What is the Great Commission? by Scott Brown. (Matthew 28:16-20) God is a missionary God and Christianity is a missionary religion. God puts a mission upon us to go out and make disciples of all the nations. He delivers us from the smallness of our own dreams and puts His mantle upon us.

The National Center for Family Integrated Churches welcomes Scott Brown with the following message entitled, What is the Great Commission? Commission. Matthew 28, 16 through 20 declares that God is a missionary God and that Christianity is a missionary religion and that God's love moves in such a way that he sends people to be emissaries of his love. And What a great gift the Great Commission is. Think about it for a moment.

Think of how many ways that God worked in order to send someone to you. Think of all the different sent ones from God that you needed. He sent many prophets, he sent many friends, he sent many, many things in order to rescue you. Over and over again he spoke to you. You know, there are people who say, well, I never really heard the gospel.

You know, many of them actually heard the gospel hundreds of times, they just didn't hear it because their hearts were so hard. How many times did you hear the gospel but your heart was so hard? But God, God in his mercy, he just kept sending prophets to you to speak to you. What a blessing it is, what a gift this Great Commission is. Now this question, how many of you here have ever heard a word by word, line by line exposition on the Great Commission?

Could you raise your hands? Just a few of you. I can't see very many hands. This is very typical. It's amazing that something so pivotal is also something that is so little known in all of its details.

People can kind of speak generally about the Great Commission, but its details we'll try to deal with here in this passage of Scripture. And my objective tonight is just to try to walk very slowly through each word and each phrase of the Great Commission in order to lay a foundation for all the other things that we're going to hear. And so let's read this great commission. Then the 11 disciples went away into Galilee to the mountain, which Jesus had appointed for them. And when they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted.

And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, All authority has been given unto me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." That is the Great Commission. And so just before His ascension, the Lord Jesus Christ delivers His last command. His last command ought to be our first priority.

And it's a life-altering commission. If you get involved with Jesus, the whole course of your life is shifted. You are not your own. He puts a mission upon you to go out and make disciples of all the nations. He delivers you from the smallness of your own dreams.

He delivers you from yourself, from wasting your life in the way that you think you would like to live it. And He changes your heart and He puts His mantle of authority upon you in the same way that he did Elijah and Elisha. This is what the Great Commission is all about, and it is truly a great commission. And the Lord Jesus Christ, He saves and then he sends on a mission. It's the mission of the Great Commission.

Now the Great Commission, as we'll find as we walk through it, is much broader than you ever thought. It's much deeper. It covers far more categories of human life than most people think that it does. And, you know, many people think that the fulfillment of the Great Commission is in the sharing of the gospel message, that that is the essence of the fulfillment of the Great Commission. And of course, it is assumed in the Great Commission, but there is far, far more.

Here's my question. Of the over 800 churches that affiliate with the National Center for Family Integrated Churches. What could happen in this nation if there was a white, hot devotion to the fulfillment of the Great Commission? What could God do in such a condition as that? And I pray that God would do something that would shake our nation and call people to cry out to God for salvation.

And yet this great commission is often our great omission and it falls in the priority system of our lives to almost nothing. And so we recognize that it is such a great commission. Now, there are seven demands of this great commission that I would like to speak of. And the first demand of this commission is a supreme authority. The Lord Jesus Christ says, all authority is given to me in heaven and on earth." And here the Lord Jesus Christ establishes himself as the supreme authority in all of the universe.

And here there's a disclosure of the Lord Jesus Christ place in the universe. You know, gentle Jesus, meek and mild, has unquenchable, undeniable, unopposable authority in the world in which we live. And the word that the Lord Jesus Christ uses is the word exeusia for authority. And it really just means that you can do whatever you wish, that you have the rightful and willful independent power over all things. This is the authority that Jesus Christ has, and it's the same authority that he actually gives to his children in order to fulfill this great commission.

This is one of the four alls of the great commission. All power, all nations, all things, and all ways. And this one here explains the great and mighty power of God. That God sends us on an impossible mission that is possible because of His power. And He desires that we know that His authority is with us, that it protects us, it comforts us, that it is the authority with which we are bequeathed with so that we will understand that it doesn't depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy that we who are sent out in the world understand the mighty power of God.

