Our joy and our delight. Speak to us by your mighty word
and shed on us your light. Reveal your smiling face, remove
our fears and doubts. Arise, O Sun of Righteousness,
and scatter all our clouds. Revive us with your grace. Instruct us by your word. Arm us for trials that we must
face while living in this world. That's about a prayer. Our gracious Father, we thank
you today for your mercy and the grace that we have through
the Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you again for this day
that we have to gather together and worship you as a church.
We thank you for this church, Lord, that you've given to us
for edification and for worship, for love and fellowship, for
serving of Christ. And Lord, we just are appreciative
that you have gathered us together one more time. We thank you,
Father, for this opportunity to hear your word, to sing your
praises, to fellowship one with another. Father, we do ask that
the Holy Spirit come today and be with us, that Christ might
be among us through that spirit, teaching us, leading us, enabling
us, lifting up our hearts, instructing us in the ways of Christ and
the things of him. Lord, we just pray that without
the spirit, we would be nothing. And so we need you today and
ask that you come. We thank you, Father, for Christ
and his death for us. We thank you for the forgiveness
of sin. We thank you for the reconciling
to God, for the new heart that you give us to love you, to follow
you and to desire for holiness in our heart. Father, we also
thank you for the way that you take care of us each day and
provide for us. We thank you, Father, for the
way that you've been with us all these years as we've met
together We ask Lord that you would continue to keep us, keep
us faithful to your word, to your ordinances, to the gospel
of Jesus Christ. Father, we just ask now that
you just speak to our hearts today as we gather in your name.
We ask Lord that you'd help me to preach the word, to share
and expound the things of God from this word, Lord, not in
man's wisdom, but in the wisdom that can only be taught by the
spirit of God. And so, Father, Lord, I pray
that these that are here today will be edified, that you will
be glorified, and it's in Christ's name that we pray, amen. All
right, still in that same book, turn, if you would, back to hymn
number 32. Hymn number 32, Sovereign Grace Acknowledged. Only seems right. Alright, hymn number 32, Sovereign Grace
Acknowledged. Sing this to the tune of It Came
Upon a Midnight Clear. The Lord our God is sovereign
and He rules with perfect ease In heaven above and earth below
He works His wise decrees The angels swiftly do His will And
they with willing minds but Satan, men, and demons to accomplish
God's designs. All things that ever come to
pass, God foreordained to be, and all He rules or overrules
to give Himself glory. God even chosen to redeem and
save some of our race. Though we are sinful, wretched
worms to magnify His grace. God's grace comes not by man's
free will nor by his legal words. God gives his grace to whom he
will and his salvation works. We all deserve eternal wrath
and some God does pass by. but some he has decreed to say,
and they shall never die. Great God, we praise you for
your grace and for your sovereignty. You chose us and redeemed us
too, and you have set us free. Great Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
the triune God we praise. We for the glory of your grace
give you alone all praise. Amen. Good morning. Morning. Welcome. I'm Michael Smith. I'm Andrew Eggmaster. He's here.
And it was Edward? Did you say? Andrew, sorry. Andrew.
I mumbled. That's all right. We get to have
you guys today. All right, turn if you would down the Gatsby
hymn books, your Gatsby hymn books to hymn number 680. Hymn number 680. hymn number 680. This is in common
meter, so we can sing that to the tune of Amazing Grace. Hymn
number 680. Before all worlds, the glorious land, the
blessed eternal was settled by the eternal three that Christ
for man should bleed astonished angels stand amazed that Christ
should die for man This proves the eternal love of God, who
gloried in His plan. But what can poor lost sinners
say? when once they get a view and
hear the blessed Spirit say, all this was done for you. Why me, why me, O blessed God? Why such a wretch as me? Who must forever lie in hell? Were not salvation free? All those that God hath foreordained
We'll sing one more and then if anybody has a request for
him, you can do that at that time. Hymn number
653 in the same hymn book. 653, we'll sing this and if anybody
has one you'd like to sing in any of the hymn books, you're
welcome to do so. One Lord, one faith, one baptism. Of one Lord we will sing and
spread his fame abroad. Jehovah Jesus is our King. and be his name of the lord one
living vital faith each christian will approve a faith that triumphs
over death and sweetly waters by love one baptism we own A
sacred solemn sign of what the Savior's undergone to wash away
our sin. His overwhelming pain and burial
we see. is rising from the grave again
to set his children free. Here we, by faith, may view that
sacred... Sorry. Let's start over on that. I got lost in my bifocals again. Here we, by faith, may view that
every Christian's dead, to Satan's sin and Moses' too, through Christ
our living Head. In rising from the flood, saints
solemnly proclaim, Their life is here with Christ in God, and
they shall with Him reign. Anybody got a hymn that you'd
like to sing? Sing Galatians 6. Galatians 6? Galatians chapter 6. Galatians chapter 6 verse 9. Let us not, let us not, let us
not be weary, let us not be weary in well-doing, for in due season
we shall reap, we shall reap, If we thank not, as we have therefore
opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them
who are of the household of faith. Let us not, let us not, let us
not be weary. Let us not be weary in well doing. For in due season we shall reap,
we shall reap if we fain not. All right, anybody else got one? Can't beat singing out of the
Bible, can you? You definitely can't argue with
the words. All right, Matthew chapter 28,
if you would please. Matthew 28. Good to have you
guys here today. We're in a series teaching on
the New Testament church, or the Ecclesia. Matthew chapter 28. Matthew 28. We'll start looking at verse 18. Matthew 28, verse 18. It says, And Jesus came and spake
unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and
in earth. Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Ghost. teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I've commanded
you. And lo, I'm with you always,
even unto the end of the world. Amen. And we began last week
in this section of our study on the New Testament church or
the ecclesia. And we began to look at the commission
of the New Testament church. We've looked at the nature of
the church. We looked at the birth or the beginning of the
church. and we looked at the gospel of the church, and now
we are looking at the commission. Now that we know what the gospel
is that Christ has given us to go with, we are looking at what
the commission is of the New Testament church. And we began
last week looking at a few things. Number one, we looked at the
passages preceding this section of scripture that we began with,
And we've seen who the people was that Jesus was speaking to. As many of us, me included, have
at one time believed is that the commission was given to just
the 11 apostles, whenever Jesus give it there in the mountain.
That was just to the 11 apostles. But yet we've seen last week
that that wasn't the case. We also have seen in times past
and what people have believed is that the Great Commission
is given to the individual. It's the individual's commission
to do these things, but yet that was also not the case as we saw
last week. If you remember last week, we
went back into chapter 28 there, and we seen that whenever Jesus
had risen from the grave, He first appeared there to, or there
was an angel that appeared to Mary and the other Mary and said,
you know, you need to go and meet him at a place where he
is said. If you look there in verse seven,
the angel says, go quickly and tell his disciples that he is
risen from the dead and behold, he goeth before you into Galilee.
There ye, and remember, I'll get to this again here in a minute.
The word ye and not you is there, the word ye. Ye see him, lo,
I have told you. And they departed quickly from
the sepulcher with fear and great joy and did run to bring his
disciples word. So the women and now the disciples
are told to go meet Jesus at the designated place. And in
verse nine it says, and they went to tell his disciples Now
behold, Jesus met them saying, all hail. And they came and held
him by his feet, worshiped him. Then said Jesus unto them, be
not afraid, go tell my brethren. So now we have the women, we
have the disciples, we have the brethren, that they go into Galilee
and there they shall see me. Now when they were going, behold,
let's drop on down to verse 16. And then the 11 disciples went
away into Galilee, into the mountains where Jesus had appointed them.
And when they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted. And then Jesus began to give
the commission. So we see here, and of course,
we also look back, you know, if you've seen, Jesus said, you
know, go into the place, go tell my disciples that they go into
Galilee and there they shall see me. We see that the angel
said there to go to the place that he had told you. And we
look back in the epistles and we saw that Jesus had over and
over and over again told them that he was going to be delivered
into the hands of the elders, that he was gonna be crucified,
and that three days later that he would rise again, and then
that he would meet them in the mountain, in Galilee. And so we saw that it wasn't
just the 11 disciples, although in that very strict close context
of verse 16 we see that, But if you don't take the whole of
what we see before that, then we would just think that the
11 disciples were the only ones there. So who do we see here
that Jesus is giving this commission to? Well, we see it as the church
already gathered together in one local place. We see him giving
that commission to the church in its church capacity. He's
giving the commission to the local church. And so, We see
that, and of course, as we've seen in our studies on Ecclesia
before, that the church, the local visible assembly of baptized
believers, is the one who Christ has given that authority to carry
out his business. The very word Ecclesia means
that. It is a called out, gathered
assembly who gathers to conduct the business of the kingdom.
That's what that word was understood by those early believers in the
New Testament, they understood that Greek word, ekklesia, which
had already been used in their hearing in those Greek states
of a secluded people that came out from among the citizenry
of that Greek city, and they comprised a formal body that
governed over the things of the state. And so Jesus used that
word whenever he said, I will build my ekklesia. I will build my church, okay? And because of our English language
and the way that the word church is being used, especially through
Protestant teaching down through history, we see that the word
church has kind of taken a different meaning where people think that
church, the church is everybody everywhere that is a believer.
