Let's open up our Bibles just for a
moment to Jeremiah, chapter
five.
Before I get started, I would just like
to say it's a great privilege for us
to be here and it has been and
I'm sure will continue to be a great
privilege for us to be able to fellowship
together, to know one another, to grow, to
see things God, to see God do things
throughout this land.
And not only through this land, but through
the many lands around the world.
Let's go to Jeremiah, chapter five, verse 18.
Yet even in those days, declares the Lord,
I will not make you a complete destruction.
It shall come about when they say, why
has the Lord, our God, done all these
things to us?
Then you shall say to them, as you
have forsaken me and served foreign gods in
your land, so you will serve strangers in
a land that is not yours.
Now, this is just by way of introduction.
Many of you would say, well, this is
a very strange passage to be preaching.
If we're going to be talking about the
Great Commission, it's true.
But there are some principles here that are
they're absolutely astounding for us today.
Here we have the people of Israel.
Their primary obligation was to serve the Lord,
their God, with all their heart, soul, mind
and strength.
They were created for that.
They had no other purpose.
When they were brought into a covenant relationship
with Yahweh, with Jehovah, every other purpose in
their life fell off.
Everything became secondary to serving Yahweh.
That is why they were so warned in
Mount Sinai.
They were warned.
Are you sure you want to become the
people of God?
Because if you make that commitment, if you
enter into that covenant, I am going to
place upon you requirements and you are going
to be called to obey them.
And I will hold you accountable in the
way that I have never held any other
nation accountable.
And if you do not serve me.
Then all these things will come upon you.
And so we see that it is, as
it is said throughout scriptures, it can be
a terrible thing to enter into a covenant
relationship with God, to call ourselves his people.
Because when his people.
Get distracted.
And become immersed in the world.
And no longer serve him principally, primarily.
Then discipline falls.
Now, notice I use the word discipline, because
if you see in verse 18, yet in
those days declares the Lord, I will not
make you a complete destruction.
He is not going to wipe Israel off
the face of the earth, but he is
going to discipline them and discipline them severely.
Now, let's notice one other thing before we
get to our point in this text, the
ungodly can rage wildly against God, and it
seems as though he does nothing to them.
Even in Psalms, a passage that we all
memorized early in our Christianity, Psalms one six,
for the Lord knows the way of the
righteous, but the way of the wicked will
perish.
God allows the wicked to rage against him
for a time as though it seems he
didn't even know their way, but you take
the righteous, those who have entered into a
covenant relationship with him, when they step out
of line, God steps in.
Have you ever wondered to yourself, why is
it that so many people around you commit
all sorts of abominations and God never does
anything?
But the moment you step out of line,
the hammer falls.
Yes.
Well, you should rejoice if that's the case,
because that's indication of having entered in to
a covenant relationship with God, that you're really
his people because he disciplines every son that
he loves.
Now, let me spring on you the reason
for me going to this text to begin.
Our country is not a Christian country, and
I would dare say that it never has
been a Christian country.
God only has one nation and that is
the people of God.
However, there are physical nations that have had
the blessing of being influenced by Christianity and
our nation falls into that category.
We have been influenced by Christianity and this
nation has received many great blessings because of
Christianity.
But even though this is a Christian influenced
nation, it's not what I want to talk
about.
It's not the point of this text.
The point of the text is the Christians
in this nation.
For over 200 years, we have had freedom
to serve the Lord.
We have had freedom to do whatever our
conscience dictated with regard to what we discovered
in scripture.
Is that not true?
No persecution.
No stamp of government approval needed.
We have had unlimited freedom for 200 years
to serve the Lord and the other blessings
that have followed along with that have been
economic prosperity, safety, the absence of war, so
many things.
But look, look in verse 19, it shall
come about when they say, why has the
Lord done all these things to us?
Why?
The people of God ask, then you shall
say to them, as you have forsaken me
and served foreign gods in your land, so
you will serve strangers in a land that
is not yours.
In the land of Israel, God gave the
people of God freedom to serve him through
his son, David, and then through Solomon, he
liberated his people from all their enemies.
There was no war after David.
Solomon had a great time of peace.
Everything was guarded by God, established a monarchy
so that God could be glorified in a
nation and that nation could serve him without
fear.
But.
What did the prosperity do?