It is the most freeing power that a human being can know to recognize that no one comes to the Father unless the Father draws him, that God is in control of all of these things. And it's an authority that dominates all things. And he identifies two specific areas of authority. First of all, in heaven. This is the first area in which his authority reigns.

And that means his authority reigns in all celestial bodies, all stars, all galaxies, all black holes, all light, angels and demons in heaven, even the space junk that is spinning through space is under the autocratic control of Almighty God. And then it's authority in heaven. All molecules, all DNA, all rocks, all rivers, all oceans, all lakes, all winds, all tornadoes, all hurricanes, all downpours, the synapses of every brain, all cancer, all back problems, all fathers, all mothers, all pastors, all brothers and sisters, all police, all politicians, all elections. Every nanosecond, every single corner of the universe is under the autocratic domination of Jesus Christ. And that's the authority that he's proclaiming.

Now, in the Gospel of Matthew, the Lord Jesus Christ has already demonstrated His authority over everything. The authority over demons, the authority over sickness, the authority over winds and waves. And even the demons cry out and say, have you come to destroy us before the time? The whole spiritual universe understands the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the authority that goes with those who fulfill this great commission, that he has defeated the devil.

Psalm 110 tells us that the foot of Jesus Christ is on the neck of all of his enemies right now. Because of the resurrection, Jesus Christ has his dominating autocratic foot on the neck of all of his enemies and this is the power of this great Commission. Now it a much needed authority. All awakenings are characterized by a voice of authority. They happen when men And women become unafraid of the Word of God, that they love the Word of God.

They rise up and they say, Oh, how I love thy law. And they are not afraid of man at all. And they cease worrying about what people think or say. When pastors have this, they're not afraid of who might leave their church. They're not afraid of the big giver that they might offend by preaching the Word of God.

They're not afraid of anything because they understand there is an authority in heaven. The fear of man is perhaps one of the greatest sins of our age, in this age of political correctness and of cowering before men, this perhaps might be the greatest obstacle in your life to fulfilling the Great Commission. I know it has been in my life many times. How many times I've made some silly comment because I was afraid of what that man would think. How many times have I not said what I ought to have said to a leader in my community because I wanted to be the friend of every man?

This fear of man is one of the greatest obstacles to the Great Commission, that we ought to just with all of the joy in our hearts say to that person, what do you think of Christ? That's all you have to say, What do you think of Christ? And then move from there. But here the voice of authority is needed. The voice of authority is needed in the pulpits today.

The voice of authority is needed among fathers today and children and wives so that the voice of God would be alive in the world today. Men emboldened by the Holy Spirit who say, thus saith the Lord. When they do that, the foundations of the world are shaken. Chains fall off. People are set free.

Happiness comes in. There's healing in his wings. That's what happens with this voice of authority. And when we cower out of the fear of man, We have to recognize what we have done in missing the power of God in the Great Commission. Christ's authority is perhaps the greatest declaration of freedom that you will ever have.

The knowledge of His absolute authority is the most freeing thing you can ever know. That you know that it's not your words, you know that it's not your arguments, you know that it's the spirit of Almighty God working through his powerful word, through the Holy Spirit. That is what converts. That is what saves. And we have no reason to fear This is an authority that guarantees the success of the Lord Jesus Christ The Lord Jesus has with this statement guaranteed the success of the Great Commission.

There is no place we cannot preach the gospel. He will open doors that no one can open. He will soften hearts that no one can soften except by his authority. He will enlighten where there's nothing but darkness in the face of his authority. He will cleanse when there's only filthiness.

He will change direction when there's only headlong flight into destruction. He can make alive what is dead by his own authority. And one of the most wonderful things about this is that it is actually a bequeathed authority, very, very much like the mantle of authority that Elijah had that was given to Elisha the prophet. His authority, his authority literally has been designed to work through your words, his voice, his person. Now the Bible actually teaches that when you are witnessing that it is Jesus Christ who is the evangelist and the disciple maker.

Did you know that Jesus Christ is the disciple maker? Did you know that he's the evangelist? Did you know that he's the one that's calling to repentance? It's his voice, not yours. We see this in Ephesians chapter 2, verse 17, where we read, And he came and preached peace to you who were far away, and peace to those who were near.

