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.” Matthew 28:18–20

Matthew 28:18–20 – Answering the Call to Missions
Third Sunday in Lent  – March 20, 2022 (am)

Main Point: The goal of missions is to glorify God by making disciples of Jesus who find their home in the local church.

Scripture Reading:

Matthew 28:18-20 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 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, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Introduction

Welcome to the third message in our series on missions – on Answering the call to Missions.

• Who is called? Where are they to go? And now, what is the goal?

Are some missionaries second class?

This past week an article was written by a missionary who had worked alongside her husband at a school for children of other missionaries. They worked as missionaries in this school for missionary kids for a period of time and then transitioned in their missions work to teaching in a seminary for East African pastors.

In her article, the author laments that while working in the school for missionary kids she and her husband had reached out to 200 churches in their home state for support and received responses from only two of them. However, when they switched from working at the school to training pastors, they interest they received from churches back home drastically increased.

The point of the article was to call out local American churches for their role in creating a class system among missionaries – a system where missionaries who focus on planting or strengthening the local church are prioritized over missionaries who focus their energy elsewhere – like Medical missionaries, or those who are there to teach English as a second language, or anyone those who work in missionary support roles – like teaching in a school for missionary kids. The author went on to explain that in the mind of sending churches, missionaries who focus their work on building the local church abroad are on the A-List whereas the rest are considered to be on the B or C list.[1]

Articles like these are hard to read because you can feel the obvious hurt and pain behind the author’s experience.  The article itself, in the way it is written, cries out for a compassionate response. Its aim is to make the reader say, “No missionary, who has left their home and family and country to move to serve Christ on foreign soil, should have to face this trial. Churches should be willing to support ALL types of missions work with EQUAL amounts of enthusiasm.”

But what if we flip this scenario around and, rather than looking at it from the missionary’s perspective, we look at it from perspective of the local church?

A local church that wants to be faithful to support the work of global outreach but has a limited amount of funds to that noble work. A church that occasionally receives an email or a letter from someone just like the author of this article who has felt called into missions and is willing to leave everything and go to the mission field to start a school or establish a Christian business or do evangelistic sports camps or begin a medical mission or plant a church or work in a seminary - but is just in need of more financial support – how does that local church go about deciding who they will support and who they will help sound out onto the mission field?

Is the proper response just one of compassion? Should churches just work on a first come – first served basis? Or should they consider other factors as they decide who to support? And if other factors should be considered, then what are they? On what basis should churches choose to support one missionary over another? How are they to decide which missionary is more worthy of their investment than another?

These are difficult questions, as there are many factors to consider, but at the center of the church’s consideration ought to be this question: What does the Bible teach is the goal of missions?  Another way we could ask it is: What is the church called to do and how should it go about doing it both here and in lands where the church is weak or non-existent?

A biblical answer to that question helps us to determine who it is that the local church should send and support and the text we will be looking at to answer it is Matthew 28:18-20 – often referred to as the Great Commission – and the final commissioning text we will study in our series, having already looked the commissions found in John, Luke, and Acts. And in it Jesus says,

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 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, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Exposition:

Our text for this morning comes to us in three parts. First we have the truth or promise that Jesus, whom Matthew’s gospel has shown time and again is the long expected Jewish messiah and God’s appointed King, is a King with Authority. From this truth then, comes a commission to all who would follow this king. And following this commission comes another truth or promise – namely, that Jesus is going to be with the disciples as they carry out this command, to the end of the age.

1. The King’s Authority

So let’s begin by exploring the first statement Jesus makes when he says, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”

Now as any 4th grader can tell you, when another student shows up on the playground or the baseball diamond and starts giving orders and bossing people around and claiming to be in charge the only proper response comes in the form of two words, slurred together to make one word, and that word is, “Sayzwho?” 

• ·You all have to stop what you’re doing and come inside – “Oh yeah, says who?”

• I get to pick who plays on which team – “Really! Says who?”

And the answer that Ms. Bossy pants gives to that question is very important, isn’t it? In fact, it is a determining factor in what happens next.

And as we hear Jesus making the lofty claim that all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to him – we might be wondering that same thing: “Says who?”

If we search the Scriptures we find that the answer is quite clear – this authority has come from the very top!