Where in fact, the scriptures we've seen in 118 places that
Ecclesia was found, that the word Ecclesia referred to a local
gathered body of people. And so Jesus has built his kind
of ekklesia. And that kind of ekklesia, wherever
it be found, baptized body of believers, comes together to
form a body of Christ. And that body of Christ is the
one who carries out the service of Christ. And so this is what
Jesus is doing. That body that he has already
gathered, if you remember, we looked at John the Baptist, who
was a man sent by God and he was to prepare a people for the
Christ that was to come. And he did, he prepared that
people, but whenever the time came, when Jesus came, was baptized
and began his earthly ministry, John pointed all those people
to Jesus. And he said, the bridegroom has
the bride. The religious leaders were saying,
hey, you know, John, Jesus is over there baptizing his disciples,
baptizing more people. than you, and in essence, John
said, you know, hey, this isn't a competition. I came for what
I came for. I came in the capacity of the
one preparing these people for him, and I must decrease, he
must increase, because he is the one that this is all about,
not me. It's his church. It's his bride. It's his people. And so they belong to him, and
he will be the one who instructs them and teaches them The faith
that he desires for them to know and so John was basically retracting
from his place of the ministry that God had ordained for him
to do and Jesus now was taking that ministry that John had prepared
and began to build upon that Those materials that John had
prepared and so it's not John's Church, and it's not the Holy
Spirit's Church It's Jesus's Church, and he's the one who
built in it. He did he began to build it as the epistles say,
that he laid first within the church apostles, and that's exactly
what he did. He went and he gathered those
first 12 men, made them apostles, and those 12 men, even out of
all the rest of the ones who had believed and been baptized,
Jesus began to instruct those men because through those 12
men, Jesus was going to lay the foundation of the local New Testament
church and how it was to function so that whenever he would die
and be buried and be resurrected and then essentially be ascended
to the Father, that the service of the gospel would be left in
their keeping and that he had put into place the way that he
desires to be worshiped for the faith to be perpetuated, for
him to be served throughout the age that we're in now. And so,
this is what is going on here in John chapter, or excuse me,
Matthew 28, 16. Jesus has these group of people
that have accompanied with him. Matter of fact, flip over just
a few pages into Acts, and you'll see that's the language of scripture.
In Acts chapter one, Remember whenever the church was gathered
after Jesus had resurrected? Matter of fact, it was right
after this account. They were in this mountain in
Matthew 28, when Jesus ascended, they left from this mountain
and went back to the upper room. And in that upper room, that's
whenever they said, hey, we need to replace Judas. And so they
began to talk about replacing Judas. And in verse 16 of Acts chapter
one, we see Peter stands up. And by the way, in verse 15,
he says, and in those days, Peter stood up in the midst of the
disciples and said, and the number of names together were about
120. And so they knew who was accompanying
with them. They knew how many were accompanying
with them. It was a group of people. I believe those 120 that he's
talking about right there, was the ones in Matthew 28 that Jesus
was talking to, the women, the disciples, and the brethren.
The disciples are used two ways in the New Testament in the Gospels.
Sometimes they are used to refer directly of the 12 apostles,
but sometimes they're also used to determine everybody who is
a follower of Jesus Christ. And then the word brethren, of
course, we know that the word brethren is only used in accordance
with those who are those of the church. But anyway, Peter stands
up here and he says, men and brethren, this scripture must
need to be fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David
spake before concerning Judas, which was a guide to them that
took Jesus. For he was numbered with us and obtained a part of
this ministry. Now this man purchased the field
and with the reward of iniquity and falling headlong, he burst
asunder in the midst and all his bowels gushed out. And it
was known unto all the dwellers at Jerusalem, insomuch as the
field was called in the proper tongue, Aklodama, that is to
say the field of blood, therein, and his bishopric let another
take. Wherefore, of these men which have, here it is, accompanied
with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among
us, beginning from the baptism of John. So the qualifications
to become an apostle here, to take the place of Judas, was
that number one had to be a man, number two had to be one who
accompanied with that group of people, that 120, or that group
that was gathered together, have accompanied with them all the
time that Jesus went out among us, beginning from the baptism
of John unto that same day that he was taken up from us. Okay,
so we see that that was the prerequisite, that they had to be a part of
that group that accompanied together. or came together, congregated
together. And I believe that this is the
very group that is spoken of in Matthew 28. Now, with that
back history, looking at that, we've seen last week that in
our King James Bibles, we find that the King James translators
used an archaic language This was, these ye's and thee's and
thou's was not the language of their day. It had already went
archaic before their day. And so we always think back,
you know, the thee's and thou's are just archaic language that
the King James people used. No, they weren't even using it
at that time. But they used that archaic language
in the translation into English because those That language is
the only language that can properly translate the Greek and Hebrew
