The church fundamentally is not a place that we go to, right?
Sometimes that's how we use the term church,
that we say, hey, I'm going to the church,
or I'm going to, Harper was playing outside a while ago,
and she was doing these funny poses where she was pointing,
and she was pointing toward the building.
I was like, what are you pointing at?
And she's like, I'm pointing at the church.
She means the building, right?
So I know we use the term that way sometimes.
That's not a problem.
I'm just saying that fundamentally, the church is not a place that you go to.
It's not a building, right?
Neither is church something that you do.
That's the other way that we use the term often,
that I have church on Sunday, or I'm going to go to church on Sunday,
and we think of it more as a verb in that sense.
And again, that's not a wrong thing to say or think.
It's just fundamentally, that's not what the church is.
The church isn't a place that you go.
It's not a thing that you do.
The church first is a people to whom you belong.
It's people.
It's not just random people.
It's just not an assorted gathering of people that changes from week to week.
It is a specific people, a particular people,
and it is a group to which we all belong.
And I think that's important for us to understand.
Everything that we cover, the way that we're going to think about church,
the way we're going to think about what God desires for our church,
it has to start there.
We've got to understand what it is first.
Well, what really is this?
Is this an organization?
Or is it something different than that?
Would this be on par with a club or some type of subscription
that maybe we would have in other ways?
You know what I mean?
Like we would say, okay, the church is kind of like what I do at the country club.
Or maybe it's like the thing that I subscribe to, like a streaming service.
I pay my fee.
I visit at my convenience.
I follow the rules the best that they have, the terms and conditions.
But it's really not anything much more than that.
And, of course, that's not what the church is.
That's a very consumeristic way of viewing the church.
That's not what it is.
We look around this room.
We look at one another, and we see the church.
We see Lakeside Bible Church as we see one another.
And it's with that understanding that the rest of this really begins to flow,
and we can begin to understand what God wants for us.
And so understand that we use that term.
I'm not saying that it's wrong to use the term church for other things.
My point is that we often miss the foundational truth of what the church actually is.
It's a particular people saved by Jesus Christ to declare his gospel and display his glory.
That's who we are, right?
Together, corporately, corporately, that's who we are.
We are an embassy is a good illustration of that.
We've got the kingdom of God.
We're a little embassy of that kingdom situated right here in Cornelius.
But we're still a part of the same group.
We're defined in the same ways.
We're just a local representation of what the church actually is.
So no matter where you go in the New Testament,
no matter where you find it mentioned,
it's always a reference to a group of people.
And it's always a reference in the sense that this is a group of people
that you either belong to or you don't belong to.
Not just because you choose to belong or not belong,
but there are certain criteria that makes you a member, a partner,
of what brings you in to the church universally or locally or whatever it is.
And so we start to understand that.
Okay, what is the church?
The church is a particular people saved by Jesus.
Then we have to start to understand then,
okay, what are some important questions we need to start asking them?
If this is what the church is,
if there's really a group of people to which I belong,
okay, well, what exactly brings us together as a people?
What makes us this particular people?
There's only one answer for that.
It's the gospel, right?
It's Christ.
That's what binds us.
We talk about this a lot in our member meetings.
There's, for most of us, without our church here,
there is probably no way that we would have,
our paths would have ever crossed before, right?
We all have varied interests.
We all work different jobs.
None of us are really in the same field.
We're not really around each other.
We might would pass each other out and about around town
and not even realize who each other are.
There's not a lot of rhyme and reason
as to why we would be together and to be friends, right?
What is it that actually brings us together?
The gospel.
The gospel has united us.
And it's once we have seen that the gospel has united us
that we find we actually have some other things that are in common too,
but essentially what makes us a people is the gospel of Jesus.
Well, what are the things that identify us as the church?
If that's what the church is and the gospel is what unites us,
what actually identifies us as that?
Our worship does that, right?
Our worship.
I thought about it this afternoon.
I pulled in to the driveway real quick to go and change clothes
before coming back over here.
And I noticed as every Sunday,
my neighbor's car is parked right in the driveway where she always has it.
She doesn't go to church.
She's there every Sunday.
Worship is not a part of her life.
And when I see that,
I think,
okay,
my neighbor doesn't worship the Lord on Sunday.
