The Highest Mission (2)

Good morning to everyone.

It’s really good to be here this morning with you. It’s been quite awhile since I last visited, so it’s good to be back and see many familiar faces. Some of you look to have not changed abit, while other’s of you are .... well.... a bit older than I remember but I suppose I have as well. For those of you that don’t know me, I grew up in this church up until about the age of 18 when I went off to Bible college so this church has had the longest impact in my life by way of years.

Mention parents- thankful certainly for both the church’s input and my families investment into shaping me into the person I am today.

Presently, I and my family (my wife and four kids) serve at First Baptist Church in Howard City Michigan just about 1 hour 40 min north on 131 just passed Grand Rapids. I served their as the associate Pastor for about 7 years now prior to that serving as youth pastor in a church in West Virginia where my wife and I met at Bible college.

It’s a real blessing to look back on your life and see how God has worked and shown Himself faithful. Especially in these hectic days. What’s especially a blessing is to see how through the years God worked to give clearer understanding of His truth and His directives. The one that I have seen Him most adamantly teach and use in my life, that I can go back to my early teen years and see how He began to open my eyes to this truth, is the one that I want to talk to you about today. It’s His most important task, His greatest mission for me and for all who follow him. In fact, it is why I believe we are here. Yes, to give glory to God, but that we will do to the fullest in heaven. That is why He doesn’t take us home to glory now because we have a mission to fulfill. The passage that I’m referring to the same passage where we will spend our time this morning will be verses that I believe you are well familiar with, the Great Commission found in Mattthew 28-18-20. I trust that will after today, these be viewed in a very different way. That God will begin afresh and anew in your life a more biblical understanding of this critical subject.

Prayer: “Open our eyes, that we may see wonderous things from your law.”

This is your church and these are your people. Father, today is not about me, but it is about you. May you be magnified and glorified today through the Words of scripture that are being spoken, but Father may not that be the only way you are glorified. May you be all the more glorified as we endeavour to live the truths that we have heard today.”

As we begin, let me ask you, what makes the Great Commission so “great”. Let me start by giving illustration in my own life. I have dear friend named Micah. He is like to me a brother… we share roughly the same age, he has children that are almost identical in age to my own, he lives in my neighborhood, attends and minsters at the same local church, he is a leader and godly example, we serve in many the same places, we are like-minded, enjoy the same things, really close....

It wasn’t too long ago that I was at my office doing typical study and things of that nature when I got a phone call to drive down the road and meet Micah and his wife at a parking lot in town. Micah had just come back from a procedure in Grand Rapids and they were just about home when Micah began having seizures and convulsions. Eyes rolling back in head, all the things that would scare his eye who was driving. So she called the ambulance. But since I was a mile or 2 up the road, I was able to be first at the scene. You know he looked in really bad shape, and she was a mess. Crying and frantic, all those different things. I remember going over the the passenger side while he was sitting and trying to talk with him, and give comfort etc. When he looked up and with all the strength he could muster, say in words that were somewhat difficult to understand .... “take care of Megan (his wife)....”. I’ll tell you that those words have echoed in my mind every since he said them.

At that moment, why was it that my friend Micah instructed me with those words. Well, it’s cause he didn’t know what was to become of his life, but he wanted to make sure that his wife was well taken of. If this were to be his last words, he would use them to make sure what was important to him was taken care of. Now Micah is fine and we still continue to enjoy our close frienship. But perhaps you’ve seen this happen in your own lives. Perhaps you’ve even thought about what you would say if they were your last words.

But here’s a question for you, what were some of Jesus’ last words while on this earth. What was Jesus’ directive that he didn’t want his disciples to miss. The Great Commission, the reason that He came… seek and save the lost. Just as my friends words still echo within me today, Jesus desired that his disciples would have the words of the Great Commission echo within their minds at all times.

So what is the Great Commission, and again why is it so important. Let’s read our text now, and come to point number one.

Matthew 28:18–20 ESV

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Before Jesus gets to the heart of his command, his mission for the disciples, he tells them… Go therefore… In my time of learning the word, whenever you come to the word therefore or wherefore, we need to ask what is the “therefore” - there for. It usually refers us to look backwards before going forwards because what is about to be said hinges greatly on what was already said. In other words, Jesus is saying before you know this Great Command, you need to understand this great truth or so the sake of our outline, ....

I. The Great Certainties

Matthew 28:18 ESV

And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

Jesus whom created all things by the word of his power, who is Himself God and as this verse states was given all authority, uses this truth to invoke his command. A king that reminds the servant of His position and authority ought to know that this ruler means business.