For through him, we have our access into one spirit to the Father." Here the apostle Paul is saying to the Ephesians that Jesus Christ came and preached to them. Now, when did Jesus Christ ever go to Ephesus? I don't believe Jesus ever took his body into Ephesus to preach peace to the people in that city. He never went there, But he did go there through those who spoke his word. And it was as if he was speaking through them.

Jesus Christ was the one who preached the gospel in Ephesus. He preached in Ephesus through someone who lived in Ephesus, even though he wasn't there himself. This is the power of the Great Commission that Jesus Christ has given to his disciples. It is a supreme authority. It is a vanquishing authority.

It is an autocratic authority and it is an authority that comes when you preach the word of God, it has in itself authority and Jesus Christ is the great evangelist, He is the one who takes your words and breaks the heart. He's the one who takes your words and soothes the soul. He's the one that takes your words and convicts of sin. He's the one who saves. And this is the authority that God has given to us to fulfill the Great Commission.

And so this first great demand and blessing of The Great Commission is a supreme authority. And then secondly, it really is an exciting journey. In verse 19, go, therefore go. This first principle here of go is very important that we understand. The Greek language is structured in such a way that when you have participles that are connected to a main verb, they take on the force of that main verb, of that command.

In this case, this is a participle, go. And it takes on the force of the main verb, which is make disciples. So it actually becomes a command. All of the participles in this sentence are actually commands. And this command, this word go, this participle, is actually a command.

And we obey the command, why? Because of His authority. Go, therefore, we go because of his authority. And so we have this central command to make disciples and then going and baptizing and teaching all of these take on the force of a command. Now, with this word go, something changes.

Something really dramatic changes in redemptive history. Now the disciples are commanded to go into the whole world. The disciples have been preaching the gospel to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And now they're going to go far beyond the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And this is the beginning of this expanding ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ in the world.

This command to go launches the whole enterprise of the new covenant and the carrying of the gospel to all the world. And it really, it explains a dynamic lifestyle. Life is not like an eddy, but like a river that's going somewhere. The sower went out to sow. He went out.

He got up from where he was. He went out. So often we just want people to come to us. We say, well, I'll encounter people just in the day. When God sends me someone, I'll speak to them.

But we often neglect to go, to go out, to get out of our chairs, to get on an airplane, to write a letter, to go and do something. Rather, we wait. I languish when I think of how often I've waited and not proactively and strategically gone out in order to fulfill the Great Commission. This is really fueled by love for lost humanity. This is perhaps the second greatest sin that destroys the fulfillment of the Great Commission, and that is lack of love for people.

We don't love them, so we don't pray for them. We don't strategize how we might find them and go out to them. But here in the Great Commission, we are called to go out. This is the same kind of passion that John Knox had when he said, give me Scotland, and I die, or the same desperation of Charles Spurgeon, who said, give me souls or take my soul. That's the kind of urgency to go that is loaded in this passage.

And so often, we just want to sit and wait, and in the normal course of our day, to somehow bump into someone. We ought to pray for the normal course of the day. But here, there is a command to go. This is why the Lord Jesus Christ said, look at the fields, for they are white under harvest. The harvest is plentiful, but the labors are few.

Therefore pray, pray the Lord of the harvest that he might send forth labors into his harvest." Of course, the book of Acts illustrates this. We could spend several hours going from each chapter of the Book of Acts to explain how this worked out in the early church. And you can see how it applies that the gospel came to you and your children and for those who are far off. In other words, to everyone who lives in the world. And so the Lord Jesus Christ in his great commission, he would ask us to go, to pray for someone who is not where we are, to be strategic about it, and then to go in that direction and find them and preach the gospel to them.

I pray that for us here, there are thousands of people who've come to mind here that you're thinking about people who you need to go to, that you need to go see, you need to go out of your way and preach the gospel to them. Would you consider that very carefully? Could it be that you're here tonight because this is one of the things that needs to be built up, this is one of the things that needs to be planted so that you're no longer sitting and just waiting, but that you're ready to go. You know, I have a friend here that I went to seminary with, his name is Paul Roby, he's gonna be giving a session on evangelizing Mormons. And my dear friend had a conviction in his soul, I think it was about 15 or 18 years ago to go to Salt Lake City and to preach the gospel to the Mormons.