She must not be a Christian.
Because what identifies us?
What is an identifying marker of who we are in Christ?
Our worship, right?
It doesn't make sense for someone who says that they're a Christian
who isn't committed to the regular worship of our Lord and Savior.
It just doesn't make sense.
I'm not saying it's impossible.
I'm just saying.
It's not likely.
It's an identifying marker.
It's not just our worship.
It's the ordinances, right?
The ordinances.
Baptism is what identifies us as a professing Christian.
It brings us into membership in the church, right?
In a local sense.
Communion is that regular rehearsing and identification with Christ and the gospel.
And as the church, those things are identifying markers, right?
The New Testament tells us that.
And so what unites us?
It's the gospel.
What identifies us?
Worship and ordinances.
What about this?
What is our purpose in a corporate sense?
Like why?
Why does the church exist?
Why is this even necessary?
Well, because we have a mission, right?
And that mission is really, it flows from what we're talking about tonight.
Making disciples.
Which is not just evangelism.
It's more than evangelism.
It is helping one another to grow as we follow Christ together.
That's the purpose that we have.
That's God's purpose for the church in the world.
What kind of relational responsibility do we have to one another?
That's an important question.
We get into all of those one another commands in the scripture then, right?
Just in the New Testament.
What is it?
50 or 60 of them that are unique one another commands.
That God commands us is to identify or be present in our relationships to one another.
Loving one another.
Encouraging one another.
Teaching one another.
Admonishing one another.
Guarding one another.
Disciplining one another.
We have a lot of responsibility, don't we?
It's not just this thing that we go to on Sundays.
That's not what it is.
It's so much bigger than that.
It's a people to whom we belong that we have been united with by the gospel.
That we are identified with through the regular practice of worship and the administration of the ordinances.
That we are on mission with as we take this same gospel to the world.
Help one another follow Christ.
And then as we interact with one another in regular life.
That's what the church is.
That's important.
And unless we view the church as a group of people to whom we belong.
We're always going to fall short.
We're always going to fall short of all of those things that we just said.
We might be believers.
But we'll still fall short of what God has instructed us to be.
And how we're to identify as his people.
So when we take these particular questions to the Bible.
We start to quickly learn what the essentials of a healthy, biblical, God glorifying church actually are.
And at this season in our life together as a church.
I think that the best thing for us to consider right now.
Is what it means to be a discipling church.
What it means to be a discipling church.
And I want to tell you why I came to this conclusion.
Why we're dealing with this particular essential.
In the summer we dealt with, and just in a single Sunday.
The essential of communion.
The reason we dealt with it then is because we needed to.
Because Jared needed to.
Was really the biggest part of it.
Jared needed to get his head right.
About communion.
And why we do it.
And what that means.
This starts there too.
Jared needs to get his head right about this.
It started a few months ago.
Many of you I had these conversations with.
Trying to think through.
Okay.
You know.
Most of what we do as a church right now is limited to Sunday morning.
Sometimes we do other things.
We have some fellowships.
We do some other outreach events from time to time.
Most of what we do really is Sunday morning.
And we need to be doing more.
If you don't feel like we're doing what the Lord desires for us to do in every possible way.
So just start having conversations with some of you about discipleship.
And maybe groups.
Or this program.
Or that program.
Or what can we do to be meeting together more regularly.
And those kinds of things.
Good questions.
But then I realized very quickly.
That what it was becoming for me.
Was just a way to feel better about the way I was administrating our church calendar.
That's really what it boiled down to more than anything else.
Because I didn't care.
I want everybody to grow.
That's my heart honestly.
I want everybody to grow in the word.
But there was a side to me that was trying to figure out.
Just a program that we could institute.
Or a way that we could put more things on the calendar.
So I would feel like I'm actually doing what I'm supposed to do.
And leading in the way that I'm supposed to lead.
And then I realized quickly.
I think through by God's grace.
That we needed to slow down.
And actually think for a second.
Before we start instituting programs of discipleship and discipling in our church.
We need to actually start to think a little bit about what it even means.
What does it even mean to be a disciple?
What does it mean to disciple others?
And is it really just about a program?
Or is there something more to this?
And so I took some time to try to think through those things.
