The Great Commission: A Command Half Done

And lord, but lord, we pray that you would help these things that we have learned as we’ve heard them, that they would sink down deep into our hearts and profoundly affect us. Make us into true disciples of the lord Jesus Christ. And so lord, we ask your blessing one more time as we look in the book of Matthew and the great commission. Please, open the eyes of our understanding and give us wisdom.

Lord, teach us. We pray. Help me to say the things that you want your people to to learn and to know. Help us all to sit as it were at the feet of the lord Jesus to hear his word. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Verse number 18, and Jesus came and spake unto them saying, all power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.

Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father and of the son and of the holy ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you and lo, I am with you all way even unto the end of the world. Amen. Now, you would go to Mark 16, Mark chapter 16.

Mark 16 verse number 15, and just as a reminder, remember that these four passages we’re reading are not accounts of the same event. They are actually different events based upon the the context and the the settings of each one of them. Mark 16 verse 15, he said unto them, go you into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. Preach the gospel to every creature.

Now, if you would look at Luke chapter 24, Luke 24, Luke 24 verse number 46, And said unto them, thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem, and ye are witnesses of these things. And finally, we go to Acts chapter one.

Acts chapter one. Verse seven. Acts one verse seven, and he said unto them, it is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the father hath put in his own power, but you shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.

Now each one of these accounts of the Great Commission emphasizes a different thing, and they although they all overlap in some way, fashion, or form. For instance, two of them say go, the other two do not say go. Two of them say preach and the other two do not say preach. One of them says, witness, one of them says teach, but there’s one thing that’s common to all four of them and I’ll I’ll cover this at the very end, but there’s one thing that’s common to all four, which is the mention of all nations or an equivalent of that, every creature, all nations, or uttermost part of the earth, all referring to who it is that is the target of the great commission.

But the, as I said, the emphasis in all four of these accounts is a little bit different. We’ll get to Matthew in a minute, but Mark emphasizes when he says, preach the gospel to every creature, Mark emphasizes the duty of the believer to proclaim the gospel. Regardless of how it is received. In other words, it is our duty whether it’s whether it is whether the gospel is received or not received, whether it is rejected, it is the duty of the believer to preach the gospel regardless of that. So, even if nobody believes it, even if nobody nobody receives the gospel, yet it is our duty to preach it. Yes. And listen, let me say this and you’ll see more about this in just a minute. I think I hope hopefully much more clearly but you do not have to be a preacher to preach the gospel. Amen. It just means to proclaim it. It’s, you don’t, you don’t, we we kinda get hung up on this preacher thing. I just wanna tell you, we we really do get hung up on it. And we think this is, you know, a separate class of citizens or something. It is not it is not that way.

Every person, man and woman is a preacher, can be a preacher of the gospel, one who proclaims the gospel. I know that’s that’s almost like a curse word but we’re not talking about church leadership. We’re not talking about the role of a pastor or deacon. We’re just talking about someone who bears the gospel, an evangelist and so and so that’s a man or a woman. We see women doing it in scripture all the time and then the book, so Mark emphasizes the duty of proclamation. Luke emphasizes the response that is demanded from the individual hearer because it says, and that repentance and remission of sin should be preached in his name. So, you have the gospel and that is what god has done, right? That is the the the gospel message is what god has done and without the gospel message, what Christ has done, you can tell people to to call upon the lord all day long and it’s to no avail. It’s vain because there is no sacrifice. There is no propitiation And so, but once you have the gospel, once once you have the gospel message, the response that is demanded from the hearer is repentance and faith, which leads to remission of sins, forgiveness.

And so Luke emphasizes that part of the great commission. And then we go to the book of Acts and the book of Acts emphasizes the evangelists relationship to the message. And in acts, it uniquely says that we are witnesses of Christ. And that’s a different word. That’s not preaching. That is we’re bearing witness. We’re testifying to what Christ has done. Right? And that that’s a little bit different than preaching the gospel. That’s very personal.

