9/28/25 - The Core Missionary Task
Notes
Transcript
The lord gave us a great commission
18 Jesus came near and said to them, “All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.
19 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,
20 teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
He showed us His vision of the great multitude
9 After this I looked, and there was a vast multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language, which no one could number, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands.
Between the Great Commission and the Great Multitude is
The Great Pursuit
8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
The greatest problem in the world is not cancer, money, power or anything like that.
The greatest problem in the world is lostness.
I heard someone mention the other day
there are more people that are dying lost than the statistical death rate
There is only one solution and one plan
I have said this before
Vance Pittman said
Vision is to see God’s activity in the world and show people how to get in on it.
The apostle Paul said in Romans 15:20
20 My aim is to preach the gospel where Christ has not been named, so that I will not build on someone else’s foundation,
So we as American Christians
have an obligation to go to the darkest places on the planet
to reach people for Christ.
Realizing that there are lost people here
The greatest concentration of lostness is in South Asia
Here is the world divided into 4 equal parts
every different color
represents 2 billion people
You will here me talk about people groups
and there are two different types of people groups
Unreached people groups
people groups who have an extremely small percentage of evangelical believers
Unreached Unengaged People Groups
People groups who have no known believers, limited access to the gospel, and among whom no known missionary church planters are working.
Everywhere there is a colored dot is a people group in the world
All the green dots are people groups that are no longer unreached
The yellow and red dots are unreached people groups
Here are just the unreached people groups
people groups who have an extremely small percentage of evangelical believers
Here are the unreached unengaged people groups
People groups who have no known believers, limited access to the gospel, and among whom no known missionary church planters are working.
Notice where the greatest concentration of UUPGs are
Statistically, there are 35,875 people dying daily without Christ.
That number has actually gone up
2,359 people groups with little to no evangelical influence
By population South Asia includes 1.8 billion people
How do we begin to reach such a great number of people and places?
This is why I love Southern Baptists
we have the cooperative program and Lottie Moon Christmas offering
The Task
The International Mission Board’s mission is
No Place Left
Local ownership of the Core missionary Task among every people and place
Every People and Place
9 After this I looked, and there was a vast multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language, which no one could number, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands.
10 And they cried out in a loud voice: Salvation belongs to our God, who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!
14 For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord’s glory, as the water covers the sea.
That defines all people and all places
“that the nations might know”
“The ends of teh earth”
18 Jesus came near and said to them, “All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.
19 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,
20 teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
God desires to work through us in order to fulfill his vision for all people and places
I have fully proclaimed the gospel of Christ from Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum.
23 But now I no longer have any work to do in these regions,
Paul had laid foundations
Now others were faithfully building on those foundations
9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his possession, so that you may proclaim the praises of the one who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
So that means every believer is qualified
2 He told them, “The harvest is abundant, but the workers are few. Therefore, pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest.
And this means that every believer is needed
So if every believer is qualified
and if every believer is needed
then we should mobilize and empower believers for the harvest
11 And he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers,
12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, to build up the body of Christ,
Our task is to do the work of the Great Commission
and
mobilize local believers to do Great Commission work
so that
the Heart of India would be saturated with the gospel, and healthy churches would be planted among all people and places
So that explains the local ownership and the every people and places piece of this.
What is the core missionary task?
The old Mission station approach was
enter a new location
build schools and hospitals to meet physical needs
build a chruch building to serve as a central ministry location
the missionary leads and pastors the local church
That’s what I remember growing up as a kid
and that worked for a time
but is it biblical?
What does the New Testament say
Does the Bible provide a better roadmap?
The New Testament provides both the motivation and the methodology for missions
2 As they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.”
3 Then after they had fasted, prayed, and laid hands on them, they sent them off.
26 From there they sailed back to Antioch where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work they had now completed.
Luke is showing us that the pattern of ministry which takjes place between these two bookends constitutes the “work” to which they were called.
The Core Missionary Task
Paul’s firs missionary journey is in Acts 13-14
Let’s look at just the trip in Iconium
Let’s see if we can pick out where Paul
Engages new places
Evangelizes people
Equips new believers
Establishes churches
Entrusts the leadership
Exits to partnership
Engaging a new place
So At Iconium -
Evangelizing People
Spoke in such a way that a great number of both Jews and Greeks believed
Speaking boldly for the Lord
Equips new believers
Strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue the faith
Establishes churches
In every church
Entrusts the leadership
appointed elders
with prayer and fasting they committed them to the Lord
Exits to partnership
They passed through Pisidia and came to Pamphylia
This pattern should become our pattern
Model the great commission, mobilize for the harvest