And what we're going to go through in these next few weeks.
Is the overflow of some of my thoughts on that.
Okay?
Discipleship is a buzzword in the evangelical world.
Isn't it?
It should be.
We need to talk about it.
We need to talk about it a lot.
But not everyone means the same thing when they talk about it.
For instance, as I've alluded to already.
Some people when they talk about discipleship.
What they really have in mind is a program that functions within the church's ministry.
Right?
It's almost a kind of an arm like a children's ministry would be.
Or a music ministry would be.
Or another outreach ministry would be.
It's kind of a subset of the church.
And it's something that people in the church, individuals can register to attend.
Or they can volunteer to teach.
It's more of a program.
It's a class.
It has different looks and styles.
But consistently across the board with that kind of mindset.
Discipling is for a specific amount of time.
And it involves a specific group of people within the church.
Right?
It's not so much about the church as a whole.
It's not so much about what is woven into the DNA of the church.
It's just another program.
Right?
I'm not saying discipleship programs are bad.
They're good.
We need them.
Hopefully we're going to have them here.
And that's not what I mean.
I just mean some people when they think of discipleship.
That's all they think about.
This thing over here that you can take the class if you want to take the class.
You can graduate, get the certificate.
Or you can be involved or to volunteer to teach it or whatever it is.
Some people that's really what they have in mind.
For others, discipleship is more about training an individual to be a good follower of a particular church tradition.
Does that make sense to what I mean by that?
It's less about, like I remember going through a class.
This may have been when I was in college.
It's a church.
And the form of discipleship.
It was a discipleship class that we went through at this church.
And it went through an acrostic for Baptist.
And each letter meant a different thing.
You know what I'm talking about, Kyle?
You probably went through some of these.
And it's not that those things aren't important.
They are important.
Of course, baptism.
It went through it.
Each one represented a different thing.
Individual, soul, liberty.
All that stuff is in there.
The perseverance of the saints.
All that kind of thing.
Ordinances.
And it's not that those things aren't important.
But what that church was doing was not really discipling me to follow Christ as much as they were discipling me to be a good follower of their tradition.
Now, I believe their tradition.
I'm happy about that.
But that's not really what discipleship is, right?
We're not exactly looking to train each other to be good followers of one tradition or another.
We want to help others follow Christ, right?
We want to help others follow Christ first, not just our church.
So let's start with a couple of simple definitions.
These aren't original to me.
I think I've found these in a Nine Marks catalog or something like that a while back.
They're not original to me.
They're very simple.
But let's, if you're taking notes, you might would be helped to write this down.
Here's what we mean by discipleship, okay?
Here's what we mean by discipleship.
It just means to follow Jesus, right?
It just means to follow Jesus, to be a disciple, right?
That's all we mean by that.
Discipleship is what Jesus said in Mark 8.
When a person comes to a point where they deny themselves and take up their cross and follow him,
it's the point of conversion.
You become a follower of Christ.
That is discipleship.
And it characterizes the rest of your life.
You spend the rest of your life as a disciple of Jesus Christ.
That's what we mean when we say discipleship.
We're talking about our personal efforts at following Christ and being a disciple of his.
Now, there's a second definition, which is discipling.
Discipling, which is really just a subset of discipleship, but it's the actionable part.
Discipleship is more like a noun.
This is who I am.
I'm a disciple of Christ.
Discipling is to help other people follow Christ.
To help other people follow Christ, okay?
What we're talking about in these next three Sundays or next three gatherings that we're together for this particular purpose
is we want to look at what it means to be a discipling church.
The very fact that we are a church shows that we are disciples.
We are followers of Christ.
But what does it actually mean for us to be a discipling church?
That we're going to help other people, others follow Christ.
So we see the story of the New Testament or the church in the New Testament
is a story of discipleship and discipling.
Being a follower of Jesus is what brings you into the church,
makes you a part of the church.
Helping other people follow Jesus is what a disciple does because he or she is a part of the church.
So some people would even frame this, and I like this thought,
they would frame this and describe it as mutual soul care.
Perhaps you've heard that term before, mutual soul care.
Discipling is certainly that.
It's not less than that.
But there is more to it than that.
Discipling isn't only about what we do with one another within the church.