words that have the, and we talked about it last week, and you guys
have your little papers there in front of you, the pronouns
in their singular and plural way. In English, we don't have
that. We have you, okay, and you can
mean you as a plural group or you as an individual, and so
it's hard to distinguish that. However, the King James used
that archaic dead language of English to bring out the Greek
grammar and Hebrew grammar that was found in scripture to properly
translate that. So whenever people started getting
down on the King James Bible about the these and thous, Remind
them, those these and those are extremely important because that
holds and reserves that Greek and Hebrew grammar behind some
of these words and it makes us understand the passages a little
bit later. If you remember, we looked at
the verse last week, whenever the Bible said, when Jesus was
talking to Peter and said, Satan has desire to sift thee. And we found out that that is
a plural, it's not a singular. And so, has a desire, excuse me, has
a desire to sift ye. And that word ye is a plural. I always thought that Satan desired
to sift Peter by himself, and after Peter had repented, that
he was to feed Christ's sheep. But yet we've seen in there that
Satan desired to sift all of the disciples, not just Peter. But yet Jesus said, I've prayed
for thee, Peter, singular. So out of all the disciples,
Jesus prayed for Peter. Well, see, we wouldn't have known
that if you look at some of the modern translations. You'll find
that it's just you. He's desired to sift you. And so there is some good that
we find here in the these and thous, and we found that to be
true. Now all that grammar lesson wasn't, as you guys know, I'm
not a scholar and I'm not a grammarian of any kind, but we brought that
up last week for the sheer purpose of, when we look here, we see
that Jesus uses the word ye and not you. He uses the word ye,
which is plural. He didn't say thee, he didn't
say thou, he didn't say thy, he didn't say thine. Okay, those
are all singular in the Greek. Jesus used the word ye, which
is a plural. He said, go ye, therefore, and
teach all nations. So he was speaking to a plurality,
but that word ye is a plurality that is a collective plurality,
okay? So it's meaning a specific ye,
not just ye everybody in general, it's a specific group of people. And when we see that, we begin
to see what we're talking about here, what we've seen in our
studies before and how it all coincides together. It all is
fitting together. There is a group of people that
John put together for Jesus. Jesus gathered them into a church
and began to instruct them, laying first the apostles in that church. and then building upon that.
Remember that word when Jesus said, I will build my church,
that word build there was in the perfect tense, meaning that
he started it already and is continually building that church.
Okay, so he was doing that during this time period. Now, today,
we wanna look at the commission. The commission is again for the
local church. So it's the church that Christ
is commissioning And I want to show you that in what is found
in this 19th verse. Now, we've seen last week there
was three things, three parts to the commission, right? I grew up in a different belief
persuasion than what I believe now, okay? I grew up in a different
quote unquote denomination, although we're not a part of a denomination,
so to speak. I grew up in a different denomination.
And so I believe differently than I do now, okay? And so I believe that the commission
was given to everybody to do and that the commission was to
evangelize, to go out and just share the gospel. And that was
it, share the gospel. Just go out and preach the gospel
to people and everything. But we find here, if we look
closely, we'll see that the commission isn't just evangelizing. It isn't
just going and preaching the gospel. Now, keep your hand there
in Matthew 28, but look at Mark, if you would, Mark 16. Mark 16. Verse 15, we find that Jesus
here, this is also another account of Jesus' discourse in that mountain
to these believers. this church that was there, and
he said unto them, go ye into all the world, verse 15, go ye
into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized
shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned. Now, so
we see here that part of the commission is to go and preach
the gospel everywhere. Now, remember again, this is
Jesus teaching primarily Jews here. Well, not primarily, completely,
totally, he was preaching to Jews here. And if you remember
the mindset of the common Jew was that they were a seed of
Abraham in the flesh, and because of the promises made to Abraham
in the flesh, then they was gonna inherit all the promises because
they were children of the flesh of Abraham. But we've seen in
scripture, especially the New Testament, it tells us it's not
the seed of the flesh that are the heirs of the promise, but
the seed of the spirit, right? It's those who are the children
of the spirit who are the ones who are the heirs of the promise,
that not all that are of Israel are Israel. So it isn't about
a fleshly seed, it's about a spiritual seed. And what these people thought
was because we are of Abraham's children, then we're saved, we're
gonna be saved because we're Abraham's children. But Jesus,
time after time after time in his earthly ministry, confronted
those religious leaders and told them, hey, you are a seed of
Satan. You are of your father, the devil.
You are a brood of vipers. He was telling them, you are
not of Abraham. If you are of Abraham, you will
believe on me. And so we find that there is
this mentality among the Jews at that time, that salvation
was only for them. that the Messiah was coming only
to them. And so the teaching of Jesus
has been to these people that this gospel is not to just stay
here in Jerusalem, but it's going to go out to all other parts
of the world. So you're not just to preach
to the Jews. You're not just to stay within
your own people. You're to go out to everywhere.