Instead of turning them to God, it turned
them away from God, and although they would
call upon the name of the Lord, it
was the prosperity, it was the ease of
life, it was the economic blessing, it was
the striving for things that really had a
hold of their heart.
We can say the same thing about us
today in America.
For 200 years, there have been blessing of
religious freedom for 200 years.
There has been economic prosperity for 200 years.
We have had the opportunity of no other
nation on the face of the earth to
serve the Lord God and to spread the
gospel throughout the nations.
But is the primary thought of your life.
Serving the Lord, is that what fills your
head, young person, when you get up in
the morning and when you go to bed
at night is the cry of your heart.
Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy
will be done.
Is that the reason why you go to
work in the morning?
Is that the basis for the decisions you
make?
Is that how you raise your children?
I would say that the answer is probably
no, though Christian.
We become so easily distracted.
By those things that are not the primary
thing.
And instead of taking the last 200 years.
To spread the gospel to all the nations.
We have, by and large, sat down and
soaked up the blessing.
Now, here's the horrible news.
Folks.
The nations.
That we have not evangelized.
Are coming for us.
The very nations where we did not take
the gospel, those are the nations that are
coming for us.
How different could it have been if we
had spent these last 200 years serving the
Lord, our God, preaching the gospel to the
whole world, taking the gospel of Jesus Christ
into every city and small town of the
Middle East and of Asia and of Africa.
What if they had heard the gospel of
peace?
Instead of a religion of war.
What if in our own country we had
evangelized the peoples?
That we would have prayed and we would
have fought and we would not have allowed
them to take over our education system and
our universities and every one of our institutions
and then kick us totally out.
I am afraid.
I'm afraid.
That apart from a miraculous move of God,
apart from some sort of phenomenal revival that
no one can even see on the horizon,
what happened to the nation of Israel is
going to happen in this country.
That we will end up.
As Christian people, I'm not speaking about the
entire nation, I'm talking about Christian people subjected.
To ungodly kings and ungodly rulers with foreign
gods, because in the time that we had
the freedom to serve the Lord, our God,
we did not.
We did not.
Now, let me say something here that's very,
very important.
I spent many years on the mission field.
And I want you to know that even
on the mission field, the missionary is not
immune from being distracted from the primary work
of serving God.
Even on the mission field, there was a
battle against the desire to do other things,
and even with all your sincerity and your
Bible study, there was always the possibility of
being distracted from the only thing that matters,
the only thing that is eternal and that
is loving the Lord your God with all
your heart, soul, mind and strength and making
his name great among the nations.
So if it's easy for a missionary to
get distracted and if it's easy for a
missionary to get distracted on the mission field,
how easy is it for the average brother
and sister in the pew to get distracted
from the main thing?
You see, Christianity is not merely about being
moral.
It's not merely about making right decisions for
yourself so that God will bless you.
Christianity is first and foremost about loving the
Lord your God with all your heart, soul,
mind and strength.
And then.
Having done that in that context, it is
loving our neighbor as ourself, and one of
the ways in which we love all our
neighbors as ourself is we present to them
the greatest gift that can be given them,
and that is the gospel of Jesus Christ.
You see that.
I am greatly afraid.
On the human side.
For Christianity in America.
Apart from a revival quicker than we would
all believe, our freedoms to serve the Lord
will be taken away.
And I am reminded of those words of
the Lord that we should work while it
is still day.
Because night is coming when no man will
work.
If you want to serve the Lord openly,
freely, if you want to for him to
use you in any public arena whatsoever, you
had better do so now, because in 20
years we could all be using little signals
and passwords to tell whether or not we're
Christian.
Meeting in homes and hiding.
If we will not serve the Lord now.
We may have to serve taskmasters.
Who are cruel and care not for the
things that are precious to us now in
saying that, I want us to go look
at a missionary heart for a moment, I
want you to go to Matthew chapter six.
Anytime you want to know anything about anything,
here's what you do.
You go to Jesus Christ.
Anytime you want to see the way anything
ought to look, you go to Jesus Christ.
I'm serious.
There is no other example.
Nothing greater than he.
So when we look in Matthew chapter six,
we see the heart of our Lord.
How should our heart be as Christians in
Matthew chapter six?
He says in verse nine, pray, then pray
then in this way.
And you say, well, Brother Paul, he's talking
about prayer.
He's not talking about the content of his
heart.
