Commission to the World

Commission to the World—Matthew 28:18-20

This evening, we’re going to continue our sermon series on “Doing Church Biblically.” This is a series of teachings that’s sort of a sermon series and a church membership class combined into one. And it’s designed to prepare those who are interested to start Redeeming Grace Church on October 23. And last week, when we talked about living in community with each other, we said that the church is a spiritual family. As those who have been adopted into God’s family, we share a common family identity. And we want to live out that identity by pursing close relationships with each other not just on Sundays but throughout the week. So the church is a family. But we have to be careful that the church never becomes an inwardly focused family—because that can very easily happen. Have you ever visited a church that was like that? Or any other group for that matter? Our natural tendency will always be to gravitate towards inward focus. It’s so comfortable, it’s so easy to get that way and gradually become more and more indifferent to outsiders.  But we have to guard against that, because Jesus has given us a mission, and that mission involves reaching out to other people. And tonight, we’re going to talk about that mission. 

Please turn with me to Matthew 28. This is a passage of Scripture that’s commonly known as the “Great Commission,” because it’s here that Jesus gives his disciples instructions that will determine their mission in life from here on out. Jesus has just died on the cross and been resurrected from the dead. And he’s about to ascend into heaven, but first he says something to his disciples. Matthew 28:18-20: “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.’”

So it’s in this passage that Jesus gives Christians their commission to the world. And that commission is very simple: “Go and make disciples.” That’s what he says. That’s our mission. That’s the reason why when we become Christians, God doesn’t immediately take us up to heaven. He’s left us here so we can accomplish something very specific: this mission of making disciples. So I’d like to talk first about understanding the mission, then about embracing the mission, and then about practicing the mission. Understanding the mission, embracing the mission, practicing the mission.

Understanding the Mission

So, number one, understanding our mission. And in order to understand our mission of making disciples, we have to understand, “What is a disciple?” You kind of have to know what one is if you’re gonna make them. So, stated simply, a disciple is someone who’s following Jesus in the everyday stuff of life. And that begins by looking to Jesus for salvation. We have to stop viewing ourselves as “good people” apart from Christ and realize our brokenness and sinfulness and the fact that we’re hopelessly entangled in sin and powerless to save ourselves from God’s judgment. And as we come to view ourselves in this way, we’re able to come to Jesus with the empty hands of a beggar, realizing that we don’t have anything to offer him, and instead looking to him as our only hope of rescue. 

A few weeks ago, I was spending time with someone who was thinking about following Jesus. We had a great dinner together at my house and had very enjoyable conversation. Then the conversation drifted toward spiritual matters, and we were talking about the gospel. And he told me that he had been thinking a lot about following Jesus and becoming a Christian, but there was one thing that was causing him a lot of difficulty. He asked, “Could it really be that simple?” “Could it really be that simple?”—as simple as merely looking to Jesus for rescue rather than trying to be good enough to earn God’s favor on our own. And the answer is yes. And that’s actually what makes becoming a disciple of Jesus so difficult, because it requires that we lay down our pride. Instead of putting confidence in our own efforts to earn salvation, we put our confidence entirely in Jesus. We believe that Jesus is fully God and that when he died on the cross, he was taking on himself the punishment for our sins. The Bible says, “God made him who knew no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” Jesus was dying in our place—as our substitute. And we believe that when he rose again from the dead, his resurrection won a decisive victory over sin. And we come to him on the basis of these things and put our trust in him alone to save us. 

And then we live the rest of our lives as disciples of Jesus, growing so that we look more and more like him, seeking to live every aspect of our lives according to his teachings and his instructions. That initial act of looking to Jesus for salvation is only the beginning of living the rest of our lives as disciples and continually growing towards spiritual maturity. And make careful note of this, as you think about what it means to be a mature disciple: a mature disciple isn’t just someone who has accumulated a certain amount of Bible knowledge. Many evangelical churches act as if Bible knowledge is the only thing you need to be a mature disciple and then they orient all of their church programs simply around increasing people’s Bible knowledge. And yet, as crucial as it is to learn biblical teaching, being a mature disciple goes beyond that. It’s about living out the truths that we know. That’s the final test of a mature disciple. Are they living out the things they know? 

And according to Jesus here in Matthew 28, we’re supposed to be making disciples. We’re supposed to be helping other people look to Jesus for salvation and then grow as disciples. And we do that not only by using structured meetings to teach them more about the Bible but also by actually walking with them and showing them how to start living according to the teachings of Jesus. That’s what the disciple-making process looks like.

