Burk Parsons: Make Disciples

Jesus in Matthew 28 before his ascension to the Father gave this commission to his disciples beginning in verse 18 of chapter 28 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 baptizing 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'm with you always to the end of the age let us pray together our Lord we thank you for Jesus Christ our Savior and we thank you O Lord for the holy spirit who indwells us who illumines your word and helps us not only in understanding what we have read but how your spirit convicts us how your spirit reads us even as we read your word and how your spirit comforts us and reminds us of who we are in Christ United to him adopted by our Father so now father help us help us not only to know your word and to know your truth but to be sanctified by your word and help us to come away from our time together not only with a greater understanding and greater knowledge but that our greater knowledge and greater understanding of your word and its truth and the theology of your word would transform us from within us the very depths of our being that our hearts would be changed that we would be even more enlivened to praise you and to thank you to repent of our sins and to spread this glorious news about the savior of the world and may it all be we pray for your glory amen now in coming to the Great Commission to this whole matter of making disciples too often we skip over some of the most significant elements and fundamental elements of what is going on in the Great Commission when we hear these words from Jesus go therefore and make disciples of all nations when we hear that language most of us say okay we're familiar with that we know what the Great Commission teaches we know that the Lord has called us to go to all nations but what if I told you that that call and that Commission that Jesus gave to his disciples so long ago is not altogether new that Jesus and his concern for the nations is the concern of our Lord from the very beginning that the very reason we exist the very reason the world exists their very reason that anything exists the very reason that God created was that he might have a people for himself who might praise him you see God created the world God created all things fundamentally for his glory but secondarily he created all things for us that we might exist that God might have a people for himself according to his good pleasure that he would call that would praise Him forever that's where the environmentalists get it backwards they think that we're here for the Earth when in reality the Bible tells us that the earth is here for us and that we are here for God to understand this we need to have a better grasp of what the Bible in fact does teach about the Lord's care for his name being glorified and for his name being lifted up for God to be known among the nation's not just to be known among the Jews but that God's name would be known among the nation's that he would have a people for himself and every tribe tongue and nation in order to do that we need to take a quick look throughout scripture to understand what it is that God teaches us but he shows us throughout scripture about his concern for the nations beginning in Genesis chapter 1 we read of course after he created man and woman he told them to be fruitful and to multiply we're familiar with that I trust and then we read again in Genesis 8 when Noah and his family are about to depart the ark that God reminded them be fruitful and multiply and then twice in Chapter 9 as they're now coming off the ark after the flood had subsided the Lord calls them again be fruitful and multiply multiply throughout the earth disperse yourselves throughout the earth and take dominion over it but then what happened in Genesis 11 people migrated from the east and they came together and they said let us let us come together and let's build a town for ourselves even a tower the reaches to the heavens and as they came together they said let us come together so that we would not be dispersed throughout the earth and so what did God do his concern was not ultimately with a city the concern was not foundationally with a tower reaching to the heavens the concern ultimately was that they were coming together speaking one language that they might not be dispersed throughout the earth but that went directly against God's command to go and dispersed themselves and to multiply to all the earth and so what did God do but he scattered them confuse their language so that they would have to scatter and then what do we read in Genesis chapter 12 the Lord says to Abram go from your country and your kindred in your father's house to the land that I will show you and I will make of you a great nation and I will bless you and make your name great so that you will be a blessing I will bless those who bless you and him who dishonours you I will curse in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed right here in Genesis chapter 12 after the Lord had dispersed all the peoples and Confused their language God called one man from ur of the chaldeans and said go and through that man he would make of him a great nation and through that one man and his descendants he would bless all the families of the earth every tribe tongue and nation all the nations and notice what the Lord says that he will do he would bless him and protect him he would bless and honor and curse those who cursed and then in Genesis 28 again as Jacob had his dream we get so caught up in all the details of the dream when the focal point of the dream is God's reiterated promise to Jacob we read in Genesis 28 verses 14 following your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth and you shall spread abroad the west and the east and to the north and to the south and in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed and then again the promise of blessing and protection behold