And he did, he packed up his family and he went to Salt Lake City and he didn't know a single person there. And he told me that he would go into a coffee shop and he would say, Oh God, show me someone to speak to. And he would go into a store and walk down the aisle and he'd say, oh God, show me who I ought to speak to. And he just cried out to God, and now there are, you know, there are three churches with over 2,000 converted Mormons there in Salt Lake City, because a man decided that God had called him to go, to go away from his comfortable life and go to the place where there really are almost no Christians, 1% of the population. Some of us here need to board a plane, maybe get on a ship, maybe send a letter, get out of your living room, and go and preach the gospel.

There are people here who ought to be recruited, maybe even tonight, to be missionaries, who have said in their hearts many times, oh, I need to go, but you've never done it because of the comfortable life, the fears, the difficulties that are before all those who would go into another culture. Are you one of those people tonight? My prayer is that God would use tonight and our sessions going forward to recruit missionaries who would go, who would leave this land. God knows how much this land needs the gospel of Jesus Christ, but the gospel is needed everywhere in the world. And the Lord Jesus, He is our example.

He's the one that left His Father's heavenly glory, and He passed through the heavens to come and take on sinful flesh so that he might redeem mankind. Here's a question, is it enough just to preach the gospel in your family? No, it's not enough just to preach the gospel in your family. It is right to preach the gospel in your family. It is right to preach the gospel in your family.

It is right to pour out your heart day by day to bring the word of God, the sweetness of the testimonies from heaven into your family and to do it day after day after day. It's right to do that. But if you think that just teaching your children is fulfilling the great commission, you are fooling yourselves. God has called us to go and to find and to seek and to save the lost. Now this is very personal to me because someone in the 17th and 18th century got on an old rickety boat and went and preached the gospel in a remote island in the Caribbean.

And it just so happened that my wife's relatives were there. They were, they were indentured servants. They were white slaves on the island of Barbados. And somebody got on a ship and went to Barbados and preached the gospel to Deborah's relatives. And they were saved.

They were genuinely saved. And since that time, on her side of the family, there's been one divorce in five generations. And it's because of the gospel. It's because the gospel, God saw to it that the gospel would be passed down from one generation to the next. One of The greatest joys of my life this year was to take Deborah on our 30th wedding anniversary to the island of Barbados.

It's a little tiny island, so it's really easy to find everything. And the Anglican Church documented everything so you can find who is baptized or who, you know, when people were married and baptized and all these kinds of things. And we went to the place where they were converted. We went to the place where they in turn went and preached the gospel in the jungle areas where their family was. We went to the place in the marketplace where on Saturdays they would go out and preach the gospel.

And my wife and I stood there and we saw the places that her ancestors were. The blessings from heaven that are pouring down upon my family, upon my life, they all go back to the preaching of the gospel. They all go back to someone who went, who got in a ship and went to a remote island and found an unbeliever. And I now have a daughter of Zion who pours out blessing because the gospel was preached, because someone got out of their uncomfortable chair in England and went to the island of Barbados and preached the gospel. What a blessing it is to consider how wonderful it is when people go, how many people went to you now?

Would you go? Would you go to that person that you're thinking of now? And then there's this wonderful work, this beneficial work to make disciples in verse 19. What is a disciple? This work of the Great commission is to make a disciple.

A disciple is very simply a learner, a follower, someone who is following Christ. Now it's not the same as making converts. It includes making converts, but making disciples is bigger than making converts. I was in church the other day and I spoke with a young man who said he just got back from the Far East and he said that they had 30 decisions for Christ. He didn't understand that God did not send him for decisions.

He had sent him to make disciples. And how easily that has been lost in all of our thinking regarding the fulfillment of the Great Commission. God has called us to make believing learners and learning believers, believing followers, following believers. That is the command of the Great Commission, to go and preach the gospel to them, and then to see to it that they walk in the ways of the Lord. In fact, The gospel is just assumed in the Great Commission.

The result of the preaching of the gospel is communicated, the making of a disciple, which begins with the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. You know, modern evangelism, as we all know, is defined by getting decisions, while biblical discipleship is defined by making disciples whose hearts and minds are captivated by their shepherd, and they follow him, and they walk with him, and they hate sin, and they continue in his word. That's what a disciple is. So the fulfillment of the Great Commission is way bigger than just witnessing. It's bigger than evangelistic campaigns.

It's bigger than personal evangelism. It's bigger than street preaching. It's bigger than preaching in the church. It's part of a multifaceted discipleship that God calls his people to perform. And this discipleship is of all the nations, of all the nations.

