Ethos | Kingdom Apprenticeship | Matthew 4:12-23 | Week 1

Over the next few weeks, we're going to be talking about what type of community "that brand new world" starts to give birth to.  What type of community it starts to form.   We're calling this series "Ethos."  Ethos is a Greek word that means values, the character of something.  It also means things that we believe and things that we dream about, things that we hope for, things that we plead with God for.  Over the next eight weeks, we're going to take a step back and go, God, who are you shaping us to become, and what are you shaping us to do, and what are the things that we hold dear, and what are the dreams that we would say, collectively together, we have about the way that you would use this little community of faith to make a massive difference in your world?  That's where we're going over the next few weeks.

I thought we would start where Jesus starts.  That's never a bad idea, right?  To ask so, Jesus, where do you start?  Jesus, what are you up to?  Jesus, how are you at work?  We're starting with a pop quiz.  What did Jesus talk about most?  If we were to read through the gospels and take a note every time Jesus talked about a theme, what would he have talked about most?  A.  Love    B.  Heaven/Hell    C.  The Kingdom of God    D.  Money    Interesting.  We have a pretty wide-swath of answers.  Let me let Jesus answer that question for us.  If you have your Bible, open to Matthew 4:12-17.  In Matthew 4, Jesus is just coming on the scene.  If you know anything about the gospel of Matthew, Matthew wants to walk us through the birth narrative---tells us how Jesus was born and focuses primarily on Joseph and the courage Joseph had to have.  Chapter 3 is Jesus's baptism.  Chapter 4 is Jesus getting led out into the desert to be tempted by the enemy.  Half way through chapter 4, Jesus comes on the scene to publicly begin teaching and ministering to people, and listen to what he says:  When Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he withdrew to Galilee.  Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali----to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah: "Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali, the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordon, Galilee of the Gentiles----the people living in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned."  From that time on Jesus began to preach, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near..."