Welcome to Cornerstone Online!

  • We are a community of people experiencing God and connecting with one another like never before in history. Introduce yourself in the chat and let us know where you are joining in from!

 

Next Steps💪

  • Connect with us! If today is your first time joining us or if you have never connected before, you are a VIP! Just click HERE!
  • Follow us on Facebook

 

Come and See || What was Jesus’ Mission?

 

That’s what it is like for many of us if we were asked “What was Jesus’s mission” or why did he come

 

Most would answer – To die on the cross for our sins

  • That not wrong, but its not fully right either

 

There is a danger in thinking this way

  • Makes us believe that His purpose is just to get us to heaven

 

Rescue Christianity

  • The belief that Jesus coming was just to rescue us from going to hell
  • What happens in this life is not at important

Something every believer must understand

Heaven is not the ultimate goal
Luke 4

16 He came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. As usual, he entered the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up to read. 17 The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him, and unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written:

18 The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

20 He then rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. And the eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 He began by saying to them, “Today as you listen, this Scripture has been fulfilled.”

 

All spoken in the present

Nowhere does it say, I just came to die for the sins of the world

 

That’s because Jesus came for a MUCH BIGGER purpose,
Simply put:

Jesus came to Reclaim and Proclaim God’s Kingdom on Earth

  • Reclaim
  • Proclaim

 

To fully understand what that means, we need to look at the larger story and context

  • No more starting the movie halfway

Reclaiming the kingdom

 

We must understand what was lost…

 

God’s purpose was to always rule the Earth ALONGSIDE Humanity

  • Adam and Eve were “priests”
  • They were to go and claim the rest of the world in the name of the Lord
  • Partial creation

 

Garden of Eden = temple. Place where God dwelt

 

Sin separated — a man from Gods presence

 

God chose a specific family to be his “new representatives” to the world

 

The Lord said to Abram:

Genesis 12

1 Go from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.

2 I will make you into a great nation, I will bless you, I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.

3 I will bless those who bless you, I will curse anyone who treats you with contempt, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.

 

God did not choose Abraham just for Abraham’s sake – He was a “NEW” Adam

  • Abraham’s family was supposed to be the NEW people of God
  • The “Law” was not for oppression, but as the visible sign of being God’s people

 

The rest of the OT is the story of this family and their failure to accomplish being Gods representative

  • Pointing forward to this Messiah figure
  • All the while, God plans and keeps secret his plan to come himself in the man Jesus to be the ultimate representative and also the full payment of man’s rebellion
  • Jesus then is not just a way for us to get to heaven, he is the person who will rule the earth as the representation of Gods presence with his people

 

When Jesus showed up, he specifically starts talking about the kingdom of God

 

Luke 4

18 The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

 

So how did Jesus start to reclaim humanity and the world?

  • He Healed
  • He freed
  • He gave hope
  • He gave his life

 

The death and resurrection of Jesus put the literal NAIL IN THE COFFIN on death

 

Adam and Eve’s sin meant that humanity belonged to the kingdom of death

  • Anything separated from God is death

 

But Jesus made a way for us to be part of the Kingdom of life

  • The kingdom we were created for

 

Proclaiming the Kingdom

 

No one here believes that everything is OK in the world right now…

It’s impossible to miss

 

Our world is full of:

  • Hatred
  • Mistrust
  • Anger
  • Death
  • Injustice
  • Poverty
  • Disease

 

But Jesus at the beginning of His ministry says this…

 

Mark 1:15

15 “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!”

 

This leaves us with two options:

  • Either Jesus was a madman and we have been following the wrong guy
  • He was starting something that he wants us to take part in

 

Earlier we said this:

God’s purpose was to always rule the Earth ALONGSIDE Humanity

 

We can say it a different way

God’s purpose is to rule the Earth ALONGSIDE Humanity

 

To understand how this is accomplished, we need to talk about temples…

 

Temples then and now

 

Temple represented the place where heaven and earth met

God’s space and our space

 

Garden of Eden was a temple

  • Adam and Eve were removed from God’s presence
  • Sin Separated

 

God met with Israel, His people, he did so in a temples
But temples have problems

  • They are difficult to move
  • They require special priests
  • People become more about the building than who its for

 

Temples will not help reclaim this world to its former glory

 

Temples do not bring God’s kingdom to the whole world

 

1 Corinthians 6

18 Flee sexual immorality! Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the person who is sexually immoral sins against his own body. 19 Don’t you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20 for you were bought at a price. So glorify God with your body.

 

As Temples of God’s Spirit, we reclaim the world for God’s kingdom when we Proclaim the good news of Jesus

 

Can’t be a temple of two kingdoms

Where is your allegiance?

 

How we Reclaim like Jesus: Take back (I’m taking it back!)

 

Take back what the enemy has stolen from you

  • Joy
  • Peace
  • purpose
  • identity
  • Past
  • You Family
  • Future

 

How we Proclaim like Jesus:

 

Announce the Good news of God’s kingdom to

  • Your friends
  • Your neighbors
  • Your Coworkers
  • Your Kids
  • Your grandkids

 

Here is your take-home today

  1. Don’t be shocked at a world that is broken. It’s exactly what happens when things are separated from God
  2. Don’t take part in “Rescue Christianity”, but instead “Reclaiming Christianity
  3. Own the fact that YOU are a temple of God’s Holy Spirit. Where you go is holy ground and your job is to take back what sin and death have stolen

Email my notes