The Greek term, pontata ethne, it's a very important term. There are those who are going to really dissect this matter of what does it mean to disciple a nation. Jeff Botkin is doing a session and there are others that speak of this really important issue And I pray that you'll understand what this means. But the scope of this is important to understand. Is it just simply every person?

Or does it include cultures? Does it include people groups? Does it include nation states? Now if you look at the lexicons, and I consulted several lexicons which speak of this, and the bottom line is this, is that it means all of those things. All of those who dwell in nations, all of those who are in language groups, and all of the other people.

And it has to do with the reality that the Lord Jesus Christ desires to have authority over the nations and even the nation states that His authority extends from sea to sea. His authority extends over all the nations. God's sovereign desire is to preach the gospel in all the nations so that the nations would be glad. How does a nation become glad? How does that happen?

There's a message about that that Michael Gobert will be giving. I encourage you to go listen to it. He came into my office a couple of days ago and I asked him to tell me about his message and he started preaching the message to me. And I thought I was just going to be blown out of my chair and I want to hear this message. But God desires to dominate the nations.

Here's an Old Testament example of this in Psalm 33, verse 12, Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people he has chosen as his own inheritance. This is the term that we get, our term goyim. It's the term that is used primarily in these contexts of the nations. And the phrase reflects the message of the Lord Jesus Christ in Psalm chapter two, verse eight. There's a context there in Psalm two of worldwide rebellion against Almighty God.

And in that passage, there is a record of a really remarkable conversation between God the Father and His Son. There's an actual conversation between these two persons of the Trinity. And the Lord Jesus Christ, The Father says to the Son, the Son says, ask of me. And the Father says, and I will surely give the nations as your inheritance and the very ends of the earth as your possession. The Father is going to give the Son all of the nations of the earth.

You think, how could that happen in our nation? How could that happen in any nation in the world? The Bible says that it will happen, that Jesus Christ will have all authority over the nations. This is why he says, now therefore be wise, O kings, and be instructed, you judges of the earth, serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the son lest he be angry and you perish in the way.

When his wrath is kindled but a little, blessed are all those who put their trust in him. And so this is a commission that is so great that it includes all of the nations. Here's what John Adams said, suppose a nation in some distant region should take the Bible for their only law book, and every member shout, and every member should regulate his conduct by the precepts that are exhibited there. What a utopia, what a paradise would this religion be? And this is the religion of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And why? Because the nations have adopted belief systems and practices that are contrary to Jesus Christ and Jesus desires to transform them. Their philosophies are bankrupt. Their philosophies of everything are bankrupt, of the family, of manhood and womanhood, of work, of economics, of politics. Their understanding of justice, their understanding of sovereignty is bankrupt, and it's only the Gospel that can come and do its work of healing to those broken cultures.

Nations have been defiled from the beginning of the world to the present time. And this spirit of the devil is the same spirit that works in every nation in the world. You know, I've traveled to Eastern Europe, to South America, to Africa, and to Mexico, to everywhere I've ever been. The problems are the same. You go and the gospel is broken in the same places.

Marriages are broken in the same place. Manhood and womanhood, they're broken in the exact same places in every nation of the world. And all you have to do is hold this holy book and preach the word of God to it and the spring will be cleansed as people turn to the Lord and amend their practices Because the devil is not very creative. And the problems in our nation, the devil has worked in every nation in the world. And we have the Lord Jesus Christ so that every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God would be torn down.

And you might ask, how do you disciple a nation? How does that happen? Well, it happens from the bottom up. It doesn't come from a government takeover. He will save his people from their sin and from the bottom of their hearts to the top levels of the culture and practice, his authority will rule and reign.

God works from the inside out. He works from the bottom up. He transforms a heart. He makes a husband and a wife to be a preacher of the gospel. And he uses children who will rise up and become preachers of the gospel.

In the same way that he did with Wilberforce in England, in the same way that he did with Wilberforce in England, in the same way that he did with Patrick in Ireland. We ought to view these transformations as very important. People say, well, the transformation of the family is not that important. Well, it is very important because it is the beginning of the transformation of society that's necessary that prepares gospel preachers with transformed lives who will go and change their nations, who will rise up and boldly preach the gospel and boldly stand for what is true and right in their nation. This is how the nations are discipled.

