The Great Commission: Understanding the Mandate - Matthew 28:18-20

1:20Well, the Bible actually has something to say about that, has something to say about missions. And I'd like for us to look at that again. This morning, I'd like to talk to you about the great omission of the Great Co-mission. And Pastor Tom has told me that you've received some excellent teaching recently on the Great Commission, so I know that in many cases this is going to be a review. But after giving a review of the passage, I would like to back up and maybe give some emphasis to a particular aspect of this passage here in Matthew chapter 28, verses 16 through 20. We'll be particularly emphasizing verses 18 through 20.

2:09Before we get to that passage, I just want to give you a few illustrations to illustrate where we are in the American church and world missions and kind of set the stage for the passage before us this morning. Missiologist Dr. David Seals, who spent many years as a missionary in Latin America and now serves as the primary professor of missions at Southern Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, in his excellent book entitled Reaching and Teaching, called a Great Commission Obedience, writes this about the church in China, and I quote: He said, All is not as well as we might hope. China's church is hurting in many ways because of the dearth of theologically trained leaders. Missionaries report that evangelicals in China are Losing 10,000 house churches every year to cults because their church leaders have no theological training. They cannot teach or defend what Orthodox Christianity holds to be true. End of quote. Amazing. That's an amazing statistic.

3:20Missionaries report similar concerns not only from Asia, but also Africa and Latin America. For example, missionary John Stamm reports that big sectors of the Latin American church seem to stagger from one shallow sensational fad to another. For a while, it was name-it and claim-it, or holy laughter and spiritual warfare. Then there was the health and wealth gospel, along with the theology of prosperity. He continues in this quote, saying that knocking people to the floor is very popular, as is the latest novelty of naming apostles. End of quote. And by the way, that is a very accurate description of the church in many parts of Mexico. I pulled off of the internet just a couple of days an article written by Dr. Miguel Núñez, pastor of the International Baptist Church in the Dominican Republic, one of the foremost reformed leaders in Latin America. And he says this. He said, it is true that missionaries of different kinds have been present in the Latin American world for more than one and a half centuries. But he said, it is also true that our Region has seen an important work of church planting from the 1960s. I'm translating this on the fly from Spanish, so it may sound a little awkward here. I just want you to get the feel of it. Nevertheless, he said, the effect of light and salt of the church over the Latin American region has been, in the best of cases, very minimal. Very minimal. And he said, if this is the case, should we not be asking ourselves this question? What is the gospel that Latin America has heard?

5:07What is the gospel that Latin America has heard? In the best, in this situation, the situation in Latin America has deteriorated greatly in the last number of years with the profound penetration of the prosperity gospel in our region. He said, it's true, on one hand, that we can affirm that Latin America has heard about sin and has heard about the need of repentance. He said, it's also true that there has been much talk about eternity in heaven and hell. There's been much talk about the final judgment, about the Bible being the inspired book of God. Nevertheless, he said, it is my conviction that the major part of Latin America does not know the gospel. That is astounding. Astounding, folks, that is astounding. After 150 years of missionary work in Latin America, most evangelicals, and El Salvador is said to have 40% population of evangelicals. Most evangelicals do not know the true biblical gospel. Astounding.

6:23The gospel entered Nigeria some 200 years ago. Nigeria today has approximately 8,500 churches and 4,000 pastors. Yet one missionary in Nigeria says, animism, animism is the belief that souls exist not only in human beings, but also in animals and plants and rocks and mountains and rivers. Animism still reigns in the hearts of most Nigerian Christians. One missionary to Nigeria says, and I quote, many Nigerian churches are so far from the truth that the truth is very hard to find. The truth is very hard to find. David Seals notes that many Christian churches, quote unquote, throughout Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Southeast Asia have largely departed from the use of the Bible as their only rule of faith and practice, such that many such churches can no longer consider to be Orthodox Christian churches.

7:27Now, folks, that is exactly the opposite. Of what most American evangelical Christians are hearing today. That's the opposite of what most are hearing. One of the primary reasons that this tragedy is occurring is because over the last number of decades, many missionary efforts have largely omitted from the Great Commission the command to make disciples by teaching them the whole counsel of God. The church and its missionaries have too often interpreted the Great Commission as only an evangelistic mandate rather than what it really is, a discipleship mandate.

