journey?
Why would a global dimension be important?
And in perspectives, that certainly takes us into talking about the Great Commission and to what we
classically call missions, but we're not just a mission's ministry.
Because what often happens is, you know, people look at the idea of missions, and I don't
know what goes on in your mind when you hear the word missions or missionary.
But I think for some people, what they hear is, hmm, that's that thing where there's really needy
and we have to feel compassion for the needy. But what do I do when there's more needy people
than I can possibly feel passion for? Or are maybe missions as seen as, well, it's great for some
people who are wired that way. You know, some of us are wired a little differently, right?
Some of us have been bitten by that travel bug, haven't we? Maybe you're that type of person.
You think, boy, the greatest vacation in the world is me traveling somewhere.
and trying to figure out how to get from the airport to a hotel where no one speaks English.
And the weirder the food is, the better.
And then some of you are like, are you kidding me, give me a break.
I'm a meat and potatoes person.
They better speak English wherever I go on vacation, and they better serve cheeseburgers.
And so sometimes what we look at missions is we say, well, that's for some people who've been,
you know, kind of wired that way, but it's not for me.
Or maybe we look at missions and we say, well, missions,
is maybe a deluxe form of Christianity.
Maybe we approach Christianity like we do buying a car.
Some of us want that car with the heated seats and the heated steering wheel and the adaptive cruise control.
And others of us are like, you know, I was fine when they had manual crank windows.
Really?
And sometimes we approach Christianity that way of like, well, you know, that's okay.
You have that deluxe version of Christian.
I'm fine with the base model.
And so sometimes we approach missions in some of the United States.
these ways. Maybe we look at it as a thankless task that, man, I really hope God doesn't call me to be a
missionary because I have to give up all the good stuff. See, the challenge is when we think about
why would I want to have a global dimension in my discipleship journey? Sometimes we start the wrong
question. We start thinking, what are my passions and what are my interests? And actually, a better way to
approach this is to ask, what is God? What is God?
God's passion and what are God's interests. And so this morning, what I want to do is looking at the
Word of God, I really want us to look and see what is God passionate for. And my goal at the end of
today is not to somehow elicit an emotional response from you to feel really sorry for some people
across the world you've never met. That's not my goal. My goal simply today is that you would see more
clearly the heart of God and that you had more long to be passionate about what God's passionate for.
After all, isn't that what a relationship is like? When we have a friendship or a romantic relationship,
that person that we're building a relationship with, oftentimes they're passionate for things
that we don't care anything about, but just being in that relationship, doesn't it cause us start to care
about those things? It's kind of like my daughter.
I have a 10-year-old daughter. She comes home from school, and one day, all of a sudden, she wants to go buy Pokemon cards.
I say, why do we want to go buy Pokemon cards? Well, why do you think? She has no interest in Pokemon,
but there's a group of kids at her school who suddenly are all about Pokemon, and there's a natural
desire that I want to know about this thing because they love it. It'd actually be weird for her not to
become passionate about those things her friends are passionate for. My mind goes to a friendship I have with,
a guy who used to be the worship leader at my church, Luke, and Luke and I did ministry together for a
number of years. We developed a very close relationship. And Luke, of course, being a worship leader,
you would expect Luke cares about music, right? Well, I don't really care about music all that
much. I love music, but I'm very casual in music. But Luke is like he is constantly breathing.
And you know what I found as I was friends with Luke and as our friendship grew?
His passion started rubbing off on me.
And it'd be a really weird friendship if one day I just turned to Luke and I said,
could you just not talk about music because I don't care about it?
Wouldn't that be odd?
Yeah, it would be.
Likewise, we, as we talk about having a relationship with God,
if there is something that is at the center of God's heart,
if there is something that God is something that God is,
passionate for, then we really need to say, am I growing passionate for this? Or if I'm not,
is there something wrong with the relationship? And so that's really my goal this morning is to look
at our God and to see that our God has a global heart. And he's moving with global purpose.