And it is for us to cry out to God persistently that he would be the disciple maker of our nation. And it will happen as we go and we seek and save the lost. And the lost rise up and they declare their voices in the marketplaces. Now, how hard is this task? Is anything, what an ominous task this is.

How can you purify our nation? Have you given up hope for that? Well, here's what Isaiah said. He said, behold, the nations are as a drop in the bucket and are counted as the small dust on the scales. Look, he lifts up the aisles as a very little thing.

The nations before him are as nothing and They are counted by him less than nothing, and they are worthless. We should never fear what our government will do because the nations are as a drop in the bucket. In Jeremiah 18, we learned that if that nation against whom God has spoken turns from its evil, he will relent of the disaster that he was going to bring upon it. God is the absolute authority over all the nations And God desires our nation. He shall have, as Psalm 72 says, dominion from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth.

Yes, all kings shall fall down before him, all nations shall serve him. Here's a fourth blessing, a fourth demand of the Great Commission, the physical sign of new life, baptism in verse 20. Baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. So the disciple making process includes baptism. Baptism identifies the convert with Christ and the meaning of the word baptizo is to immerse in water.

Baptism is a fruit of repentance. It requires repentance. It requires the receiving of the word of God. It's an outward sign of conversion. It's that ceremony where a Christian demonstrates his fidelity to Jesus Christ and his identification with him.

And it is an expression of his, of his true faith. If you're, if you're reluctant to be baptized, then you ought to question your heart before God. God has desired that his disciples would be baptized. And it is a sign of ownership. It's a sign of new life.

It's a sign of friendship with God and of sonship. And the pattern in scripture is to repent and to be baptized. So the question is, have you been baptized? If you've not been baptized, you should ask, have I bowed my knee to the Lord Jesus Christ? One of the most wonderful parts of this commission are some very simple words that we are baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Now, this is very wonderful. We are baptized in or into one name. We are baptized into three persons. We are baptized into the very nature of the one true God. And what's so amazing about this is that a Christian is actually inserted into a family, into a community.

It's a community of humility. It's a community of love as the Father loves the Son, as the Son delights to do the will of his Father. It's a community of delight. It's a community of divine pleasure. It's a community of relationship and communication.

When you are baptized into Jesus Christ, you are baptized into a community of love. You are baptized into a whole world of love, of which God is the sinner. So when you read these words, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, you are being introduced into a family. The most wonderful family that exists is the family of God. This community of beings who love one another.

And you just Consider what a blessing it is to be baptized into the name of the Father. Think of the blessings and the benefits, the goodness of the Father and the Son. Think of the love and the mercy of the Son of God. Think of His authority. Think of His wisdom.

Think of what He gives as bread of life, as waters of life. The Spirit, we are baptized into that name, this relationship of humility and love and service and presence, what a blessing it is to be baptized in that name. And it changes your whole behavior. You might ask yourself, what were you baptized into? Were you baptized into that?

Maybe you were baptized into a cult and you haven't recognized that that was the nature of your baptism. Maybe you were baptized in one of those big youth group baptisms where everybody makes a profession of faith and they get wet that night. But you weren't really baptized into that name, into that community of love. You've never really known that community. You've never really tasted of his love.

You've never really been nourished from heaven. You've never really been comforted by him because the Spirit of God is the comforter. You're never really all that convicted of your sin. And you've not been baptized into that name. Perhaps you were baptized into moralism.

You were baptized because you wanted to get your life together. You want to fix up all the problems that were beating you to death. You were a mess as a husband and you figured you had to do something so you went and got baptized. You thought that might help you. You started going to church.

Maybe you've been there for 10 or 20 years, but you were just baptized into moralism and you've spent your whole life trying to clean the outside of the cup when in fact the inside of the cup is full of extortion and there's no life there because you weren't baptized into a community of love. You've never really tasted and seen that the Lord is good. This is one of the critical marks of true conversion. You taste, you see that the Lord is good. But what were you baptized in?

Were you baptized into that? We have to ask that question. But the fulfillment of the Great Commission includes the performing of a physical, representative, and symbolic ordinance called baptism that signifies that you are now a child of God. And you have been inserted into this community of love. And now you love.

