Category: Mission (Page 25 of 26)

Go means to both make disciples (see Matthew 28:19) and to be witnesses (check out Acts 1:8). The first passage, recorded by the apostle Matthew and the second, penned by the physician Luke, lay out clear directions for going to the world. The passage in Acts emphasizes being a witness, which involves telling someone what you’ve seen and heard. Matthew directs us to the priority of making disciples, which involves baptizing and teaching new followers of Jesus. These are not separate or mutually exclusive activities, but rather represent two sides of the same coin.

First, going means that you talk about, promote, discuss, chat, either out loud or in a whisper or in the written word, the name of Jesus. As you go, you are witnesses for Jesus. Jesus is quite clear when he says, “you will be my witnesses.” Those who go are involved in lots of good things, but always in the name of Jesus. Mother Teresa of Calcutta ministered to the poorest of the world’s poor among the Hindus and Muslims of India. She and her Sisters of Charity worked with people who literally lived in holes in the ground and died on the streets. They were among the few Jesus followers in a city teeming with millions of adherents of another faith. Yet they always offered their services “in the name of Jesus.”

The second side of the coin is this, you go with a plan to help these newest followers of Jesus to grow in their faith. You go with the idea that it will take time and work and energy to teach people to obey everything Jesus has commanded. It’s not a one and done proposition. Jesus tells us that that greatest commandment is to “Love the Lord your God with all you heart, mind, soul and strength and to love your neighbor as yourself.” That’s quite a teaching to drop on someone that’s new to the Christian faith and then leave them by themselves to ponder. This is quite a teaching for all of us to wrestle with on a daily basis. We have to help new followers of Jesus understand some of the depth and breadth of what Jesus was saying and we have to help them apply it to their lives.

We have to make disciples. This is the hope of the world. Both sides of the coin. Just as it’s impossible to just spend one side of a coin and keep the other half in your pocket, it’s also impossible to be true to Jesus’s words without speaking to what you’ve experienced and teaching people to be true followers of Jesus.

Go to the ends of the earth.

Isn’t it interesting to think about the people who heard these words of Jesus and their world in which they lived. They heard the call to Samaria and Judea and Jerusalem and they knew those places. They lived there, walked there, slept and ate and sneezed there. They spoke the language and knew the customs. They had favorite restaurants, or at least favorite foods. Although there were many differences, it was familiar.

You have to wonder what ran through their minds when they heard “ends of the earth?” The boundaries of the Roman empire? Egypt and beyond? Persia and India? Where they afraid they’d sail off the edge of the world? They would have known little of Northern Europe and Eastern Asia and nothing of the Americas. How did they feel about the ends of the earth? How do you feel about the ends of the earth?

I’m a North American and I came to faith in a Sunday School class as a boy in Missouri. When Jesus gave that commission to go, where was Southern Missouri in that geographic structure? Not close to Jerusalem or Judea or Samaria. It was at the ends of the earth. Absolutely. I had the privilege of hearing and understanding the gospel in my native land and language because a succession of men and women took seriously the call to the ends of the earth. Missouri is about as far from that hill near Jerusalem as you can get, yet the gospel was available when my heart was ready on a hillside in Missouri.

Most of us are “ends of the earth” people. That is, we were born and raised and became followers of Jesus in a part of the world that fits into Jesus’ “ends of the earth” construct. Our faith is real to us because someone, or many someones, acted on the words of Jesus. John Calvin, the great reformer, wrote these words in his introduction to his commentary on Ephesians, “The gospel does not fall like rain from the clouds, but is carried by the hands of men wherever it will go.”

Jesus says to go to the ends of the earth, to the whole world, to be his witness and to make disciples. As we’ve received this gospel, this gift and this teaching, it’s now our turn to go. Our turn to carry the good news to whatever places the “ends of the earth” represents to us.

If you look the word “go” up in the dictionary, which I’ve done as it’s not that hard, you’ll find a variety of definitions along the same theme. Dictionary.com gives these: 1. To move or proceed, especially to or from something 2. To leave a place; depart 3. To keep or be in motion. When Jesus tells his disciples to “GO,” he means for them to get up and move; to proceed to the task of making disciples. It is time to leave the hillside and move to a new place, to get into motion.

Like a lot of the things Jesus encourages us to do, like “love your neighbor as yourself,” the actual teaching is fairly easy to understand. Unfortunately, putting the teaching into practice is much more difficult. Loving your loud, smelly neighbor is more work than Jesus lets on. In the case of “go,” for instance, you might ask, “where?” Jesus says to go to all the nations, but where to start? With whom? What time? What comes first? Second? One of the glories of all this going is that Jesus does not spell out all the details. He gives quite a few available options (all the world). He gives some direction on what you should do as you go, which is to be his witness and make disciples and to love God and love others. But he leaves the place you do that up to you.

It may be far, like the uttermost part of the earth, wherever that is from you, or it may be near, like across the street. But one thing is clear. You have to move to get there. You have to get off your broad backside and go.

When Jesus told his disciples to go, they took him seriously. They went. They left their homes and communities and took the message out. They left to make disciples of all nations. Those of us who follow Jesus today are beneficiaries of these first disciples. We owe them a debt. They set the tone for Jesus’ disciples over the centuries. To follow Jesus involves going. It involves helping others become his disciples. Christianity is, at its core, a missionary religion. It’s spread by the followers of Jesus going either next door or to the next continent to make disciples.

Followers of Jesus have embraced this teaching over the centuries. Paul, the apostle, was one of the first and one of the greatest to go. Patricius of England became Saint Patrick of Ireland because he chose to go in response to God’s calling. David Livingstone went to Africa to make disciples of all nations and thanks to his pioneering work and the efforts of many others, millions of Africans are now disciples of Jesus. Their influence is broad.

Nelson Mandela was formed in his faith and his ability to forgive during his time in a Methodist grammar school. Taking seriously the call to make disciples of all nations, in this case being the Xhosa tribe of South Africa, resulted in a leader who stressed forgiveness and unity despite spending 28 years in a prison for his political beliefs. Mandela led South Africa through a perilous journey towards freedom and staved off what many felt would be a time of mass bloodshed and loss of life. Why? Because the teachings of Jesus infiltrated his young life. He heard those teachings because someone took seriously Jesus’ word to “go.”

How about you? Do you take those words seriously? Where can you go? Perhaps there is a young Mandela in your path, down the road, ready for the words of Jesus.