And preach to, as it says here, every creature. Now that doesn't
mean that we have the obligation that absolutely everybody would
come, and I used to believe this, by the way, that, and I'd come
home at night sometimes, and oh man, I met somebody in the
elevator and I didn't say something to them. I'm supposed to preach
to every creature, blah, blah. You know, that's not what the
scriptures is teaching when it says preach to every creature. It's
talking about that we are not to be distinguishing about who
we take the gospel to. We are to take the gospel to
whoever, wherever. And wherever the Lord takes us,
leads us, we're to share that gospel. And it's not secluded
to just one group of people. And so Jesus is making this claim
here that the gospel is to be taught. But look, if you would,
back in Matthew, of course, we know he's, we're to go with the
gospel, but he says, go ye therefore and teach all nations. This word teach here, um, This is the main verb of this
whole entire passage. To teach all nations. Matthew 16, to go with the gospel
and preach to every creature. That's what it's saying. It's
saying the same thing, okay? To teach all nations. Not just
in Jerusalem, not just in Israel, teach all nations. But this word
teach here, this word teach, the Greek word behind that, it
means, to make disciples. We are to make disciples from
all nations. Now, we all know that through
preaching and teaching that we cannot cause somebody to be born
again, that the new birth comes by the sovereign work of the
Holy Spirit alone, and it precedes everything. The Holy Spirit comes,
brings the new birth. It causes us to go from being
natural to spiritual We are born from above. We now are spiritually
awakened. We are now spiritually alive.
We now have spiritual receptors, so to speak, eyes, ears, heart
that can hear the scriptures. And so whenever the Holy Spirit
comes and births somebody from above, that person now can hear
the gospel, believe the gospel, repent, believe, come to Christ. They desire the things of God.
That is the order of things. I used to believe before that
it was just the opposite. First, we have to hear the gospel,
and then we believe the gospel. And if we believe the gospel,
then God will cause us to be born again, and then we are Christians. But it's just the opposite. The Bible says that because ye
are sons, God has sent his spirit into you, whereby we cry out
of a father. It's because we were already
sons eternally from God. God has already, in Christ Jesus,
chosen us before the foundation of the world. And he has given
us life in Christ Jesus. And that life that we have now
is manifesting the sonship that we already had in Christ Jesus
before the world began. And that's why he sent his spirit
into us at the time of his choosing. And then whenever he does that,
whenever that life comes in us, that life then receives the things
of the spirit of God, because the natural man cannot receive
the things of the spirit of God because they're spiritually discerned. And so whenever we go with the
gospel to make disciples, it isn't that we're going making
people say we were saved in Christ Jesus. We are going and making
disciples. What does the word disciple mean?
Well, it means a follower, right? It means a follower. We're going
to make followers of Jesus Christ. And so what we're doing is we're
taking the gospel to somebody who already and we don't know
who they are, we don't know where they are, and that's why we share
the gospel to whoever. But we don't know who they are,
where they are, but we share the gospel, and those who have
been given life, those who have been given spiritual life, then
they hear that, and they believe that, that becomes something
that resonates in their soul. Matter of fact, the Bible clearly
states that in that passage in Corinthians that I just quoted,
and I don't want to misquote the rest of it. Turn to it real
quick. In 1 Corinthians chapter 2, Paul
writes, for what man knoweth the things of man save the spirit
of man which is in him, even so the things of God knoweth
no man but the spirit of God. Now we have received not the
spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God. So we
have received the spirit which is of God, and here it is. that
we might know the things that are freely given to us of God,
which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom
teach, but which the Holy Ghost teaches, comparing spiritual
things with spiritual. So the reason that we have to
be born again is so that we might know the things that's been freely
given to us. See, salvation is a free gift
of God. Imputation, we are imputed with
the righteousness of Christ freely. It's not based on any condition.
God has not laid any condition for the human to ever come and
do something so that he might declare them just and righteous
because there's nothing that we can do to make ourselves just
and righteous. Even our believing and receiving
and coming and repenting and all those things, all those things
are never perfect. And so salvation is something
that is perfect in Christ Jesus. whenever we come and believe
it is because we've been born from above. And we have to have
the Spirit given to us so that we might know those things freely
given to us. Because it says in verse 14,
but the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit
of God for they are foolishness unto him, neither can he know
them because the man who has not been born again cannot know
the things of the Spirit of God. Now that's not my words, that's
not the denomination's word, that's not how theological systems
work, that's the words of the Bible. The Bible says that the
person that has not been born from above or spiritually made
alive cannot know the things of the Spirit of God because
they're spiritually discerned. You have to have spiritual life
to spiritually discern. Now you can gain some facts,
surely, you can gain some facts, but to know and believe, to trust,
to put hope in, You can't do that unless you're spiritually
alive. Verse 15 says, but he that is spiritual judges all
things, yet he himself is judge of no man. For who has known
the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him, but we have
the mind of Christ. So whenever we see in Matthew
28 where he says, go make disciples or go teach all nations, that
making disciples isn't causing people to be born again. It's
going to those who have already been born again by the spirit
who have need of hearing the good news. See, the good news
is only good news to those who can hear it, right? It's only
good news to those who remember in the scriptures, Jesus said that these things
are for the sinners. I've come to save sinners. Well,
we're all sinners, right? But not everybody is going to
be saved. We're all sinners, but who is the ones who know
that they're sinners? Well, it's the ones who have
been born again. They're the ones that's been given to know that they
are sinners before God. Again, I kind of appeal to that
story that Jesus told about where there were two men that had went
to the temple and were praying. One was a Pharisee and the other
man was not a Pharisee. And the Pharisee was standing
there beating his chest saying, I praise you. I thank you, God,
that you have not made me like this wretch, like this guy, you
know? But yet that guy was on his face
before God saying, be merciful unto me, a sinner. And Jesus
said, who do you think is the one that's going to go down justified?