My dear friend, listen to me, prayer is
the verbal or public manifestation of the content
of your heart.
If every time you hit your knees, your
praying is all about you or the things
you need, you have revealed to God and
anyone else who's heard you the content of
your heart.
So here we see the content of the
heart of Messiah.
He says this, our father, who art in
heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Although it sounds rather common, it wouldn't be
wrong to translate this special be your name.
Let your name be special, let it be
unique, let it be set apart from every
other name in the universe, a cosmic separation
in which there's God's name and every other
name is put in another category.
He said this is the will of my
heart.
This is the desire of my heart, father,
father, that your name.
Be separated by the people's and honored by
the people's above absolutely every other name, that
there's no competition whatsoever.
And let me ask you a question.
Can you and I say that that is
the desire?
Of our heart, is that the cry of
your prayer life?
Is that one of the most frequent statements
that come out of your mouth in prayer?
It's repeated Malachi, it's one of the phrases
that that heart cry is most identified with
that your name be great among the nations.
We ought to be a person who looks
inwardly at our own heart and says, is
this true of me?
Is this the greatest desire of my life
that God's name be glorified in me?
Then we look at our relationship with our
spouses and ask ourselves this, is this my
desire?
Is this what I am diligently working toward
that God's name be great in that relationship?
Do we look at our children?
Yes, we are missionaries to our children.
Do we look at our children and think
this, my greatest desire in that child?
Is that God's name be great in him
or her, that God's will be done, that
God's kingdom come.
Now, if someone were to step back and
film your life.
Would they be able to look at your
relationship with your children and say, man, Matthew
six, or would they say, I think the
greatest desire they have for their children is
that they be popular in a twisted, demented
culture or that they be successful.
In a temporal, worldly, financial sort of way,
or that they be the greatest baseball player,
soccer player, football player, basketball player.
How much time do you invest in a
missionary endeavor with your children?
It goes back to that statement of years
ago when I met this boy and all
he could do was talk about China, how
he loved the Chinese, he wanted to go
to China, he wanted to be a missionary
in China.
One day I just looked at him and
I said, you know, the reason you love
Chinese people so much is you don't know
any Chinese people.
That doesn't mean that I have something against
the Chinese people.
I have friends that are Chinese that are
quite wonderful.
My point is this.
It's easy to love someone 10,000 miles
away.
It's easy to talk about a missionary endeavor
to people you're never going to have to
witness to.
I can tell you the missionary content of
your heart by seeing what you do with
those closest to you.
Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be
your name.
Your kingdom come.
Do you desire the advance of capitalism?
Do you desire the advance of democracy?
Does it bother you when you hear news
that democracy is on the demise or capitalism
is dead or socialism is king?
Does that bother you?
Well, I guess it should.
But it shouldn't bother you a fraction.
To the degree that this should bother you,
the kingdom of Christ.
It's not advancing now, I can assure you
that it is, but I can also assure
you that we ought to become participants and
seek for its greater advance.
Does it bother you that there are countries
where there is no gospel?
Is there well, there's need a gospel here,
listen, someone can get saved in America if
they want to get saved in America.
Now, they may have to scan the airways
for a long time and travel to a
lot of different places, but they can find
a gospel.
There are places all over this world where
there is no gospel.
Cities of a million people where the kingdom
of Christ has yet to advance, does that
bother you?
Now, let me talk about the word bother
for a moment, preoccupation, cause of anxiety, so
on and so forth.
The heart can only handle a few anxieties
at a time.
Or else it break down, sometimes, you know,
you you come home from work, all of
us know this, you've got all kinds of
problems, and soon as you're met at the
door with your wife or your children or
something else and they've got another problem and
you go, no, I can't take another problem.
I'm full.
Well, let me just say this, one of
the reasons why we are not as anxious,
as preoccupied, as concerned about the advance of
Christ in the world, one of the reasons.
Is because we're so filled up with all
sorts of manmade anxieties that we have brought
upon ourselves.
Everything from keeping up to the Joneses, to
financial debt, to worries about things that are
not eternal, but they are temporal.
We are so worried about so many things
that don't matter.
There are some very great things to say
about Albert Einstein.
He was he was an amazing, amazing individual.
One thing that I've heard about him and
read, hopefully it's true, is that if you
opened up the doors of his closet.
There were several different changes of clothing.
But it was the exact same shirt, the
exact same socks, the exact same suit coat.