• Dan. 7:13-14   “I saw in the night visions,

               and behold, with the clouds of heaven

                          there came one like a son of man, (The way Jesus often referred to himself)

               and he came to the Ancient of Days (GOD)

                          and was presented before him.

              And to him was given dominion

                          and glory and a kingdom,

               that all peoples, nations, and languages

                          should serve him;

               his dominion is an everlasting dominion,

                          which shall not pass away,

               and his kingdom one

                        that shall not be destroyed.

• 1 Corinthians 15:27 - For “God has put all things in subjection under his feet.”

• Philippians 2:9-11 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord . . .

Scripture is clear that this authority comes from God!

So assuming you’re the 4th grader on the playground, after hearing what Scripture says, you turn to your friends and say, “His credentials checked out – God sent them – but you’ve still got another card to play. So you turn back to Mr. High and mighty and ask, “What exactly did God say you were in charge of?”

To which Jesus would have responded – “everything!” – He gave me all authority, in heaven and on earth! He’s made me the undisputed king of the universe.  He’s given me authority over Herod and Caesar and every other ruler and he’s given me authority over you! He’s even given me authority over the angels and the demons and over the Devil himself.[2] There is no authority that rivals mine, no power more powerful than mine, no kingdom that will prevail against mine – in fact, he’s given me a seat at his right hand “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come.”[3]

Now I use the 4th grader analogy because we Americans can be a lot like 4th graders in that we don’t really like being told what to do. And we, as a people, can tend to have a healthy amount of contempt for authority figures – especially when we don’t agree with what they say.

But what if we had a leader who was like Jesus? What if we had a leader whose track record was one of perfect righteousness? A leader who was always just in their dealings with other people? A leader who used his power to serve his people, rather than abuse them? A leader would give his own life to save the lives of his people? A leader who had unrivaled authority with which he could show unrivaled love and mercy and kindness?

Well that would be really good news wouldn’t it?

And what if we had a leader who, when someone was found to be guilty for breaking his laws, he had the authority to forgive their trespasses?[4] What if we had a leader who used his authority to answer our law breaking with mercy and grace rather than wrath and punishment? What if we had a leader who, after forgiving our trespasses could give us new hearts and new power with which we could live new lives? And what if we had a leader who had the authority not only to provide us a better life now, but also eternal life in paradise with Him? [5]

Well, that would be more than just good news, that would be news so good, it was worth sharing wouldn’t it?

And that’s what we find here at the beginning of our passage. The news that all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Jesus is wonderful news that is worth sharing and so, that is why the commission that come next contains the word “therefore.” “Go, therefore, and make disciples!”

That someone like Jesus reigns and rules the universe is news that can’t be kept quiet. That Jesus has authority over every ruler, whether wicked or benevolent, and every spiritual being, whether angelic or demonic, and over the eternal destiny of every soul – with the authority to take those who are eternally damned and destined to eternal wrath under the just judgment of God and grant them forgiveness and peace with God and reconciliation to their fellow man and eternal life, is such good news that it would be wrong to keep it to yourself!

And so, in keeping with the news of His authority, Jesus commissions his disciples saying “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, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.”

2. The King’s Work

Moving on to the second point, the King’s Work is the work we are aiming to define this morning. What is the goal of missions? And as we see in the word “therefore,” the king’s work is in light of and flows out from of the King’s authority. And what we see here is that the King’s work is the work of bringing the nations into his kingdom and under his reign.

That is not to say that the work of Jesus’ disciples is to establish Jesus’ his kingdom – as if Christians are being sent out to take land that doesn’t belong to them. It’s not to say that our mission is to win more authority for our King, as if he’s sent us out bring people not belonging to him and make them submit to his reign.

Rather, our work is the work of helping people to realize Jesus’ reign. It is the work of communicating the way the world actually is. Jesus does reign and His reign is over all, but not everyone has received his authority in their lives. And it is the disciples work to bring to tell such people of the good news of the reality of Jesus’ reign and invite them to bow their knee to him in worship.

So we might say that the goal of missions is to help people from every tribe and nation to realize Jesus’ reign and submit to Him. But how do we do that?

The way Jesus tells us to do that is through the work of making disciples – so what does it mean to make disciples?