I am with you and will keep you wherever you go and will bring you back to this land for I will not leave you until I have done what I've promised you throughout Genesis throughout the entire Torah we read of God's promise and concern for the nations even making provisions for the nations and the foreigners among Israel throughout the Psalms we can read numerous Psalms about God's concern for the nations and about how the nations would praise God as the nation's saw God's power and God's work in and among and through his people similar to what we saw in their crossing of the Red Sea in the destruction of Pharaoh and his horses and chariots that God's name would be known throughout the world and wherever Israel went and their trends in conquest into the promised land they heard time and time again we know of your God we have heard about what your God did to your enemies we know of this God that's why so many came to trust him wherever they went because they heard about what God had done to the Kings and the princes the most powerful nations on earth as God was with them as Moses is concerned Lord if you don't go with us and it's hopeless but the Lord went with them and then the Lord tabernacled among them in Genesis 22 a messianic Psalm that begins with sadness and crying out my God my God why have you forsaken me ends with praise it ends and culminates with a focus on what will happen through the restoration of God's man in verse 27 of Psalm 22 all the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord and all the families of the nations shall worship before you and then in Psalm 67 the psalmist declares may God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us because as God blesses his people and protects and sustains his people through his people through his work in them through his light shining in them in his face shining upon them and reflecting upon their faces and in their lives as they live confess and proclaim God's praises God does his work of bringing the nations to himself so that this is the purpose so that your way may be known on the earth your saving power among all nations let the peoples praise you O God let all the peoples praise you let the nation's be glad and sing for joy throughout the prophets we can read of what will happen in the day of the Lord when that day comes and how the nations will flow to the mountain of the law and when the nation's began to flow to the mountain of the Lord the great Mount Zion what do we begin to read about in John's Gospel well we read about John the Baptist declaring that this Jesus from Nazareth is indeed the Son of God and the Lamb of God who takes away not only the sin of Israel but who takes away the sin of the world and then we come across John's record of Jesus cleansing the temple and in John chapter 2 in mark chapter 11 Matthew chapter 21 it seems abundantly clear that while Jesus was concerned about what seemed to be underhanded thieving and exorbitant interest rates and charging on the buying and selling an exchanging of monies and payments for lambs and animals for the sacrifice that ultimately the concern that ultimately the reason why Jesus cleanses the temple was not because they were buying and selling and exchanging money that took place for centuries just on the other side of the valley God even made provisions for such a thing it would have been the Prudential and wise thing to do as families were coming and traveling and buying animals to sacrifice the problem was is that they were doing it in the court of the nations the problem is that the court of the Gentiles was to be a place of Prayer that's why Jesus said this was to be a House of Prayer you've made it a den of thieves they crowded in to the court of the nations the court of the Gentiles that God had reserved for the nation's to be able to come and to pray in to worship Yahweh and they had turned it into a busy noisy place of Commerce and so he cleansed it you ever wonder why Jesus wasn't immediately arrested for doing that and this by the way was likely a very recent thing that had been doing they likely only recently been doing this because of an edict that had been issued that allowed this but likely the reason Jesus wasn't immediately arrested is because many of the Pharisees who actually knew their Bibles knew that Jesus was right it's not for no reason that one of the head Pharisees a ruler among the Jews came to him the next evening or that evening they came by night and he inquired because Nicodemus and most of the Jews they believed that they were saved by virtue of being a Jew they had the Word of God they had the covenants the Oracles they had the promises of God they had their forefathers Abraham Isaac and Jacob they had the prophecies they were the people of God and the Messiah was to come and to save them and they were destroy all the nations all the enemy pagan nations and so Nicodemus came and inquired and Jesus made it clear to him you can't enter the kingdom of God in other words you can't be saved unless you're born again and then Jesus goes on to make it even abundantly clear in that passage saying it's not just you Nicodemus this is for whoever believes for God so loved the world not just Israel and if you knew your Bibles you'd know that God so loved the world you would know God's heart for the nation's you would know God's concern for all the families of the earth for God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes whoever believes whoever believes occurs time and time again throughout chapter three of John's Gospel concludes with that same language whoever believes will be saved whoever believes will not perish but have everlasting life and then we read in Acts chapter one Jesus saying you will be my witnesses not you should try to be my witnesses but you will be my witnesses by virtue of being United to Christ by virtue of being his disciples you will be my witnesses here