September 2024

“Then Jesus came to them and said, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.  Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age’” (Matthew 28:18-20 NIV).

For those of you who listen to my sermons every Sunday, or who watch the videos on YouTube from home, you know that one thing I always try to do is make the passage I am preaching applicable to your day-to-day lives and your walk with Christ.  I try to never let a sermon pass without telling you what you are supposed to DO with the information you are receiving.  And the reason that I do this is because I can tell you all that you could possibly want to know about a passage of the Bible, but if I don’t tell you what it means to you, how it applies to you, I’ve completely missed the point; the purpose of any sermon should be to tell people how they should be living out their faith daily.

And, there is no greater passage in all of the Bible to tell us what we are supposed to do with our faith than these words from Jesus in Matthew 28.  This passage is what’s known as the Great Commission, it represents the last instructions that Jesus gave to His disciples before He ascended to the right hand of the Father.  I know that you all have heard me talk about the Great Commission on more than one occasion; so, I wanted to revisit this passage with you this month and think about exactly what it is Jesus is commanding here.

First, Jesus tells the disciples that all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Him.  This is a clear statement from Jesus about who He is: He has absolute power and sovereignty over all creation, all mankind; nothing in the universe is outside of His control.  Jesus is stressing to His disciples, and to all of us, that He is God and, therefore, what He is about to say comes with the full authority of God.  Thus, we can see that the following words truly are the Great Commission, not the Great Suggestion.  As believers, we cannot choose whether or not we want to follow Jesus’ command in this passage; He, as the sovereign God of the universe, has commanded it, so we must obey.

After declaring His authority, Jesus issues His command, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”  There are four specific imperatives, or commands, in this instruction: go, make disciples, baptize, and teach.  First, we are to go.  We are not to just sit comfortably in our churches, putting in our hour every Sunday and being consumer Christians; we are to get out into the world, serving others and sharing the Gospel.  Second, we are to make disciples.  This goes further than mere conversion; it is more than simply getting someone to make a profession of faith in Christ.  Conversion is only step one; making disciples means, after someone makes a profession in faith, we begin to shepherd them and teach them what it means to follow Christ and live for Him.  Third, we are to baptize.  Christ’s church has been called to baptize as the means to show that we have been united with Christ; that we have been buried and raised again with Jesus, cleansed from sin, and regenerated by the Holy Spirit.  Just as circumcision was the sign of belonging under the Old Covenant, baptism is the sign of belonging in the New Covenant.  Finally, we are to teach.  It is our job as Christians to make the whole counsel of God known, to share the Gospel and explain to others what it means.

Taking all of this together, we can see that Jesus is commanding us to go, to get out of our comfortable spaces and into the world, and make disciples by baptizing them and teaching them.  However, I’m not saying that this will be an easy task; getting about the work of discipleship is a lot of hard work and can be very challenging, discouraging, and frustrating, especially in the 21st century.  But Jesus didn’t leave us with simply a command in the 28th chapter of Matthew, He also left us with a promise to encourage us.  In verse 20, Christ says that He will always be with us, even to the end of the age.  If Christ is with us, no amount of frustration or discouragement can stand in our way!  If we have the Messiah, the Savior of the world, with us and on our side, there is no reason that we cannot boldly go out into our communities and tell them the wonderful news of our salvation; because we do not have to go out in our own strength or with our own boldness, but with the strength and boldness of the One who died so that we may live.

My prayer for each and everyone of us is that we will take these words from Jesus to heart; that we will be Christians who are not content to just show up and put in our hour every Sunday morning, but who live out our faith on a day-to-day basis and show our communities who Jesus is through how we act and interact with them.  I pray that we will all be witnesses to the saving work of Jesus Christ, and that we make disciples of our friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers.  I pray that we, Franklin Presbyterian Church, get about the business of the Great Commission and truly begin to make an even greater impact for the Kingdom right here in our community.  The Great Commission is the last command that Jesus issued during His time on earth; that shows us how important it truly is.  So, let’s put aside all of our fear, our doubt, our worry, and let’s get to work!

May the blessings of the Father and the peace of the Son be with you,

Pastor Keith