8:12And then, a relative new and alarming development, many Christian churches in America and evangelical missionaries are turning the Great Commission into primarily a social justice mandate or even a mercy ministry mandate rather than a discipleship mandate. So, what I would like for us to do this morning is to re-examine briefly the meaning of the Great Commission and then discuss a number of important implications of this for the church and mission. So, if you have your Bible open to Matthew chapter 28, follow along with me as I read verses 16 through 20, and I'm reading out of the ESV translation of the Bible. Now it says, 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. 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. To the end of the age. Now, obviously, one of the first things that you notice about this passage is that it's the very last section in Matthew's gospel. Everything else that has preceded in Matthew culminates in this commission that Jesus gives to his disciples. And then, if we move from the Gospels to the beginning of Acts, in Acts chapter 1, verse 8, everything in the book of Acts flows from the great commission in the book of Acts, from Acts chapter 1 and verse 8.

10:15So, what I'd like for us to do first of all is to look at the activity of disciple making, the activity of disciple making in verses 19 and 20. Although we're inclined to see multiple, Multiple commands in verses 19 and 20, for example, the commands to go, to make disciples, to baptize, to teach. The commission here contains really only one central command that is found in the words, make disciples of all nations. Make disciples. Jesus' disciples are to do what He did, and that is to make disciples. Surrounding this single command, there are three participles that provide us with insight both into the circumstances in which disciple-making is to take place, as well as giving us the characteristics of disciple-making. So, first of all, let's look at the circumstances of making disciples as found here in our text. The first participle of verse 19 is translated by the simple word what? Go, go. It modifies the command to make disciples by detailing the circumstances in which the church is to make disciples. The idea is that disciple-making will take place as the church is going. It speaks of the church making disciples as a part of its normal ongoing ministry operations.

11:51But the kind of participle used here indicates that it has some imperatival force. In other words, the going is not just an individual. Incidental matter as if the Lord Jesus Christ were saying, you know, whenever you go on a trip, try to make a few disciples along the way if you have time and if you would like to. That's not the idea here. Rather, the Lord was clearly directing his disciples to go somewhere as an action that had to take place prior to fulfilling the main command of making disciples. That Christ's followers are commanded to make disciples of all the nations certainly means that they would have to intentionally go to those nations.

12:36There's to be an intentionality to our going. And this is confirmed, of course, by the other commission commands in Mark, Luke, John, and Acts. For example, Luke says in his gospel that repentance and forgiveness of sin should be proclaimed to all what? Nations, to all nations. And then Luke adds in Acts chapter 1, verse 8, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and where? To the end of the earth. The aim of Jesus' disciples is to make disciples of all men everywhere without distinction in all places of the earth.

13:19So the circumstances of making disciples is as the church is going intentionally to the nations of the earth and it is proclaiming, it is preaching the gospel. Of Jesus Christ. Those are the circumstances in which disciples for Jesus Christ are to be made. But secondly, notice the characteristic of making disciples or the characteristics of making disciples. You'll notice that there are two more participles used in these verses that reveal the characteristics of making disciples. Now, the first characteristic of disciple making, it says is that disciples are what? They're baptized. They're baptized.

14:01Baptizing implies that there has been repentance and forgiveness of sin. Conversion to Christ meant incorporation into a Christian community. It meant incorporation and united to the body of Christ, and baptism symbolizes that. In baptism, the disciple publicly shows his faith in the crucified, buried, and risen Savior and his union with Christ in his death to sin and resurrection to a new life. The New Testament really can scarcely conceive of an unbaptized disciple of Jesus Christ. It amazes me as I travel the number of so-called evangelical Christian churches in America that think that baptism is an option.

14:51Folks, the New Testament can scarcely conceive of an unbaptized disciple of Jesus Christ. Christ. No, baptism does not save us. It does not save us. Only the gospel and God's grace saves us. But baptism is an important part of becoming a disciple of Jesus Christ. If you have named the name of Christ, if you have repented of your sin, if you have believed in the gospel of Jesus Christ, you need to follow him in believers' baptism.