and throughout the world and then what do we read in Acts chapter 2 the reversal of Babel where now all those men and women who are in Jerusalem at the time from all over the world were gathered together in one place and the Holy Spirit came and tongues of fire came upon them and everyone could hear in his own language the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ for the nations and what do we hear from Peter in chapter 2 in his sermon at Pentecost he says very plainly in verses 17 21 and the last days it shall be God declares that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh and verse 21 it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved and then Peter in chapter 3 speaking there in Solomon's portico Peter says all the prophets who have spoken from same on those who came after him also proclaim these days the coming day of the Lord and Peter is essentially saying you should know the Word of God and you should know the law of God and the prophecies of God and if you know them you will know that what I'm saying is true that the day of the Lord has come and the proof of that is that God has now begun to reach the nations in mass and then Peter says in verse 25 you are the sons of the prophets and of the Covenant of God made with your father's saying to Abraham and notice what portion of God's promise Peter quotes and in your offspring all the families of the earth will be blessed so in Matthew chapter 28 when Jesus says go therefore and make disciples of all nations Matthew a Jew riding largely to Jews recording these words of Jesus recording this Commission of Jesus is recording something that every Jew who knew his theology every Jew who knew the Word of God well every Jew who understood God's concern for the nation's heard this and said of course of course we are being called to go to the nation's of course we are called to go from here and to go and to spread this good news because we know of our Lord and we know his heart for the nation's we know why God created man and woman we know why God created the earth it was that God might have a people for himself see when we come to the Great Commission we have to first of all realized that the Bible actually never calls it great now it is great in the sense that it is a grand Commission it is weighty and heavy it is significant it is monumental and what Jesus is calling us to do but too often when we hear that language of greatness it can be both intimidating and daunting and it can actually lead us to almost complete complacency doing nothing because it seems too grandiose it seems too overwhelming you see the reality of it is is that while this Commission is indeed great it's also very ordinary because as his disciples they were to be about the business of living their lives and going from Judea from Jerusalem to Judea Samaria to the uttermost parts of the earth as they lived their lives as they raised their children as they took care of themselves as they made tents or as they fished or did whatever it is they were called and gifted to do they were to go and to make disciples you see disciple making for most of us is indeed a daunting task and the reason that many of us are not engaged in disciple making is firstly because we either don't have the interest we don't have the time we don't care or simply that we might be lazy because being a disciple maker being a teacher is messy work isn't it it's hard work it's not simple and it often hurts because when we are about the business of teaching and training and making disciples we know that that means real lives come together and God's people have to meet face to face and we have to hear one another's sins and hurts and worries and burdens and not only from one but both ways we have to open up we have to talk about our own burdens and our own sins and our own worries confessing our sins to one another bearing the burdens of one another but that is what our lives are to be about and the work of disciple making is to be a regular ordinary way of our lives now for many people discipleship and we think of that it is it's a program it's a 12-week program or a 16 week program now we need to understand that there's nothing wrong with programs in and of themselves there are many helpful programs many helpful resources that we can use in our homes and in our churches to guide us as we strive in our efforts and disciple-making but friends we need to be more concerned with sitting out principles and certain parameters for disciple-making rather than merely relying on programs see we are by nature disciples we are by nature learners we are by nature those who learn and grow and and want to be informed and want to learn how to grow and want to learn wisdom and humility we by nature are people who want to know and grow God put it in us we're by nature worshippers if you don't believe that we're by nature worshippers every human being worships something well then you can just go and visit any european or british football game you can go up to a man you Liverpool game and you can see how everyone worships we are by nature worshippers we are by nature learners and we are also by nature teachers we are by nature disciple makers from the very moment we begin to talk we begin to tell those around us things that we know things that we have learned and things that we want them to know even though they might already know it and as we grow we want people to hear from us because we've learned something we'd experienced something we've we've we've understood something we've come to grasp something we've come to understand a new a new biblical truth or a new point of difficulty ology that we can't wait to share with those that we love because it makes us so filled with passion it excites us it it lives us we want people to know what we have learned there's no greater picture of that and in the relationship between a mother and her children mothers are