And so on and so forth.
And someone said, what is this?
Why do you do this?
He said, because I've got too many other
things to think about.
I do not want to waste the mind
I have thinking about something as unimportant as
does my do my clothes match.
Yet, ladies, if we took your preoccupation for
clothes and the matching therein and we turned
that into prayer time, we would probably have
the gospel preached throughout all the nations.
And men, I can say the same thing
about all our endeavors, we're filled with so
many things that aren't important, that do not
satisfy, that cannot help us, that cannot bring
any benefit whatsoever eternal to our families.
Yet our minds are so filled with so
many silly things that we cannot set our
minds on things above.
Which is the kingdom of our Lord and
its advancement, it's true.
It's just true, I discovered when we were
in Peru for the first probably half of
the time there, the country was under terrible
political and civil unrest.
I mean, you would have to wait in
line for a bag of rice, bombs were
blowing up everywhere.
There was no no possibility really in many,
many of our friends lives to get an
education, to prosper in business or anything.
And because so many things, so many doors
were shut off to them, they had no
hope whatsoever.
Their devotion to Christ was supreme.
All they had was that which is eternal,
Jesus Christ and living for him.
But the moment there was political victory and
some sort of peace in the nation and
prosperity came back, you started seeing many of
the same maladies in Peru, their commonplace in
the church in America.
Distraction, distraction.
I'm going to preach at a missionary, at
an ex-missionary.
I don't think you can ever become an
ex-missionary, but he's a missionary who became
a pastor down in Georgia.
And what's amazing about his church is I
don't think there's a hall.
Literally, there's a hall you can walk down
more than five feet and not see a
big picture of a missionary.
And the data of that missionary.
He calls it his hallway of heroes.
And what he told me was this, I
don't want these people in this church to
ever forget about missions.
I want them to see missions everywhere they
turn on every wall, every window, every place.
There is a place to put something about
missions.
We're going to put it about missions because
there is so much competition in this world
that distracts even the good people of God.
That's true.
So he says here, our father who is
in heaven, hallowed be thy name, your kingdom
come, your will be done.
Our involvement in missionary activity or our lack
of involvement in missionary activity again is a
great reflection of our own heart.
If you honestly believe that the most important
thing in the world.
Is the will of God.
Then you will be involved in missions.
But before you ever get to the mission
field, that desire of yours will be reflected
in your own life.
Just let's think for a moment.
How much of our lives.
Is lived.
In practical atheism, practical atheism.
Yes, you love the Lord.
We love the Lord.
We read the Bible in the morning and
we pray we want to do what's right.
But at the end of the day, before
we go to bed at night, if we
were to take inventory.
How many hours of that day was lived
without a consideration for the presence of God
or the importance of his will.
The supreme importance of doing his will, when
was the last time you did anything thinking,
am I doing the will of God?
To purchase a car.
Or a house or clothing.
Or friendships.
Any manner of thing on the planet that
you must decide foremost in your mind should
be the will of God.
And when that happens, I want you to
know that the same concern will bleed over
into the nations.
You will be concerned about this.
Do the nations know the will of God?
Are the nations subjected to the will of
God, not in slavery or bondage or by
force against their conscience?
But have they heard the gospel?
Have they been changed by the power of
the Holy Spirit in the work of regeneration?
Are they willingly, freely, joyfully concerned with the
will of God missions?
It begins in the heart.
Now, I want us we've kind of just
jumped all over, but I want us to
get for just a minute to the Great
Commission, just point out a few things that
are very important.
Go to Matthew 28.
My problem is whenever I decide I'm going
to preach on a certain text, I end
up making about 20 sermons out of it.
And so when I'm going to preach it
once, I got to just jump all over
the place.
Matthew 28.
Verse 16, but the 11 disciples proceeded to
Galilee to the mountain which Jesus had designated.
I just noticed for a moment, it's 11.
And not well.
One fell away.
Not only did he fall away.
He hung himself in such a fashion that
his bowels exploded.
He spilled himself out.
He died and he went to hell.
But it says these 11 proceeded to Galilee.
They proceeded in obedience, they kept moving forward.
Now we're going to see in just a
moment, we don't have much time.
We're going to see that they went there
timidly.
They went there with worship, but they also
went there with doubt.
These were not a rock solid band of
followers of Jesus Christ at this point.
They are confused.