15:26Jesus' disciples follow the Lord in water baptism by immersion in the name of the triune God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. But notice here the second characteristic of disciple making is that the disciple is instructed in the truths and teachings of the master. Look there again at your text. It says, teaching them, teaching them to observe, that is, to obey, all that I have commanded you. When Jesus uses this word teaching, he's making it very clear that he has in mind more than initial evangelism in that initial response to the gospel. The kind of ministry called for in this commission doesn't end with the conversion of the unbeliever, nor does it end with the baptism of the new believer. Rather, it continues throughout the lifetime of that Christian by means of teaching him all that. Jesus what? Suggested all that Jesus commanded, all that Jesus commanded.

16:40That is, teaching these new believers, especially, yes, especially Jesus' words, but ultimately the entire plan and purpose of God as revealed in all of Scripture. Teaching them all that Jesus commanded, it is draining, it is time-consuming, it is teaching them theology proper, it is teaching them the doctrines of the Bible and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and of sin and of man and of salvation and of last things. It is teaching them the basic fundamental orthodox doctrines of the Bible.

17:22Did you know that disciple making is very often messy? It's a very messy ministry, and all too often it is heartbreaking to spend four or five or six years investing your life in someone that you believe is a truly born-again Christian, only after six years to have them just renounce and walk away from the faith. Yeah, making disciples is messy. Sometimes it's heartbreaking. Making disciples is really a never-ending process, but simply because it is a never-ending process. Never-ending challenge is not a sound reason to stop doing it because that is our command to make disciples. So, in part one, we've seen the activity of making disciples. We've seen the circumstances in which disciples are made. That is, as the church is intentionally going to all of the nations of the earth, and as it is intentionally proclaiming the biblical gospel of grace, then it makes disciples, those who respond to the gospel by baptizing them and entering into a teaching discipleship relationship with each one of those people.

18:41Now, in second place, in verse 20, I'd like for us to look at the assurance while making disciples, the assurance that Jesus leaves us with while we're making disciples. He says, at the end of verse 20, I am with you always until when? To the end of the age. You'll have to excuse me in Latin America, sometimes our sermons are QA. So don't feel afraid to respond to a question. I am with you, Jesus said, always to the end of the age. And let's look at three important truths about this assurance that Jesus offers us.

19:25As he offers his church this assurance, as we go to the nations, as we make disciples, First of all, it reminds us that the assurance offered is that of divine presence, is that of divine presence. He said, I am with you. I am with you. What is the significance of Christ's presence? Well, it's obviously anchored in the statement found earlier in the passage in verse 18, where Jesus said, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. I have all authority, and I am going to be with you always even to the end of the age. You see, absolute sovereign authority has been handed to Christ by the Father.

20:13He has absolute authority over all of heaven and all of earth. He has absolute authority over the souls of all men who have ever lived or ever will live. Though Satan is said to be the God of this world, he ultimately does not have authority over the souls of men, but rather Christ does. And this one who has all authority over heaven and earth has commanded his church to go to the nations of the earth, and he has promised to his church as it goes, I will be with you.

20:49The ascended Christ is with his church to bless her, to empower her, to protect her as she goes to all of the nations. But notice, secondly, it's not just a divine presence, it is a continual presence because he uses the word always. I am with you when? Just yesterday. No, always, it says, always. I'm with you always. The word translated always is a word that literally means the whole of every day. John Bratus, in his commentary on Matthew, says about the word always that these include, and I quote, these include days of strength and of weakness, days of success and of failure, of joy and of sorrow, of youth and of age, days of life and day of death, all the days, all the days. There is never a moment, never a day, that Jesus is not with his church as it goes to all the nations to proclaim the gospel and make disciples. He is with us. He is with us.

22:01The third truth about this assurance is that it is an enduring presence. Look at it again. He says, even to the end of the age. That points obviously toward the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. He will never leave his church throughout this entire age, from the commissioning to consummation. Jesus will be with us to the end as we carry out this commission to the nations of the world. World. Now, having just kind of reviewed that, and I know that that is very familiar material to many of you, I'd like for us to back up and I'd like for us to look at the, first of all, the essence of Christ's commission here. The essence of Christ's commission. As we've already noted, the central focus of this command is what?