by nature trainers and nurturers fathers to training and nurturing and teaching we are by nature disciples and Jesus says go and make disciples of all nations but make disciples of what may seem like a silly question and perhaps even an obvious question but it's an important question make disciples of water make disciples a home too often throughout our history both in England Europe and perhaps most predominantly in the United States of America we have too often been concerned with making disciples of America we have too often been concerned with making the world like England or making the world like the UK or making the world like Germany or making the world look like whatever country you're from I met people from Romania I saw an old friend from 20 years ago for the first time in 20 years from Belarus too often our concern has to go has been to go and make disciples of people who look like us and talk like us and dress like us and act like us and do everything just like we do because it's only when they have reached that plane then they've really made it when we are called to make disciples not of ourselves but to be constantly about the business of pointing those that we are teaching in those that we are training to Jesus Christ that we are called to make disciples of all nations making them disciples of Jesus Christ that means working constantly to get ourselves out of the way and pointing those who are under our care not only those in our churches not only our friends and our families our children teaching even our children that ultimately though we want them to imitate us as Calvin would add even only insofar as they imitate Christ that ultimately we want our children to imitate him that we want our friends and we want those that we're working with those that we're teaching in any capacity to imitate Jesus Christ now it's important to point out that in the Great Commission we don't come across the word evangelize Dewey we don't come across the word evangelism and the Great Commission many people when you ask them what is the Great Commission about they'll say well it's about evangelism well while evangelism is certainly contained within it subsumed within the whole charge of making disciples we have to understand that evangelism is only one part of disciple making only one part of fulfilling the Great Commission too often that has been the sole focus of too many preachers and too many ministries throughout history both in America and the UK and elsewhere that evangelists would come in and blow in and blow up and blow out or come and hand a gospel tract or even a Bible that is not making disciples and if we are only going and evangelizing if we are only going and handing out a resource only going and giving a Bible we are sometimes doing more harm than good because ultimately we need teachers Christ ordained and called us to go and to make disciples one-on-one face-to-face and that means that we need to go and evangelize and proclaim the gospel and wherever we proclaim the gospel and people respond to the gospel it's there but the Spirit plants a church and the Great Commission the fulfillment of what Christ has called us to do in making disciples can only happen in and through the local church it can and must only happen where God calls one and then another and brings them to get and they gathered together in corporate worship not through logging in online but actually seeing one another gathering together singing together in affirming together and confessing together and as we come from the highways and the byways and from our towns and villages the world sees us going sees us taking our gathered worship seriously and they see us as a bunch of odd and strange bizarre people who even go and do this and regularly weekly and then we come together and we sing together where else in the whole world do you see people of different colors and ages and economic and social backgrounds coming together and singing songs of victory only in the church you see by virtue of us coming together we are showing the world that we are his disciples and as we come together and as we gather together it's there where these ordinary means of God's grace are set before us the word and prayer and the sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper and so when Jesus says baptizing them in the name of the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit this baptism ordinarily takes place within the local church so that all can see and bear witness to what God is doing and how God is blessing all the families of the earth but then Jesus says teaching them it's unfortunate that many times when I hear the Great Commission quoted here's what I hear go therefore and make disciples of all nations baptizing them to the name of the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit teaching them all that I have commanded that sounds good doesn't it the problem is we've left out one very important phrase Jesus didn't just say go and teach them nor did Jesus say go and just preach the gospel nor did Jesus say go and just teach them theology you see we need to be about the business always as Martyn lloyd-jones said something to the effect of we need to be about the business of teaching theology and we need also to be about the constant business of teaching people that theology is not enough that we teach the gospel and we proclaim the gospel and we teach the Bible in the theology of the Bible to the end that we would be about the business of teaching all those disciples whom God has called forth all those disciples whom God by his Spirit has made to be born again whom he has regenerated and taken from death to life and made his own that we might teach them to observe all that Christ has commanded and that little phrase teach them to observe or teach them to keep the word that Jesus uses there is fascinating and this is why there's the variation in translations from