Day 1 - Week 84 - Continuing on with our Directions!!

We are now starting WEEK 84 --- before you know it, our journey will be finished.  But I hope we will continue putting God's Word into our hearts on a regular basis.  As I've said before, I know that I will be going back and reinforcing so many of these verses, firming them up in my memory, as I know so many of them have slipped through the cracks of my aging brain!  At first that really bothered me, that not all of them were staying put, but I became content with knowing that I'm adding Biblical thoughts and principles to my head through this process, and if I need to go back and review and reinforce later on, that's just fine.  Feeding my brain with the Words of God has been just what I have needed, and I plan to stay on this diet the rest of my life!

Let's do a quick review of our recent weeks:

Faith: Trusting God and Resting in His Word (12)
Ephesians 2:8 "For by grace you are saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God's gift."
Ephesians 2:9 "Not by works, so that no one can boast."
Ephesians 2:10 "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."
Galatians 2:20 "I have been crucified with Christ; and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me."
Colossians 3:15 "Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful."
Colossians 3:16 "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns
and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God."
Colossians 3:17 "And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him."
Romans 1:16 "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is God's power for salvation to everyone who believe, to the Jew first and also to the Greek."
Romans 1:17 "For in it God's righteousness is revealed from faith to faith, just as it is written: The righteous will live by faith."
Psalm 56:3 "When I am afraid, I will trust in You."
2 Chronicles 16:9 "The eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to Him."
Hebrews 11:6 "And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him."

The Great Commission (4)
Matthew 28:18 "Then Jesus came near and said to them, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth."
Matthew 28:19 "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."


This week we'll add the third of our four verses regarding the Great Commission...the directions Christ gave us, as His disciples, before He left this earth.

So far we have Matthew 28:18, the affirmation of Jesus' authority to commission His followers.

Matthew 28:19,  Our "marching orders"...go and make disciples...everywhere.
Now adding on Matthew 28:20, "Teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you.  And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.". 

On the previous post, I included a quote from David Livingstone, the Scottish missionary-explorer to Africa.  Robert J. Morgan includes this entry from Livingstone's journal dated on January 14, 1856 (almost exactly 100 years before my birth on January 13, 1956!) which shows his dependency on the words of Matthew 28:20...

I felt some turmoil of spirit in the evening a the prospect of having all my efforts for the welfare of this great region and in teeming population knocked on the head by savages tomorrow...But I read that Jesus said, "All power is given unto Me in heaven and on earth; go ye, therefore, and teach all nations...and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world."  I took this as His word of honor and then went out to take observations for latitude and longitude, which I think were very successful.
 

Morgan adds, "The promise of God's presence is a potent reality for every Christian worker.  It was originally given to the eleven disciples on a hillside in Galilee; and it is so deeply impressed on one of them---Matthew---that he chose to end His Gospel with these words rather than by recording our Lord's ascension into heaven or the promise of His return.  What a joy to practice constantly the presence of the Lord!"

I am with you always...what a promise!  What a comfort!  What a God!  He is with us...what have we to fear?






 

Day 3 - Week 83 - Matthew 28:19 "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."

"If  a commission by an earthly king is considered an honor, how can a commission by a Heavenly King be considered a sacrifice?"  David Livingstone

"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."  Jim Elliott

"There are three indispensable requirements for a missionary: 1. Patience 2. Patience 3. Patience."  Hudson Taylor

"The greatest form of praise is the sound of consecrated feet seeking out the lost and helpless." Billy Graham

"There are four things that we ought to do with the Word of God - admit it as the Word of God, commit it to our hearts and minds, submit to it, and transmit it to the world."  William Wilberforce

The above are quotes by disciples of Christ who took the Great Commission very seriously.

David Livingstone was an Scotchman who forsook his comfortable home in Glasgow in order to take the Gospel to Africa as a medical missionary in the mid-1800s.  He once said, "I place no value on anything I have or possess except in relation to the kingdom of Christ."   He spent from 1840-1873 devoted to bringing the joy of Jesus to the interior of Africa.  Many of the time he spent away from his wife and five children.  He died an English hero, buried in Westminster Abbey.  Did he consider his commission to service to God a sacrifice?  Not at all, even though he sacrificed much of what we would consider the "good life."

Jim Elliot was a young man who graduated from Wheaton College in 1949.  While at Wheaton, Jim felt such a compulsion to share the Gospel with those who had not come to know Jesus that he would take the train into Chicago and spend the afternoon at the train station, ready to share with anyone that he could the good news of salvation.  Eventually, Jim felt called to travel to Ecuador to take God's Word to the Quichua Indians and specifically the Waodani tribe that lived in the deep jungle interiors.  Jim and the other missionaries of Mission Aviation Fellowship spent months preparing and learning as much of the Waodani language as they could from a young Waodani woman who came to them for help.  The Waodani's were an extremely violent and vicious people who had been cut off from society for centuries.  But Jim and his team were "commissioned" to take the Word to them, and they took their commission deadly serious, as they were massacred by the tribe upon their second arrival.  But the seeds planted on their first meeting, as well as with the Waodani woman whom had converted to Christianity through her relationship with the team, brought salvation to this tribe who now serves as light in the dark Ecuadoran jungle. Steve Saint, son of Nate Saint who was the pilot for Mission Aviation Fellowship continues to work with the Waodani's.  He calls Mincaye, one of the tribesman who killed his father, one of his closest friends.  "I came to speak God's carvings," Mincaye says, as Steve translates from Wao tededö into English. "Carvings" is the term the Waodani use for the Bible. "God tells us to teach the other people."  Disciples making disciples.

Billy Graham is a household name in the United States and in many other parts of the world.  He has been the primary proclaimer of God's Word in the 20th Century.  His evangelical crusades have brought the word to millions of people.  He has said, "My one purpose in life is to help people find a personal relationship with God, which, I believe comes through knowing Christ."  From the late 1940s up until today, he continues to stand for the Gospel.  He has spent the majority of his life away from his family in order to ensure that others have the opportunity to know that they are loved, forgiven and saved through the blood of Jesus.  He knew his commission, and he fulfilled it.

These three, Hudson Taylor and William Wilberforce quoted above, along with many, many more dedicated evangelists have responded to the Great Commission with absolute dedication and resolve. 

Have we all been called to commissions of this magnitude?  Probably not.  But we have all been called.  Are we taking our commission seriously?  Do we realize that eternal futures are at sake?  Or are we too self-minded to care enough for others to ensure that they have the knowledge necessary for them to understand the love, joy, and peace that is available to them? 

I pray to love others more, and to be ready to share, at any opportunity, the reason for the hope that I have within me.