Embracing the Mission

So now that we understand the mission, let’s talk about the second item: embracing the mission. What’s the reason we should make disciples? Well, look at the reason Jesus himself gives. Jesus starts out in verse 18 of our main text by saying, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples….” That’s the reason. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Jesus. He deserves to be followed. When we call people to be disciples of Jesus, we’re calling them to acknowledge the complete kingship and lordship of Jesus over everything in the universe and then personally yield to that lordship in their lives. I think that’s Jesus’ main intention here in reminding his disciples of his authority in verse 18 before telling them to make disciples in verse 19. It’s because making disciples is about calling people to give their total allegiance to that authority. It’s about calling people to recognize, in the words of Colossians 1:16, that all things were created “through [Jesus] and for [Jesus].” And it’s about calling people to recognize, in the words of Revelation 19:16, that Jesus is the “King of kings and Lord of lords.” Jesus can point to every square inch of this universe and rightfully say, “That’s mine.” So this mission of making disciples is about calling people to recognize Jesus as the king and then inviting them to embrace him as their king. That’s why Jesus reminds his disciples of his supreme authority back in verse 18 of our main text. And that’s the ground we stand on when we call people to be disciples.

And, in fact, as we look at verse 19 of our text, we can see that making disciples is the main thing Jesus has commissioned us to do here on earth. Making disciples is our mission. It isn’t just one task of the church—it’s the task of the church. So that means everything we do as a church should contribute to this mission of making disciples. That’s why Redeeming Grace Church has this mission statement to keep us on track: “Our mission is to lead people to know Jesus personally, grow to spiritual maturity, and become disciple-makers themselves.” Basically, making disciples. We want to be a disciple-making factory. We want to lead people to know Jesus personally, grow to spiritual maturity, and become disciple-makers themselves. That’s how we as a church evaluate every activity we do and every dollar we spend. Does it help people know Jesus personally, grow to spiritual maturity, and become disciple-makers themselves? If it doesn’t pass that test, then we don’t do it as a church. We have a laser beam focus. We’re not going to let ourselves get distracted. 

Unfortunately, many churches do get distracted. I’ve visited one church in our city that has launched a campaign to save their stained glass windows. They have some very historic stained glass windows, and I’m told these windows will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to fix. And since the church has lost a lot of its membership in recent years, the 40 or so people who attend don’t have that kind of money. So they’ve launched a fundraising campaign to ask people outside the church to help them in their quest to save their stained glass windows. And I’m sure their stained glass windows have a lot of sentimental value to them and are just a nice piece of history, and I certainly don’t want to be overly harsh in my criticism of another church, but I can’t help but wonder of that church has lost its focus on the mission Jesus has given us of making disciples. 

And listen to me: just because we’re a new church and we don’t have stained glass windows to preserve, we still have that same tendency every other church group has of drifting towards an inward focus. Don’t fool yourself by thinking you’re immune from that. Like we said at the beginning, that’s human nature. And that country-club mentality will kill Redeeming Grace Church just as fast as any other church on Brownsville Road. Don’t think it won’t creep in or that it hasn’t already been trying to creep in from the very beginning. And if you want a quick way to measure the level of inward focus in a church, just pay attention to how long it takes someone to engage a first-time visitor who walks in the door. My hope is for a first-time visitor be engaged in conversation within fifteen seconds. Maybe you could call this a “fifteen second rule.” Fifteen seconds is optimal, thirty seconds is probably permissible. And if they’ve had time to grab refreshments and you see them sitting alone, then you know the group has become inwardly focused. We are family, like we talked about last week, but we’re a family with a mission. 

Practicing the Mission

Now, if you remember at the beginning, I said that I’d like to talk not only about understanding the mission and embracing the mission but also about practicing the mission. I think I lot of Christians have their heart in the right place. They really do want to embrace the mission of Jesus wholeheartedly, but they’re not exactly sure how to go about doing that. If that’s you, be encouraged that we’re all learning and growing together in that area. I’ve never met anybody who has it all figured out; I certainly don’t. 

Build Friendships with Non-Christians

But one thing that I think is important is simply becoming friends with people who aren’t Christians. It amazes me how many Christians talk about their lack of opportunities to share the gospel, but then you ask them a few questions and you discover they don’t even have any non-Christian friends. The only people they ever hang out with are Christians. Now I’m no rocket scientist, but that’s sort of like a fisherman who’s complaining that he can’t catch any fish, but you do a little investigating and discover that he’s in the middle of the Saharan desert. Last I checked, the desert isn’t exactly the destination of choice for fish. They don’t like to go there. It’s about as desirable to them as going to Long John Silver’s. So no wonder this fisherman can’t catch any fish; he’s never around any fish! If he wants to catch some fish, he needs to start spending time where the fish spend time—in a lake or a stream or even the ocean. 

It’s interesting to observe that one of the nicknames Jesus’ opponents gave him was “a friend of sinners.” And they meant that in a derogatory way, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Jesus wore it as a badge of honor. If you’re a Christian, could people say that about you? Could you accurately be described as “a friend of sinners”? I heard it said once that the way you can determine if you’re really a friend of sinners or not is to ask yourself, “If I went out of town on vacation for a week, are there any non-Christians besides family who would miss me? Would any non-Christians miss that I’m not there?” You see, I’m not talking about hanging out with someone just long enough to talk about Jesus with them, and then you’re off doing other things. That’s not looking at people as friends; that’s looking at them as projects. Being a friend is about really caring for them, enjoying their company, genuinely embracing them as a person regardless of whether or not they ever become a Christian. Are you friends with non-Christians? 