There's an also external dimension to this.
Discipling also involves what we do with those outside of the church.
We are making disciples, helping people to follow Christ,
and that even begins with unbelievers.
And so the gospel is so fantastic,
the command to do this, so explicit,
that discipling is the natural and inevitable result of being a faithful Christian.
Let me say that again.
The gospel is so fantastic,
and the command to make disciples is so explicit
that it is the natural and inevitable result of just being a faithful Christian.
If you're a faithful Christian, you will inevitably find yourself helping other people be faithful Christians,
whether that's with a primary focus on evangelism,
or discipleship within the church, or within your home, whatever it is.
A faithful Christian will make disciples.
It's just natural.
Mark Dever says this.
I find this challenging.
He says,
If you're not helping others follow Jesus,
then I don't know what you mean when you say that you are following Jesus.
If you don't help others follow Jesus,
then I don't know what you mean when you say that you are following Jesus.
What does he mean by that?
You know what I just said?
Discipling is the natural and inevitable result of being a faithful Christian.
That to be a follower of Jesus is to trust him,
to learn from him,
to imitate him.
And Jesus himself is the supreme example of what it means to disciple others.
That's what he did.
We've been studying it for so long now in Mark's gospel
about how Jesus was focused on discipling others to follow him.
So an essential quality of a healthy biblical church
is that it is a discipling church.
And I want you to know that the ultimate goal of these three lessons
is not that they would produce a particular program in our church,
though I think that's going to happen and I hope that does happen.
But that's not the goal.
The goal is that we will begin to learn how to have a church culture
that is shaped by discipling.
That discipling one another and discipling others outside of the church
is so integral to the DNA of who Lakeside Bible Church is
and what Lakeside Bible Church does
that we can't think of our church without thinking about this process of discipling,
of having a mindset of following Christ and helping others to do the same.
So in the next two lessons, next week,
we're going to talk about the ministry of discipling.
We're going to go to Ephesians 4, Lord willing,
and we're going to look at the responsibility of every believer,
every Christian to be a faithful minister of the gospel
in evangelism, but especially to one another.
It's not just a pastoral responsibility.
It's all of our responsibility.
We're going to look at that more specifically next week.
In the last week, the 28th, we're going to look at methods.
We're going to get really practical.
How can we actually do this in our homes, in our neighborhoods,
in our church, so on and so forth.
But before we can get to those things,
we have to start here at the very basics,
which is the mandate for discipling.
The mandate for discipling.
So you're in Matthew 28.
Let's read it together.
Matthew 28, verse 16.
Now the 11 disciples went to Galilee,
to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them.
And when they saw him, they worshiped him,
but some doubted.
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 things that I have commanded you.
And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.
Well, it makes sense for us to begin here, right?
The Great Commission, as we know this passage to be,
perfectly summarizes what a discipling church does.
But its significance really lies first
in the fact that making disciples
is the explicit command of Jesus.
He said it plainly.
Because of my authority,
go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations.
There's no other way to read that.
It's the explicit command of the Lord.
And here in this passage,
Jesus is removing all possibility of indifference to discipling.
He places every disciple of his
in a position of either obedience or disobedience,
which is why it's so important
that we think about a culture of discipling
being the goal of this series,
being the goal of our church,
over and above merely a program.
Every Christian must be engaged
in helping others follow Jesus.
Or they're living in disobedience to Jesus Christ.
He plainly said it.
Make disciples of all nations.
And we can look at many other places in the New Testament.
We're not going to do that.
But we look at many other places
where this is an explicit command.
Some people have tried to diminish
the significance of this passage,
saying that since this was given just to the 11,
that it only applies to them,
that it was a command for the apostles.
It's maybe just an encouragement for the rest of us.
But that argument just doesn't make sense.
It's unsound.
Certainly, Jesus' command to teach disciples
everything that he commanded
includes the Great Commission itself, right?
Certainly, his desire was that these apostles
wouldn't only share the gospel,
but they would train those people
to share the gospel as well
and continue to perpetuate discipleship
and discipling as people came to Christ.
The very nature of discipling
is that it continually replicates itself.
That's what it does.
That's what Jesus means.
This wasn't just for the apostles.
This is for all of us.