What Christ has done on the cross? Yes, but through the cross, what he has done to me, what he has done to you. The fact, in other words, as we saw last week, the fact of Christ resurrection should be evident in our own new life, resurrected life. And then we come to Matthew. What does Matthew emphasize? So, let’s go back there because that’s where we’re gonna spend our time.

Matthew 28. Look at verse number 19. Go you therefore and teach all nations. Now, you you’ll see in verse number 19, the word baptizing and you’ll see in verse 20, teaching. Now, first of all, I wanna point out that there’s a little bit of there’s a little bit of cause or reason to be a a little bit confused. How many of you have ever read verses nineteen and twenty and saw have seen the word teach in 19 and see the word teaching in 20 and thought, why is that repeated?

Has anybody ever thought maybe I’m maybe I’m the only one but I I’ve thought that for a long time. Why does it say teach twice? Why couldn’t we just say it once? But we’re actually talking about two different things which I hope you’ll see in just a minute but in verse 19 of the great commission, the word go, the words go and teach are the main verbs. Though those verbs are in are the imperatives.

And then we find the word baptizing and the word teaching, if you know your grammar, those are participles. In other words, they are verbs that are acting like like, actually like adverbs. In other words, teaching and baptizing and teaching are actually modifying and telling us how we do the first word, the first imperative which is teach. Go you therefore and teach all nations. Baptizing and teaching is the way that is accomplished.

We’ll see that in just a minute. So, there are two teaches here which can be a a source of confusion and so, I want to concentrate on the first teach in verse 19. Teach all nations. Now, what’s interesting about this word teach is that it is directly related to the word disciple. Let me give you an illustration of what I mean. If I were to say to you, like Sam and Anna have a baby, they have a baby, the most beautiful baby, Madeline of course. But Sam and Anna have a baby, but if you were to have an adult, say you had a teenage son like Isaiah, okay, that would be a good example, and somebody coddled him and took it easy on him and all that like you are not supposed to do with a teenage boy, and you would say, don’t baby him, right? What am I doing? I’m taking that noun, baby, and I’m making it into a verb.

So, I’m doing something with the noun, right? Is that and and we do this all the time. We do the we we we do this frequently, frequently and we just switch them between nouns and verbs all the time and that’s exactly what we have here. Except it’s just a different word. The root the key the root of this this first word teach is the word disciple but disciple is a noun. So, what what is what they do is they take the noun and they make it into a verb and that’s what the word means.

In other words, we might say and I hesitate to say it like this, this word, this first word teach means to disciple but even that is a little bit deceptive. Even that is a little bit kind of off the mark or not the full picture.

And so here’s here’s here’s the definition I want to give to you and I think it’s I I think it’s it will be helpful to us. The first word teach as it relates to the word disciple means this, it means everything that is required to take a person from an unbeliever to a person who is a personal disciple of Jesus Christ. That’s all kind of encompassed in this first word teach. You say, it just says teach. Well, here here’s why we have to understand that. We have to understand the connection with the word disciple because that’s that’s the whole definition. It is not just a matter of sitting in a classroom being fed information because sometimes we use the word teach.

Now, for and the best example of this is the lord Jesus himself. The lord had disciples, did he not? Did the Lord teach his disciples? Of course, he taught his disciples. But when the Lord taught his disciples, was it only in a classroom? No. We would say that the the the teaching of Christ to his disciples when he was discipling them was not just let’s go through the doctrines of the Bible, it and that was all in there, but that was not the sum total of it. It was much much more than that, was it not?

When the lord discipled his disciples, when he taught his disciples, they were with him. They followed him physically, right? He he commissioned them to do work for him. He corrected them. He held them account to account. He gave them accountability. He he taught, of course, taught them doctrines and truths but he also taught them things, character things that came from him and they observed his life and he laid down an example for them. You know what? All of that is encompassed in the word disciple.

