Jesus came near and said to them, “All
authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 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
everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to
the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:18-20, HCSB)
But you
will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be My
witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the
earth.” (Acts 1:8, HCSB)
“For
this is what the Lord has commanded us:
I have appointed you as a light for the Gentiles, to bring salvation to
the ends of the earth.” (Acts 13:47, HCSB)
Frequently, I see the words “Missionary Baptist” in
a church’s name. This strikes me as
extreme redundancy. This is like the
term “born again Christian.” It is
impossible to be a real Christian and not be born again, and it is impossible
to be a real New Testament church and not be missionary.
You can only see missions as optional by having a
wrong or inadequate definition of missions.
Here is a good definition of missions: Beginning where you are,
lovingly share the good news about Jesus with lost people everywhere, teach
believers to love and obey Jesus as Lord, plant and develop New Testament
churches and meet human need around the world.
Edmond’s First Baptist Church’s stated purpose leaves no doubt that
our priority is missions. Go to our
website and these words will immediately capture your attention, “Our purpose
is love God and others through Jesus Christ.”
However, it not enough to say that our church is committed to
missions. You and I must take missions
personally.
To be a Christian is to acknowledge that Jesus is your Lord and
Savior. If He is Lord, your Master, your
King, His commands are to be taken personally and obeyed unconditionally. As a believer, your Lord has commissioned you
to be a missionary:
“All
authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 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
everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to
the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:18-20, HCSB)
In his book, Missions
in the Plan of the Ages, Dr. W. O. Carver wrote, “No one can understand the
Bible without reading it in the missionary spirit. No one can know and believe the Bible and
receive the Holy Spirit without becoming missionary.”
Hudson Taylor, who was used powerfully as a pioneer
missionary to China, declared, "The Great Commission is not
an option to be considered; it is a command to be obeyed.”
If yours is not a missionary lifestyle, it is
possible to faithfully attend worship services and Bible study groups, to hold
church offices, to master theology and fill notebooks with conference and
sermon notes while living outside the will of God.
If you have not yet seen yourself as a missionary,
that can change today. If this happens,
your life will be radically changed and, ultimately, lives around the world
will be changed.
John R. Mott, who challenged thousands of university
students to “evangelize the world in this generation,” said, "It is
possible for the most obscure person in a church, with a heart right toward
God, to exercise as much power for the evangelization of the world, as it is
for those who stand in the most prominent positions."
Our Lord’s Great Commission is to go, making
disciples of people from every
class, race, language and nation, marking
them as His followers by baptizing them in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to observe everything He commanded.
Ours is
a Great Commission church and you and I have a personal mandate to be Great
Commission Christians.
James Stewart, Scotland’s most powerful 20th Century
pulpit voice, said, "The concern for world evangelization …can never be
the province of a few enthusiasts…It is the distinctive mark of being a
Christian."
Three things will mark you as a great Commission
Christian:
A
GREAT COMMISSION CHRISTIAN WILL PRAY.
Samuel Zwemer, who was called “The Apostle to
Islam,” said, "The history of missions is the history of answered
prayer."
There have been great sweeping movements of the Holy
Spirit without great preaching, without great music, and without great
planning; but, there has never been a mighty, history changing work of God in
missions and evangelism without someone having paid the price in earnest,
prevailing intercessory prayer.
When early Christians prayed, the place where they
prayed was shaken: “When they had prayed, the place where they were assembled was shaken,
and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak God’s message
with boldness.” (Acts 4:31)
Those first believers prayed ten days, preached ten
minutes and 3,000 people were drawn to Christ.
Today we are inclined to pray ten minutes, preach ten days and hope to
see someone converted.
The English reformer, John Knox, prayed: “Give me
Scotland or I die!”
Mary Queen of Scots said, “I fear the prayers of
John Knox more than of an army of ten thousand men.”
In 1806, five students from Williams College in
Massachusetts knelt under a haystack during a violent thunder storm. They were overcome with a burden to take the
gospel to the lost people of Asia. When they
got up from their knees, God had given birth to the modern missionary movement
in North America!
During a dramatic six years, 1826-1832, Charles
Finney was used of God to lead thousands of people to Christ. A man, known as Father Nash, seldom heard
Finney preach, but he took a room wherever the evangelist went and gave himself
entirely to intercessory prayer. Today, his grave is marked with a simple
stone. On it is carved, "Father Nash, helper of Finney."
In 1857, four years before our republic was to be
tested by the horrors of a civil war, there were 30,000 men idle on the streets
of New York. Drunkenness was rampant,
and the nation was divided by slavery.
God raised up Jeremiah Lanphier, a praying businessman and a convert of
Charles Finney. On September 23, 1857 he began a noontime prayer meeting the
old Dutch Reformed Church on Fulton Street in the Financial District of
Manhattan. Out of a city of one million people, six people showed up a half
hour late.
The group decided to meet the next week and there
were 14. The next week there were 23. The following week there were 40. Within
weeks there were thousands of people meeting daily. God moved so powerfully that the prayer
meeting spread across the nation. During
those days of spiritual awakening, it is estimated that nearly one million
people were converted out of a national population of 35 million, including
10,000 weekly conversions in New York City.
How
should a Great Commission Christian pray?
Do
not pray for the wheat, pray for harvesters.
Jesus said, “The
harvest is abundant, but the workers are few. Therefore, pray to the
Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.” (Luke 10:2)
Pray
for clarity and boldness in proclaiming God’s message.
Paul pleaded with the Ephesians believers, “Pray also for me, that the message may be
given to me when I open my mouth to make known with boldness the mystery of
the gospel. For this I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I might be
bold enough in Him to speak as I should.” (Ephesians 6:19-20)
Pray
for the rapid spread of the gospel and for the God’s protection of His
missionaries.