And he's had this purpose from the very beginning of the Bible. And so as we come to Psalm 67 today,
this is part of what I want us to see is God's passions and for us just to see more and more clearly
who our God is. So let me read Psalm 67 for us. And I understand you all read from the new King
James. So I'm going to use that this morning. And Psalm 67 says, I'm just going to read the Psalm in its
entirety. In fact, before I read, let's ask God for his help, all right? So let's pray. God this morning is,
as we come before you, we're so thankful for who you are.
And we're thankful for the privilege to open our Bibles this morning.
God certainly, we look around our country and we see a lot of problems,
but it's not lost on us that we still have the freedom to open your word
and to proclaim it over a loud speaker.
And so God, this morning, we thank you for that privilege.
And God, more than anything, we thank you that you, that you are.
a God who is relational, that you saw fit to give us your word so that we would know who you are.
Because, God, if we didn't have your word, we could look around at nature and we could figure out
that there's a creator. But God, we wouldn't know what it means to have relationship with you.
And we wouldn't know what it is that you care for. And what pleases you and what displeases you and
what's right and what's wrong. But God, through your word, you reveal these things about yourself.
And so as we look at your word this morning, just open our eyes that much more to see who you are,
to see truth about you, to understand the things that you are passionate for.
And God, my prayer this morning would be that even though I am speaking, that it's not my words that move people.
Because people don't need to hear what I have to say.
But God, insofar as my words help us to see what your word says, then through your word and through your spirit, Lord,
work in our hearts and open our eyes, open our ears to hear your voice.
And then as we hear you, Lord, we need your help to actually act on that and to have changed
hearts. And so we just ask that you would be the one who helps us understand and the one who
helps us change and that we want to try to do these things in our own strength.
And so, God, this morning with great thankfulness, we pray all this in the name of Jesus and through
your spirit. Amen.
Right. Here's the words of Psalm 67 says this. God be merciful to us and bless us and cause his face to shine upon us.
That your way may be known on earth your saving power among all nations. Let the peoples praise you,
oh God, let all the peoples praise you. Oh, let the nations be glad and sing for joy.
For you shall judge the peoples righteously.
and govern the nations on earth.
Let the people's praise you, oh God, let all the people's praise you.
Then the earth shall yield her increase.
God, our God shall bless us.
God shall bless us.
And all the ends of the earth shall fear him.
Now, Psalm 67, I want you to understand this morning,
is not a stand-alone Psalm.
It's not talking about an idea out of the blue.
I believe Psalm 67 is actually capturing something that's at the heart of God's redemptive plan.
And in a way, it's serving as a summary of God's redemptive plan.
It's showing us something pretty amazing here.
However, sometimes we have a hard time seeing some of these things.
You know, I think about oftentimes when I look at this passage,
and especially when we in our classes with perspectives, I think about glasses.
I don't know about you, but when it comes to sunglasses, for instance, I buy really cheap sunglasses.
There's a reason for that, because I'm the type of guy I lose my sunglasses all the time.
I forget I'm wearing them, and there I am changing the oil or something on my car and scratching them up.
And so it'd be really foolish for me to buy expensive sunglasses.
The problem, though, with cheap sunglasses is, yes, they block some light, but sometimes they obscure.
everything else as well. Sometimes they don't actually help you see better because they start obscuring
things. And that's the difference between cheap sunglasses and expensive sunglasses. Now, I do have
one pair of really expensive sunglasses. My buddy Luke gave them to me. And the only reason I have
them is because they were a gift. You know how I said? I don't buy sunglasses because I lose them.
I lost those sunglasses once at a restaurant, drove 50 miles down the road, remembered.
and I had to drive 50 miles backwards to go get them.
I don't want to do that.
But for those ones, I did.
Anyway, that's a side note.
But what I notice on these nice sunglasses is they help me,
they're polarized, and I put these on,
and they just help me see everything more clearly.
But the reality is sunglasses do color our vision.
And here's where I'm going with this.
Our culture gives us a lens through which we see the world.
And our culture colors how we see the world.
And sometimes our culture obscures things and causes us to not see things clearly.
And sometimes when you have something that's obscured, you need a different kind of lens,
like what I'm wearing today, a corrective lens.
