The Kingdom Mission

We are finishing our series on the kingdom. We started there by looking at the proclamation of Jesus to Pontius Pilate, the governor of the Roman province of Judea, who said that, you know, these people had brought Jesus to him with the accusation that he declared himself to be a king. And in that investigation, Jesus does say that he is a king, but of a kingdom that Pontius Pilate doesn't understand, doesn't know. Then in the weeks following, we looked at the nature of this kingdom. We went to Daniel chapter two.

We saw that this kingdom is a kingdom that would be established like a stone cut out of the mountain that has not been cut out by human hands, but has been delivered by God that overcomes all great nations and kingdoms before it and after it, and that will grow to fill the whole world. So we looked at this mighty kingdom that will swallow up the whole planet. And then we looked at some of the teachings and parables that Jesus himself gave about this kingdom. We saw at one point that he talked about how we enter, how humanity may enter this kingdom. And so that it's an invitation that goes out to everyone and anyone. It goes to the most noble and to the most humble of us.

But it's an invitation, he said, that can only ever be accepted by a humble heart. A heart that has a desire to enter into the joy of the king. Then for the past few weeks, we looked at what it means to live inside this kingdom with the ethics, the laws of this kingdom in the citizens' hearts. We've looked at the men and the women whose hearts have been so changed by their entry into this kingdom that their values are completely overhauled. They are people therefore of forgiveness, who forgive because they realise just how much they've been forgiven.

Another week, we saw that the people in the kingdom are people of generosity as they realise they cannot serve the God of heaven and earth and the God of money. And then last week, we saw that they are people of genuine love, because it gives purpose to their living, and it becomes that love is the golden thread that inspires and motivates every other ethic within this kingdom. And so today, we come to the end of this series by going to, I think, the natural place, and that is to go to the final words of Jesus to his disciples. In these words, he turned a group of nervous young men into a force marked by purpose and unwavering determination. It was only a month after he was crucified and was raised from the dead that Jesus of Nazareth, now recognised by these very men to be the king of something altogether divine, gave his final words.

And yet, because it was this parting message to them, here he grabbed this ragtag group of men and thrust them into a mission which would so consume their lives that they would be willing to give up everything in their accomplishment of it. What were these words that had moved them so much? What command could have been given to them to fill them with this purpose, with this passion, with this perseverance? Well, we find those words in Matthew 28:16-20, and we're gonna read that right now. Matthew 28:16.

Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshipped him, but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptising 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, and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. So far, our reading.

In the days after his resurrection, Jesus had met numerous times with his disciples, convincing some of them of that very fact that he had been raised from the dead, teaching them about what it meant for him to have been raised from the dead, what his death on the cross had meant. He taught them that through his suffering and his death on the cross, that he had conquered the power of sin, the power of Satan who had been threatening his kingdom. He said that he died to break the power of sin, but it was only rather because of his resurrection that he could be crowned the king, because a dead king is no king after all. And so that war had been won. The war had been won, and the king was now about to take his seat on his throne.

And so that is why Jesus is leaving forty days after the resurrection, he is going to go and sit on his throne to reign over his kingdom. But before he goes, Jesus tells his disciples of this magnificent news, of this magnificent power that he is leaving them behind. And that is in the opening of the passage we read, which is that all authority has been given to me. He says, all authority on heaven and on earth has been given to me.

Why is this magnificent news? Well, because it means that Jesus is in control. Jesus is in control even as he is leaving. It means that there isn't a decision that these disciples will need to make, a decision or a choice that they will take, a moment in their experience that doesn't in some way work towards the plan that he has. And that includes their faith in him.

When Jesus sends out his disciples into this world mission, he says, you must go to the ends of the earth. Imagine the daunting task that that would have been. He sends them into the mission to bring a message of repentance and faith in Jesus' saving work, and it was his disciples that needed to believe that they could do it. That their message, that their preaching, that their invitation into the kingdom would actually make a difference. And that is why Jesus has to tell them, and why he does, that all authority is with me.

So why does that matter for us? Why does it matter for us to know that as well? Well, firstly, for those of us who have received Jesus into our lives, if you were to reflect on your personal journey of coming to faith in Jesus, I wanna ask you the question, do you give God the thanks for that conversion? Do you thank God for that? Or do you give yourself thanks and think to yourself, boy, how lucky was I?

Every Christian deep down is aware that they have not saved themselves. Even if you try and argue that you don't believe in the doctrine of election, that it is God alone who chooses who is saved. Even if you were to try and defend that position, I wanna ask you, who do you thank for you coming to faith? Your thanksgiving to God for your salvation is an acknowledgement of this very statement that Jesus says, all authority on heaven and on earth is mine.