22:55Is what? Let's pretend we're in San Salvador, El Salvador. Let's pretend we're at La Comunidad, Cristiana de la Gracia, and let's pretend that we're having a conversation. Okay? What is the central focus of the Great Commission? To make disciples. To make disciples. So any meaningful attempt to obey this commission must come to grips with what it means to make disciples. The task that Jesus has given to his church is not only going and proclaiming the gospel, but rather it is making disciples for Jesus Christ. We cannot, of course, make disciples without going to the nations and without proclaiming the gospel. Romans chapter 10, verse 14 and following tell us very clearly that faith comes from hearing and hearing through the word of what? The word of Christ. But that is where the great commission starts, not where it stops.

24:01Jesus' command demands more than simply driving into a small little village in northern Mexico, preaching John 3.16 through an interpreter, and then driving away saying, We have completed the Great Commission. It is much more than showing up and showing an evangelistic film and then moving on. Why is it more than that? Because the Lord's command to make disciples involves something significantly more than evangelism. We need to resharpen our focus on the essence of the Great Commission by considering two important questions. First of all, what does it mean to be a disciple of Jesus Christ? What does that mean? Not just in El Salvador, not just in Mexico, not just in Africa, what does that mean in Bryan, Texas?

24:50And secondly, how are disciples of Jesus Christ made? We've already looked briefly at that, but I'd like for us to go a little more in-depth than that. So, first of all, the meaning of discipleship. What is a disciple? Being a disciple of Jesus Christ meant more than being a convert. It meant more than being a member of a local church. A disciple in Jesus' day literally attached himself to a teacher, identified himself with that teacher, learned from that teacher, and very often followed him, and in some cases, even lived with that teacher. Teacher. He learned not simply by listening, but he also learned by doing.

25:38Let me quote John Bradis again in his commentary on Matthew. He says that to make disciples means, and I quote, to bring them into the relationship of pupil to teacher, taking his yoke of authoritative instruction, accepting what he says as true because he says it, and submitting to his requirements as right because he makes them. End of quote. If we put it perhaps in a little bit more simplified form, we could just simply say that it means to make someone into a learner, into a follower of Jesus Christ.

26:15It involves the transformation of rebels into followers of Jesus Christ. So the Great Commission, properly obeyed, produces disciples, not just decisions. It produces disciples, not just decisions. It's true, of course, that becoming Christ's disciple occurs at a decisive point in time, and it involves repentance for the forgiveness of sins and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. But one of the sad evidences of a defective and unbiblical missionary strategy has been the tendency to be satisfied with evangelistic decisions that yield no lasting fruit or transformation in the lives of those who have supposedly made. Decision for Christ.

27:04The work of missions is intended to produce disciples who follow Christ and who obey His Word. My wife and I were involved for about eight years in primarily an evangelistic ministry during the 1980s in northern Mexico. We had not yet truly learned the biblical doctrines of grace and all of the implications of that. We were your typical conservative Armenian missionaries. Oh, it was supposedly a fruitful ministry. Eventually, there were over 10,000 young people and children enrolled in our ministries. We were training and administrating all of the teachers of these ministries. Every year, there were between 2,000 and 4,000 professions of faith in Christ. We were working with 45 different Mexican Baptist Convention churches throughout the state of Chihuahua, and some of them actually even were growing, and we saw some permanent fruit that remained.

28:17But after about six or seven or eight years of that, we began to sit down and ask ourselves, shouldn't there be more fruit? If all of these professions for Christ were genuine. Should there not be more fruit? And the asking of that question began a new search of reading the scriptures over and over and over again. You know, it's a funny thing when you read the New Testament over and over again, you don't find a lot of the things that we evangelists think are there.

28:53And you know, that's exactly what the Lord Jesus Himself taught in John chapter 8. Keep your finger there in Matthew 28 and turn over to John chapter 8 with me, if you will. John chapter 8, and look at verses 31 and 32. John 8, verses 31 and 32. So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, If you abide in my word, then you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. So, according to the Lord Jesus Christ here, a genuine disciple is one who does what? Is one who does what? Abides in what? In His Word. A genuine disciple is one who abides in Christ's word. But I'd like you to notice what's going on here. Verse 31 says at the beginning that Jesus was talking to a group of Jews that had done what? They had supposedly believed. In him.