To be a disciple is not someone who learns a lesson. To be a disciple is to become a learner and that is all encompassing and that is all wrapped up in this word teach. So, in verse number 19, here’s what the lord is saying to kind of summarize it. The lord is saying to the believer, to the church, which we’ll see in a minute, Go you therefore and turn people from unbeliever to a full, mature, personal disciple of Jesus Christ. That’s all encompassed in the word. In other words, they at the... What is being focused on here, going back to what I said earlier about the different focus of each one of the great commissions, the emphasis and the focus in Matthew is not on the preaching, it’s not on the response, it’s not on the relationship to the message like in Acts, the emphasis in Matthew is on the end goal.

Now get that. The emphasis in Matthew when he says, go ye therefore and teach all nations is on the end goal. What is the product? The product is a disciple, Is a disciple with everything that includes. With everything that includes.

Acts 14 verse 31 says this, fourteen twenty one, and when they had preached the gospel to that city and had taught many. Notice, it says, they returned again to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch. That’s the same word. They and had taught many, but notice, it actually gives a little bit of a distinction between preach the gospel. It says, in in Acts 14, it says, they preach the gospel, that’s the proclamation, and that implies that there were some believers like Mark says, preach the gospel to every creature, he that believeth. It goes on to say, well, here, they preach the gospel, they proclaimed, but that’s different than teaching them. But there were some who believed and they brought those people in and sought to instruct those people in every way possible to produce a product of a mature personal disciple of Jesus Christ in his own right. It’s in a way, it’s kind of like replication.

Not just of a believer but of a disciple and there is a distinction. There is a distinction. Look if you would briefly at Acts chapter one. Acts chapter one.

Acts one verse number 15. And in those days, Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples and said, I know, I just want to show you that one word. He stood up in the midst of the what? Disciples. Look at in Acts chapter 11.

Verse 26. Acts 11 verse 26. And when he had found him, this is Barnabas, when he had found Saul of Tarsus, he brought him unto Antioch, and it came to pass that a whole year they assembled themselves with the church and taught much people, and the, what does it say? Disciples were called Christians first in Antioch. So this is the first time Christian is mentioned in the Bible.

And it was not named of the of the disciples of themselves, it was named by others calling them that, which is an honor, although it wasn’t intended to be. Did you know that the preferred word to describe a believer in the book of Acts is not believer, is disciple. That is the most common way to refer to a Christian in the book of Acts. Not Christian, not believer, but disciple because that means more than believer.

It means more than believer. Here’s why this is important. As it as it as it relates to the great commission, when the lord says, go ye therefore and teach all nations, That is turn an unbeliever, turn unbelievers into full, mature, personal disciples of Christ.

That is more, there is more to the great commission than just giving the gospel. Now, this morning, I tried to emphasize and tried to to press the question of, are we engaging on purpose, intentionally, actively trying to give the gospel to people? And that is something that the great commission doesn’t detail us to do. You can’t have, you can’t end up with a disciple as the end goal if you don’t give the gospel to people as we saw in Acts 14. They preached the gospel and taught many.

But it cannot stop there either. It can’t stop there either. There is more to fulfilling the great commission than giving the gospel people to people and this word teach teach them, go you therefore and teach all nations indicates more. It is not. I repeat, it is not just about getting a person to believe on the lord Jesus Christ. That is not the goal. That is the that is the the the door opening.

But that is not the end. And if we stop there, we have we have failed. We have fallen short of full fulfillment of the great commission. Because the goal in Matthew is the product of a mature disciple of Christ.

And so we make a mistake if we describe the great commission only as an effort to get people saved and that is one, listen, that is one mistake that a lot, a lot of people and a lot of churches make. They put a lot of effort into getting people saved and that’s good and that’s necessary. It’s not bad and by any means but it is also not complete.

