Our Mission is to Proclaim

Our Purpose:

This was my weekend to teach a lesson from God's Word in children’s ministry to a group of fifth-grade boys and girls.  Our lesson was one of utmost importance, it describes our mission in the life of a believer.  The purpose for our lives is found in this passage, Matthew 28:19-20.  As I typed that last sentence, the internal editor caught my error and wanted to change my sentence from ‘the purpose for our lives’ to 'the purpose of our lives.  Do you see the subtle difference between these two little words? I needed to look them up.

·       The word ‘for’ means with regards to, and

·       The word ‘of’ means derived by or coming from.

I stand corrected, the purpose of our lives derived by God in the context of our mission.  The passage we studied came from the 40-day presence of incarnate Jesus following the resurrection. Incarnate means deity taking on flesh or in human form.  This passage, taken from Matthew 28 reflects our assignment following Jesus' death, burial, and resurrection.  But before Jesus gives this mission to his disciples, he tells them who has the ultimate authority to do so.  This is where I started my lesson.  Jesus Christ has the authority to tell us what to do.    In Matthew 28:18(ESV) Jesus says, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me."

What is Authority?

What is authority?  According to the dictionary of Bible Themes, authority is the right to act or speak in certain ways, in accordance with the authorization of a Higher Power.  All human authority is derived from God and is to be exercised in a responsible manner.  Paul writes in Romans 13:1(ESV) "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except from God and those that exist have been instituted by God."  In other words, humankind has been created and established to be under authority. You may recall when Jesus was tried by Pontius Pilot prior to his crucifixion, Jesus said, “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given to you from above." John 19:11a(ESV). Even before this revelation, Jesus told his disciples speaking of his death and resurrection, "No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord, I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again.  This charge I have received from my Father." John 10:18(ESV). 

Our Assignment:

Are you speaking to your kids about who has authority over you?  Are you telling them who has authority over them? We as followers of Jesus Christ have been given an assignment.  We will call it an ongoing mission.  Do you know what that ongoing mission is?  It is the same mission that Jesus, after his resurrection, gave to his disciples on the mountain where he told them to go in Galilee. "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." Matthew 28:19-20a(ESV) Often is passage is referred to as “the Great Commission”.  Commission isn’t a word that we commonly use in our English language unless we are referring to a brokerage fee, a dividend or a percentage of earnings based on a transaction.  This commission; however, is speaking of a command, instructions or a duty given to us as believers.  Unfortunately for many believers who stand before the judgment seat of God to account for how well we’ve followed our mission, we may recognize our response as “the Great Omission”, or something we failed to do.  It is important to point out that our actions toward this assignment are meant to bring glory to God, not to earn our salvation.  We are saved by grace through faith, not of works.” Ephesians 2:8 (ESV) However, the Bible also tells us, “So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” James 2:17 (ESV)

The Faithful:

As a result of their faithful obedience to Jesus’ command, we have come to know Jesus Christ today.  The early disciples took the mission Jesus gave to them over two thousand years ago, and by their teaching and baptizing one generation after another came to understand Jesus when he said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6 (ESV) Receiving this teaching and accepting its message creates disciples.  As a believer, you and I are disciples.

God gave instructions to fathers starting with Abraham when he said that fathers were responsible to teach their children.  In Deuteronomy 6:5-7 (ESV) we see, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.  And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.  You shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise."  The Great Commission starts at home. 