And so even your faith, even the message of repentance and faith that these disciples would deliver, depended on the authority of Jesus. You and I don't put to chance or to accident that particular friend that came into our lives at just the right moment. That particular church that you just so happened to stumble into that particular Sunday to hear a message. That random podcast that you listened to. That random YouTube video that you watched.

Again and again, as I talk to people, I hear testimonies of people who cannot attribute their coming to faith to their own wisdom, to their right thinking, to them talking themselves into believing. We all acknowledge that we needed the external influence of both a good, gracious, but also a very powerful saviour who is able to draw people to Himself. You would never dream of dividing the credit for your salvation between God and yourself. That's why we give God all the glory and know that it would be unthinkable to refuse to thank Him for our faith. And that is why Jesus says that He has all authority as He sends His disciples out to go and make other disciples.

Another way we know that this is real, even in our own experience, is by the way we pray. When we pray for others to come to faith, do you limit your prayer praying to ask God that He would simply wrangle them and bring them to such a point where they will save themselves? Lord, will you please lead them to the water of eternal life, but then stop at those banks and respect their wishes of whether they want to drink of that water or not? Then we just pray, Lord, work in my friends, work in my family, everything that is necessary for their salvation. That is how we pray.

I think if we're honest, every Christian would say that God and His will is quite simply and categorically the thing that saves our loved ones. And so those who might hear Jesus saying, all authority on heaven and on earth has been given to me, and then think that somehow excludes people's own wishes in coming to faith, I will say to them kindly, I think your prayers betray you. Your prayer on behalf of others acknowledges the sovereignty of Jesus and His electing grace. And friends, this is so comforting for us to know in these final words that Jesus gives His disciples, because Jesus is saying that He is a king who is more powerful than we dare to believe. We serve a king who says in John 10:18, of the work that He did on the cross, no one takes my life from me.

I am laying it down of my own accord. I have the power to take it back up again. It's why theologian Abraham Kuyper would once write, there is not a square inch, not a square inch in the whole domain of human existence over which Christ does not cry, mine, mine. And so as Jesus sends out His twelve young disciples, some of them even in this moment, not really believing, some of them doubting even as others worship Jesus, He gives them the only thing that can instil hope, and that is to say that I have all power. And so everything, every single thing has come under the kingship of Jesus.

So Jesus begins by saying all authority on heaven and earth is mine. And then He says, therefore, go and make disciples. In light of Jesus' absolute authority on heaven and on earth, His disciples are commissioned to now go to the ends of the earth, making disciples for Jesus, bringing people into this kingdom. Now, it's very very important to remember what these last words of Jesus were before He ascended into heaven. These last words weren't sentimental niceties.

You know, Peter, I love you. You were such a good bloke. You know, I hope that life is good for you. John, you know, make sure you look after my mother well. See you later.

See you on the other side. Jesus finishes by giving commands before He leaves. These are marching orders that He gives His disciples. And the first command is, go. Go.

Move. Don't remain here. Emil Brunner, the great theologian of the twentieth century, famously said that the church exists by mission as fire exists by burning. In other words, just like you can't have a fire without burning, you can't have a church without mission. The church exists to be on mission.

The church only survives when it is in the mission. Now, some people may disagree with me and say, the church exists to worship God, doesn't it? I mean, that's why it's here on earth. It's to declare His praises. But according to the Bible, worship is mission.

Mission is worship. We can't separate the two. One Peter 2:9, that great famous verse says, the church is a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, so that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvellous light. You can translate that word declare as pronouncing, as sharing, as explaining, and as preaching. We are to declare the praises of God.

Who do we do that to? Well, yes, surely to one another, but to anyone who is willing to listen. The church, therefore, truly glorifies God by making Him known by making Him known. Mission and evangelism, therefore, defines the nature and the purpose and the activity of the church. Evangelism cannot be then just one activity in the church amongst other things that we sort of prioritise.

You know, we're building a stage, we're doing some renovation work on our retainer, and we'll also do some evangelism as well. It doesn't sit on the agenda according to those sort of priorities, vying for attention. The church exists by mission as a fire exists by burning. I believe this is going to become more and more true for us as Christians in Australia, as the Australian church senses more and more the alienation from standards that were more familiar to us, norms of a society that has moved from Christendom into postmodernism, we are sensing more and more that what we hold on to as truth does not coincide with the values around us. And my prayer is that we become less and less comfortable with that, and therefore more active in declaring the praises of the God who is calling us out of that darkness into His wonderful light.