It includes everything else that is required to arrive at the end goal of a person being an actual disciple of Christ. It includes a disciple, the word disciple includes learning, it includes following, it includes imitating, it includes identifying with the Lord Jesus in every way that that that that that word means and it also includes suffering with the lord Jesus. Now, just just turn your ears on a second. I wanna read a few passages of scripture that are related to being a disciple and I want you to listen to what I want you to to ask yourself, now, what does this passage indicate about what it means to be a disciple?

Matthew eight says this, and a certain scribe came and said unto him, master, I will follow thee, discipleship, right? Withersoever thou goest, and Jesus say it unto him, the foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the son of man hath not where to lay his head. And another of his disciples said unto him, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. And but Jesus said unto him, follow me and let the dead bury their dead.

What is he calling them to? Not to sit in a classroom and learn doctrine. He’s calling them to follow him and with that comes suffering and with that comes sacrifice and that’s also part of being a disciple of Christ. Does it not? Matthew 10 says this, the disciple is not above his master nor the servant above his lord. It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master and the servant as his lord. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more shall they call them of the household?

Which is to say, identification. They have they have mocked and ridiculed and slandered the lord Jesus. They’re going to also slander the disciples of Jesus. Those who follow him and imitate him. That’s also part of discipleship. Matthew 16, listen to this, verse 24. Then said Jesus unto his disciples, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

You know what you have in that? You have an example. The lord Jesus is teaching his disciples what it means to be a disciple by by setting out himself as the example. We already covered that, right? Where the lord lifted his cross. And went to Golgotha and that was an example for that for that man or that woman who would follow the lord Jesus that is not just about learning doctrines, being a disciple means lifting your cross and going after Christ.

I don’t know about you but it seems it’s becoming clear that being a disciple is a lot more than just what you know. Is it not? Luke 14 says this, if any man will come after me and hate not his father and mother and wife and children and brethren and sisters, yea, in his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.

Putting putting Christ as the first place, supreme, utterly, absolutely supreme. That’s part of being a disciple. And whosoever does not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. He goes on to say, so likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath. He cannot be my disciple which is to the lord is laying down requirements for discipleship. John 13 verse 15, for I have given you an example that you should do as I have done unto you. What’s the context of John 13?

Trivia? Washing of the disciples’ feet. So not only was it carrying crosses, following his pattern, listening to his words, doing what he does, obeying his instruction, mimicking him, developing the character that the Lord Jesus Christ had, that’s all part of being a disciple, but it also includes humbling yourself, serving others, washing feet.

He says, this is the example I’ve given you. This is how you are a learner of me. This is what it means to be a disciple. Now, all of that put together, you know what that tells us? That is not just preaching the gospel.

A person, we preach the gospel and a person comes to Christ and they put, they repent of of their sin and they trust in Jesus at that instant, they are a believer. Amen. But if they stay only at that place, we have not arrived at the goal and the goal is not just to have a believer but for that believer to grow into a disciple who is all of the things I just read. A person who is willing to put Christ at the supreme place in his life, whose life is characterized by the character of Christ, who who lifts his cross and is willing to endure any suffering in order to live for Christ.

Who is willing to endure any ridicule for Christ, who is willing to live a life that is holy no matter what others think for Christ. Who is no matter what and under any circumstance will never turn away from Christ. That is the goal. The great commit. That’s that’s a that’s a big task. Now, here’s the thing I want you to see though.

What the Lord says in the Great Commission in Matthew 28 is not directed at that disciple. It’s directed at us as a church. In other words, it is our job, it is our command to bring people to that point.

It’s more than evangelism. Now this morning, I told you that it’s our duty to give the gospel to people. It’s our duty to actively preach the truth to people and call them to repentance and faith, right? Yes. But just as it is our duty to do that to those who are lost, in the same way it is also our duty as a believer, as a disciple ourselves to bring believers along to the point that they are themselves also disciples.

Evangelism is your duty and my duty and bringing someone along to the point that they are a disciple is also in the same measure our duty for it’s the same command.