Disciple making is the work of reproducing ourselves. Notice that the people Jesus told to make disciples were the very people who were identified as disciples themselves and they would have understood Jesus command as a command to take their experiences of sitting at Jesus’ feet and following Jesus along the way and learning from Jesus’ teaching and loving who Jesus was, not to mention their experience of deserting Jesus at his arrest only to be received back by Jesus in love and forgiveness and acceptance – to take all of that and pass it along to others.

One observation we might make at this point is that when it comes to making disciples, being comes before doing. We need to be disciples before we make disciples. And Jesus taught that to be His disciple, we must deny ourselves, take up our cross and follow him.”[6] To be a disciple of Jesus is to give up our plans, our ambitions, our hopes, and our desires and instead to learn and to follow Jesus in what are his plans and his desires, both for us and for this world. To be a disciple is to surrender everything to follow Him. To be a disciple is to know that following Jesus comes at a cost, it described as taking up our cross because it is following Jesus in the way of the cross, the way of sacrificial love for others, and it may very well end with our own cross.

But we’d be mistaken if we understood Jesus’ call to discipleship to be nothing but doom and gloom, for Jesus promises his disciples in the very next sentence that “whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” That is to say, what Jesus gives to his disciples is far better than what they stand to lose for what disciples gain from Christ is nothing less life – true life – life that is defined by forgiveness rather than condemnation, peace with God in the place of wrath, a transformed heart that loves Jesus’ ways, and eternal life instead of eternal punishment.

If we’re to pass on that life of discipleship then we will have to have lived that life of discipleship. If we’re to make followers and learners of Jesus than we need to have truly given ourselves to a life of following and learning from Jesus.

The second point to make about disciple making is that it begins with evangelism. I think this is important to understand because it’s not how we tend to talk about discipleship in the church today. We tend to talk about discipleship as if it only begins after someone has already begun a relationship with Jesus and but now wants to go deeper in that relationship, usually through the help of another person. In other words, the task of disciple making has been relegated to a mentoring relationship between Christians. And while discipleship certainly can and should take place in such mentoring relationships – it doesn’t start there.

Disciple making begins with evangelism, and even before that. It begins with being around other people, it begins with befriending people, it begins with being kind to people and building trust with people and praying for open doors with people so that the gospel might be shared with them and received by them. And it is from there that the work of disciple making proceeds.

So we could say that the goal of missions is to help people realize Jesus’ reign and submit to him by becoming his disciple. But once again, we can’t stop there. We need to ask, how are we to go about making disciples?

And Jesus gives us three ways that we are to go about making disciples: We are to make disciples as we go, baptizing them, and teaching them to obey.

Obeying Jesus’ command to make disciples first involves going. That is to say that disciple making is meant to be carried out by people who go. It is not a ministry that is to be accomplished only by sending letters or mailing pamphlets, it is to be accomplished by real, in-the-flesh, followers of Jesus who are willing to go to those they aim to make disciples.

Now why might that be important? I believe it’s because that is how Jesus made his own disciples. The people of Israel had already been sent plenty of letters through the prophets telling them of God’s ways and rules and heart. They could go to the synagogue and read the invitations God had sent to them, calling them to repent and return to Him. But when the time came for God to bring about his kingdom and bring people into that kingdom he didn’t send them another letter with paper and ink, penned through the prophets, instead he sent them His Son. He sent them a letter in human form, the Word become flesh. And he did it this way so that he might not only tell them about but also show them that His kingdom has truly come and the power it contains and that they are welcome to join it.

And as the Father sent His Son, so Jesus is sending us. Jesus tells us to GO so that we too can show God’s Kingdom has come in power, and that kingdom power is to be seen in the testimony of our transformed lives. The call to GO is the call to take the testimony that God can transform lives and show, through our own lives, that he actually does.  

And we do this by being Christ to other people – whether that is by caring for the poor or serving the forgotten or loving our enemies or forgiving those who have wronged us or by giving our own lives for the people we long for God to save – our aim in going is not just to tell of a transformed life, but to live it, to put the gospel on display through it, such that others might see and know and desire to follow Jesus too.

We cannot do these things if we do not first go. So whether we are going across the street or to the another table in the cafeteria or to Papua New Guinea or Ecuador, we must understand that going plays no small role in accomplishing our goal of making disciples.