All of us need to take this seriously.
They had a specific role to play in the church,
no doubt about that.
But they were really just the setting into motion
at the start of the church
what all of us are to be faithful to do.
And there's one more note I want to make
before we jump into four quick points.
And it's this.
I want you to notice the indicative
that precedes the imperative.
You know what I mean?
There's a statement of fact
that precedes the command.
Look at verse 18.
That's where the indicative is.
What does Jesus say first?
All authority in heaven and on earth
has been given to me.
And it's because of that indicative
that Jesus then immediately says,
therefore, go and make disciples.
So before he ever commands them,
he reminds them of his supreme authority.
So then our obedience to the great commission,
it's not just about growing our church.
That's a good thing.
That's a good goal.
We want growth in our church, right?
We want to see people following Christ.
But it's not first about that.
It's first about looking at the authority
that Jesus Christ has in our lives
and saying, I'm going to obey the master.
You know, obey the Lord.
All authority on heaven and earth belongs to him.
Because of that, he says, go.
And our response as faithful disciples is to obey,
to obey what he's commanded.
But then surely there's a connection here
between Jesus's statement
that all authority on heaven and earth belongs to him.
And therefore we are to go to all nations.
Surely Jesus meant for there to be a link
in those two statements.
That's an encouragement to us.
We can confidently take the gospel around the world
with the expectation
that Jesus will produce more disciples through us.
So the indicative not only produces the imperative,
it motivates it.
It motivates it.
Not only do we go because we want to obey Jesus,
we go because Jesus has promised his authority
over all people.
Therefore, as we go,
he will produce disciples through us among all people.
That's fantastic.
That's amazing.
We get so worried.
Sometimes we don't do this
because we're maybe fearful.
I know that's one of my reasons
that I'm less faithful to do this than I should be.
Maybe we get fearful
or maybe we just get discouraged
because we don't see the fruitfulness
the way that we wish that we saw the fruitfulness.
But Jesus says,
go and I'll provide this.
All authority belongs to me.
I will save them.
I will call them.
So let's look at four quick things here.
First, discipling is intentional.
Discipling is intentional.
Look at the first phrase in verse 19.
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations.
The first thing I want you to consider here
is that no one ever makes disciples on accident.
No one makes disciples on accident.
This doesn't happen.
It takes initiative, intentionality to make disciples,
which I think is why Jesus at the very beginning
emphasizes this,
go, action, go, be intentional,
initiate this in your life.
So the great commission then combats
a missional laziness and lethargy
that exists in so many Christians.
So there's one sense in which the go here
is essentially Jesus's way of saying,
hey, get off the couch,
get out in the world,
make some friends,
share the gospel,
help another believer follow Christ.
And consider the perspective of the disciples here.
This is post-resurrection.
This is not yet the ascension of Christ.
They're in Galilee, not the Mount of Olives.
Remember, Jesus had told the apostles,
after I raised,
go to Galilee and wait for me there.
And that's what they did.
And while they were there,
they were so overwhelmed and excited
by all that had happened in Jesus's atonement
and in his resurrection
that they just couldn't help
but tell everybody about it.
No, that's not what they did.
They went back discouraged is what they did.
In fact, many of them were like Peter
that were so discouraged by their own failure
that they had all but given up
on what the Lord had actually called them to do.
Remember Peter at the end of John's gospel?
He grabs a couple of the other fellows
and he just says, let's go fishing.
And it's not that he's abandoning Christ.
It's not that he doesn't want to follow Christ.
He's discouraged because he failed miserably
in denying Christ right before his crucifixion.
And he's down about that.
He has reached a missional lethargy.
Laziness perhaps would fit this
to where he wasn't doing what God
had actually called him to do.
Why?
He wasn't going.
So what does Jesus do?
He comes and he says, go, go and tell,
go and tell all that you have seen and heard.
And I think many of us can identify with that.
Our lack of intentionality in discipling others
can often be boiled down to spiritual lethargy.
And what we need to do is listen to Jesus's call to go.
I love that old hymn we sing,
that old missional hymn.
I can't remember.
Facing a task.
I'm finished.
I think it's the last verse.
O Father who sustained them,
O Spirit who inspired,
Savior whose love constrained them
to toil with zeal untired.