What does a corrective lens do?
It causes us to see things.
It doesn't cause us to see things that aren't there.
What it does is it brings things into greater clarity, doesn't it?
It might make things that are blurred.
a little bit more sharp. And what I want to give to you this morning is Psalm 67 can become a corrective
lens for us. Because like I said, our culture does color our vision and it does cause us to sometimes
have things obscured that are right in front of us in scripture. And let me give you an example of that.
One of the ways our culture is wired, and one of the ways our culture obscures our vision a little bit,
is that we are a highly individualistic culture. In fact, the United States is the most individualistic
culture that has ever existed on the planet. Now, here's the thing. There's some really good things
about our culture, and there's some good things about that individualism, aren't there? We have in our
culture a certain grit, a can-do attitude, a get it done, and we're going to do it with pride, and we're going to do it well,
and those are some good things, aren't they? But there's also some trash. A certain attitude. A can-do attitude. I get it done, and we're going to do it well, and those are some good things, aren't they?
But there's also some traps in our individualism.
Some of the traps include thinking that it's all about me.
And one of the ways that our cultural lens obscures our vision is when we take this book
and we read it, sometimes the one thing we ask is, what does this say about me?
And actually, this is a book about God.
And so we need sometimes a corrective lens.
that helps us not ask that individualistic question, but starts to look at things through a different
light. Because we don't, we miss things in here. It reminds me of a time as a daddy, you know,
you get to parent your children through all the seasons of their life. And there's a season in your
children's life when they're about three where they don't have a filter yet. So they're very
honest with you, aren't they? And I remember one day with my daughter, Jillian, and I don't remember
exactly what was going on, but I remember in this moment correcting the sweet little three-year-old child,
and I said, Jillian, it's not all about you. And with her sweet eyes, she looked at me and she said,
but daddy, I want it to be all about me. You know, I thought, honey, so do I. I just filter it
sometimes. No, the reality is it's not all about us. And Psalm 67 serves as a corrective lens for us.
And so this morning, I want this to be a lens that going from here you use when you read your Bible
to bring things into greater clarity.
And here's the lens.
I'm going to give this lens a name to make it memorable.
I didn't come up with this terminology.
This is not original with me.
But I'm going to call this lens the top line and the bottom line of God's redemptive plan.
What do I mean by that?
What do I mean by top line, bottom line?
Well, what I mean is when you're doing a business deal and you're negotiating with some,
somebody. Oftentimes, you will say, what's the bottom line, right? What's the bottom? What is that all this
about? What's the main thing? What I mean by top line is simply that it's included, it's part of it. It's just not the
bottom line. All right? And when we look at Psalm 67, I think it starts to show us this principle of there's a top line of God's
redemptive plan and there's a bottom line. What's the top line and what's the bottom line? Well, look at verse 1.
God be merciful to us and bless us and cause his face to shine upon us.
Aren't those wonderful things?
Don't you want the mercy of God?
Who here does not want to be blessed by God?
I don't see any hands going up.
And this idea of God's face shining, this is a poetic way in Hebrew of speaking about,
somebody simply smiling at you.
You ever know someone you walk in the room and they just light up because they're glad to see you?
That's what verse one is saying God is like with us.
When he looks at you, he lights up and he smiles.
This is a wonderful verse.
But you know what happens again?
Because of our individualistic mindset, sometimes, are like,
what am I going to get out of scripture today?
And I read this.
And God's grace to me is mercy, his blessing, he smiles me.
Oh, it's so wonderful.
And we close our Bible and we go about our day.
But you might notice something in this verse.
what punctuation mark is at the end of that verse?
Is it a period? It's a comma, isn't it?
Because it's not the end of the thought. It's not the end of the sentence.
And so in verse one, we see this blessing that God gives us, his grace to us, these benefits to us.
And I would say that's the top line. And the top line I'd simply word it this way, is that we benefit from being part of God's redemptive plan.
A famous preacher used to say,
God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.
And you know what?
That is absolutely true.
You are not inconsequential to God.
Do you hear that today?
You are not inconsequential to God.