They are bewildered.
They are making two stands.
It says literally in Greek, undecisive about which
way to go.
But they were proceeding.
It's just too good to pass up.
There are some that begin the Christian life
and end up labeled sons of perdition.
They do not continue on.
They deny the Lord and walk away.
Do you realize, young people, even among your
group, there will be some who do that
statistically?
I'm not a prophet.
Can't see into your heart, but statistically of
all the young people that come out of
this church, some of them will be like
Judas.
Maybe even most.
The problem is in Christian America, you can
get away with having a Judas heart and
still come to church.
And still think you're OK.
The radical.
Dangerous nature of Christianity.
Eleven show up.
One is lost forever.
Eleven proceed on in obedience to Christ.
One is literally stopped dead in his tracks.
Christianity is a very dangerous thing.
Now.
It says when they saw him, they worshiped
him, but some were doubtful.
Now, this word worship here is very important
in the Greek.
I believe it's proskuneo in the Greek.
It refers to worship, the bending of the
knee in the Septuagint, which is the Greek
version of the Hebrew Old Testament.
It's used with regard to reverence toward God
and reverence toward men.
But in the New Testament, it is used
with regard only to God and Jesus Christ.
It is a mark in the New Testament
of deity.
That they worshiped Christ, the same word is
used when the man Cornelius tried to bow
his knee to Peter and Peter said, no,
no, no, don't don't don't you do that?
I'm just a man just like you.
It is also used in the book of
Revelation, I believe, in chapter 19, where John
seeks to proskuneo the angel, he seeks to
bow down and give reverence to the angel
and the angel says, don't you do that?
It is a word in the New Testament
that is to be done only toward God.
And if Jesus is not God, then we
have blasphemy here because these men worshipped and
Jesus allowed it.
Now, it goes on, it says they saw
him, they worshiped, but some were doubtful.
Some the word literally means a dual standing
or two standings, they were standing over here
a bit in belief, they were standing over
here a bit in unbelief, they weren't really
sure what to do, who this was, what's
going on.
You ask yourself, you say, why would the
New Testament writers put that in there?
I mean, if they're trying to prove that
Jesus is the son of God, why would
they put that in there?
Well, I'll tell you why they put it
in there.
They put it in there because it really
happened.
You see, they weren't a bunch of fraudulent
men trying to soup up a story to
make it believable.
They were telling you things the way they
really happened.
But I want you to know this, the
doubt of the disciples actually gives us confidence.
Why?
Because after this and after the day of
Pentecost, they became not knowing that we shouldn't
touch it.
They were standing back.
They did not know how to deal with
this person in front of them.
This is no longer a carpenter with calloused
hands.
This is the resurrected Lord of glory.
How do I approach him, what do I
say to him, how do I act?
Let me tell you something, sometimes when Jesus
Christ comes in his presence into a church,
yes, there is joy and the raising of
the hands and people so excited.
But I want to tell you something, if
his presence never turns into everyone laying on
their face trembling, then I would have some
doubts.
There needs to be in the missionary endeavor
a holy, reverent awe of God and not
just in the missionary endeavor, but in the
church and in the pulpit and everywhere else.
Yes, there is time for rejoicing.
There is time for putting our hand out
and touching the scars in his side, in
his hands and his feet.
But there are other times we need to
withdraw, be quiet and worship.
Now, it says Jesus came up and spoke
to them.
One of the things I wrote down in
my notes, if I've been going through this
passage, is that he's not only an omnipotent
commander, he is a compassionate commander.
He really is, he really is, and we
would expect him to be after all, he
is a compassionate high priest.
So he is a compassionate commander.
He knows that our frame is weak, that
we are made of dust.
He became like us in every way except
without sin.
He knows how to sympathize with our weaknesses.
He saw this trembling, weak group of followers
and he didn't stand back and rail at
them because of their weaknesses and their doubts.
He came to them and he spoke to
them.
Listen, there are men that you can work
for that you will be afraid to carry
out any new endeavor for them because, you
know, if you fail, the hammer's coming down
worse than the hammer, the hatchet.
That is not the case with our Lord.
I have never known a missionary truly called
of God that did not accept that call
with fear and trembling and great doubts about
himself or herself.
I don't hardly know of a missionary who,
when they are traveling over, finally going over
to the country where they're going to serve,
that they're not sitting on the airplane thinking,
when I come back in a year as
a total failure, how am I going to
explain this to everybody?
