Matthew 28:11-20
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This morning, Lord willing, we will complete having preached through the gospel of Matthew.
140 sermons.
October 2, 2022- October 26 2025.
I had more hair and it was darker when we started.
Someone asks me the other day, What’s next? Revelation?
Man…Can I get nap first?
In all seriousness, This book of the Bible, has been a blessing to me, and I hope it’s been a blessing to you.
You know— The gospel of Matthew contains 28 chapters, 1071 verses, and 23,990 words, all inspired by the spirit of God, so that what we have here are the very words of God himself to us.
What a gift to us.
This week, because I knew we were finishing up I went back and read the first sermon that I preached from Matthew 1:1-17, and I’m sure y’all remember that one from three years ago.
But in that first sermon, I made the point that the theme of the Gospel is that Jesus is King.
He is the Messiah King.
That really is the point of this whole book.
Matthew in each section has shown us.
In chapters 1-4, we have the king’s arrival.
His birth in Bethlehem, and he is revealed as the promised son of David in his genealogy.
In chapters 5-7, we see Jesus preaching the law of his kingdom in the sermon on the mount.
In chapters 8–10, we see the King’s power and his compassion for his people.
Jesus demonstrates his kingly authority over the created realm as he heals diseases, casts out demons, and does all other kinds of miraculous feats that only he could’ve done.
In Chapters 11–13, we see the King is rejected as we find conflict between Jesus and the religious rulers of his day.
We see people reject his kingdom.
And through that, it’s revealed who are a part of the kingdom and who are not.
In chapters 14–20 — we see Jesus preparing his disciples, those within his kingdom, for the suffering he’s about to endure.
And this point, it kind of builds up to the point where in chapters 21–23, this hatred boils over— as King Jesus enters Jerusalem, exposes false religion of the Jewish religious crowd, and pronounces judgment upon them.
In Chapters 24–25 — we see Jesus explain his second coming kingdom through the Olivet Discourse.
Chapters 26 and 27 is the height of all this. The conflict for which he was born commences.
Jesus is betrayed and handed over to godless men, and they crucify him and they mock him with ornaments of a King.
That humiliation of our King and Lord does not last long.
Jesus rises from the grave, trampling death and sin, stepping foot back on the earth that you and I now live on.
As we come to verse 11 of Matthew 28, We have a resurrected king.
But not everyone believes…
Pick up with me in verse number 11.
While they were going, behold, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests all that had taken place. And when they had assembled with the elders and taken counsel, they gave a sufficient sum of money to the soldiers and said, “Tell people, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ And if this comes to the governor’s ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” So they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story has been spread among the Jews to this day.
So the news is spreading of what happened at the tomb.
Some of the guard, that is some of the soldiers, told what had happened.
And you have to think of their story here as they went up to their buddies.
Y’all will never believe this… we were hanging out in the graveyard, and this angel who came and rolled the stone away, and we were so scared we fainted, and now the tomb is empty, and Jesus isn’t there.
The guards are telling that story, but for the religious rulers who put Jesus to death, they hate Jesus and so, for them, that can’t be the narrative.
They cannot let that be the story that gets out.
And so the religious rulers find this out.
They heard the story… from the guards…but they can’t let that be the narrative.
Remember, at the end of chapter 27 these same people said this—
64 Therefore order the tomb to be made secure until the third day, lest his disciples go and steal him away and tell the people, ‘He has risen from the dead,’ and the last fraud will be worse than the first.” 65 Pilate said to them, “You have a guard of soldiers. Go, make it as secure as you can.”
These people knew that if Jesus rose from the grave that everything that he was telling them was true, and if everything he said was true— it was going to effectively make their jobs useless.
If Jesus rose from the grave, that puts Jesus and his followers at odds with everything that they need to be true to keep their jobs and their reputations, their place of importance in the world.
And so—whatever the cost, whatever lie they have to tell, they want people to believe that Jesus did not rise from the grave, but that his body was stolen.
And so they pay.
They pay the soldiers to tell people, that the disciples had come in the night and stolen the body of Jesus.
They pay for them to lie.
But here’s the problem with that story for the guards personally…
If Pilate found out that Jesus got out by virtue of these guards being outsmarted by his ragtag group of disciples, these soldiers are going to be in big trouble with their boss Pilate, because that makes Rome look weak.
