For this year I have written a weekly blog for those who would like to go deeper with the Scripture we will be teaching the next Sunday. I will continue to do so but I felt this Scripture is far too important to bury in a blog that is not universally read. So here goes ...
We will be preaching and teaching the great commission which is widely viewed as the 'great suggestion.' I want to approach this Scripture from Matthew 28 simply, Biblically and in a way I hope gets the message across.
First, the Great Commission says we go throughout the world. Some of you have expressed disagreement with this using cliche's like "charity begins at home" and "we should care for each other first." Yes, we should be charitable to each other and care for those at home, but Jesus specifically addresses other places here. The apostles and the early church took this to heart. They started communities all over the Mediterranean Rim that so expressed God's love, mutual respect and spiritual fruit that they were contagious. As we have heard repeatedly, if your view differs with God's view, it is you who are in a spiritual crisis and it is you who need to make a life-adjustment.
Some of you are already preparing your learned response that we are to preach, teach and baptize. I agree totally. Preaching and baptizing are relatively self-explanatory. It is that teaching thing we get confused about. Why do you think that almost all of the epistle writers have a statement that generally says, "live lives becoming of the gospel so no man will have anything against you." Jesus said, Matthew 5, "let your light shine so before men that your Father in heaven is glorified." While we are having high-tone discussions about the second coming, the meaning of the symbols in Revelation, doctrines that aren't even central to our faith, and who will and won't get into heaven, God's people are walking away from these discussions. I met a person that bragged that he loved to engage in discussion about doctrines of the church (none of them seemed central to the main thing). I don't know of a single person that man has brought to Christ but I know many who walked away from the faith because of his witness.
We preach the gospel. We baptize under the authority of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. We teach by living Christ out in a world that needs to see an alternative to the confusion, pop psychology and false (or at least wimp) Christians that we are wont to be. We show an alternative that sees the bottom line yet has the faith to step into the river or fight the giant. We know a God who is into rescue. God and people are watching.
We go down into the dark places where light has trouble shining. Are they dangerous and inconvenient? Yep! That is how we express contagious faith. Sometimes it takes years before a soul trusts enough to say, "I want some of what you have!" God and people are watching!
We get the ministry job done! We don't drag our feet because of imagined barriers and we ask God to knock down the real ones. For we read the Word which leads us to learn and place our faith into action. The church has lived for the last fifty years inside the heads of scholars, high-ranking church leaders and even preachers who are impressed with their eloquence. The only scholars I have met who have had their faith survive the onslaught are those who know they cannot KNOW God (mind) without loving God (heart and soul) and serve God (strength). We place our sweat where our hearts are. Because God and people are watching!
I want to shout "let God's people go" because we are enslaved, entangled in the things of no meaning. So one lady tells me, "I won't give up my lifestyle for anyone." Another says, "I will redefine God's storehouse to the places I want to give." Another person says, "I would send the check, but I don't know what tomorrow will bring." Do any of these folks believe God will be with us, even unto the ends of the earth?" If not, I wonder if they really have a real, living God. Isaiah said, "why do you seek the dead on behalf of the living?" God and people are watching!
Be the called-out ones who live by and in the power of God. Learn. Tell. Bring people to a saving faith. Preach (or at least let those called preach). Teach by your witness. God and people are watching.
Go with God! Pastor Randy
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