Love Your Church - Week 9 - Chapter 8
CHAPTER 8 — SENDING: CONTINUING THE MISSION AND PLANTING HEALTHY CHURCHES
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Consider what a grand story you are part of. The unfolding narrative of God gathering a people for himself stretches from Jerusalem through Antioch and Rome and across twenty centuries to your local church. The book of Acts ends with Paul under house arrest in Rome — a cliffhanger. If you were reading a novel with such an unresolved ending, you might think a chapter was missing. You would be right: the story is still in progress. The church today is living out what we might call Acts 29. The same Spirit who moved in Jerusalem and Antioch and Corinth is moving now, in the churches where you live. The same commission — to make disciples of all nations — has not been revoked. Every generation of the church has been entrusted with the same task: advance the mission, plant healthy churches, send workers into the harvest.
The church at Antioch offers an early and formative model. It was in Antioch that disciples were first called “Christians” — not a name they chose, but one given by unbelieving neighbours who observed that these believers identified so thoroughly with Jesus that they seemed like little Christs. That identity produced both mercy and mission. Mercy ministry meets needs through practical deeds — the Antioch church gave generously to believers elsewhere during a famine, demonstrating that the gospel had genuinely transformed their relationship to money and neighbour. The gospel that unites believers across economic lines — that makes rich and poor genuinely one family — produces generosity as its natural fruit. Your church can reflect this same model through ministry to orphans, widows, refugees, prisoners, the sick, the hungry, and the oppressed.
When it comes to sending, the church at Antioch also set the pattern: while they were worshiping and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them” (Acts 13:2). The church fasted and prayed over them, then sent them off. Missionaries are directed by the Spirit and sent and supported by the church. The sending is as essential as the going. Be a Barnabas — when you see the Lord working through fellow believers, speak words of life-giving encouragement. When you see someone flourish in ministry, say so, tell others, champion their gifting. Get involved in church planting through prayer, giving, support, or going.
Questions - SENDING Read Acts 11 v 19-30; 13 v 1-3
1. How do we see God at work through people as the Antioch church is established (11 v 19-25)?
2. What different roles do Barnabas and Saul play?
3. What attitude do the Antioch Christians have toward other churches, toward Saul and Barnabas, toward unreached people, and toward God himself? What does this teach you as a local church today?
4. How outward-looking are you as a church? What would be one step you could take to grow in this area together?
5. In your church, what could you do to follow the example of Barnabas? How could you encourage others to do the same?
6. What will you pray for your church, your community, and the world in the light of this passage?
01/09/2026