I had the privilege of sharing a sermon this morning using Matthew 28:18-20 and Acts 13:1-3 as my main texts. The message was entitled, “GO!”, and in keeping with my preaching style the two letters of go became my outline — main point #1, God; main point #2, Others.
Matthew 28 is clear about Jesus commanding us to go and make disciples, baptizing them and teaching them to obey all that Jesus commanded – including the command to go and make disciples, baptizing them and teaching them to obey all that Jesus commanded. On and on it goes as one disciple makes another who makes another who makes another who . . . you get the point, right?
The big question for the church, for Christianity, for you and I, is “are we doing that?“! It appears to me that Jesus would say proof of being a disciple is that you are making disciple-making disciples. I connected the “great commission” passage with the Acts 13 passage because I believe the events at the beginning of Acts 13 shows us a glimpse of how to carry out the great commission at a church congregation level.
As Acts 13 opens, we find the Christian leaders in Antioch worshiping God and fasting. We don’t know if this was a regular “worship service” and time of fasting but the history of the early church to this point in the book of Acts would indicate that this was a regular practice. It was during this time of focusing on God that the Holy Spirit instructed them to set apart Barnabas and Paul for the work He had called them to do. As you read the rest of the book of Acts you discover that the work they were called to do was to take the news of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus to the Gentiles — they were to have God’s focus on others!
That is the way Jesus lived while He was on earth. He first and foremost focused on His relationship with God — His Father. He knew His power came from the one who had sent Him. He knew, and practiced, the importance of spending time alone with God in prayer and fasting, listening for the voice of His Father. His focus was so much on God that He could say that if anyone had seen Him, they had seen the Father.
His time with God the Father gave Him his Father’s focus on others. His realization and statement that He was sent to “seek and save that which was lost” came from the Father. He knew his Father’s focus on others is what would take Jesus to the cross. He adopted that focus as his own, not willing that any should perish but all would come to repentance. His focus on God gave Him the focus on others that allowed Him to pray, “Not my will, but Thine be done.”
Will you GO? Will you deliberately focus your life on God in order to have His focus on others? You most likely already go — you go to work, to the gym, to the classroom, to the golf course, to the ball field, to wherever else it may be. Since you are already going, the real question is are you making disciples, baptizing them and teaching them to obey all that Jesus commanded? I pray that you are, and that you will!
GO!