Now look if you would back at Matthew 28. Matthew 28 verse number 19 says this, go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I’ve commanded you. Okay, now, hold on a second. So, the go is the imperative, the teach is the imperative, but baptizing and teaching them to observe all things, those who are supportive.

Those two, in other words, they point to the the first teach as to the means how you take an unbeliever and you bring them along to the point that they are actually a disciple and obviously, from the other great commission accounts we have, we we give them the gospel and they believe that. That that’s step number one. You can’t be a disciple without being a believer, right? So, that’s step one but step two, on the path to becoming a disciple is to baptize them.

Now, I’m gonna I’m gonna really mess you up right now. Did you know there’s nowhere in the Bible that says that only the preacher can baptize people? In fact, right here, Christ commands his disciples to baptize people.

Okay? Furthermore, after they get baptized and they move along to there so let me say, there might be a day that I call on one of you to help me baptize somebody. There might be a day that I’m sick and you might need to baptize somebody.

And that’s okay. It’s so long as it’s scriptural baptism. Right? It’s obedience. It’s obedience. Why do we baptize? Right here. This is the reason we baptize people. Okay, so they’ve they believed. They’re on the road to discipleship now and it’s our duty as a church and as believers and as disciples ourselves to bring them along and help them to grow and become disciples so they get baptized which is the first step of obedience after their faith. Now, it’s time to teach them to observe all things. Boy, that’s a that’s a that’s a mouthful.

In fact, that’s like I said this morning, that’s what we’re looking at right now. The very thing we’re doing right now is we are learning one of the commands of Christ that is to be passed to us that we are then to pass to others. So, in this teaching them to observe all things, there’s a there’s a a perpetuity. There’s a there’s a passing along the command.

I am a disciple. I have learned I must obey the great commission and now, this person is coming along. They need to learn that as a disciple, they have to obey the great commission and then disciple and preach the gospel and then disciple others and so it perpetuates. You see? That’s how it’s supposed to be. It is not just about get them saved, you know, get them saved and then send them on their way. How are they going to then preach the gospel to the next generation?

You know, those of you that are in here that have been saved, put your faith in Christ, remember, you’re not there anymore. To some degree or another, you have yourself become a disciple, right?

You’ve been baptized. That’s why you’re a member of our church. You have begun to grow. You have made decisions in your life to follow Christ and to mimic his ways, right? You have decided. You have you have made decisions to obey the lord Jesus. You have tried to start witnessing to your neighbors or to your friends or or to strangers. You have done all of those things.

You have become a disciple yourself. But we must replicate that. That’s what the great commission is all about. About turning unbelievers into disciples. This is a work that is not just for the church but is for the believer. No, this is a work that is not just for the preacher but it is for the church and it is for the believer. Look if you would at at verse number 16.

Then, the 11 disciples went away into Galilee. Verse 18, and Jesus came and spake unto them, who’s he, who is the audience of our lord’s commission? The 11 disciples. You might look at that and you might think, well, well, that’s preachers, right? The preachers are the ones who’s supposed to do it but I want you to, I want to remind you of something. The great commit about the great commission.

When the lord, although the lord spoke this to 11 disciples, you have to remember one thing. First of all, the 11 disciples were the beginnings of the church of the living god, what it is today. All believers everywhere. This is the beginning. They were the representatives of all what would be all believers. They because they were the personal show personally chosen disciples of Jesus Christ, okay? That’s number one. Number two, this command was not intended just for those 11 men.

First of all, because they were commanded to tell others to teach them to observe all things whatsoever ever I’ve commanded you, which tells us those 11 were to tell to teach the ones that came after them who were then to teach ones that came after them and so on. So it wasn’t just for them. Not only that, they couldn’t have done what Jesus commanded. Why not? Because he says, you’re to do this until the end of the world.

Their life’s not gonna last that long, then it has to be for somebody else. Not only that, but he says, go into all the world, all nations. How are they going to do that? It’s not just for them. They represent the church, right? They represent us. The command is not just for the 11. So, we can’t say, look, this is just for the preacher. Actually, the Great Commission is for the Christian.

The Great Commission is for the church. You know what, and as the body of Christ, each one of us is a part, each one of us is a hand, or a foot, or an arm, or an eye, or whatever. Every one of us has a role. The role is different. Some are missionaries, some are pastors, some are teachers, some have gifts of music, some have gifts of of instruction and faith and giving it and all these other ways but everyone of us as members of the body of Christ has a role to play in getting the gospel to others. Number one, and then bringing people believers into being a disciple which is what Matthew 28 is talking about.

Everyone of us has a role to play in that. Now, this is a work for the church. This is a work not for the clergy, not for the ordained, but for the disciple.

At this point, notice what verse 16 says, what does it say? Then the 11 what? Disciples. They’re not ordained? Now you can say, well they were personally chosen by Jesus, okay, I get that, right, I get that, but they were unique in history.

But you know what they are at their core? Same as you. They’re a disciple. They’re a disciple. This command is given to the church. It is the work and the mission of the church.

But the thing I want us to see is that this command includes, as we said earlier, it includes not only evangelism, it is not only the mandate for evangelism but it’s also the mandate for everything that comes after evangelism that results in a disciple.

Brothers and sisters, listen, this is what I’m telling you right now, this probably the most important thing I’m gonna say tonight. Probably the most neglected, it’s a tough decision, but probably one of the most neglected duties of a church when it comes to the Great Commission starts when a person believes. It’s it starts there. It’s everything after that point that grows people up to where they end up as a disciple. That is neglected.

We think, well, we’re we’re just got... Hear hear me now, I’m not against this. Okay, I’m not against this, but we have to be careful here not to go to an extreme. We say, well, we’ll have a discipleship program. We’ll have a twelve week program they go through and they’ll go through the doctrines of the Bible. Hear me, that is good, but that is not the sum total of what we’re reading here.

A person can go through that and still wreck their life and still live in a way that is ungodly and still not learn to obey the commands of Christ. That is totally and absolutely possible and it does happen. There is more to it and and what we’ve done is we’ve kind of programmatized what is supposed to be very personal and hands on. The disciples of Jesus Christ, the 12 disciples he he picked, lived with him, walked with him, observed him, saw his example, did what he did, and and and learned as they went.

He held them to account. He taught them personally. Not not just says, here’s a book, fill in the blanks. No, he taught them personally and brought them up along. It took time but he did it. That’s discipleship.

And you and I, as disciples ourselves, have an obligation from the great commission to find those people that are believers who need to grow and to help them along and to bring them under your wing and to teach them and spend time with them and set an example for them and to exhibit your face so that they can see it so they they can catch it.

And so help these people and that means helping them with decisions they have to make about their life and helping them deal with problems and and bringing them up along. This is the neglected thing. Church, listen, church in America is basically, you come, you sit, you listen, you leave and what actually the lord wants us to do following his pattern is he wants us to get to know each other and to bring those who are mature, to bring the less mature under their wing and say, come, spend some time with me. Let’s talk. Let’s pray. Let’s let’s go through this decision. Let’s let’s help you figure out who you’re gonna marry and and what decisions you’re gonna make and how you’re gonna serve god and let me show you how to get these these sins out of your life and let me show you how this is going to hurt you or or you know, and on and on and and actually bring up.

Remember, to go toward that end goal. This is so grossly neglected. It has been it has been formalized into books that we expect people to go through and think, well, now they’re a disciple. No, they went through a book but that that has no real relationship to being a disciple.

Let me show you this. Look at Titus chapter two. Titus chapter two. Titus two verse two. The aged women likewise, that they be in behavior as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things, that they may teach the young women. Now, this is not teaching doctrine. What does it say? Teach the young women to be something. You see this? This is character.

This is example, right? This is values. This is not book learning. They teach young, the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, keepers at home. I know we get bogged down in some of the details of this, but every part of this list is supposed to be what an older mature disciple, a woman disciple of Christ is discipling and teaching and bringing somebody along, a younger woman who’s less mature to do these things.