It's going to be that guy who is humble. He knows that he is
a sinner. See, the religious zealot doesn't know they're sinners
because they think by their own self-righteousness that they
can appease God, that they can be, do what God requires, that
they think that by their religious efforts, that they can do what
Christ has commanded to do. And so by doing that, they will
in turn either get salvation or be kept in salvation because
of their religious activity. And that's why the Pharisee could
never see that, is because they were continually in their own
self-righteousness. They had rejected the righteousness
of God and they had made for themselves their own righteousness.
And so the one who is humbled before God and sees their sinfulness
and their brokenness and their inability to please God, their
inability to worship and to give anything towards God conditionally,
that person is the one that is justified. That's the one who
God has saved because he has brought him to the place to see
that he cannot do anything. Remember Paul said in Romans
chapter seven, he said, Oh, wretched man that I am. He said, I want
to do good, but I can't do. My flesh continually warned with
the spirit, and the spirit continually warned against the flesh. He
said, in my mind, I wanna do the things that the law says,
but in my flesh, all I find is I keep doing not the things that
the law says. I don't do the things that the
law tells me to do. And there's this constant battle,
back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. Well, the person
who's not born again doesn't have that conflict. The person
that's born again, they continue to just do what they wanna do,
and they continue to say, justify their own sins. Hey, it's all
right for me to do this or to do that. But the child of grace,
they have this struggle within themselves. And so we see that
the person that is made a disciple is one who has already been born
again, but yet when that good news comes to them, they hear
that good news and they believe that good news, and then they
in turn, they repent of their wrong thinking about the gospel,
their wrong thinking about salvation, And then they turn and they trust
only in Christ Jesus. Now, whenever they do that and
they believe that gospel, they have now begun to be a disciple. And so we have made a disciple
or a follower of Jesus Christ. OK, but what does it tell that
we are to do with that person as we see here? Now, if you look
there in our text, you'll see that there are two groups of
people, right? There is the ye and there is
the them. Okay, there's the ye and there's
the them. Verse 19, go ye therefore and
teach all nations. Okay, so who is the one who is
given the commission to go make disciples? The ye, right? Okay, so the ye is the one who
is given the commission to go and make disciples. Now, as we've seen, again, this
was the gathered church already there, okay, the local church.
So the church is the one who's given the commission to go preach
or make disciples, okay? Now, what are the three things
that we are to do? We are to go, we are to baptize,
and we are to teach. Correct? It says, go ye therefore
and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father
and the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all
things whatsoever I have commanded you. So the commission that is
given to the ye is to go to the them baptized and to teach. Go to
them with the gospel, baptize those who are made disciples,
and to teach them, those who have been made disciples and
have been baptized, all things whatsoever Christ has commanded.
So for you as a church here at Joplin, for us to be obedient
to Christ in the commission, it's more than just going and
preaching the gospel. We go making disciples, whenever
those disciples are made or found, wherever they may be, we are
to instruct them about baptism. Now remember, it's always ye
going to them. And once them are made, we are
to baptize them and ye are to teach them. So if we look at
this, Not only is the ye commissioned to go make disciples, but Jesus
is also commissioning only the ye to baptize them and only the
ye to teach them. That's why our church doesn't
believe in parachurch organizations. We don't believe in extra outside
of church organizations preaching, baptizing, and teaching the gospel.