And so the religious rulers, tell the soldiers not to worry about that… We will satisfy him too.
In other words, we will pay him too, and make sure that this never comes back on you.
Just do what you’re told and go tell people that the disciples stole the body of Jesus.
And Matthew tells us— this story is actually still present among the Jews today.
They try to discredit Jesus’s resurrection, because if Jesus resurrected, then everything he said was true, and their way of doing religion is fulfilled and there’s no longer any need for them.
And so they pay whatever money it takes to advance their narrative.
I want you to see..
SDFS
This moment here captures for us, the danger of unbelief.
These people are so prideful and cemented in their unbelief, that they will make up a story to believe rather than admitting and believing the truth.
Rather than believing the miracle of miracles that honestly, is the greatest hope the world has ever know, they’d rather believe the lie.
Unbelief is stubborn isn’t.
This is why we understand.
Unbelief can only be overcome by God himself opening the eyes and the ears and the heart of the unbeliever.
Unbelief won’t be overcome just by witnessing miraculous things happening.
These people have witnessed many miraculous things, and now they see an empty tomb and they still don’t believe.
Jesus was right when he told the parable of the rich man and Lazarus.
Remember in that parable, the rich man opens his eyes in torment and he begs that Abraham would send Lazarus to his five brothers who were lost and headed for hell as well.
And remember the rich man’s thought is that if somebody rises from the dead, they will repent and believe.
Remember this conversation… In torment, the rich man says—
And he said, ‘Then I beg you, father, to send him(LAZARUS) to my father’s house— for I have five brothers—so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.’ But Abraham said, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.’ And he said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ He said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.’ ”
It’s true.
Jesus rose from the dead, and THESE people do not believe.
You would think that after he rose that everyone would just have gone to believing.
But that’s not the case.
It’s not the case today either.
Paul makes it clear in 1 Corinthians, that our message isn’t a natural one.
but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,
We preach a message that is foolish to some and is the wisdom of God to others.
Some rejoice to hear this message and other mock us for preaching it.
It’s always been this way.
As we move forward here, at the same time you see the world tried to suppress the truth of the resurrection…
Jesus is on his way to prepare His people/ His disciples to declare the truth.
The schemes of these religious rulers can’tstop the mission of God.
Jesus, as king, will build his church.
Look at verse 16—
Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted.
The 11 disciples, that is the 12 minus Judas go to Galilee as they have been commanded.
They go to the mountain that Jesus told them to go.
The text says when they saw him there are two responses.
First response is They worship him.
By the way he deserves to be worshiped.
It’s worth noting that he does not refuse this worship.
As the resurrected king, he accepts this worship.
But then we were told that some doubted.
Some of his disciples doubted.
Now, this word doubt doesn’t carry with it the idea of rebellious unbelief.
This doubt here isn’t hardened unbelief.
That’s not what’s going on here.
The idea here is that there is a natural human hesitation here.
They are uncertain.
You have to think.
They knew what happened to him just a few days prior.
Some of them had even watched him die.
And now three days in the tomb and he’s standing before them alive and well.
You have to think about this from their perspective.
There is a uneasiness. There is some hesitation here. How could this be?
How did he just get up after having been dead?
You have to think all of these thoughts are going through their head.
And I don’t know— I find this encouraging.
Maturity in faith is something that often must grow.
Even the strongest believers hesitate at times.
No one understands everything right away, not even the original disciples.
We all must grow into maturity.
These guys don’t show up, beaming with confidence. They are nervous. They are still men.
And Jesus comes and approaches them, and I want you to listen to what he says.
And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
He walks up to his disciples who were worshiping yet doubting, and though he could have. he doesn’t rebuke them for their unbelief….
He also doesn’t rub their faces in the fact that they had all left him during the trial and the crucifixion.
He doesn’t begin to walk down the line of each disciple had failed him in a specific way during his time of most urgent need and the time where he was most vulnerable in his life.
He doesn’t do any of that.
He shows up and says I am king. All authority in heaven and on earth is mine.
Doubt no longer.
Remove all your hesitation about who I am.
I am who I said I was.
I have proven it by my resurrection, and now Jesus says, I have been rewarded the fruit of my labor.
The father, because of what Christ has done has placed in the hand of Jesus all Dominion.