Furthermore, remember what came prior to this passage, Christ’s resurrection which was the ultimate moment that validated his authority.

John 5:26–27 ESV

For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man.

Christ has life in Himself and with His own power, conquered death. He proved that He was the Son of God and with that proof and authority He brings down this command of utmost importance.

What is the mission, what is the charge.... Let’s look at that next.

II. The Great Charge

Matthew 28:19 ESV

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

Now I want you to understand, that this isn’t the great commissions, or great charges because there is only one task that is being given. You can more clearly see this in the way it was written in the Greek. It intended to be one command with 3 participles. I want you to think of it as one goal with three how to’s in order to achieve that goal.

So what is this one task.

It is to make disciples....

We are going to take several minutes here to discuss this because it’s important we understand this.

A. What is a disciple?

As we come to this word, how would you define the word disciple? How would you explain it to someone?

Give pause.

When Jesus told his followers to make disciples, He would have used the word greek Mathetes, which if you didn’t know is what the original NT was written in Greek.

The word literally means learner or pupil.

When Jesus called the 12 to be his disciples, his Mathetes, it wasn’t like they didn’t know what that meant. Plenty of people before them had “mathetes” students that literally walked in the way of the their teacher. Carrying on in the same tradition as what their master their master had taught. These were the greek philosophers such as Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle who lived 500 years before Christ did.

Socrates described himself ultimately as a disciple of Homer, the person Socrates regarded as the greatest thinker of all of Greek history.

We tend to think of Homer as a poet rather than a philosopher. But Socrates saw him as the supreme teacher of ancient Greece. Then, of course, Socrates had his own student—his chief disciple—whose name was Plato. Plato had his disciples, the chief one being Aristotle. Aristotle also had his disciples, the most famous being Alexander the Great. It is astonishing to think about how drastically the ancient world was shaped by four men. It really testifies to the potency and effect disciple-making has upon the world. It is nearly impossible to understand the history of Western civilization without understanding the influence of those four individuals, who in their own way were each disciples of another.

Also interesting enough about this is that they committed only ever to one discipler, no philosopher hoping. They also committed to keep in line with there philosopher discipler’s teaching on even after he died. Staying true to it and not jumping to another. They elected a new teacher, who was liking the one that spent the most time under the teaching and made them the new disciple-maker.

Beyond that Jewish rabbi- Talmeed (heavily influenced by the Greek culture) all had disciples of their own to carry on their teaching. So this wasn’t a new concept. The disciples knew exactly what Jesus meant when he asked them to be his disciples and they knew exactly what He meant when he told them to make disciples because this process had been already playing out it different places and formats around them.

It may have been familiar to them, but it isn’t so much familiar to us how to make a disciple, so the verse gives us some insight into what it means to go and make disciples. The process or step by step method....

Looking again at Matthew 28.... it first tells us to....

B. What is Disciple-Making

(B)1. Going (salvation)

The first step is salvation.

Couple of convicting truths to match this command.

1. Barna research… extensive studies/research on christian topics- surveyed and found that

95% of evangelical Christians have never led someone to Christ outside of the local church.

Leading someone to Christ is an exciting thing!!!! It’s a wonderful blessing. But the truth is…

2. Leading someone to Christ doesn’t mean that you made a disciple, in fact there’s still more work to do.

The Great Commission as R. C. Sproul well observed is not go therefore and make converts of as many people as possible. No, He gave a mandate to the church of all ages not simply to evangelize but to make disciples.

(B)2. Baptizing

Baptism is commanded.

Acts 2:38 ESV

And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

This is important because it is when a new believer chooses to publically identify themselves as a follower of Christ. As you see, baptism isn’t what saves you but signifies your new relationship with the Lord and usually follows salvation rather quickly.

Acts 16:30-33

Acts 16:30–33 ESV

Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.” And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds; and he was baptized at once, he and all his family.

To add to that as well, those who were baptized were added to the number (or added to the church records, membership would be another way of putting it.)

Acts 2:41 ESV

So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls.

Being baptized placed you into the larger body of Christ as you chose to identify with His people and His church.

The church is central to a disciples. It is God’s chosen institute to further His message and His kingdom. Matthew 16:18

Matthew 16:18 ESV

And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

It’s not the 3rd party organization or what we call para-church organizations that God ordained it was the church that He ordained. Meaning mission agencies, christian schools, help centers, campts, etc are not God’s primary place for christians and disciples. Yes, they can be good and helpful and no they are not wrong, but they are not the church. God never instituted these, man-made them. Churches are expressly Biblical so to be unattached from the church your local church is to be unbiblical. And the priority of Authority on these matters needs to go through the church where God put the authority in the first place. Making disciples means helpful them understand that they need to learn to publically confess their commitment to Christ in baptism as well as being unified with the body of Christ the Christ.