But you see, that's the beauty of it.
Christ does not use capable men.
Are capable women, he uses the weak, the
willing, those who just continue on.
Who proceed to the place, the next place
he tells them.
I have served the Lord for several years
and I have never known him to be
without compassion.
I have never known him not to be
forgiving, not to be kind.
I, as a missionary and a preacher, have
tested my disobedience and my weakness, have tested
the Lord in almost every way he could
be tested.
But he continues to call, continues to speak
and continues to use me.
This is one calling in which we should
never have fear to accept, but fear to
refuse.
Because he is a compassionate general in this
commission.
Now, Jesus came up and spoke to them
saying, all authority has been given to me
in heaven and on earth.
That was it.
You see, there are certain small statements that
after they're made, nothing else has to be
said, absolutely nothing.
Here are these trembling, frightened followers who possibly
already know something of the commission that is
ahead of them.
Who know they're not capable.
When Jesus was there, when he was right
by their side, they were rather bold.
But when he wasn't there, they couldn't even
cast a demon out of a little boy.
He looks at them and just says this,
all authority has been given unto me.
Every type and kind of authority has been
given to me in heaven and on earth
with unlimited jurisdiction.
There is no place on this planet and
there is no place in the heavenlies where
I am not king.
You know, we don't have time to go
there, but it says in the book of
Daniel chapter seven that that the son of
man comes in the clouds and he is
taken up or presented to the ancient of
days to receive all authority in heaven and
on earth.
And it reminds me of do you remember
back in Genesis with Joseph, he's down there
in the in the prison, he's been thrown
in the prison after Potiphar's wife did all
the lying that she did and his life
seems to be one chaos after another.
And finally, he is thrown into the prison.
And then in just a matter of minutes,
he's brought out of that prison and he
is escorted in to the throne room of
Pharaoh.
And Pharaoh looks down at him and says
to all of Egypt, not one finger, not
one hand or finger will be raised in
all of Egypt without your word.
Now, you think about that.
Christ.
Is in the tomb.
He is brought up as Joseph is brought
out of that dungeon, Christ is raised from
that tomb and it is at that resurrection
that he is publicly declared with power to
be the son of God.
Romans one for it is at that time
in Peter's sermon, we find out that God
made this Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord
and Christ, and he is brought into the
presence of the ancient of days.
And God looks at the entire cosmos and
says this, not one finger will be raised
apart from his word.
That's what it means when he says all
authority has been given to me.
That is why we do not fear the
rulers of these nations.
We pity them.
Because we know who is really king.
We know who's really seated upon the throne.
And we go out with unlimited jurisdiction, there
is no place that we cannot preach.
There is no one on this planet that
has the right to tell me or you
where we can or where we can not
preach.
Because the Lord of glory has said all
authority has been given unto me in heaven
and on earth.
Now go go.
Now, just quickly, he says, go, therefore, and
make disciples of all nations.
Now, there are two extremes here.
Some people who put all the emphasis on
go, go, go, go, go, go, go.
And then other people who are more theologically
astute and perhaps have had a semester of
Greek say, no, that's not the emphasis.
It's make disciples, make disciples, make disciples.
And I have found that both extremes lead
to nothing.
I think the best translation here is having
gone make disciples.
You can't make disciples hidden in a hole.
We're to make disciples here and make disciples
there, say, Brother Paul, how are we to
govern this?
I mean, should we just look for a
place where no one is and send somebody
there?
Well, that's not the problem.
The problem is when the people of God
collectively.
Are so mesmerized by the things of the
world and so concerned with the anxieties of
this age that they're not seeking to discern
the will of God.
If all of us were pressing hard to
understand God's will and to live it out
in our daily lives, God would be burdening
different individuals for different places.
God would be burdening churches, even like this
one, to say we feel led to concern
ourselves with this one area of the world
or that area of the world or this
type of ministry or other type, because they're
seeking God's will.
You see, I don't want you to seek
missions.
I want you to seek God.
I don't want you to bring your missionary
ministry in line, I want you to bring
your lives in line and then everything else
will fall in place.
Do you see that?
Very, very important.
He says, having gone, therefore, make disciples of
all nations.
Of all nations.
Oh, I want you to know, don't think
that what God has done, he has done
in a corner.