Sometimes, you have to go out of your way to do it. For example, right now, I’m involved in tennis league in Brentwood. I also volunteer for a local hospice here. I also try to do some of my work at the public library two or three days a week, and the noisiest section of library at that—because that’s where the people are. I’m also counting down the days until my 3-year-old is old enough to play soccer. Ask yourself, “What can I do to put myself in a place where I’ll have regular social interaction with people who aren’t Christians?” And maybe you don’t need to change anything and you already have those opportunities—I don’t know.

And as you get to know people more and more, you’ll just naturally have opportunities to talk to them about Jesus. It may be 3 months, 6 months, or a year, but you’ll almost always have the green light eventually to talk about meaningful things, personal things, spiritual things. Hopefully you’ll get the chance to explain to them the reason why everything is so messed up in this world: because human beings have sinned and rebelled against God. Hopefully you’ll get the chance to explain to them how Jesus demonstrated incomprehensible love for us when he on the cross to take the punishment for our sins. Hopefully you’ll get the chance to help them understand how Jesus being raised from the dead is a picture of what can happen to each of us as we repent of our sins and put our trust in him to save us. You need to be sharing those things. Share that gospel message! But try to do so at the right time as well. I think that we Christians talk about Jesus with each other so much that we often forget that many non-Christians regard that as a deeply personal subject, and you’ll offend many of them if you try to have that conversation too early. My advice is to just pray for the Holy Spirit to lead you every step of the way. 

Tag-Team with Other Christians

Another practical thing you can do, in addition to building genuine friendships with non-Christians, is letting non-Christians see believers living in community. Invite them in. Living in community and being engaged in the mission of Jesus mesh together perfectly. Because non-Christians need to see Christians interacting with each other and loving each other and serving each other. They need to see us living like a family. And when they see that—when they see people from all different backgrounds and all different walks of life who would probably never spend time with each other if it weren’t for Jesus—when they see all of those people loving each other like family, they won’t be able to explain it. They may try to explain it, but if they were honest with themselves, they wouldn’t be able to explain it because it can only be explained by the power of the gospel changing people’s lives. I think we mentioned last week Jesus’ words in John 13:35: “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” So invite them into the Christian community and let them see that love in action. 

For example, Becky and I have started the yearly tradition of hosting a Christmas party at our house. And what we do is bake Christmas cookies for our whole street—about 40 houses—and I go door to door delivering them along with an invitation to our Christmas party. And we usually have around a dozen neighbors who come, and then we also invite about a dozen of our Christian friends. And it works out really well letting the two groups interact with each other. And you can also do that on a smaller scale. Instead of just inviting a non-Christian family over for dinner, extend an invitation to a Christian family to join you for dinner that night as well. And then just chill together and have fun. 

Conclusion: Multiplication

So those are two practical pieces of advice. Build genuine friendships with people who aren’t Christians, and then introduce them to some of your Christian friends so that you guys can all hang out together. And as people see how Jesus has change you and how he’s changed others in the church, hopefully you’ll have the opportunity to share the gospel message with them so that Jesus can change their lives too. 

And let me emphasize that this is something every Christian is called to do. You may not have been physically present when Jesus said the things he said in Matthew 28 about making disciples, but you may as well have been, because it applies just as much to you as it did to the original hearers. Making disciples isn’t something that’s best left to some elite group of professionals. It’s something that every Christian is called to do. And in fact, we don’t just want to make disciples. We want to make disciples who make disciples. That’s what our mission statement says: we want to lead people to know Jesus personally, grow to spiritual maturity, and become disciple-makers themselves. So not just making disciples, but making disciples who we then train to make more disciples. It’s about multiplication. Look at this chart. How to turn a penny into 5.4 million dollars. You can do it in 30 days simply by doubling that penny every day. So you start out on Day 1 with one penny. Then, if you double that on Day 2, it becomes two pennies. Then on Day 3, it’s four pennies. Then eight pennies. Then sixteen, thirty-two, sixty-four. Then you’ve got over a dollar on Day 8. And on Day 30, you end up with 5.4 million dollars. That’s the power of multiplication. 

And that’s what we want to do in this church. And not just pragmatically. I think that’s actually the biblical model—that’s the example Jesus gave—and we simply want to follow that model. If every person in our church could make a disciple of just one other person every year and train that disciple to make another disciple every year, our church would double in size every year. Think about the transformation we would see in people’s lives. Think about the transformation we would see in our city over time. It all goes back to the very simple concept of making disciples who make disciples.