And then it says,
From cowardice defend us.
From lethargy awake.
Forth on thine errands send us
to labor for thy sake.
That's an important verse of that hymn.
We need to be awakened to that.
That's part of what Jesus has in mind there
with the go.
It's intentionality.
It's initiative.
But there's a second consideration here
that isn't the same as lethargy or laziness.
For some of us,
the problem is missional indifference.
It's not so much laziness.
It's not a lethargy.
It's just kind of indifference.
It's not always that we don't care
about helping other people follow Jesus.
It's that we don't care enough
to change the structures of our lives
to actually do it.
And this one hits hard for me.
Because to take the initiative
and intentionality of actually making disciples
takes time.
It takes effort.
Study.
A lot of times you're going to be carrying a burden
that doesn't actually belong to you first.
You're helping a brother or sister in Christ
carry a burden.
Or you're carrying the burden of a lost soul
that you're trying to pray for the Lord
to open their heart to the gospel.
And it takes time and energy and study
and faithfulness and prayer
and all of those things.
All of those things.
And let's just be honest.
We're busy.
We've got a lot going on
between our jobs and our kids
and our hobbies and all the things.
It's not that we don't want people
to follow Christ.
We just don't care enough about that
to actually change the structures of our life
to help people follow Christ.
always hoping that somebody else
with less going on can do it.
Somebody else with less going on
can step up to the plate in these matters.
But that's not what the Lord commands.
He commands for all of us.
It's not unreasonable to translate
this particular participle go
to as you go.
The assumption is that you are going
in the sense of you are going about your life.
And Jesus is saying is as you're going
intentionally take the initiative
to make disciples.
Whether you're at home or at work
or on the soccer field
or in the grocery store
or on the golf course
or at church,
wherever you are,
whatever you're doing,
have a mind that is intentionally
looking for ways
to help other people follow Jesus.
But it takes initiative to do that.
Intentionality to do that.
It doesn't happen by accident.
And if we're waiting for it to be convenient,
we'll never help anybody follow Christ.
It will never be convenient.
The best things never are.
Even in our homes with our kids.
You'll never help your kids follow Christ.
I'll never help my kids follow Christ
unless I do it on purpose.
Unless I do it on my purpose.
Dad didn't accidentally talk about the Lord
when we're driving down the road
or on the golf course.
He didn't do that on accident.
He did it on purpose.
You don't read your Bible
to your kids on accident.
You don't pray with your kids on accident.
It takes intentionality.
This also needs to be intentional
within our church fellowship.
Right?
Think about your attendance to church this morning.
All of you are here except Marty and Faye.
Marty just wasn't feeling good.
But think about it.
If you would have been here,
think about this.
When did you get here?
How late did you stay?
Where did you sit?
Think about it.
Just put your place,
put yourself back in your own shoes from this morning.
Or maybe,
or any Sunday for that matter.
Where did you sit?
Where did you park?
Who did you bring?
Who did you speak to?
What was the nature of those conversations?
Think about it now for a moment.
Now how much of those things,
the answers that you have for that,
was motivated intentionally
by your desire
to help somebody else in our church family
for five minutes?
For five minutes.
Follow Jesus more faithfully.
I don't know that I can say
that I did that this morning.
I mean,
it's unfair.
I came to preach this morning.
That's cheating, right?
But outside of the sermon.
I don't know.
I don't know that
there was any of you
that I had first and foremost
in my mind
when we were having a conversation
this morning.
How can I help them love Jesus more?
How can I help them
follow Jesus better today?
When we come to church,
come early,
not just to hang out.
Like I typically do.
Come early
to encourage somebody
in their faith.
Stay late
to encourage somebody
in their faith.
Bring somebody with you
to hear the gospel.
Go talk to somebody
that maybe
you don't often talk to.
Sit with somebody different.
Sit in a different place.
Look for intentional ways
to help one another
follow Christ.
And I know what you may be thinking.
Jared,
this all sounds so radical.
It sounds like
Jesus expects us
to abandon our lives
for this.
Yeah.
That's right.
That's what he wants.
Discipling takes initiative.
The next three
will be faster.
Okay, number two.
Discipling includes evangelism.
It includes evangelism.