God is raising up people in all the
nations, he's doing a great work, I'm not
going to sit here, stand here tonight and
tell you if you don't go, everything's going
to fall apart.
But I will tell you this, if you
don't go, everything in your own life may
fall apart.
You see, God's going to do the work.
He has decreed that he is going to
bring all the nations to his son.
The question is, do you want to participate
in this or do you want to waste
your life?
He said, well, Brother Paul, what if I'm
not called to go?
Well, make sure you're called to stay and
remember this, that missions is simply two ministries.
You either go down into the well or
you hold the rope for those who go
down.
You either go and serve as a missionary
or you support spiritually, financially and every other
way the missionaries who do go.
Now, we just finish up here, go therefore
and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them
in the name of the Father and the
Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to
observe all that I commanded you.
And I find this very, very interesting.
It is not just filling their head with
knowledge, but teaching them to obey what they
know.
It is so easy to teach.
It is another complete thing to disciple, to
teach, to simply teach.
You can just transfer information from your head
to theirs.
Or if you want to be really spiritual,
from your heart to their heart.
But when you disciple, you're not just sharing
information or giving them some emotional experience.
You are teaching them to obey, to live
this thing out.
And the problem there is you can teach.
You can preach what you don't practice.
But you can't disciple what you don't practice.
You can teach people all kinds of things
you don't do.
But you can't take your life and show
them how to obey those things unless you
yourself are obeying those things more and more
and more and more and more and more
and more.
What I want to see the people of
God doing is reading their Bibles, reading their
Bibles, reading their Bibles, memorizing scripture, meditating on
scripture.
It has such a permeating power to it.
And if we stay in the word long
enough, we will not be able to stay
there without being brought into obedience to that
word.
So church, I could say, you know, get
involved in missions, but that's just going to
put a bandaid on the problem.
What you really need to do is spend
your life in this word, hearing from God,
knowing that this temporal life is temporal.
That you're going to die.
That everything you've worked for is going to
rot.
But those who serve the Lord.
Those who serve the Lord, they do not
pass away and what they have accomplished does
not pass away.
And then he says this, Lo, I am
with you always.
The idea there is behold.
He's saying, look at me.
You know, one of the things that dads
and especially moms have to do is you
can't just give a command to some children.
I mean, they're just gone before they even
hear what you've said, you've got to look
at me.
No, no, no, stop.
Look at me, look me right in the
eyes.
That's what Jesus is doing here.
He's saying, look at me, listen to me.
I am with you always.
So.
You are with me always, you who sits
upon the throne of the entire universe, who
is omnipotent and omniscient, you are with me
always, you're not just thinking about me, you
don't just have me on your mind, you're
not just standing from afar and gazing, you
are with me, Emmanuel.
God with us even to the end of
the age now here is very important.
The end of the age is not referring.
Necessarily to the end of the world.
But to the end of this age, we
are living in.
The world doesn't so much come to an
end, it comes to a consummation right now,
we live in the age, I love saying
it this way, we live in the age
of Messiah, we live in the reign of
Christ, he sits upon a throne right now,
right now, he is the ruler of every
governor and prince and king and president right
now, nothing is even thought about apart from
his permission.
But.
There is a consummation when the church militants.
Becomes the church victorious.
Yes.
When that kingdom is consummated.
With the shout.
Of an archangel with the trumpet call of
God.
And before you can even let out an
exclamation.
You're standing there with Christ.
And he and his universal reign is acknowledged
by friend and foe alike, because he who
rules the nations, part of those nations, those
nations who submit to them, he will rule
them as a shepherd with a shepherd staff,
but those that refuse, he will rule them
with a rod of iron.
And every knee shall bow and every tongue
shall confess that Jesus is Lord now on
that day.
Don't you want to know?
That not only, you know, him.
But he knows you.
That he is going to rule you as
a shepherd.
And not as a judge.
Don't you want to know on that day
that by the grace of God, you did
not waste your life.
But you lived it in service to the
most high God, that what he commanded of
you, you set your hand to that plow
and you did not look back.
Let's pray.
Father, I come before you, Lord.
And I ask you that you might.
Use this, Lord, to kindle a fire in
the heart of your people.
Or even use this, Lord, in the salvation
of someone who may not yet belong to
you.
As one of the redeemed.
Father, use this word.
According to your will and for your glory,
in Jesus name, amen.