You know, there was a man that was converted in our church not very long ago, and he was a theologian. He had a lot to say, was always involved in theological arguments and debates, but he actually ended up realizing he wasn't a Christian. He said, he said, I realized that I was converted because I was sitting in church and I realized that I wasn't criticizing everything that pastor said. My heart loved him. My heart loved the word that was coming.

He said, I looked at my wife and I realized I loved her because I hated her before. He had been baptized by the Spirit of God into a community of love. Who have you been baptized in? What is the nature of this salvation that you claim? You must address that.

And Then there's this transforming influence in verse 20, a transforming influence, teaching them to obey Christ, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you. That word observe is translated all over the New Testament as obey or keep. It's the same word, it's the word with the word tereo and it has to do with the changing of your life by obedience to Christ. And there are three things that are mentioned here. First is the activity teaching, second the requirement to observe, and then thirdly the content to observe all things that I have commanded.

So there's this teaching, this didosko as the Greek language has it. Teaching was always the central activity of Jesus Christ and he taught in synagogues, on roads, in a boat, on hillsides. He taught everywhere. This is the ministry of the Great Commission. We teach, but what do we teach?

We are involved in teaching all things that Christ has commanded. We know that the people were astonished at his teaching because he taught as one having authority, not as the scribes and the Pharisees. We know that God requires fathers to teach their children. We know that God requires saints to become teachers in the world. And this is the whole teaching ministry of the church.

Here's a question. Why is it that churches who are known for evangelism are known for shallow doctrine and shallow teaching? Why is that? Maybe you can tell me that. I'm not even gonna attempt to answer that question with the shortness of time that we have.

But God has called us to a teaching ministry. And then there's this requirement to observe, to obey. This occurs many times, and this is about transformation, not first of all information. And what we learn here is that Jesus Christ desires an obedient church. The problem with the church today, at least one of them, is that preaching obedience in the churches today has fallen on hard times.

We live in a toleration generation and we want preachers to speak sweetly and the moment they make any demands we call them legalists. And we live in a generation where anyone who commands is called evil. This is the spirit of the Pharisees who killed the prophets and stoned those who were sent to her. And the question we have to ask is, is calling for obedience legalism? Is it?

And here the Lord Jesus declares that it's not, because the disciples of Jesus are commanded to go and teach all things that Christ commanded. This is our work. When you find a shepherd who's not doing that, he's not a faithful shepherd. People sometimes come and ask me, What's the vision that you have for the church there in Wake Forest? And of course, my prayer for our church is that it is a Christ-centered church.

It's a holy church. It's a praying church. It's a fearless church. It's a happy church. But I also pray that it is an obedient church.

This is not a personal vision. This is Jesus Christ's vision for the church and there's no better vision for the church than he has. I don't know if you've ever been on a committee to write a vision statement for your church. Have you ever entered in obedience as one of the elements of your vision statement? To bring the congregation to the obedience of Jesus Christ.

Is that part of your agenda in your church? I know we have many church leaders here. Ask yourself, is this part of your discipleship? We learn from Hebrews 5.9 that obedience is a sign of eternal salvation. We read, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him.

In Revelation chapter 3 verses 3 and 4 we read that obedience is a fruit of repentance where the writer says, remember therefore how you have received and heard. Hold fast, it's the same word obey, hold fast and repent. Therefore if you will not watch I will come upon you as a thief, and you will not know what hour I will come upon you." We learn in John 14-15 that obedience shows that you love Him. He said, If you love me, you will keep my commandments. In John 14, 21, we learn that obedience shows that you love him and that you are loved by your father.

He who has my commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him." Obedience is a condition to abiding in his love, John 15, 9-14. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love." Obedience is a sign that Christ is your friend. John 15, 14 says, you are my friends. If you do, whatever I command you.

Obedience is a mark of discipleship because the disciples kept his word in John 17 verse six. The Lord Jesus says, I manifested your name to the men you have given me out of this world. They were yours, you gave them to me. And they have kept, they have obeyed your word." In John 8 51, we learn that obedience causes you never to see death. More assuredly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he shall never see death." In 1 Corinthians 7 19 we learn that obedience matters.

Paul says, circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing, but keeping the commandments of God is what matters. And then the Bible ends with Revelation 22, 7, Behold, I am coming quickly. Blessed is he who obeys the words of the prophecy of this book. Obedience has fallen on hard times in the churches. We need to get it back.