30:02Yet, verse 37 says, if you drop down to verse 37, it says, these same people that had believed in him were seeking to what? To kill him. Whoa. It was because their faith wasn't genuine. How could these Jews be described as both believing Jesus and yet still as seeking to kill him? It was because they had a spurious faith. They did not truly believe. And that's exactly what Jesus says there in verse 37. He says, you seek to kill me. Why?

30:43Because my word finds no place where? In you. My word finds no place in you. And so Jesus here lays down exactly what it is that separates counterfeit faith from true faith, what it is that distinguishes fickle disciples from genuine disciples. If you abide in my word, then he says, you are truly my what? Disciple. Disciples are those who hear, who understand, and who obey Jesus' teaching in the word of God. That's a true disciple. D.A. Carson, commenting on this verse, says, and I quote, perseverance is the mark of true faith, of real disciples. A genuine believer remains in Jesus' word, his teaching. In other words, such a person seeks to obey it, to understand it better, and finds it more precious and more controlling precisely when other forces flatly oppose it.

31:49In other words, perseverance and obedience to the word of God is the evidence of genuine faith. Do you say that you know Jesus? If you do, do you love his word? Do you love to hear it proclaimed? Do you love to hear it preached? Do you love to hear it taught? Do you love to study it? Do you love to read it? If you say you know Jesus and want to have nothing to do with his word, you need to ask yourself, am I truly a disciple of Jesus Christ? Or if I just deceived myself, the word abide says his word should abide in you. The word abide means to habitually abide, to habitually remain in Jesus' word and live in obedience to them.

32:44So the command of the great commission is to make disciples. And to make disciples not only means to preach the gospel of Christ, but also to continue to teach these new learners and these new followers of Jesus Christ the whole counsel of the word. Of God, so that they hold fast to and habitually remain in Jesus' teaching. And that reality, folks, whether they abide in the Word of Christ or not, tells us whether true disciples are being made.

33:20If we believe, if we mean business about fulfilling the Great Commission, then yes, we need to stand without apology for a divinely powerful, transforming gospel that calls people to repentance for the forgiveness of sins and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. We cannot dodge that fact. The gospel calls people to turn from sin to the true Savior. The gospel calls people from their dead works to Christ's righteousness. The gospel calls people from worshiping their vain idols to the one true and living God is revealed in Jesus Christ.

34:01Christ commanded us to make disciples who will follow Him in baptism and obey all that He commanded, so our missionary efforts must settle for nothing less than that. You know what's amazing to me how I don't know what to call us. I don't know, self-deceived, I think it is. It's like our churches here in America understand the importance of having a doctrinal statement, of having an Orthodox Christian biblical doctrinal statement. They understand the importance of having biblical, sound, expositional teaching in the pulpit, in all areas of the church here. But it's like we can send a missionary to any part of the world, and we really don't care what they teach. And let me tell you, once they leave the borders of your country, you don't know what they teach.

34:49What kind of confidence do you have in the people that you're sending? Are they teaching, proclaiming the same gospel there that is proclaimed here? Are they teaching the same Word of God there that is taught here? Because you know what? The only difference between making disciples in Bryan, Texas, and San Salvador, El Salvador, the only difference is it's done in Spanish. It's done in Spanish. Otherwise, it's the same gospel. It's the same word of God. There are the same principles. And you don't need to be intimidated by missionaries coming back and telling you, well, you really can't do it that way where I am.

35:28Have you ever heard that? Baloney. Baloney. It's the same Bible. They have the same sinful nature. They are in the same need of the same gospel and the same sanctification and the same Holy Spirit and the same Christ. There is no difference. But you might have to learn another language. You might have to get used to eating food that you're not used to. But that's okay. That's all right. So, how are disciples made? Now, we've already seen that generally. How are disciples made?