Look again at verse 19.
Baptizing them
in the name of the Father
and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit.
Now it may be helpful here
to understand a little bit more
about the grammatical structure
of these verses.
Now there's only one imperative
in these verses
and it's the phrase
make disciples.
That's the imperative
statement here.
Go,
baptize,
teach.
The other verbal ideas
in this,
in the Great Commission,
they're not actually
imperatives.
They're participles.
So Jesus says,
big thing,
make disciples.
And then he says,
make disciples
by going,
baptizing,
teaching.
Those three things
are the way
that Jesus
intends for us
to make disciples.
And here at the end
of verse 19,
he says that one part
of fulfilling
this command
of making disciples
is by baptizing people
in the name of the Father
and the Son
and the Spirit.
And we understand
we're Baptists,
but we understand
that doesn't mean
that baptism
saves a person.
We understand
baptism is a public
identification
with Christ.
It's a stated declaration
that a person
is saved
and now following
as a faithful disciple.
But though it has
no saving power,
baptism in the New Testament
is very closely
related to conversion.
In fact,
there are times
when the New Testament
authors actually
used the word baptism
to refer to conversion.
Not that it's the baptism
that produced salvation,
but it's so closely linked
to the early church,
baptism and conversion,
that they didn't separate
those two things.
So when Jesus says here
that one of the ways
to make disciples
is to baptize them
in the name of the Father,
Son, and the Holy Spirit,
he's not talking about baptism
for baptism's sake.
He's talking about
faithful evangelism.
He's talking about
taking his gospel
and sharing it
with other people
in order that
you may call them
to believe.
Call them as he did
to turn away
from their sin
to follow him
as a faithful disciple.
Listen,
we can't help people
follow Jesus
more faithfully
if they're not his disciples
to begin with.
The work of discipling
starts with evangelism.
And though the Bible
speaks of evangelists
who are uniquely gifted
at sharing the gospel
with unbelievers,
nowhere in the New Testament
are other believers
exempted from the responsibility.
In fact,
faithful evangelism
is assumed
everywhere in the New Testament.
Somebody tried to tell me
a year or so ago
after I preached a message on,
remember when
the four friends
lowered their crippled friend
down through the roof
in Peter's house
and preached a message
on evangelism from that.
And somebody told me
afterwards that
they thought that
I did not preach
that text right.
They said the New Testament
doesn't actually command
that we evangelize.
And so for me
to exhort our church
to evangelize
was to be inconsistent
with the New Testament.
And I think that's foolish.
I think it's foolish.
These New Testament authors,
they didn't have to exhort
the early church
to evangelize.
They were just doing it.
In almost every letter
that Paul wrote,
what does he say?
I thank God
for your faith
that is known
around the world.
Their faith can't be known
around the world
if they keep it to themselves
and never share it
with anyone else.
Peter writes and says,
endure faithfully,
persevere in persecution
for the sake of the gospel.
Well, how can anybody
be persecuted
for the gospel
if no one knows
you're a believer?
Of course they were telling people.
Of course they were evangelizing.
The church in Jerusalem
was growing daily
such as should be saved.
It wasn't just the apostles.
The gospel message
was on the lips
of every believer
in Jerusalem
and the church was growing.
Wasn't evangelism
a part of Jesus' promise
to Peter and Andrew
and James and John
when he called them
to follow him?
What did he say?
Follow me,
I'll make you fishers
of men.
Of course,
it's assumed everywhere
in the New Testament.
We have to be faithfully
evangelizing the lost.
It's a part of making disciples.
Number three,
discipling requires teaching.
Discipling requires teaching.
Look at verse 20.
Teaching them to observe
all that I have commanded you.
There's some people
who think that evangelism
is the whole of making disciples,
but it's not.
Jesus didn't just stop
at baptizing them.
He takes it a step further
that once they're following Christ,
help them be faithful to that.
Teach them everything
I've taught you.
And we know how this goes, right?
We've been Christians
long enough to know
that we're in constant need
of discipling.
We're in constant need
of instruction,
constantly needing someone
to model for us
the truths of the scripture.
And we need to be constantly
doing that for others,
teaching them,
modeling for them,
encouraging them.
It's a part of making disciples.