Obedient to their own husbands that the word of god be not blasphemed. Verse six, young men likewise, notice the word likewise, exhort to be sober minded in all good things showing thyself a pattern of good works, in doctrine showing uncorruptness, gravity, sincerity, sound speech that cannot be condemned, that he that is of the contrary part may be ashamed, having no evil thing to say unto you. Look at verse one, but speak thou the things which you become sound doctrine that the aged men be sober, grave, temperate, sound in faith, in charity, in patience, and then it jumps down to verse six, exhort the young men to be sober minded. You know, you see the pattern, older, younger, older, younger. You see that? Both for the women and the men.

Listen, where is, where are the where are the mature disciples that are saying, hey, I’m going to stick my neck out there and obey the great commission and help some younger, less mature people grow up. I know it says, aged women and you know, some of us like Rico, oh, you know, I don’t want be that person but listen, all that means is older. It doesn’t mean you’re, it doesn’t mean you’re ancient.

This could be somebody who’s just further along. You don’t have to be a 100 to, well it says age it, so that’s over a 100, so I can’t do that, I mean, come on. But the point is, this is the practical outworking of the Great Commission. The more mature disciples helping, the less mature disciples in a practical way, in a personal life to life way, the way our Lord did it.

Look if you would at two Timothy chapter two, second Timothy, we’re gonna go backward in the Bible a little bit. Second Timothy chapter two verse two. And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men who shall be able to teach others also. Do you see the great commission in that? Who shall be able to teach others also? That’s the perpetuity.

That’s Matthew twenty eight twenty. Teaching them to observe all things. See how it’s being passed along? Look at Philippians chapter two. Philippians chapter two. Philippians chapter two verse number 22 or 22. Let me look at my notes here. Yeah, that’s it. Philippians two verse number 22, speaking of Timothy, Paul says this, but ye know the proof of him that as a son with the Father, he hath served with me in the gospel.

You see this pattern? Have you ever invited somebody to come pray with you? Or invited somebody to come evangelize with you? Invited somebody to take part in a ministry that you do? Have you ever thought about maybe reaching out to somebody and say, hey, go have lunch, let’s go have dinner and trying to help them in their faith, in their walk, in their character, in their service, in their decisions.

You say, that’s awkward. Listen, the reason it’s awkward is because we have been absolutely programmed wrong. We’ve been programmed that we’re supposed to have a hard division between church life and regular life. And there is to be no such division.

Our life is supposed to be an extension of our discipleship as a disciple of Christ, which is then perpetuated to others. We ought to have people in our personal life. We ought to have people in our home. We ought to have people that are under our wing that say, come come along with me. Let’s talk. Let’s go. Let’s go do something. Let’s serve God together.

Look at Acts 18. Acts 18. This is another example where you see this in action. It doesn’t explicitly say it, but it’s obvious. Acts 18, look if you would at verse number 24.

And a certain Jew named Apollos born at Alexandria, an eloquent man and a mighty in the scriptures came to Ephesus. This man was instructed in the way of the Lord and being fervent in the spirit, he spake and taught diligently the things of the lord knowing only the the baptism of John. So, there’s a there’s a gap here. And he began to speak boldly in the synagogue whom when Aquila and Priscilla had heard, look, notice what they did, took him, they took him unto them.

See that? They opened their life to this person, said come, come in our shadow, You do this with humility, this is not like, you know, I’m better than you, so you need to listen to me. They took him unto them and expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly. And when he was disposed to pass into Achaia, the brethren wrote exhorting the disciples to receive him, who when he was come, notice, helped them. This is the new believer slash disciple as a result of the the obedience to the great commission by Aquila and Priscilla, who is now helping the church which had believed through grace. For he mightily convinced the Jews in that publicly showing that the scriptures by the scriptures that Jesus was Christ. What has happened in those few verses? What has happened to Apollos? He is he is started as an unbeliever, right? Someone who did not have the full truth and he has been taken in that short period of time, he is now a bold witness, a disciple in his own right, the great commission has been fulfilled.