36:08But I'd like for us to go beyond the Gospels and beyond Acts 1:8, because too often in America, we've only looked at the Great Commission in the Gospels. We've only looked at Acts 1:8 at the beginning of the book of Acts. But very infrequently, have we studied the book of Acts? Have we studied the epistles to find out how these apostles actually implemented and carried out this Great Commission? We're going to do that in more detail tonight, God willing.

36:40But I'd like for us to take just a general review here. Because in the Gospels, Christ gives us the divine mandate for making disciples of all of the nations, but in the book of Acts, God actually gives us the divine strategy for making disciples. We have the divine mandate, but then we have the divine strategy. God cares about how disciples are made. You just don't go out and make disciples any old way you think is good. God has a lot to say about that. And you know, when we carefully study the missionary strategy of the apostles and of their associates, a very clear biblical strategy for making disciples is seen very clearly in the book of Acts. There were three Essential Holy Spirit-directed elements in the missionary strategy in the New Testament church. And I'd like for us to look at them briefly here, kind of as a transition into a little bit more in-depth study tonight. First of all, the first strategy that we see is in the book of Acts: God chose men that He had transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ, and He sent those men out to the nations.

38:08God chose Peter and John and Stephen and Philip and Paul and Barnabas and others. You see, God's method in making disciples is man, not a machine. It is man that has been transformed by the gospel of Christ. Jesus said to his disciples in John 20:21, As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you. You guys there. And just prior to his ascension back into heaven, he says to them in Acts 1:8, that we've already seen, You will be my witnesses. You will be my witnesses. Who's going to be the witnesses?

38:56Who's going to be the witnesses? They, they. The apostles, their associates, men transformed by the gospel of grace. You will be my witnesses, he said, in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria to the end of the earth. God saved Saul, and then he sent him as his chosen instrument to the Gentiles and to kings and to the children of Israel. Acts 9:15. You see, God's method in making disciples in the nations of the world is man transformed by the power of the gospel.

39:31And it's kind of interesting to me that God didn't choose the learned scholars of Alexandria. He didn't choose the distinguished philosopher of Athens, the eloquent orators of Rome, or especially he did not send the self-righteous leaders of Israel. Rather, when we look at who God chose, he chose simple fishermen, despised traitors, obscure men, uneducated common men. Even the learned men, such as Luke and Paul, were humble, unimposing people. If you don't believe that, just read 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and 2, particularly 1 Corinthians 2:1 through 5, where Paul told the Corinthians, I did not come to you with great strength and with great oratory and with great power. I came to you in great weakness. Why? So that the power of God. Might be seen in you through the gospel.

40:35So, God's strategy for building his churches and making disciples is man. Secondly, what do we see in the book of Acts? Those men chosen, transformed by God, those men traveled everywhere. They traveled from Jerusalem to all Judea and Samaria. They traveled to the remotest part of the earth, teaching and preaching the Word of God in the power of the Spirit of God. That's what they did. And time and time again, as we read through the book of Acts and see the actual strategy that was used by the apostles in carrying out the Great Commission, we see the centrality of the preaching and teaching and proclaiming of the word of God over and over again. For example, let me, if you want to follow me, you can. If you want to just listen, that's all right too. We see this straight away in Acts chapter 2. What happened in Acts 2? What happened? The Holy Spirit came. The church was born.

41:40And in Acts chapter 2, at Pentecost, we see Peter's sermon. And so from verse 14 of Acts chapter 2, all the way to verse 41, Peter preached the Word of God. And when you examine his sermon and at seminary, at our seminary extension in El Salvador, Or last week, I actually took the men verse by verse so that they could see this in their own Bibles. But what you see, and when you examine this sermon, is you see that it was just filled with quote after quote after quote, guess from where? The Old Testament.