So Jesus says, all authority is mine, therefore go. Now this word go in the original Greek, in the structure of that sentence, is the leading verb after which all of these other commands and statements will follow. As the leading verb, the command to go determines everything therefore that will follow it. It determines the making of disciples. It determines the teaching of these disciples.

It determines the obeying of these disciples. Why? Because if the disciples don't go, the rest won't happen. If we don't move, the rest won't happen. Now, as twenty-first century disciples, what does this mean?

Well, firstly, it means that those disciples did go. The fact that we can sit on the other side of the world from the Middle East, Palestine, Israel, right now, and call ourselves Christians, is that there have been generations, starting with these disciples, that went, that took this command seriously. Somewhere along the line, very courageous, very obedient men and women took Jesus' words seriously and brought that message to us. When Jesus tells us His final command for His kingdom people is to go, it may mean for some of us that we are required to physically go, to physically move. Now, it may not mean that for everyone, but this is what it does mean for everyone.

Dynamic action is required. Movement is required. The verb to go requires energy. It requires innovation. It requires creativity.

And so wherever we might find ourselves, whatever location, whatever church community, our very existence as the church should drive us to intentionally deliver the message of Jesus. And so therefore, God may move us into our workplaces, God may move us into our schools, into our universities. God may move us to do things, to be creative and innovative in those environments. But listen well. We can only go because Jesus says, I have all authority.

That is why that word therefore is also included. Jesus says, I have all authority, therefore, go. If Jesus really is the king of the universe, then we have nothing to worry about going to the nations. If Jesus really has all power over heaven and earth, then we have nothing to worry about in the sharing of the gospel. Why?

Because we believe that my job, whether I lose my job for sharing a humble faith in Jesus, inviting humbly someone to come to church, if I lose my job over that, Jesus is going to sort that out. Jesus will look after me in that. That is the level of authority that Jesus has over every aspect of our life. He is so in control over whether we win the favour of our boss, of our friends. And since He is the sovereign king, whatever people think of us, really should always be second to what He thinks of us.

All authority is mine, therefore go. Then, after this command to go and make disciples, Jesus says that we are to baptise them. Why baptism? Well, baptism in the Bible meant the incorporation of people into the kingdom, into the church. It is a rite of entry for people into the kingdom of God.

But Jesus doesn't say anything here about the church, does He? He doesn't mention the church or the community of faith. Jesus says that these people are to be baptised into the name of the father, and of the son, and of the holy spirit. Now, why that baptism? Why into these three persons?

Well, Christianity is the only faith that teaches that God is a trinity. That God is one being who exists eternally in three persons, father, son, and spirit. Now what that fundamentally tells us of the character and the nature of God is that He is relational. That He is a community even as He exists. Tim Keller, in talking about the Trinity, says that in life, when we are in relationship with people, we delight and we serve them, and when we do that, we enter into a dynamic orbit in their life. We intersect and we come in at various times, and we become a part of their orbit.

We centre on their interests, we have them centre on our interests, and so on. But this is what the Bible tells us about God as well. That within the Trinity, each person of the Trinity is orbiting and centring around the other one. Each person is voluntarily serving the other, pouring love, delighting in, rejoicing over the other person. This creates a dynamic, pulsating activity of joy and love, which C S Lewis calls the dance of God.

Serving and being served, rejoicing and rejoicing over. When Jesus commissions His followers then to baptise others into the name of the father, the son, and the spirit, He is telling us to invite others into a joyful, living, pulsating relationship, which is God. The command to go and make disciples then is not a command to start a religion. It is not a command to establish a world order. It is not even creating a whole school of disciples who will just memorise the teachings and the lifestyle of Jesus.

To make disciples means inviting people into the eternal relationship which is God. The purpose of Jesus coming to earth was to put the whole world right again. But the world is set right again when it relates rightly to God. The thing that Jesus saved us from is sin. And sin is the centring of ourselves, on our identity, on anything that is not God. Jesus sends us to make disciples, baptising them into the trinity, and is therefore essentially saying, bring them to know us.

Bring them to us. To baptise people into the triune God means to invite them into the family of God. And therefore, by extension, they are invited into our communities, into our churches, because we belong to God. Jesus says, baptise them and include them into the relationship of God. And then, fourthly, Jesus says that His disciples are to go and teach others to obey what He has commanded them.

So if we have joined with this dance of God, this eternal pulsating joyful relationship, how do we actually dance when we've been included in the dance of God? How do we maintain and grow a relationship with God? This is where that last phrase of the great commission comes in. Jesus says, teach them to obey everything I have commanded you.