We're going to flesh that out
in greater detail
over the next two lessons,
so I'm going to leave it there
for now,
except to say
this is a part of our responsibility
to one another.
When we talk about
church membership
or church partnership,
I want to change it.
I want to stop calling it
church membership.
We'll get into that another day.
Well,
church membership
is discipleship, right?
To submit yourself
to a local church
is to submit
to the discipleship
of a local church
and to engage
in discipleship
with that local church.
It's really what it is.
We have a responsibility
to one another in this.
We have a responsibility
to help one another
follow Christ
faithfully,
to constantly teach
one another,
encourage one another,
admonish one another,
help one another.
We get to Hebrews 10.
Remember,
the writer of Hebrews
encourages us
to not forsake
the gathering
of the church, right?
Don't forsake
the gathering
of God's people.
Encourage
and exhort
to love
all those things
that happens
at the gathering.
That immediately follows
the third warning
of apostasy
in the book of Hebrews.
And I think part
of what the writer
has to say there
is that our
intentional discipling
within the local church
is one way
that we avoid
apostatizing,
that we protect
ourselves
against the warnings
of falling away
from Christ
by constantly
being together
as a people.
We have a responsibility
to that.
Finally,
discipling is empowered
by Christ.
Discipling is empowered
by Christ.
The end of verse 20,
Behold,
I am with you always
even to the end
of the age.
So I love how
this mandate ends.
Notice how long
he says he will be
with us.
To the end
of the age.
How long is that?
Until he comes back
and we get to be
with him.
Right?
The promise
of Christ's presence
and power
and making disciples
is just applicable
to us as it was
to those apostles
in Galilee.
But it also
reminds us
that fruitfulness
in discipling
only comes
by the grace
of Jesus.
We can devise
all manner
of programs
and we're going
to do that.
But we got to remember
that there's no power
in our strategies.
There's no power
in our strategies.
If anybody's
going to come
to know Christ
it's going to be
because of the grace
of Jesus
that worked through us.
If anybody's
going to be
discipled in Christ
it's going to be
because of the grace
of Jesus
working through
his word
through his
people.
If we lean
on our own
devices for success
what we'll end up
doing is filling
our church
full of people
that aren't
actually true
disciples.
but if we
cast ourselves
on the power
and grace
of the Lord
he'll do
his work
through us
no matter
what our
chosen method
may be
or what the
strategy is
that we
devise.
It's going to
look different
in every church
isn't it?
God uses
his word
he does it
by his spirit
and he promises
us his grace
and his power.
I am with you
so go and do it
I will be with you.
So let's just
do a quick
honest evaluation.
First personally
how are we
doing at
obeying the
mandate?
Are we
intentionally
making disciples?
Are we
evangelizing
the lost?
Are we
teaching others
our kids
our friends
others in the
church
to follow
Christ faithfully?
We should
probably also
consider this
corporately
right?
We zoom out
for a minute
away from our
individual lives
and just
think about
our church
life and
our own
evaluation
of what our
church is
doing right
now collectively.
Are we
making disciples?
Are we
evangelizing
the lost?
Are we
mutually
caring for
one another's
souls?
Are we
developing
strategies to
make that
possible and
to make it
more evident
in our
church?
I think we
could all do
a little better
work on that.
In fact
there's
probably
never
going to
be a
time
where I
would say
otherwise
because we
always need
to do more.
We always
need to be
more faithful
and there may
be an area
that you're
really faithful
right now
that maybe
five years
from now
you're less
faithful in
and you're
going to need
the person
sitting next
to you to
come up to
you and
encourage you
a little bit.
Say hey
you remember
a few years
ago you were
at that class
on Sunday
night and this
was true in
your life.
It's not true
anymore.
I just want
to encourage
you.
Be faithful.
We're going to
need that
for the rest
of our
lives aren't
we?
And I think
that's what
Jesus commands
us to do.
So what does
it mean to be
a discipling
church?
It means
first that we
care that our
church is made
up of true
disciples.
We preach the
true gospel
right?
We care about
church membership
and ordinance
all those things
but it also
means that we
are intentionally
initiating in
our own lives
ways to help
other people
follow Christ
first in
evangelism and
then in our
responsibility to
one another.