42:21And he comes to the end of the sermon in verse 40. Repent, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of sin. Or that's verse 38. And then in verse 40, he says, That with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them. He bore witness. He exhorted them. Then, if you want to go over to Acts chapter 4, Acts chapter 4. In Acts chapter 4, we see that the Jewish religious leaders were so annoyed with Peter and John that they arrested them. What was it that Peter and John were doing that annoyed these leaders? Well, verse 2 says it was because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. Wow. What were they doing? They were teaching. They were preaching. They were proclaiming Christ. And the next day, when they were called before the Jewish high council to be examined, Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, says in verses 11 and 12, this Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builder. Which has become the cornerstone, and there is salvation in no one else. For there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be what? Saved. What was he doing? He was preaching. He was proclaiming. He was teaching the gospel. And then Acts chapter 4, verse 31 says that the apostles continued to speak the word of God with what? Boldness. Verse 33 adds, and with great power the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. In Acts chapter 5, after the apostles had been arrested, beaten, and charged not to speak in the name of Jesus, verse 42 tells us that in response to that threat, they did not cease doing what?

44:21Teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus. Acts chapter 6, verse 10 tells us that the people could not withstand the wisdom and the spirit with which Stephen was what? Speaking. Speaking. Chapter 8, verse 25 says, When the apostles were returning to Jerusalem from Samaria, they were preaching the gospel to many villages of the Samaritans. If you go over to Acts chapter 13, when the church at Antioch sent out Barnabas and Saul. On the first missionary journey, verses 4 and 5 tell us: so being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they proclaimed the word of God in the synagogue of the Jews. What were they doing? They were proclaiming.

45:15And then from verses 16 to 41, Paul preaches another sermon, after which the next day, verse 44, almost the whole city gathered to hear what? What did the whole city gather to hear? What does it say? The word of God. And when the Gentiles, verse 48, heard the word of the Lord preached, as many as were appointed to eternal life believed. Verse 49, and the word of the Lord was spreading throughout the whole region. And you know, folks, we could just go on and on and on with that.

45:58But you see, the early church had the right message, and they had the right method for delivering that divine message. What was that method? It was teaching and preaching and proclaiming the word of God. In 1 Corinthians 1, verse 21, the Apostle Paul said that it pleased God through the foolishness of the word what? Preached to save those who believe. The Apostle Peter. Peter in 1 Peter chapter 1, verses 23 and 25 says, You have been born again through the living and abiding Word of God, and this Word is the good news that was preached to you.

46:45One commentator writes that the book of Acts reveals that the apostles in the early church fulfilled Jesus' instruction to make disciples with an astonishing single-mindedness of purpose, preaching the word of God for the salvation of sinners and the edification of saints. It sounds kind of simple, doesn't it? God transformed and chosen, sent men to proclaim, preach, teach with boldness in the power of the Spirit of God the Word of God. I don't know for whatever reason, that just kind of sounds very clear to me.

47:24But it is precisely this teaching, proclaiming, and preaching of the Word of God and the power of the Spirit of God that is being omitted from much so-called missionary work today. There's been a mega shift in the church today away from making disciples through evangelizing, baptizing, and teaching Jesus' disciples the whole counsel of His Word. There's been a mega shift now toward social action and mercy ministries. We're being told by very influential voices. Within the Christian community, that the church really has a two-fold mission, we're told. First of all, we're to preach the gospel, and second of all, they are telling us that we need to do social justice and mercy ministries, which involve social and cultural transformation and renewal projects.

48:23Now, please don't misunderstand, those are good things to do. They're very often in the history of the church, they've been part of the fruit of making disciples. Part of the fruit of making disciples. However, to say that doing social and cultural transformation work are key components of the gospel, or that we cannot preach the gospel without the, that's quite another thing. That's quite another thing. One key figure in this movement, whose name you would recognize if I were to mention it, says that promoting social justice and meeting humanitarian needs is not just an equal partner with the gospel, but that is the gospel, quote, unquote.

49:19Folks, do you know what that's called? I mean, I'm giving away my age. I lived through the Protestant denomination of America going from life to death. Death. You know what that's called back then? That was called the social gospel, the social gospel, which is a departure from the biblical gospel. Miguel Lunez, in this excellent article, tells about how many hospitals, schools, mercy centers were established the last 150 years throughout Latin America. It's an astounding number, and yet he goes on to point out that Latin America is the most violent country in the world today.