Why? Because a couple, Aquila and Priscilla, a married couple who are themselves disciples of Christ said, hey, come over to my house, I wanna talk to you, I wanna help you. I wanna be your friend. I want to show you some things. I want to help you grow and help you live for god.

Now go back to Matthew 28 and we’ll close. The last thing I’ll tell you is the point I’ll make is about the nature of the great commission. Sometimes people read verse number 19 and it says, go ye therefore and teach all nations, and when we hear the word nation, some people have kind of latched onto that and they’ve thought of countries like Somalia or The Czech Republic or Russia, but the word nation doesn’t refer to a, that’s called a nation state.

It doesn’t refer to political boundaries, it refers to peoples, races of people, like Polish people or Russians or Irish or whatever, whatever group. The Lord wants every one of them evangelized, but not only that, He wants every one of them to be brought into discipleship.

Now, the problem with that is sometimes people have read this and they kind of read a a social or a political goal or agenda into the great commission but the great commission is not is is not about is not about Christianizing countries. And turning their political system from communism to Christianity or turning their political system of of idolatrous Rome to because we all know that that Christian Rome was no better than idolatrous Rome.

Once it was Christianized, what is in focus, what is in view, and the nature of the great commission is about having individuals turn from unbelievers to believers who then become disciples. And we see that because we’re told in Matthew 28 that that that we teach them to become disciples. In Mark, it tells us to preach the gospel. In Luke, it tells us that repentance and remission of sins should be preached.

All of those things indicate all of those things point to the nature of the great commission is not being political, not being social, it’s not about Christianizing anything, it’s about, it’s about individual people’s relationship to god.

And that’s exactly what we see the apostles in the book of Acts do. They viewed their their mission as not to overthrow or or alter anything in Rome. If that happened because people believe the gospel, it happened because people believe the gospel is a byproduct but their goal, their focus was to save the souls of the people that they were speaking to. The end, every individual, every creature, wasn’t to necessarily bring about national conversion of the countries to to some form of Christianity but to make believers and followers of the lord Jesus Christ within those countries. Now, what I’m saying to you might sound like a distinction without a difference but there is an actual difference because it speaks to the goal of the great commission.

You see, the goal of the great commission is not political or social. Or national, the goal of the Great Commission is spiritual and you can tell that from each part of it that’s expressed.

It’s not a temporal goal, it’s not a political goal, and we know that the Gospel does have effect on all layers of society. I mean, you can’t have people believing the Gospel and it not affects stuff. In fact, I would say if it doesn’t affect stuff, then something’s wrong.

But the goal of the Great Commission is not just temporal, it is eternal, it is spiritual. And whatever other effects it has are incidental to the main purpose, the main objective.

It is purely this, to make men personal disciples of Jesus Christ by faith in Him, by baptism, and by observing His commands. That is the sum total of our duty.

So here’s the question I have for you, I know we’ve been going long but here’s the question I have for you as a Christian who is a part of this church because what we’ve studied in the Great Commission today is the duty and responsibility of ourselves as individuals, Christians and disciples, but also it is the duty of our church as a body.

Are we doing what we should be doing to fulfill the whole of the Great Commission? To not only see people saved and give the gospel to people, but then also to see them grow into disciples themselves. And that’s not just my job, I am just a disciple as you. That is all of our jobs as Christians, as disciples of Christ. I wanna challenge you, but Dave’s gonna come and we’re gonna sing a song, but I wanna... I just wanna... Before he does that, I wanna challenge you to ask yourself this question. Lord, what what real concrete thing can I do to bring people along in their discipleship toward Christ?

What can I do to actually help them grow, help them serve, help them mature, help them make decisions in the direction of the Lord and His will and obeying His commands? Because that’s what the Lord wants us to do. Let’s pray.