Paul asked the churches of Thessalonica, “Pray for us, brothers, that the Lord’s
message may spread rapidly and be honored, just as it was with you, and
that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men, for not all have
faith.” (2 Thessalonians 3:1-2)
A
GREAT COMMISSION CHRISTIAN WILL GIVE.
In his letter to the Roman church, Paul asked, “But how can they call on Him in whom they
have not believed? And how can they believe without hearing about Him? And
how can they hear without a preacher? And how can they preach unless they
are sent?” (Romans 10:14-15)
The mark of a great church is not how many it seats
but how many it sends. Every time you give, through our church, you
are helping to send the good news about Jesus around the world.
A Great Commission Church is a giving church. A Great Commission Christian is a giving
Christian. Paul wrote this about the
early churches in Macedonia: “During a
severe testing by affliction, their abundance of joy and their deep poverty overflowed into the
wealth of their generosity. I testify that, on their own, according to
their ability and beyond their ability,
they begged us insistently for the
privilege of sharing in the ministry to the saints.” (2 Corinthians
8:2-4 with my bold face)
Downturns
in the stock markets and difficult financial times should never have a negative
impact on the giving of God’s people.
During World War II, R.G. LeTourneau was the person
most responsible for equipping the Allied forces with the machinery needed for
the invasion of Normandy. His life was
changed by the realization that he could serve God as a businessman.
LeTourneau’s first business went bankrupt, sending him into debt by $5,000, a
large sum in his day. However, a pastor friend told him that God needed businessmen
as well as pastors. During our nation’s Great Depression, he found a
construction job. Eventually, he was
able to establish his own company. When
he succeeded, he remembered God’s faithfulness and gave 90 percent of his
earnings to Christian endeavors. He often said, “If you’re not serving the
Lord, it proves you don’t love him; if you don’t love him, it proves you don’t
know him.”
A Great Commission church and a Great Commission
Christian should never be “under the circumstances.”
When Jesus came to his frightened disciples walking
on the water, He was demonstrating that everything that threatened to be over
their heads was already under His feet!
A
GREAT COMMISSION CHRISTIAN WILL GO.
Jesus said, “As
the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” (John 20:21)
He was the Sent One from the Father. Now, as His followers, we are the sent ones
of the Sent One.
Every member of Edmond’s First Baptist Church can be
involved in world missions by praying and giving. However, there is more that you can do. We are living during a time when any faithful,
spiritually fit Christian, with reasonably good health, can literally have a
hands-on involvement in carrying out the Great Commission.
It may be God’s will for you to go as a career
missionary; to learn a new language, to adjust to a new culture, to plant your
life in a new place and to spend your life crossing barriers to reach people
who have never heard the good news about Jesus.
Today, the International Mission Board of the
Southern Baptist Convention has over 5,000 such men and women reaching out to
nearly 2,000 people groups around the world.
During 2009, their work resulted in 451,301 new believers being baptized
and 6,525 new churches being planted.
In addition to the work of these career
missionaries, nearly 34,000 volunteers…men, women and young people such as
you…are going around the world for periods ranging from two years to a few
days. They are making a world of
difference, one transformed life at a time.
Right now, there is something you can do as a
volunteer on a mission field.
Does this challenge frighten you? Does it seem too great a sacrifice to
consider? David Livingstone, who
established missionary beachheads throughout the African continent, asked, “If a commission by an earthly king is
considered a honor, how can a commission by a Heavenly King be considered a
sacrifice?”
How
can you know if God is leading you to step out of your comfort zone and into a
missionary experience?
William Carey, the father of modern missions, said, “To
know the will of God, we need an open Bible and an open map.”
Isaiah the prophet heard God ask, “Who should I
send? Who will go for Us?”
He responded by saying, “Here I am. Send me.”
(Isaiah 6:8)
Do you have a passport?
If not, get one as soon as possible. Keep it with your study Bible and
journal. Every day when you have your
quiet time, look at your passport and pray Isaiah’s prayer, “Here I am. Send me.”
Begin where you are:
·
Read the biographies of great
missionaries and evangelists.
·
Study the history of world missions.
·
Become a student of world missions in
today’s world.
·
Become a student of history and current
affairs around the world.
·
Learn a second language (Spanish).
·
Carry copies of gospel tracts, such as our
church’s “Greatest Need” booklet.
·
Engage people in conversations about Jesus.
·
Volunteer for local mission
opportunities.
·
Inquire about volunteer opportunities in
the U.S.A. and internationally.
“He is no fool who
gives up what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.” –Jim Elliot
“If
anyone wants to come with Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross
daily, and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose
it, but whoever loses his life because of Me will save it.” (Luke
9:23-24)
I said, “Let me walk in the field.”
He said, “No, walk in the town.”
I said, “But there are no flowers there.”
He said, “No flowers, but a crown.”
I said, “There’s nothing but noise and den.”
“There is more,” He said, “there’s sin.”
I said, “I’ll miss my friends and they will miss me
they say.”
He said, “Choose today if I’ll miss you or they.”
I pleaded for time to be given.
He said, “Is it hard to decide. It won’t seem hard in Heaven to have followed
the steps of your Guide.”
I turned one look to the field and I set my face to
the town.
He said, “My child do you yield? Will you leave the flowers for the crown?”
Into His hand went mine and into my heart came
He.
Now, I walk in a light divine, that path I had so
feared to see.
If you are ready to be a Great Commission Christian,
pray this prayer:
“Lord
Jesus, I submit to You. Do anything
through me that You choose, anytime, anywhere, with no restrictions on
geography or job description.”
Wayne
Bristow
January
26, 2010