God, Christ has only authorized the ye to do these three things. We believe that whenever someone
has been born again, they're to be instructed by the command
of Christ to be baptized, to show forth that profession of
faith, an outward sign of what was inwardly done, to baptize
them. And that is the prerequisite
there to even be included into the church. Turn with me, if
you would, to Acts chapter two. Acts chapter two. Now, in all of Acts chapter 2,
all the way up to verse 36, Peter is preaching to them about what
Christ has done, about Christ coming and dying, and then handing
them up, and the reason why he came. Anyway, he's preached the
gospel up until this point. And look at verse 37. He says, Okay? So that means whenever
they were pricked in their heart, that term means that they were
convicted in their heart, that something weighed upon them in
their heart. Okay? This shows that they had
been born again. They began to spiritually discern
that something had been done here. And so, they were pricked
in their heart and said unto Peter to the rest of the apostles,
men and brethren, what shall we do? Then Peter said unto them,
repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus
Christ for the remission of sin, and you shall receive the gift
of the Holy Ghost. Now, we've talked about this
and I don't have time to get into a lot of this right now,
but if you look there, whenever they were pricked in their heart,
what did Peter tell them to do? He said, repent and believe Right? No, he didn't say that. He said,
repent and be baptized. Repent and be baptized. Okay? What are they to repent of? Their
wrong thinking about what Christ, who Christ is, what Christ did,
and what salvation was about, right? Repent and be baptized,
every one of you, in the name of Jesus. And then it says, for
the remission of sin. Not so that your sins will be
remitted, right? Remember we talked about this?
If Waylon was a soldier, went out to war, and fought in a war,
and saved a whole platoon of guys that was going to be bombed
or something, but yet he ran out there and did something to
save them all, whenever he got back, they give him a medal for
bravery. Giving him the medal for bravery
make him brave? No, he was already brave. The
medal only represented the fact that he had been brave, right?
That's what this word for here means in this passage. Be baptized, it says, for the
remission of sin, or excuse me, and be baptized every one of
you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins because
your sins have been remitted. Be baptized. The reason that
we are baptized is to show forth what has already been done for
us. It's not to get it, but it's because it's already been given.
Just like the medal for bravery wasn't to make him brave, it
was because he was already brave. Our sins have already been remitted
in Christ Jesus, and baptism shows forth that. We are proclaiming
the fact that what Jesus did for us is our salvation. We don't trust in anything else
but what Christ did. That's what baptism is all about.
It says, For this promise is unto you and unto your children
and to all that are far off, even as many as the Lord our
God shall call. And with many other words did
he testify and exhort saying, save yourselves from this untoward
generation. And in that he's not talking
about legal salvation before God. He's talking about practical
salvation by getting away from the teachings and the things
of this world so that they don't clutter your mind. He says in
verse 41, then they that gladly received his word, the only ones
that can receive, remember the natural man receiveth not the
things of the spirit of God, the one who's spiritually discerning
is the only ones that can receive the things of the spirit of God.
So this means that they have been born again. It doesn't say
it explicitly to us right here, but we know it from the rest
of scripture that the only ones who received the word of God
is the ones who have been born again because they have the spirit
of God in them. to teach them or to show them
or to bring them to understand what has been freely given them.
It says, and then they that gladly received his word were baptized. Okay, so they received, they
took his word as the truth. They trusted it, they believed
it as the truth. And then they followed him and
what he commanded them through Christ, what Christ had commanded
them through the apostle here to be baptized. They that gladly
received His Word, and only they that gladly received His Word.
They didn't baptize everybody. They only baptized those who
professed faith in Jesus Christ. Those who had professed the gospel
to be true. Who had repented of their wrong
thinking of the gospel. Who had repented of their wrong
thinking about salvation. Who had turned to Christ only
for their salvation. They were the ones that was baptized.
But look what it says further. Then they that gladly received
his word were baptized, and the same day there were added unto
them about 3,000, added unto who? The church. The church. The church. The church was already
in existence. The church wasn't born on Pentecost. That's how
I was taught growing up, but that's not what the scriptures
teach. The church was already active and in existence before
Pentecost. The church was already gathered,
following Christ, being taught his doctrine, was already, had
already had, you know, had ordained elders that they had already
done, that already conducted business among themselves in
voting for Matthias to replace Judas. They'd already been baptizing. They'd already had the Lord's
Supper. So they already had the ordinance there. I mean, the
church was already in existence. Anyway, you can't add somebody
to something unless that something already exists, right? Otherwise,
you're making something. OK, they were added to the church. And they. Who's they? The ones who gladly received
his word and were baptized. What does it say they did? They
continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and fellowship
and in breaking of bread and in prayer. Is that not what this
is right here? They made disciples, they baptized
those who responded to that discipling, and they met with them on a regular
basis, teaching them whatsoever the Lord had commanded, or as
it says here, continued steadfastly in the apostle doctrine. What's
the apostle's doctrine? It's Christ's doctrine, right?
How do we know that? Well, number one, we know that
Christ taught all those men the doctrine that they were teaching.
But second of all, we know Paul later, coming as one abnormally
born, remember, an apostle who came after the fact for the Gentiles,
what did he tell the Galatians and the Corinthians? He said,
hey, these things that I've brought to you is not from myself, it's
from Christ. I came and told you what Christ
told me, okay? So we see that the apostle's
doctrine is Christ's doctrine. And so they, the ones who receive
the Word of God, are commanded to be baptized, and then they're
commanded to come back under. But who are they to come under?