He’s been given a kingdom, and his kingdom is all encompassing.
This takes us all the way back to Genesis 1:1
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
Here Jesus says—Heavens and earth— I have been given authority and Dominion over it all.
All authority in heaven and on earth is mine.
You cannot get more comprehensive, all emcompassing, all inclusive, than the statement that Jesus makes here.
Now, I want you to think about something and we’re going to go a little deeper here theologically.
...Go very slow here…
When we think about the statement that Jesus makes here it could be a little confusing.
Because Jesus is the son of God, right?
And we understand as orthodox Christians. It is a part of our statement and confessions of faith that we believe that Jesus is eternal.
In fact, it’s not just that he is eternal, but he possesses all the attributes of God because he is in fact, God himself.
And so as God The Son, (the 2nd person of the Triune God) has always been sovereign.
He has always been omnipresent.
He is the creator of the Earth.
He uphold all things by the word of his power.
So what’s it mean here when Jesus says all authority has been given to him?
Didn’t he possess it before?
He did. But through his obedience at the cross and the resurrection to follow, now, he has been given this authority as the God man.
That the second person of the Trinity took on flesh as he was conceived in the Virgin Mary’s womb.
He was born as a man and lived as a man.
He died as a man., and when he arose, he arose as a glorified man.
And so when Jesus says here, all authority has been given to him in heaven and on earth, he is speaking of the reality that now in his human nature, as Jesus, he has all authority in heaven and on earth as a man.
And so now he sits as the mediator between God and man because he is God and man.
When we speak of Christ, we don’t speak of the nature singular of Christ … in order to be theologically correct, we must speak of the natures of Christ.
He is both divine and human.
So Jesus is speaking here as the second Adam. The one who took on flesh has conquered so that he can say to his disciples into us-
All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Jesus says that.
The reward of his suffering is that God has bestowed upon him the name that is above every name so that at the name of Jesus, the God, man, every knee of every man, woman, boy, and girl will bow the knee to Jesus.
Of course, this is a fulfillment of everything Jesus had said. But it’s also a fulfillment of everything. The Old Testament said to look forward to.
Daniel and Daniel chapter 7, saw a vision of the son of man coming before the ancient of days, and listen to the words of this vision.
“I saw in the night visions,
and behold, with the clouds of heaven
there came one like a son of man,
and he came to the Ancient of Days
and was presented before him.
And to him was given dominion
and glory and a kingdom,
that all peoples, nations, and languages
should serve him;
his dominion is an everlasting dominion,
which shall not pass away,
and his kingdom one
that shall not be destroyed.
So listen carefully to the language of that vision. The son of man which is fulfilled in Jesus, a title that he has given through throughout the New Testament, is given a glory and a kingdom that all peoples and nations and language languages should serve him.
It is an everlasting kingdom. It is an everlasting authority. It shall not pass away.
All of this is what the Bible has been pointing toward
Jesus here is saying that he has inaugurated his kingdom.
He is crowned king of kings and Lord of Lords.
Now to be sure, he has not consummated that kingdom.
In other words, this kingdom is not how it will be, but all authority is currently his.
Jesus is Lord. All authority has been given to him in heaven and on earth already
Abraham Kuyper- “There is not one square inch in all of this universe over which Jesus does not say ‘it’s mine.’”
And one of the reasons why I think Jesus says this is to remove all doubt that the disciples are worshiping the right one.
All authority is his.
Now he tells them what to do in light of that.
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.”
Jesus has not left us without knowing what we should be doing.
If you read commentary on these verses, you’ll see very quickly that there’s been some debate on how to translate this verse..
I’m not gonna bore you with the details of that only to say this the main command of making disciples and going and teaching and baptizing are tied closely together.
In other words, they go hand in hand.
The disciples are given the command to make disciples and the understanding here is that they will be going, baptizing and teaching as they do.
The main command here is MAKE DISCIPLES.
Church family— this is our mission.
And it’s always been the mission.
Too often, I think we get distracted from what is the mission.
Jesus didn’t say go and attract attenders.
Too often, let’s be honest the church gets caught up and so focused on building attendance that we forget that we have a job to do with the attenders.
He didn’t say go and build buildings.
And don’t hear me wrong— beloved I am thankful for this building.
