Matthew 28:16-20
\n16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”<\/p>\n
This week, we are reminding ourselves of the overarching purpose of our church. This passage has come to be known as the \u201cGreat Commission.\u201d<\/p>\n
We looked at the\u2026<\/p>\n
I. The Power (Authority) of the Great Commission<\/p>\n
II. The Activity of the Great Commission<\/p>\n
And now, let\u2019s see\u2026<\/p>\n
III. The Process of Making Disciples<\/p>\n
As I mentioned last time, there is only one action word (verb) in the Great Commission. It is a single word in the Greek. In order to understand the meaning, most translations will say, \u201cmake disciples.\u201d<\/p>\n
There are three participles in a verbal form, which means they complement the one action of making disciples. They are \u201cGo,\u201d \u201cBaptizing\u201d and \u201cTeaching.\u201d These three participles explain the process of making disciples.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s look at the first step in making disciples is\u2026<\/p>\n
A. Go<\/p>\n
\u2014\u2014As a participle, the literal translation would be \u201chaving gone.\u201d We would understand it better as, \u201cas you go make disciples.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014\u2014The early disciples didn\u2019t have to be commanded to go. The Jewish Council\u2019s high priest complained to the apostles, \u201c..you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching\u2026\u201d (Acts 5:28).<\/p>\n
\u2014 \u2014And though God had to organize a persecution through the hearts of evil men, when the believes were forced to scatter throughout Judea and Samaria, as they went they immediately began to make disciples.<\/p>\n
Acts 8:4 Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went.<\/p>\n
You see, it never occurred the the disciple not to go. That\u2019s a 21st Century idea.<\/p>\n
Our everyday life is to be one of teaching or discipling others to follow Christ wherever we go.<\/p>\n
There are two ways of going:
\n**Spontaneous going – Lifestyle (taking the word with us as we go)
\n**Planned going – Jesus sent the disciples out in groups of two.<\/p>\n
Our modern day evangelism has turned Jesus idea of \u201cgoing\u201d upside down. Rather than encouraging believers to personally share their faith wherever they go, we have developed a false concept of evangelism. I call it, \u201cYa\u2019ll come.\u201d Members are encouraged to bring the fish into the stained-glass aquarium, so the big fisherman can cast his hook from the pulpit.<\/p>\n
Everywhere we go, we should be initiating conversations about our faith and about Jesus.<\/p>\n
Here are a couple of conversation starters for you to consider:<\/p>\n
Have you come to the place in your personal life that if you died you know for certain you would be with God in heaven?<\/p>\n
If you were standing before God and He asked you, \u201cWhy should I let you into my heaven,\u201d what do you think you would say?<\/p>\n
Tell me, what do you think it takes for a person to be with God in heaven?<\/p>\n
So, let\u2019s put our \u201cmask\u201d on and get out there, and as we go\u2026\u2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Matthew 28:16-20 16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false},"categories":[140],"tags":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3588"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3588"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3588\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3589,"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3588\/revisions\/3589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/southsidealive.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}