the old King James Version to some of the newer versions we hear translations like teach them to obey teach them to keep teach them to observe well the same word is used elsewhere throughout the New Testament and translated guard teach them to guard and that is an element and the nuance of the word that Jesus uses here that we have almost forgotten and when we look at the churches that are beginning to dwindle in our United States and as we begin to see the United States following the suit as it almost always does of England and the UK people not taking worship seriously people not taking the Lord's Day seriously people not taking gathered worship seriously people not taking the sacraments seriously people not taking church membership seriously people not taking their church membership vows seriously people not really taking the training up and nurturing of their children in the Lord very seriously just trusting that to some Sunday School teachers or a VBS here and there because we have failed to teach our children to guard all that Christ has commanded do you know the reason we have creeds and confessions the reason our forefathers throughout church history have sought to put into summary fashion against the heresies against the false teachings to summarize in a careful and concise way for the church what we believe it's so that for generations we might earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the Saints the reason our faithful forefathers met on these grounds the reason they formulated confessions and creeds is so that we might better guard that we might better train that we might better set the parameters of our faith and to say this is what we believe this is where we will stand this is where we will draw the line this is where we will not compromise this is where we will stand this is what we believe these are the truths that we confess these are the truths that we will die for these are the truths that we will teach our children to guard and to know and to observe and to keep because Jesus didn't just teach us to go and evangelize and he didn't just go teach us tell us to go and teach he told us to go and to train to train older women training younger women men finding faithful men and entrusting to them and trusting to them with a stewardship to guard that stewardship and to be a faithful steward of the things of God Jesus promised at the end of this commission that as we do this and as we go as we make disciples he promises just as he did to Abraham just as he did to Jacob the promise to bless them and protect them and behold Jesus says I am with you always to the end of the age and so dearly beloved as we strive to be faithful to this calling the only way we can preserve persevere to the end is if we are resting in and relying wholly upon the power of the Holy Spirit to do the work that God and His sovereignty promised that he would do and we are called to be faithful we are called to be faithful to take the gospel to take the Word of God to take the rich heritage of the theology of the word of God that our forefathers have sought to guard with their lives and to go into the all the nations and shine as we reflect the light of Christ as we go and as we contend as we go and as we guard as we go and as we draw lines in the sand as we go and make certain that we will not compromise the gospel of Jesus Christ or the Word of God always striving to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace because that's how we show that we are his disciples by our love for one another not in spite of the truth but because of the truth not compromising what we believe but affirming and striving to teach so that we all might affirm that one faith and while the world wants Christians to affirm every religion and every belief system but our own and while the world wants us to shut our mouths because they don't want to hear that Jesus is the only way to God they don't want to hear us talk about their sin they don't want to hear words of repentance they don't want to hear about the wrath of God they don't want to hear about the condemnation of God that's coming you see the world calls that hate speech but the reality of it is is that's love speech because one of the most loving things Jesus ever did and preaching the gospel was tell people about their sin and about the coming eternal judgement of God and so dearly beloved as we go and as we reflect the light of Christ as we preach the gospel as we contend for the faith once delivered to the Saints as we strive to be a people loving each other that the world might know that we are his disciples as our greatest apologetic to the watching world the world will hate us the world will want to kill us the world will want us to seem irrelevant when the reality of it is we are going to a world and to the nation's that are all around us because God has a people for himself from every tribe tongue and nation let us pray our Lord God Almighty we give you thanks that you are God and that you have created us as a people for yourself Oh Lord may we proclaim your praise and may we give you thanks this day as we rest and the finished work of Jesus Christ who is the author and finisher of our faith Brits and his name we pray amen you

Channel: Ligonier Ministries

Views: 3,073

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: ligonier ministries, ligonier conference, london conference, 2019 london conference, Philippians 2:15, reformed theology, reformation theology, christian, protestant, burk parsons, the great commission sermon, matthew 28 16-20, how to make disciples, the mission of the church, teaching them to obey, make disciples, go therefore and make disciples of all nations, make disciples of all nations, discipleship, what is the great commission, great commission, disciples, bible, jesus

Id: r0yl2oKjfCQ

Length: 41min 33sec (2493 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 04 2019