Second, we are to make disciples by baptizing. Though the process of making disciples begins prior to someone becoming a disciple, one obvious goal of disciple making is that at some point – someone actually transitions from being outside the group of Jesus’ disciples to inside it. The distinguishing mark Jesus gives for the person who has become his disciple is the mark of baptism. It is a mark that symbolizes what God in Christ has done for the new disciple – a physical testimony to the fact that through the believer’s faith in Jesus they have been united to Christ in his death to sin and then raised to new life in Jesus’ resurrection.

And the fact that Jesus tells us to baptize as we make disciples tells us that disciple making, at some point, must demand a decision. Disciple making is not meant to be a venture in always learning about something but never arriving at it.[7] We need to keep that in mind as we aim to obey Jesus’ commission. While there is much to be said for gaining trust and playing the long game with those we hope to reach, there is also a day when we must ask people – are you in or are you out? And if they’re in, we baptize them and say, “Welcome to the family” but if they’re out, then we need to be careful not to give them false assurance that just because they meet with a disciple of Jesus and talk about being a disciple of Jesus that this makes them a disciple of Jesus. A disciple of Jesus is someone who has decided to follow Jesus, through repentance and faith, and who submits to Jesus as their King.

Third, disciple making is to include teaching new disciples to observe all that Jesus has commanded. What Jesus is commanding of his disciples here is more than writing a good curriculum. It’s more than a list of powerful object lessons that really help to get the point across. It’s instruction that has as its goal obedience to what is being taught. That is what Jesus is saying when he says “teach them to observe all that I have commanded.”

To be a disciple of Jesus is not achieved by becoming an expert exegete or a scholar on the New Testament. There are plenty of those in the academic world who don’t qualify as Jesus’ disciples. To be a disciple of Jesus is to be someone who knows what Jesus says and obeys it, not perfectly of course, but in a way that shows steady spiritual growth and transformation as they follow Jesus with the help of His Holy Spirit.

And anyone who has aimed to teach people to obey knows that it is not an easy task nor is it a quick one. It takes time and patience and prayer and wisdom on the part of the discipler and it takes time and patience and prayer and wisdom on the part of the disciplee. But it is something that is evident and measurable and filled with grace and joy along the way.

So the goal of missions is to help people realize Jesus’ reign and become his disciples by going to them as Christ’s ambassadors, baptizing them into Christ’s family, and teaching them to obey all that Christ teaches.

And by God’s design, this is not a work that we are called to carry out on our own. For Jesus finishes his great commission with the sweet affirmation, “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.

3. The King as Co-Laborer

Interestingly enough, Matthew’s gospel ends with this final statement. There is no record in Matthew of Jesus’ ascension. He doesn’t even bother to point out that the way Jesus will be with us is through His Holy Spirit. He simply ends his gospel with Jesus’ affirmation that we need not consider this commission one to be fulfilled on our own.

He will be with us the very thing he asks of us. And what a gracious reminder that is, and one we need to hear today, and every day. Jesus goes with his disciples in the work of disciple making.

As we conclude today, I’d like us to ponder three questions

• What is the goal of missions?

• How do we aim to accomplish it both globally and locally?

• And Is My life My best answer to the great commission?

What is the goal of missions?

If you recall how we began this morning, there was an article I mentioned at the beginning of this message. An article that raised the question of whether the church ought to prioritize supporting one type of missions work over another. Specifically, should the church prioritize missions that focus on planting or strengthening the local church?

We’ve made significant headway in answering that question by concluding that the goal of missions is to help people realize Jesus’ reign and become his disciples by going to them, baptizing them, and teaching them to obey all that Christ teaches.

You’ll notice that nowhere in that statement do we use the word church. We don’t talk about church planting or church strengthening. But at the same time, you’ll notice that the necessity of the local church is all over this statement – for if the work of missions is to make disciples and disciple making requires baptism and spiritual instruction – then what exactly are new disciples being baptized into and where does Scripture teach that they should be instructed? The answer we find both in the example of the book of Acts and in the letters that follow it is that baptism and spiritual instruction find their home in the local church.

We see this through Romans 6 where Paul, in speaking to the Roman church about baptism, doesn’t tell them the get baptized but rather assumes they already are, as that is the mark of the disciples of Jesus.

We see it in the fact that the apostles letters offering spiritual instruction are being written to local churches or the pastors of those churches.

We see it in the Hebrews 10:25 where disciples are told to not neglect meeting together but to regularly gather for the encouragement of one another. 