We can keep this building immaculate, but if we fail to make disciples inside, we may as well do something else with it.
He said go and make disciples of all nations.
Which means, He doesn’t limit where we go.
Did you know sometimes churches get territorial?
Where we believe that over here this is our territory over here.
And over there, That’s their territory and we shouldn’t go to that town because that’s not our town.
Weact like gangs ?
‘“That’s our block, y’all stay on your side of town.”
Like the Great Commission came with a zoning map.”
Beloved— our town and our mission field is wherever there is a person made in the image of God who needs to know the Gospel.
I hope I was clear earlier, Jesus’ authority knows no boundary lines.
His kingdom is all we see.
He didn’t say, go make your name or your church name great, it’s about making the name of Jesus known.
And if something we do helps another church grow then praise be to God. Its the kingdom that matters.
Let me add one more… This may surprise you, but he didn’t say go and get people to make decisions.
He said go and make disciples.
This is really important to say as well because so many times, as the church, we have the wrong finish line when it comes to doing what Jesus says here.
So often times we think that the finish line is getting somebody to the front or raising their hand or signing a card or saying a prayer and dunking them in the baptistery.
But the mission is more than that.
Read the commission again.
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.”
The main command here is make disciples.
That is the heart of the Great Commission.
That we would follow Jesus in doing what he did.
Make disciples.
Now how do we do that?
Firstly, by going.
We have to reach out intentionally.
We don’t wait for people to come to us; we go to them with the gospel. We can’t have the attitude “Well they know where the church is. They will come if they want to hear about it.
No.
Jesus came to seek and save the lost.
So we have to go where the lost people are.
We have to go to those we know are lost.
We have to go to the world and many regions of the world and the people have never heard the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Jesus told his disciples in Acts 1…
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
We talk about sending missionaries. I want us all to understand, if we have been saved by Jesus we are all missionaries.
We have been given the same mission.
My New Testament professor in seminary was Dr. David Lanier—
“Y’all we have been give the same commission as the disciples, and we have better shoes.”
What did he mean by that?
He meant we have the same command they had and we now have the ability to travel more easily than ever before.
Are you going?
Don’t have the attitude, well someone else will go. They will, but that just means they are being obedient.
What about us?
The next thing he says is Baptizing..
Baptism is important… because in it , We identify believers with Christ and His church.
Baptism marks public commitment and entry into the community of faith.
It’s not just a ritual… it’s a declaration of new life in Christ.
The person is saying..
THIS IS WHO I AM NOW. HOLD ME ACCOUNTABLE. The church is affirming that.
The last way we make disciples is by teaching.
We teach them EVERYTHING Jesus commanded.
But not just teaching them.
Teaching them TO OBSERVE all that Jesus commanded.
Every last thing he says is important.
The finish line is to make disciples who then go and make disciples.
The last thing Matthew records Jesus saying is this…
And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
After three years walking through this Gospel, from Bethlehem to the empty tomb.
From His first cry in a manger to His final command on a mountain, we end really where Matthew began… with the presence of Jesus.
Do you remember how this Gospel opened?
Matthew 1:23
“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
and they shall call his name Immanuel”
(which means, God with us).
And now, how does Matthew end?
Matthew 28:20
teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
From the first chapter to the last, this Gospel has been preaching one great truth: The King has come to be with His people.
Everything we’ve seen in Matthew’s Gospel it all leads here: the presence of Jesus with His people until the end.
He does not send His disciples out alone.
He does not call His church to make disciples in her own strength.
The same Jesus who has all authority in heaven and on earth also says, “I am with you always.”
That means when you go to work tomorrow, He’s there.
When you sit at the hospital bed of a loved one, He’s there.
When you open your Bible in the quiet of the morning, He’s there.
When you share the gospel with trembling lips, He’s there.
When you doubt, when you fear, when you fail — He’s still there.
Our King does not abandon His people.
And one day, the “always” of that promise will give way to eternity — when faith becomes sight, and the King who is with us invisibly will be with us visibly.
The One who said “I am with you always” will wipe away every tear, and we will dwell with Him forever.
And so as we close the book of Matthew—
Let us do what our King says and go, make disciples, baptize, teach.
He began with us as Immanuel.
He ends with us as Immanuel.
And until the day He returns, he is with us.
Let’s pray.