(could get rid of this) One other bonus comment, we often treat the baptism of a new believer like a graduation ceremony. Instead, we should treat it as we would bringing home a new baby from the hospital or a treat it like a baby dedication service. We should certainly celebrate but with it should also recognize that the job is still far from over.

Which brings us to the last how to steps of making a disciple, and one that I am finding may yet still be the most challenging yet.

(B)3. Teaching

The last part to making a disciple is to teach and the verse even clarifies what we are to teach… “everything I have commanded you.” That’s no small order. A really large task. But what did Jesus mean when he said teach. Teaching was in two parts here. Jesus is simply envisioning all of his followers to be sunday school teachers, or preachers, or instructors in schools and youth groups. No his idea was much more than that. Truly, it was investing the truth into others. The purpose of our knowledge in the Lord is not simply so that we may grow and become stronger Christians. The purpose of our growth also lies in the fact that we are to give that knowledge onto others and teach and train them up in the Lord.

You can see that so clearly commanded and practiced in places like...

Titus 2:3–5 ESV

Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.

We also see the expectation that everyone has to do it...

Hebrews 5:12 ESV

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food,

One final verse that really captures this mindset is 2 Timothy 2:2

Which if you know much about the book of 2 Timothy, you would know that this is the final book written by Paul to his beloved disciple Timothy before he would be executed. And what did he want his disciple to know…

2 Timothy 2:1–2 ESV

You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also.

Doesn’t this sound very familiar to the Great Commission. Strength, Grace, and Authority from God to carry out the task of teaching and training others.

But let me tell you, teaching goes far beyond formal settings of learning. It applies in what we do in modeling and showing others what to do.

Philippians 4:9 ESV

What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.

Philippians 3:17 ESV

Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us.

Learning from example. And where did Paul get this from. Jesus himself.

John 3:22 NASB95

After these things Jesus and His disciples came into the land of Judea, and there He was spending time with them and baptizing.

At first glance, you say what does this verse have to do with anything.

In John 3:22, the Bible makes what is easily an overlooked and seemingly mundane statement: “Jesus and his disciples went out into the Judean countryside, where he spent some time with them.” What Jesus did is really quite simple. He selected just a few people — he focused on 12 — and they hung out with him and did ministry alongside him. Yet when Jesus spent some time with these 12 apprentices, something big happened. The word for “spend time” in Greek is pronounced “dia-tree-bo” (and transliterated diatribo). Dia means “to rub against” or “to rub off.” It literally means “to spend time together rubbing off on each other.”

Jesus made us that way that we become like the people and the leaders we are around. I thank my dad everytime I circle the house when talking on my cell phone and wondering why I’m doing laps. It’s because that’s what Dad did. It become involuntary for me because I observed him doing it. Same happened when my sister came back from living in Virginia, suddenly she began sounding like a southern. These are small examples but show truth. It changes our practices, our thinking, our mindset, and way of life. So when Jesus commanded his followers to make disciples, he envisioned them doing the same things that He did.

Optional:

John 14:12 ESV

“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.

That’s the focus of this verse. Not physical miracles, cause we won’t produce greater miracles than Jesus. Greater spiritual works in the sense that through the power of God, the message He gives us will go through us to the entire World. But we do it exactly the same way he did it, through teaching and modeling.

Optional:

* (Maybe disregard) These need to take place together. Now simply to illustrate a point, I want to ask you… How many of you can remember one of sermons you heard from last year, how bout can anyone remember a sermon preached five or more years ago, how bout ten, etc. There are probably gonna be maybe a few that stick out. How many of us though can thoroughly remember an engaging spiritual conversation or experience that happened in the last year, 5 years, and 10 years. Don’t get me wrong here. I’m not advocating that we preach less. Preaching is Biblical and right and needed for our growth, but so much is these meaningful life on life moments where we learn together and share truth and spiritual experiences together. I can remember pretty well most of the spiritual conversations I’ve had with my brother in law Randall in the last year, as well as the ones I’ve had with my Father five years ago. They stand out because God wired us to learn this way and grow this way. Teaching and the modeling go together.

So therefore, disciple-making requires both structure meaning particular lessons and topics to work through as well as a margin for allowing the discipler to speak into unplanned and teachable moments as thy arise. Such a process is both engineered and organic, involving both truth-speaking and life-sharing.

What is disciple-making? (Definition)

“The process of a mature believer investing himself into another for the sake of them coming to know the Lord and then growing in their faith up to maturity to the point where they themselves will be able to go out and make other disciples.”

