Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Go and Make Disciples

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.” (Matthew 28:18-20)
“All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.” These are Jesus parting comments as he ascends for a time to the Father’s right hand. Modern translation: “The universe is under new management.” The old managers of pride and rebellion, pain and death, sorrow and fear have come to an end. A new day is dawning, and the new managers of repentance, healing, forgiveness, redemption, and joy are moving in by the authority of the new King, Jesus. From here on out there are but two choices for humanity, become a citizen of the new King or remain the citizen of a fallen kingdom that is about to be ruined and judged. All the world needs to get this memo. So how does this message factor into our daily life?

“Go therefore.” Answer #1: Deliver the memo. The NT calls it the “gospel,” which means simply “good news.” Did you get that? It’s “news.” Something not previously known and must be heard. Jesus commissions his disciples, his church, to be the tellers, the witnesses, the heralds, the postmen, the bloggers of this news. Thus, the command to “go.” Not wait for a co-worker to ask just the right question, or for a neighbor to meander coincidentally into a church service, or a friend to tune into K-LOVE or flip the channel to a Billy Graham Crusade. That’s a passivity that finds no place in Jesus’ instructions. Jesus commands us to act, take the initiative, be the aggressor.

“Make Disciples.” Jesus doesn’t command us to go and tell the nations, “Repeat after me, ‘Dear Jesus, I’m sorry for my sins. Please forgive me. Thank you for dying on the cross. Amen,’” or any version of that. We don’t “go” simply to seek one-time decisions, or even to disseminate correct theology, but to “make disciples.” And we do this by “baptizing them” and “teaching them” all Jesus commanded. We baptize to initiate them into a new citizenship: one that dies to self and lives for the King. And we teach them how to live out that citizenship in the whole of their life. Thus our mission is to recruit citizens for the kingdom of God: men and women loyal only to Jesus, who conform their lives to the new order of repentance, healing, forgiveness, redemption, and joy and shun the old order of rebellion, pride, and self rule. To be Jesus’ witness, then, means to proclaim the gospel to those who have never heard, or who have heard and rejected. But to be Jesus’ witnesses also means going to the man who call himself a Christian, who prayed a prayer 10 years ago, who is a decent person, who maybe even goes to church regularly, but who lives under the old order with more loyalty to his goddess Prosperity than he has for Jesus.

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