God desires that there would be obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ. Here the Lord Jesus Christ has declared that we ought to learn how to obey Him in every area of life. It is part of the fulfillment of the Great Commission. It is not an explicit part of the gospel message, but it is a part of the fulfillment of the Great Commission, because we are commanded to teach them to obey all things which I have commanded you. You know, There are many churches that support the work of the NCFIC and I view the support that we receive as really a great commission investment because we are part of fulfilling an aspect of the great commission.

We are declaring the sufficiency of Scripture for church and family life. We're trying to teach families how to be families. We're trying to teach churches how to be churches. It is a great commission, mission that we are on. It is part of declaring these issues.

God gives many callings to many different people and thank him that he has done that. There are many people who have such different focal points and they have to do with the fulfillment of the Great Commission. And then there is an abiding presence, an abiding presence in verse 20. He is with us always. Behold, I am with you always, even until the end of the age.

This is such a precious promise here. He begins with those beautiful, that beautiful word, lo, to get your attention, to say, behold, would you look at this? Would you just pause on this? That I am with you always, even to the end of the age. And so he commits his identification with you, he commits his attention upon you, and it means that you are never, never alone.

And there are two ways to understand this. First of all, individualistically, that He walks with you, that He will never leave you or forsake you. But here in this text, Jesus uses the plural, and He's talking about His church, that He will never leave or forsake His church. There's nothing that will destroy the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's such a wonderful assurance that my safety is secure, that he will never leave me or forsake me.

You can go out on the mission field, he will not let you rot. He may kill you, but he will not let you rot. You can go out and witness to your friend and he will not leave you or forsake you. He may cause you to be hated. He may cause you to be belittled and stoned, but he will never leave you or forsake you, and you will have the peace that passes all understanding." And then there is a thrilling ending in verse 20.

Even to the end of the age, He is ruling until the end. What a wonderful thing this is, that the history of the world and the history of my own life is that there is a wonderful and thrilling and happy ending. That Jesus Christ, ruling and reigning, is there. That He is there, and we are with Him for all eternity. And this is the meaning of life.

This is the meaning of the resurrection. This is the purpose of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that there would be people from every tongue and tribe and nation before his throne, and he, making them co-heirs of his kingdom, will rule and reign. It's such a happy ending. This is the ending that God promises all of those who would be saved and who would fulfill the great commission. It's such a happy ending that God has promised.

I'm so grateful for this passage of Scripture. You know, we love happy endings, don't we? We love the endings that conclude with such heartwarming change and freedom. This is the kind of ending that we have here. We love those endings because we long for that ending.

And those who bow their knee to Jesus Christ will have that ending. And so here we have a supreme authority. We have an exciting journey. We have a wonderful calling. We have a physical sign of new life being baptized in the name.

We have a transforming influence to teach them to obey Christ. We have an abiding presence and we have a thrilling ending. This is your great commission. This is the love of Jesus Christ for the world, that he would seek and save the lost through those that he would save. And he would send us out, that he would call us to go.

Here's my advice. Number one, make your family a little missionary society that has this passage of scripture as its vision statement. Secondly, make a list, make a list of people in your community that you need to go to. Go to them. Get out of your chair.

Get out of your car. Or maybe get on a boat or board a plane, but go. Thirdly, Make a list of missionary biographies and read them as a family. This is one of the most helpful things that one can do to help them understand God's heart for the world and to destroy the grip of the world upon us. I pray that God would give us in these churches, such a heartfelt love for Jesus Christ, such a fearless life in the world, such a vision for the transformation of society, Such a true gospel.

The gospel where we learn that he who knew no sin was made sin for us. That we might become the righteousness of God in him. This is your great commission. Would you pray with me? Oh Lord, I pray that you would fulfill each and every one of these elements in us and through us.

Lord, that you would show us what to root out, what to pull down, what to destroy, what to tear down, what to build, and what to plant, and that now, O Holy Father, that you would come and work by your spirit in all of our hearts to teach us these things. We thank you for such a great commission. Oh Lord, let it not be our great commission. Amen. The National Center for Family integrated churches is dedicated to proclaiming the sufficiency of Scripture for church and family life and to the establishment of biblically ordered churches.

For more information, resources and products, please visit our website at www.ncfic.org.