But just as I told my daughter, Jillian,
it's not all about you.
I'm sorry if that hurts a little.
But let's take a look at the next verse.
There's a comma there.
And the next verse starts with the word that.
It's a causal word.
You might even reword it to say so that.
It answers the question.
Why is God gracious to us?
Why does He bless us?
Why does his face shine upon us?
And in verse 2, we see the reason it's that.
Your way may be known on earth.
Your salvation among all nations.
And I would say verse 2 is the best.
bottom line that God is working for his glory. And get this, I'm going to come back to this in a moment,
but specifically, God's not after a generic kind of glory. God is specifically working for his
glory among the nations. We're going to unpack that a little bit here in a moment. But top line,
bottom line is simply this. You are part of God's redemptive plan. There's blessing for you as part of
God's redemptive plan, but you are not the bottom line. In it, God, God,
is working for his glory among the nations. And listen, these two things are not against each other.
Sometimes in some of the churches I spent time in in my childhood, sometimes somebody would say,
God loves you. And then someone would kind of be grumpy and be like, no, it's all for his glory.
As though these things were against each other. No, God loves you. You are not inconsequential to him.
And God is working for his glory among the nations. And these two things are actually wed and they go together.
and they are not to be separated.
And let me tell you this.
This is a driving theme throughout the Bible,
throughout God's redemptive plan.
We can look.
And once we have this top line, bottom line lens on our eyes,
you're going to start seeing this everywhere.
What I want to do is simply show you a couple examples of it this morning.
So if this sounds kind of nebulous, we can kind of start seeing this in place.
So I want to start with Genesis chapter 12,
which is a foundational passage.
and the Bible where God has chosen this guy named Abram.
Eventually, he's going to be renamed Abraham, and he comes to Abram.
And in Genesis chapter 12, verse 1, this is what God says to him.
He says, now the Lord had said to Abram, go out of your country from your family and from
your father's house to a land that I will show you, and I will make you a great nation.
I will bless you and make your name great, and you shall be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse you, and I will curse you, and I will
curse him who curses you. And in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed.
Now, in this we see, did God love Abraham? Did God bless Abraham? Absolutely.
Abraham is not inconsequential to God. But here's the question. Is the blessing and the benefit to
Abraham? Is Abraham the top line of what God is doing, or is he the bottom line?
Is this all about Abraham?
No, actually, the benefit to Abraham's the top line.
He's included in what God's doing.
But what's the bottom line of what God's doing through Abraham.
It's at the end of verse 3.
Through you, in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed.
You know, what's amazing here is when God chose Abraham, this was not some divine act of
favoritism as though Abraham, I like you,
more than everybody else. So I'm going to give you stuff at the expense of those people over there and those
people over there. No, God said, I'm going to bless you Abraham because through you, I want you to be a blessing
to the families of the earth. And by the way, when God mentions the families of the earth here, he's not
talking about mom and dad and sister. This is the nations, the tribes, the peoples, the ethnic groups.
And how do we know this? Because this begins a driving theme through the redemptive story that God is
to bless the nations and to be known by the nations. How is he going to be blessed them?
Well, the main blessing is to deliver the nations from idolatry to bring them into a true
relationship with the living God as true worshippers. In fact, if you think I'm making a lot of
a big deal about Genesis 12, listen to what Paul says about this moment in Galatians 3,
or chapter 3 verse 8. Paul says in the scripture, for seeing that God, a big deal about Genesis 12, listen to what Paul says,
would justify the Gentiles by faith, preach the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying,
in you, all the nations shall be blessed. So then those who are of faith are blessed with
believing Abraham. In other words, do you know when the gospel was first preached? It's in Genesis
12. That when God came to Abraham and blessed Abraham, he had in mind the gospel in blessing the nations
through the gospel.
Our God has a heart for the nations.
In fact, theologian, English theologian, John Stott once said this,
the living God is the missionary God.
In other words, it's God who is pursuing the nations from the beginning of the
redemptive plan all the way through.
So you're starting to see the top line, bottom line here, Abraham blessed,
not inconsequential to God.
