Five-Fold Ministry Part 5: Imparting the Word, Impacting the World

This series on the five-fold ministry is based off my handwritten notes, which I took as I attended a church conference on this topic in Mar 2024.

Text: Luke 24:44-49

Although five-fold ministries in Eph 4:11-13 can be different from each other, they share a common goal: how can the Word be devoted and spread
We need to not only receive, but be devoted
We must firmly believe in God’s word: have confidence and surety
Don’t challenge and doubt His word
And we must also spread His word
We must preach the word of God too in faith and confidence
As we preach God’s word, we must be faithful in preparing
We need to guard against twisting and stretching God’s word
Another thing is the burden of mission
In the book of Acts, there are people who come and turn the church upside down
But today, are we a church that turn the Word upside down
v44-48: When Jesus was preaching and teaching them, their hearts were on fire
When we are explaining the word of God, are we explaining the truth, is His Holy Spirit with us, His anointing with us
May every time we preach: their hearts would be burning
v44-48: Jesus said to them, this is what I told you when I was with you, He opened their mind so they would understand the scripture. This is what is written Messiah crucified and rise on the third day
v49: I’m going to send to you what my Father promised, but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high
From these six verses, we can find some principles on preaching
These principles are consistently backed up in Acts, as observed in the preaching of Peter, Philips, Stephen

Some principles on preaching:

Scripture based:

In v44, Jesus used the scriptures to open the hearts of disciples: Law of Moses, Prophets
How can we base on our preaching on the truth of God: when He puts a scripture on our hearts, we need to look at it seriously and preach from it
It could just be word, a sentence, a verse, but let the scripture be the basis in preaching the word
And God will bless us

Be Christ centered:

As Jesus was explaining the Messiah, he said this is what is written the Messiah will suffer and rise on the third day, and repentance for forgiveness of sins will be preached to all nations
When we look into the book of Acts, every preaching is about Jesus
E.g; As He fulfilled all the prophecies from OT, and three years all His miracles and preaching
Every preaching from the book of Acts, at least 30 sermons
And their common theme: surrounding about Jesus, and let Christ be the center
Thus every of our preaching, must mention Jesus
When we preach Christ, God will bless our ministries
In every sermon, we must ask ourselves: how can we put Jesus finished work in this message

Gospel driven:

Objective is to bring people to Jesus, even in all sermons in Acts
As preaches sometimes we can convey very well, but may not be good listeners
But we need to be fed from others too
Our Bible students will be tomorrow teachers, if they don’t hear properly they will go astray when preachers

Spirit empowered:

v49: I’m going to send you what my Father has promised but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high
We need the Holy Spirit, the anointing, be filled with it
This is constantly repeated in the text to the disciples who already believed in Christ, so the baptism of Holy Spirit is after they believed, and it’s important
The disciples lack the Holy Spirit baptism to be effective for Christ
It can happen again too
And we can see when a person is filled with Holy Spirit
We need the Spirit empowerment in our preaching
We not only need equipping, but empowerment filled with strength to do the work of God

Nations as Focus:

Boldness to witness:

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