A Failure:

If we fail to follow through on our mission the Bible teaches that it can have far-reaching effects.  God said to Moses, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation.” Sadly, it has come to my attention in reading Rob Rienow’s book, Never Too Late that, George Barna’s research from 2006 indicates that 80 percent of young adults in their twenties are disconnected from church. Three out of four of these young people were connected in the church as teenagers but drifted away. Barna surveyed not only church connections for young adults, but also their faith convictions.₁

The Same “I AM”:

Jesus provides comforts to all disciples when he says, “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age." Matthew 28:20b(ESV) Do you remember the story of Moses when God spoke to him in the burning bush?  Let me remind you with this verse.  Then Moses said to God, "If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' what shall I say to them?" Exodus 3:13(ESV) Do you remember God's response?   'God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM."  And he said, "Say this to the people of Israel:  'I AM has sent me to you' Exodus 3:14(ESV) This is the same ‘I AM’ who is with us “always, to the end of the age." Matthew 28:20b(ESV)

The End of the Age:

Do you recognize the phrase ‘end of the age’ from any other Bible passage?  Let’s explore what this means.  This phrase is found in several books of the Bible.  The first place we see this is in the gospel of Matthew, chapter 13.  In this passage, Jesus is speaking in parables and his disciples ask him why he tells stories in this manner.  A parable is a simple story that is used to explain a moral or spiritual lesson told by Jesus in the gospels.  It can also be called a discourse.  Just because the stories are simple, doesn’t mean that they are easily understood.  In the ‘parable of the weeds’ found in Matthew 13:24-30, Jesus tells the story.  Jesus explains the meaning of this parable to his disciples beginning in verse 39.  He explains reveals the enemy is the devil, the harvest is ‘the end of the age’, the angels are the reapers, and the weeds will be gathered and burned.  The weeds are the cause of sin and all law-breakers.  He goes on to explain that the righteous will be shining brighter than the sun in the Father’s kingdom.  As a believer, it is easy to discern that the ‘end of the age’ is the judgment because we have been given understanding, not offered to all. 

The apostle Paul speaking to the church in Corinth provides an explanation on why we have access to Old Testament stories regarding the Israelites when he says that idolaters, grumblers, and those that put God to the test have been set as examples for us.  In 1 Corinthians 10:11 (ESV) we read, “Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come.”  The third sighting of this phrase is found in Hebrews chapter 9 starting at verse 11.  This is an explanation of the redemption that we receive through the blood of Jesus.  We see that Jesus death was a once-for-all sacrifice which never needs repeating.  Jesus is no longer in the holy place made with human hands, but He is in the presence of God “on our behalf.” Hebrews 9:24(ESV) Because of this we can have the confidence of our final destination at the 'end of the age'.

Ancestral Story:

So, do you know your ancestral story of how you came to know the Lord through the obedience of those in prior generations?  My story has roots that go back to the disciples, the same as yours.  Wouldn't it be interesting to trace our believing "begets" back to the original seed sower?  On my not so distant path, I know my great-grandmother, Daisy Seymour, was a seed sower for My Father’s kingdom when she took my mother to church as a small girl.  My mother was faithful and taught my brother and I about Jesus.  In the process of our hearing, we came to know Jesus through the confession of our sins, by believing that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and obediently being baptized, buried in the likeness of his death, and raised in the likeness of his resurrection.  Now as a mother many years later, I am sowing the same seeds.  I have seen evidence that my seed has too fallen on fertile ground.  In March 2017 my husband and children made their profession of faith publicly in baptism.  It is my prayer that our family beats the terrifying static and that our children will continue to sow seeds for future generations. God has designed the family to be the place where our mission begins.

Man Does Not Save, God Saves:

It is not mankind that saves, but God who has chosen us.  Jesus explains to the disciples in John 15:16 " You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you."  Before our salvation, Paul writes, "For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.  But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code." Romans 7:5-6(ESV) Stepping back just one verse we see that our fruit-bearing has been changed.  It is no longer to bear fruit for death.  We are brothers and sisters to Christ have died to the law through the body of Christ, "so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God." Romans 7:4 (ESV) This is the Great Commission, the mission we have been given to bring glory to God.  So, if the question ever arises, what has God purposed for me to do, we find it here, starting with “Go, therefore into all the world…”

1 Rienow, Rob. Never Too Late: Encouraging Faith in Your Adult Child (Kindle Locations 158-160). Kregel Publications. Kindle Edition.