We see it in the book of Acts when Paul and Barnabas were on their first missionary journey and in Acts 14 we read about how Paul and Barnabas went to Derbe and . . .  

21 When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch, 22 strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God. 23 And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. 

Yes the goal of missions is to make disciples but disciple making, especially understood as including baptism and spiritual instruction, is the work of the local church so we can’t say that the goal of making is to “just make disciples” as if church planting can come later. The work of missions is to make disciples through the instrument of the local church.

So what does this mean for local and global outreach?

It means that if we’re to be faithful to fulfill the great commission then we need to be faithful to the work of planting and strengthening the local church. But how does this play out here, where we already have a church, as opposed to global outreach when we send people to regions where there is no church or the church is weak and undeveloped?

To answer this question I think it is helpful for us to adopt the terms used by Lesslie Newbigin when he distinguished between the mission and missions.

Newbigin argued that the mission is the work of the local church but where there is no church – then missions becomes the work. The difference between the mission and missions is that the mission of making disciples takes place where a church has already been planted but where missions takes place no church exists, or it exists in a weak form.[8] So in order for the mission to be accomplished the work of missions is first and foremost the work of planting and strengthening churches. Or as Newbigin says, “. . . when a witnessing community (or church) has been established, missions is finished and the mission begins.”[9]

What that boils down to for our purposes is to say that when we engage in missions, our goal must include as a top priority the establishment and strengthening of local churches. That isn’t to say that sports ministry or medical missions or community development aren’t important or valid ministries, but what it is to say is that those ministries should find their home in and flow out of local churches whose work it is to accomplish the mission of disciple making. But they aren’t the best way to go about the work of missions – especially missions where there is no church – for how can they make disciples when there is no church for these disciples to be baptized into or instructed in their faith.

Is my life my best answer to the great commission?

How are you doing at being a disciple?

Are you following Jesus? Do you have anyone in your life who is helping you to follow Jesus? Have you made the decision to give your life to Jesus, to take up your cross and follow him? Have you been baptized? Are you part of a local church?  Are you attending that church? If you showed up at the church where you say your attending, would other people say you are part of that church? Have you submitted yourself to the authority leaders of that church? Are you teachable and learning to obey all that Christ has commanded you?

How are you doing at making disciples?

Being a disciple is half the battle in making disciples. So many people learn by watching the lives of others! Who is watching you and what are they learning from you? Perhaps you are meeting with someone regularly to help them walk with Jesus – that’s awesome – we need more of that! Whether unbelievers or rooted believers. And as you consider who you might be discipling, if they’re unbelievers, are you counseling them towards making a decision to follow Jesus? To get baptized? To join the local church? Do you speak well of the local church with them? Perhaps you have a real gift for disciple making – have you considered using that gift to plant the church where it doesn’t already exist?

Jesus has called us to be a disciple making church – let’s strive to be just that, knowing that He will be with us as we do.

 __________________

Resources

France, R. T. The Gospel of Matthew. William B Eerdmans Publishing Company: Grand Rapids, 2007.

Franke, John R. Missional Theology: An Introduction. Baker Academic: Grand Rapids, 2020.

Goheen, Michael W. The Church and Its Vocation: Lesslie Newbigin’s Missionary Ecclesiology. Baker Academic: Grand Rapids, 2018

Rogers, Glenn. A Basic Introduction to Missions and Missiology. Mission and Ministry Resources: 2003.

Morris, Leon. The Gospel according to Matthew. William B Eerdmans Publishing Company: Grand Rapids, 1992.

Turner, David . Matthew. Baker Academic: Grand Rapids, 2008

[1] Hannah Guinto. “In Defense of Second-Class Missionaries.” March 11, 2022. MissioNexus. https://missionexus.org/in-defense-of-second-class-missionaries/

[2] 1 Peter 3:21-22

[3] Eph. 1:21

[4] Matt. 9:6 But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins"-he then said to the paralytic-"Rise, pick up your bed and go home." Cf. Luke 24:46-47 & John 20:22-23

[5] John 17:2 since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. Cf. John 3:35-36.

[6] Matthew 16:24.

[7] 2 Tim 3:7

[8] See Franke, 56-57 and Goheen, 81.

[9] Goheen, 98 citing Newibign, Open Secret, 129.

NEXT WEEK: The Mark and the Meal of the New Covenant Community, Kipp Soncek