And yet, it wasn't all about.
Abraham, God is working through him to be known among the nations. Let's look at another example.
I'm going to go to First King's Chapter 8, which deals with the temple. Of course, Israel being God's chosen
people, we certainly can look at a number of ways that they are blessed, right? It'd be a blessing to be
God's chosen people, the firstborn of the nations. And of the many blessings, one of the
blessings they had was having the temple. And think about back in those days of King Solomon when they built the temple,
you now have the global center of what true worship looks like in your backyard.
Wouldn't that be a blessing?
Now here's the question.
Having that temple in their own backyard and being blessed as God chosen people,
was that blessing?
Were the Israelites the top line or the bottom line?
Was it all about them or was something else going on?
They weren't inconsequential to God.
And yet God was working for a bottom line.
purpose through them. Look at this. In 1 Kings chapter 8, Solomon has built this temple. And of course,
just like we would do when we build a building, we have a party, we dedicate it. And they have this party
of dedication. And look at this prayer he prays. As he's praying a prayer of dedication in verse 41,
he says this, and he gets to the bottom line purpose of the temple. He says, moreover, concerning a
foreigner who is not of your people, Israel, but has come from a far country for your name's sake,
For they'll hear of your great name and your strong hand and your outstretched arm.
When he comes and prays toward this temple here in heaven your dwelling place,
and do according to all for which the foreigner calls to you,
that all the peoples of the earth may know your name and fear you, as do your people
Israel, and that they may know that this temple which I have built is called by your name.
Do you see the bottom line purpose there?
This temple exists not just to be a blessing to us.
but it exists so that all the nations of the earth would come to know your name, God,
that your name would be lifted up among the nations of the earth.
In fact, in Isaiah 56, 7, this is what God says about his temple through the prophet Isaiah.
He says, my house shall be called a house of prayer for who?
All the nations.
And very interesting, if you were, we won't turn there, but if you were look at Mark 11,
where Jesus cleanses the temple, guess what he quotes.
He quotes Isaiah 56. He says, my house is to be called a house of prayer for the nations, but you've made a dinner of robbers.
And you know, we don't have time to unpack all what was going on in that moment.
But one of the chief things is the Jewish people had actually taken their blessing and they had cut it off from the bottom line purposes of God.
Rather than the temple being the place to bring the nations, it had become a place to exclude the nations.
and it should catch our attention that this was highly offensive to Jesus.
My house is to be a house of prayer for the nations.
And so we see again, the top line, yes, they were blessed.
They were not inconsequential.
And yet the bottom line purpose of all this blessing was that God's name would be lifted among the nations.
I'll give you one more example here, Daniel 6, which is, I love Daniel 6,
Daniel and the lion's den. I think we're familiar with Daniel 6 in this, this account of these evil men
had manipulated the King Darius to get Daniel thrown into a lion's den. And of course, oftentimes,
this is a passage where we really see our individualistic lens blind us, because when this
passage is usually preached in churches, the application is left at the top line. It's, you know,
Daniel was delivered from the lions. What is the lion's den in your life and how might
God deliver you. It's not a terrible application, but it's missing something. Because when you think
about it, think about Daniel, was he blessed to be delivered from the lions? Easy question, right?
Yeah, if I ever end up in a lion's den, I want to be blessed like Daniel. Deliver me, Lord.
However, was it all about Daniel? Was he the bottom line? No. So how do we see God working towards
the bottom line purposes through Daniel in this story? Well, we find it.
at the end of Daniel chapter 6 in verse 25. Listen to what happens as a result of Daniel's deliverance.
It says this, then King Darius wrote to all people's nations and languages that dwell in all the earth.
Wow. Would you like that kind of power? I'd like to write a letter today. Who do you want to write it to?
Everybody. Okay? All peoples, all nations, all languages, and this is what King Darius says.
Peace be multiplied to you.
I make a decree that in every domain of my kingdom, men must tremble and fear before the God of Daniel.
For he is the living God and steadfast forever.
His kingdom is the one which shall not be destroyed and his dominion shall endure to the end.