We know that babies who are born into families aren't just born and then placed in a cot and said, welcome to the family, look after yourself now. Nor does God invite us into His family and then just leave us to our own devices. In a healthy family, babies are nurtured and are prepared for adulthood. Jesus didn't come to set sinners free merely from their past brokenness and then left them to their own devices. Jesus is setting sinners free from their past, their present, and their future brokenness as well. And so Jesus is spending three years of ministry teaching His disciples how this healed life will look like.

But the schooling Jesus gives His disciples becomes our schooling. The ministry college, the Bible college that Jesus puts His disciples through is our Bible college. And when we reach others, we're putting them through the same training. And so to teach others what Jesus has commanded is pointing them to what God has taught us in His word. But not just simply the words that have been taught to us, but the way that Jesus taught as well.

Jesus' teaching is constantly relational. If we see that, it's always a dialogue, it's always a patient discussion, questions and answers. And Jesus does it everywhere. He does it when he's about to go to bed, he does it when he wakes up. There's never a I'll wait until Sunday to have this discussion.

Jesus is teaching and encouraging wherever he goes. And so when we obey Jesus' commands to teach others what He taught, we must take the opportunities to teach what Jesus taught, but to teach in the way that He taught us well, while we're walking the dog, while we're driving in the car with our kids, while we're sitting around a lunch table at work. It means that we are open about inviting people into our lives, and therefore, into our small groups. Our small groups can never be just about me and God and the few people that I like. As we teach, we should welcome debate.

Invite them in to disagree, to argue, but we seek opportunities to engage and teach in the ways that Jesus taught as much as what He taught. But then as we teach, we are also reminded to apply those very teachings to ourselves as well. It must start with ourself. People will only really sense the truth of forgiveness when we are able to forgive them. People won't know about the forgiveness of their sins from necessarily a brilliant sermon on Romans 5.

They will see the peace of your forgiveness, the peace that you have with God, as they see you resting in the finished work of Jesus, instead of anxiously trying to justify yourselves and your mistakes to them. These people will understand the nature of Christian hope, simply by you telling them a great Bible study on Romans 8, but as they see you enduring patiently the hardships in your life, with hope, waiting for God to come through with whatever purpose He has for that situation, people see that. They are taught by that. Jesus says, go and teach others to obey everything I have commanded you. And so we are to share His words with others while we apply it very carefully to our own lives as well.

So in finishing, after Jesus has revealed His kingship to His disciples, he's been teaching three years what it looks like to live in this kingdom, the kingdom ethics. He's taught about what this kingdom means, what it how it will impact our lives. And here, He reveals the authority of His kingship. But Jesus is saying goodbye to His disciples, to go and reign from His throne. But Jesus finishes with a command, with several commands of things for them to do, and that work continues to this day.

This is the hope we have in accomplishing that. That we have the empowering nature, the authority of Jesus, the king of the universe, who sends us out to move with dynamic action, to incorporate people into the family of God, nurturing and loving them in such a way that they will in turn become disciples, who will then also make more disciples. But even in this, He finishes with these very last words, and it is a promise. I am with you always. Till the very end of the age, I am with you.

And what a comfort that is. He won't let us do this on our own until the seas dry up, the mountains turn to dust. He will continue to be our comfort and our support. That is His promise. But He says we have a job to do.

We have work that needs to be done. We have a mission to commit our lives to. And so as citizens within this kingdom, let's get down to it. All authority on heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go, make disciples, baptise them into the name of the father, the son, and the spirit, teaching them everything that I have commanded you.

And surely and surely, I'm with you till the very end of the age. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the way that you have commissioned your church, the work that you have given us to do. And Lord, as we look around, our neighbours, our friends, Lord, our very nation, we feel the enormity of that task. Oh, but God, if you could start with eleven frightened doubting men.

And if you could reach a people on the other side of the world, how much more can you do with us? We ask God that you will empower us by the very spirit who we've been baptised into. Holy Spirit, that you will quicken our hearts, give us an urgency in our minds. Lord, help us to keep the priority. Help us to keep the important things important.

And so, Lord, as you dismiss us, not only today, but also in this series, as we bookend your great revelation of your kingship on the one hand, and the authority and the command of what we must do now in light of that now. Lord, we ask that we will believe and trust that all authority is yours, that you are with us until the very end of the age. And father, that even in open house church, you will help us to make disciples who know Jesus and who make Jesus known. In your promise, holding to it by faith, we commit ourselves again. In Jesus' name. Amen.