50:00Contemporary mission agent representatives who visit the campuses of Christian colleges and seminaries in the United States to recruit new missionaries report that the needle of student interest is clearly swinging away from gospel proclamation and making disciples through teaching the Bible and proclaiming the gospel, and it is swinging toward social action like medical relief, digging wells, combating poverty, etc. In fact, one survey that was recently done said that a huge percentage of missionaries on this one particular mission field had never even proclaimed the gospel one time, not even to speak about making disciples for Jesus Christ.

50:43In 2007, just prior to returning to Latin America for our second round of missionary duty, Carolyn and I attended a Spanish refresher course in San Jose, Costa Rica, where evangelical missionaries from many evangelical denominations and missions. Throughout the world, go to learn Spanish. During the time period that we were at the school, there were approximately 90 different missionary units, a unit being either a missionary couple or a single missionary. We learned during our time there that of those 90 missionary units, only three were going to a field of service in Latin America with the specific purpose to evangelize and make disciples through gospel proclamation and teaching the Word of God.

51:29Only three. Most of them were going primarily in medicine, dig wells, plant crops, combat poverty, secular education. Again, those things aren't bad, but they are not the fulfillment of the Great Commission. Even worse, some missionaries today believe that without some kind of social action or mercy ministry preceding gospel proclamation, there will be no believing response to the gospel. One such advocate said, and I quote, simply preaching the gospel will fail unless social action or mercy ministry precedes it.

52:09According to this new Peace Corps mentality, the gospel is not powerful enough. The Word of God is not sufficient enough to save people and to make disciples, apart from housing reforms, job development, education, and health care, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. My dear brothers and sisters, In Jesus Christ, this is, has been, is, and continues to be a direct assault on the power of the gospel and the sufficiency of the divine word of God. It's a direct assault on the Great Commission. It's the church's new pragmatism. The gospel needs a lead-in because it will never succeed by itself. It's not powerful enough.

52:58Historically, it has been seen over and over and over again. And like I said, all you have to do is a study of America's mainline Protestant churches during the 20th century. But it's seen over and over again that when social justice and relief projects are used as lead-ins to the gospel, A, the gospel is moved into second place, and B, the lead-in medium becomes the gospel. And when the church puts the gospel and the Word of God in second place, they have a way of staying second.

53:34And eventually they just disappear altogether. Evangelist D.L. Moody used to warn Christians about going to the world with a loaf of bread in one hand and a Bible in the other because he said sinners will take the loaf of bread and ignore the Bible. I mean, we shouldn't be surprised at that. That's exactly. Point that Jesus made in John 6 and John 8. The crowds who followed him were motivated by a superficial desire for what? Food.

54:14They were motivated by a superficial desire for something to eat rather than any real understanding of the true spiritual significance of his person and of his mission, right? D.A. Carson, in his excellent article entitled A Hole in the Gospel, after noting that studies have shown that American Christians are spending about five times more money on poverty relief projects than on evangelism and church planning, warns that the gospel is too often the missing component in what is today called holistic gospel ministry.

54:48He writes, and I quote, he said, deeds of mercy are not the gospel. Judging by the distribution of American mission dollars, the biggest hole in our gospel is the gospel itself. One of the defining problems of the evangelical church in our generation is a spiraling loss of confidence in the divine power, authority, and sufficiency of the Holy Scriptures. Let me close. With this, in Luke chapter 4. Luke chapter 4, verses 42 and 43, explains there the purpose of Jesus' ministry. Luke chapter 4, verse 42 and 43. Verse 42 says that he departed and went into a desolate place.

55:48And the people sought him and came to him and would have kept him from leaving them. Why? Why didn't they want Jesus leaving them? Because they wanted what? Food and healing. They wanted all the physical benefits of his ministry. But in verse 43, it says, but he said to them, that but there indicates that Jesus' purposes were different from the people's desires. But Jesus said, I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to other towns as well, for I was sent for this purpose. Folks, the church of Christ has been sent for the purpose of proclaiming the gospel to all of the nations in the world, making disciples in all of the nations of the world through the proclamation and preaching of this book. Do you believe that?

56:46May the Lord bless you in your efforts in doing that. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for the clarity of the commission that you've left your church with. I pray that you will have your hand upon this church, that you will continue to bless their efforts both here and around the world. In Jesus' name, amen.