The guy on TV? The guy on the radio? Well, I'm
just going to meet in my house and listen here. I feel more
comfortable doing it here. No. The people who are made disciples
are commanded to be baptized by the ye, and then to be taught
by the ye. So what does that presuppose,
brother? Well, number one, it presupposes that the ye have
to already be made disciples and been instructed in the Lord's
commands, right? And baptized, and instructed
in the Lord's commands. So the ye and the thee continue
to be separated here. The them continues to be them
and not the ye until this has had some time to be done. We're
making a baptism. and the teaching whatsoever Christ
has commanded. But if you'll notice there, they
were added. Added. They weren't told to go home,
find the church of your choice. They weren't just left alone.
They were brought back in and they were continued steadfastly
in the apostles doctrine, fellowship, the breaking of bread, and in
prayers. That's why it's important to
be a part of a local church. That's why it's important to
be That's why in Hebrews we are admonished to continue and not
forsake the assembling of ourselves together because Christ has designed
the ye for a specific purpose. That ye is to build us up. That
ye is to edify us. But most importantly, that ye
is for the worship of Christ and the furtherance of the ministry
of the gospel. That's why we come together.
Because it's in the ye, this local assembly, that Christ gives
gifts, right? And there may be some here, some
of these men here, that Christ gives a gift to preach the gospel
or to pastor. And at that point, as God raises
that man up and prepares him for the ministry of the gospel,
whether it be here or us sending him out somewhere, then he goes,
and here we go. There's a reciprocity of the
Gospel. That's how churches are made, right? Isn't that what
happened? Didn't Jesus tell them? Turn
to Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1. The rest of the
commission is found in Acts chapter 1. Verse 4. And being assembled
together with them, Okay, again, the church is the church whenever
it's assembled, right? It's an assembly, it's a gathered
assembly. And being assembled together
with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem,
but wait for the promise of the Father, which saith, ye have
heard of me. For John truly baptized with
water, but ye should be baptized with the Holy Ghost, not many
days hence. Not baptized by the Holy Ghost.
Did you notice that? It didn't say baptized by the
Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost has never baptized anybody. You can't
find it anywhere in Scripture where the Holy Ghost has baptized
anybody, but baptized with the Holy Ghost. And when they, therefore,
were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou
at this time restore again the kingdom of Israel? And he said
unto them, it is not for you to know the times or the seasons
which the Father hath put in his own power. But ye, again,
there's that ye, that's that plural, collective, but ye, he's
talking to the church still at this point, but ye shall receive
power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you. That's the
baptism of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is going to come
upon the church and empower them. Ye shall receive power after
that the Holy Ghost has come upon you. When did that happen?
Just not long after this conversation took place. when that 120 people
was in the upper room and the Holy Spirit came down and they
began to proclaim the things of God. Peter stood up and gave
that great long sermon to where 2,000 souls, 3,000 souls were
saved. Okay, ye shall be given, ye shall
receive power after the Holy Ghost has come upon you and ye
shall be witnesses unto me. Okay, is that what this is not
saying? Ye shall be witnesses, you're
gonna go to the then. You're going to be witnesses
unto me, both in Jerusalem and Judea and in Samaria and unto
the uttermost part of the earth. Now, at that point, they didn't
know how that was going to fall out. But us looking back, having
the scriptures before us now, look back and see it happened
exactly that way. The gospel went first to Jerusalem
and then into Judea and then into Samaria and then into the
uttermost parts of the world. If you remember the church, whenever
it was scattered, whenever the dispersion came, when Paul was
breathing out threats, the Jews from the Jerusalem church scattered
into Judea and Samaria. And at that point, they began
to preach the gospel where they was at. And churches began to
form in those places. But then when Paul came around,
guess what? It started going out further than Judea and Samaria.
It went out to the other parts of the world. to all the Gentile
nations. And so we see that that exactly
as Christ said, took place. And it was all because that the
church, the local church has been given power to do these
such things. The ye has been given power.
And where did that power come from? Well, back in Matthew chapter
28, we see it in verse 18. Jesus said, all power is given
unto me in heaven and on earth. Jesus had the power, the authority, and he has called or commissioned
the ye to go to them, and once them are made disciples, baptize
and teach. The gospel is to be, the gospel
commission at least, is to be through the local church, by
the local church, through the local church, and whenever one
is made a disciple, it still is part of the local church ministry
to baptize them and to teach them all things whatsoever Christ
commands. That's why we gather here today.
That's why we're here today. It's also for worship.
We worship together and corporately lift up our praises and worship
Christ. Now, we'll stop right there. What time is it? It's 1108. We'll stop right there. We'll
take a quick break and then we'll come back After we use the restroom
and stuff, we'll take a quick break, come back. There's a few
other things I'd like to make note of in this before we break
for lunch. But anyway, we'll stop and take
a break and get a drink.