He delivers and rescues and he works signs and wonders in heaven and on earth.
Who has delivered Daniel from the power of the lions?
Wow.
Do you see the bottom?
line here. Through Daniel's deliverance, now God is being proclaimed to who? The nations.
And so maybe it's okay to say, what's the lines in in your life and how might God deliver you?
But we need to not forget the bottom line and say, and through that deliverance,
how will God's name be proclaimed to the nations? This is incredibly important.
Here's what I want you to see in this lens is simply this. Whenever you're reading the Bible and you see
God's blessing, look for his bottom line purposes as well. Look for his pursuits of the nations because it's
there over and over again, but sometimes we need that corrective lens to see it because it gets a little
blurry. Now, I want to look at one other thing today, which is simply this. Earlier, I said that
God's not after a generic kind of glory. He actually has a very specific kind of glory in mind.
And specifically, he wants to be glorified. He wants to be worshipped by all.
the nations. And I want to unpack that for just a moment as we come to our end because I want us to have
some clarity about what God has in mind. Now, when we use the word nations, our minds tend to go to
our modern era where we're thinking about political nation states, Germany, Mexico, United States.
When the Bible uses that term nations, it has more in mind ethnic groups. In fact, the word is
ethne in Greek, where we get our word, ethnic,
from. And the Bible uses a number of words for the nation. Sometimes it uses the word peoples.
Sometimes it uses the word tribes or tongues, nations, of course. Sometimes the main word
often used as Gentiles. When the Bible talks about Gentiles, it's not merely meaning non-Jewish
people. It's God's way of talking about the nations that the Jewish people were supposed to reach.
And so God has this desire to have all the nations, all the ethnic people, all the ethnic
groups, all the tribes worship him one day. And it probably shouldn't surprise us then if we turn to the end
of the Bible. Who do you think we find there? We find the nations. Now look at two passages in Revelation.
I'm going to start in Revelation 7 here. But we see this as kind of an end of God's redemptive plan.
And what do we see in Revelation 7?9? Well, John is seeing this vision. He says,
after these things I looked and behold a great multitude, which no one could number of all nations,
tribes, peoples, and tongues standing before the throne and before God. And they're worshipping God.
But who are they? They're from all nations, all tongues, all tribes, all peoples. Do you think
this matters to God? Do you think God is passionate about the nations? We're getting a preview of his heart.
In fact, Revelation 7 is not the end of redemptive history.
This is during the apocalypse, but it's not until Revelation 21 that we see what is a new creation.
And check this out because the nations are still there.
Revelation 21, we have this vision of the New Jerusalem.
And in verse 24, we get this really amazing picture of who's coming into the New Jerusalem.
And look at what John says in Revelation 21, 24.
He says, and the nations of those who are saved shall walk in its light.
And the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor into it.
And its gates shall not be shut at all by day.
There shall be no night there.
And they shall bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it.
Pause on that for a moment.
That is stunning.
They're going to bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.
Where do you think they got that glory and honor from?
From God.
Here's a personal conviction of mine.
I believe that God has given every people group,
unique glory that one day, we will all glorify him. And it's to give him worship, to praise him.
And we think about this in eternity, you and I will still be finite beings with finite tongues.
God alone is infinite. And what's more fitting to worship God through eternity? One language and one
style or a clitoscope of cultures and styles and languages all describing God.
in amazing ways in worshiping him. You see, this is the kind of worship that God is after into eternity.
And so this is why God is pursuing the nations. And it's not a pursuit that's driven by how
needy people are or how much compassion or love I feel for people. It's about how worthy is God to be
worshipped. Let me give you one quick analogy to wrap up on. There's a day that I'm,
I had some friends on Facebook who love puzzles. They're involved in ministry, so they have a lot of friends.
And they were building this puzzle, and the puzzle was missing a piece. And it was really funny because as you
looked at their post of this puzzle missing a puzzle piece, all these people were like commenting on
there, I'm praying for you right now and, you know, all those things. It's just very Facebook.
And then a couple weeks later, they found the piece. And then a couple weeks later, they found the piece in
People are hitting the like button. They're praising God. The missing piece has been found. And I had this
thought, you know, if it was your birthday and I decided to give you a puzzle as a gift,
and I knew that one piece was missing. Is this a good gift or a bad gift?
It's such a bad. The kind of misery I'm about to put you through. And here's the thing. It doesn't matter how
that puzzle is, it doesn't matter how many pieces that puzzle has. If it's missing a piece, it's a
bad gift. Think about this way. If God created every nation for his glory to worship him in eternity,
if we get to that place one day and one is missing, is that good worship or bad worship?
It's at least incomplete. And what kind of worship does the holy God deserve? Now here's the other
beautiful thing. This is not a task that actually depends on us. This is a task we're invited into,
but the living God is a missionary God. He will complete it. And he has already spoken in revelation
that there will be people from every tongue and tribe and nation and people in eternity. And what
God speaks about in eternity will first play out in history. And he's invited us as his church
to be part of this endeavor. The only lasting endeavor,
and worthy endeavor that there actually is. Now, not everybody is called to go, but as the body of Christ,
we are all called to be part of this endeavor. In fact, it was Charles Spurgeon, who once said this.
It's the whole job of the whole church to take the whole gospel to the whole world.
It's not the job for some weird people who like to travel and eat strange food. It's not the job. It's not the job of,
people who've been bitten by the travel bug or committed themselves to some deluxe form of Christianity.
God's passion for the nations and his desire to be worshipped by nations is the job of the body of
Christ, period. And so today, like I said, it's not that you would, I'm not guilting anyone.
It's not based on how lovable people are. It's simply based on God's passions and who he is.
So as we get ready to launch a perspective saying, you know, this is just the launch of it.
And this is a small cohort.
It's not a large class.
But you know one thing I'm hoping for is that there will be a representative from every church in there.
And I would love to see at least one person from out west in this cohort as we get ready to launch.
But other than that, here's my question for you this morning.
This is really where I want you to really contemplate this.
Are you blessed?
have you been blessed by God?
If you've been blessed by God, which I would imagine you are,
especially if you are in Christ,
Ephesians say you have been blessed with every spiritual blessing.
And the reality is that God has blessed us in addition to all the spiritual blessings,
because a lot of us have pretty substantial physical blessings as well.
My question for you is this, what's the bottom line of your blessing?
And how has God blessed you that the families of the earth?
earth would be blessed. And so really, that's the question I want you to leave with today is just
contemplate how have you been blessed and how is God's name to be made great because of your blessing.
What I'd like to do as one final time here, I'm going to read Psalm 67 again, and then I'm going to
pray. But I'm going to actually invite you to close your eyes as I read this. And this time,
I've been reading from the New King James Version. This time I'm going to read it actually from the
English Standard Version. It's what I'm going to. It's what I'm most.
most familiar with. But I want to read this as a prayer. And then I want to pray it over you as a
church. Okay? So go ahead and close your eyes and listen to the words of Psalm 67 one more time
as a prayer to God. May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us.
That your way may be known on earth your saving power among all nations. Let the peoples praise you,
O God, let all the peoples praise you. Let the nations be glad and sing for joy for you judge people
with equity and guide the nations upon earth. Let the peoples praise you, O God. Let all the people's praise you.
The earth has yielded its increase. God, our God, shall bless us. God shall bless us. Let all the ends of the earth fear him.
And God, that is our prayer. God, that is our prayer. God, our God, shall bless us. God shall bless us.
today, God, I pray that you would bless out West Church. I pray for each person here that you would
bless them and be gracious to them. And yes, cause your face to shine upon them. But God, I also pray
that we want to put a period there. But God, that through that blessing, your way would be known on earth,
your saving power among all nations. And so take what this church is, this is your body,
and cause them to live for your purposes and to see just that much more what your heart is.
God, cause our heart to resonate with your heart.
That's our prayer today.
We can't generate this in ourselves.
We need it from you.
And so we trust this to you, Lord.
Pray this in the name of Jesus and through your spirit.
Amen.
Amen. Thanks, Tyler.
Give him a hand.