Things to ponder when considering these truths:

- Disciples task is reproduction.

Not just in the sense of having children although that can be part of it. What Jesus had in mind is for us to reproduce ourselves, our faith, our doctrine, and our love of Christ in another person. To multiply ourselves.

- The church is called to equip and train us so we are able to become disciple-makers.

Many of us feel that we aren’t able to do this task, not prepared for it. That’s why the church exists. Now will get back to that crucial text in Ephesians 4:11-17. And some day, I’d love to come back and go through this passage with you in greater detail. It’s fully redefined my understanding of the church and what my purpose as a pastor is.

Ephesians 4:11–16 ESV

And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.

This is the ultimate purpose of the church. To train and equip us to fulfill the great commission. That’s my role. But it’s not just my role, it’s yours as well as shown in verse 16. So when people are not doing the work then where is the fault, either the church for not equipping well or the people for not growing in their faith.

- Disciple-making is not for one person to do everything.

Equipping people means that you must not do every job even though it may be easier. Jesus sent out disciples to do his work while He was still on earth, Paul sent Timothy and Titus to do his work in other churches though they probably would have desired Paul more,

illustrate with my my kids and chores....

- God intends a church to grow through disciple-making.

A healthy church will see conversions take place and disciples being made. Too much of our church growth comes only from those who church hop. But this is not healthy church growth. Biblical church growth happens when we follow the great commission. When we don’t see church growth, we cannot blame the process that God set out for us, we can’t find fault in His word, but we certainly can find fault in our own life. We can certainly find plenty of instances where we haven’t been living on mission.

- Disciple-making doesn’t happen on accident.

As you look at the life of Jesus or look at the life of his disciples and the life of Paul, they were intentional with this. How, through priority, planning, and patience

Priority

Do you wake up, and prioritize your day around the Great Commission. Is it a priority of the people you are around, your church, your friends, your family, remembering that we become like the people you are around. Do you prioritize your love for God. You’ll probably have no desire for making-disciples if you have not been faithful to his Word.

Planning

Luke 19:10 ESV

For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”

The word “seek” mean: to plot against. A phrase we now often say in our church. Jesus came to plot against sinners for the sake of the gospel. He chose to be places where they were. Had lunch with tax collectors, He purposely went through Samaria to met the woman at the well as well and evangelize the town nearby.

It starts with prayer,

then it follows with looking for ways to insert ourselves into the lost community. Think strategically...

My neighborhood- president of association

My parent- volunteer firefighter

Cameron His co-workers

Brad- my discipler- selling pens

Patience

This disciple-making culture takes time. Patience for your church.

It takes patience of the individuals part.

lost one, ones your leading, and the ones that are leading you.

Now as you hear all of this, you may feel overwhelmed, so I want to go back to Matthew 28:20 and conclude with this encouragement that Christ gives to us after giving us this great command.

III. Comfort

Matthew 28:20 ESV

teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Sermons from John Piper (1980–1989) Go and Make Disciples, Baptizing Them …

But teaching people to obey Christ is not easy. Obeying Christ in all he commanded is harder yet. It requires tremendous spiritual power. And Christ was so gracious to leave us with a word of comfort and power: “Lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age” (v. 20). The reason that promise is packed with power is that the one who made it has all authority in heaven and on earth (v. 18). He is not powerful and far away. Nor is he present and weak. But he is with us, and he is all-powerful—forever. The great commission is sandwiched in powerful grace, and so are we

1 Timothy 1:12 KJV 1900

And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry;

You are where you are for a reason

Where you work, where you live, where you go to school, where you shop and do business, where you find entertainment, it starts there. It just starts with one.

In our church, our goal is for everyone in the church to have one. One to win, one to lead, and one to follow. And we continue to remind our folks of this because it can be so easy to get of track, become unattached and distracted from the mission. But by God’s grace and through the continued teaching and modeling of the Word, we continue to see more and more folks in our church seeing the important of this Biblical command and following it. Just this past week, I learned that two more ladies in our church have now taken up a discipleship relationship with younger ladies and are now meeting together regularly for the sake of growth and maturity. Man is that exciting! Especially knowing that from this, that disciplee will go on to reproduce herself in others and so on. It’s really created an environment and culture where people yearn to know the Lord and grow. It’s super exciting.

Disciple-making is Biblical, exciting, and every bit worth your time but it has to be a priority, you gotta plan, and continue to ask God for patience. If we expect God to do great things in our lives and in our church, we must go back to doing it God’s way and not our way. Obedient to His Highest Mission.

Closing Prayer:

Ezra 7:10 ESV

For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the Lord, and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel.