How do we bring God glory through the Great Commission?
1.) Realize It Is About Him, Not Me. V.18
John 3:30 “He must increase, but I must decrease.”
John 4:34 “Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.“
John 5:30 “I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.”
John 6:38 “For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me.”
2.) Refocus On The Urgent Task. V.19
Be Urgent, Matthew 24:44 “Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”
U–Understand the destiny of the Lost (Rev.20:15) “And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.”
R–Repent of my silence (Acts 4:20) “for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.”
G–Go and Tell (Great Commission, Matthew 28:18-20)
E–Equip Others to Tell (Make disciples, 2 Tim.2:2) “and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.”
N–Now is the Time (2 Cor.6:2; Romans 13:11) “For he says,“In a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you.” Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation. Romans 13:11 “Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.”
T–Time is Short (1 Cor.7:29) “This is what I mean, brothers: the appointed time has grown very short. From now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none,”
To Glorify God is to make Him known.
The greatest way to make Jesus known is to make disciples.
John 17:4 “I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do.”
John 17:18 “As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.”
The Great Commission is the task we must refocus on
Our Priorities: “The Glory of God & The Great Commission”
In his book, One Thing You Can’t Do In Heaven, Mark Cahill asks the following question. “Three hundred million years from now, what will be the only thing that will matter?” He answers by saying, “Three hundred million years from now, the only thing that will matter is who is in heaven and who is in hell. And if that is the only thing that will matter then, that should be one of our greatest concerns now.”
Why isn’t this often our greatest concern? One word comes to mind…
DISTRACTED– the diversion of attention of an individual or group (church) from the chosen object of attention (the glory of God & the great commission)
2 Corinthians 11:3 “But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ.”
How do you maintain that sincere and pure devotion?
Matthew 9:35-38 “And Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction. 36 When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. 37 Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; 38 therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” Jesus went, He saw, He had compassion…
William Carey “father of modern missions” Journal, March 29, 1794.
“O what is there in all this world worth living for but the presence and service of God – I feel a burning desire that all the world may know this God and serve Him-”
“I care not where or how I lived, or what hardships I went through, so that I could but gain souls for Christ. While I was asleep I dreamed of these things, and when I awoke the first thing I thought of was this great work. All my desire was for the conversion of the heathen, and all my hope was in God.”
Why don’t many of us have this burning desire?
“It seems obvious that some Christians think little about their mission in this world, except in regard to their own personal needs. They attend services and meetings when it is convenient or even frequently to enjoy all that is provided for them, take what they feel like taking, and have little concern for anything else. They are involved in the church only to the extent that it serves their own desires. It escapes both their understanding and their concern that the Lord has given His church a supreme mission and that He calls every believer to be an instrument in fulfilling that mission.” John MacArthur
If we are going to bring glory to God and fulfill the Great Commission we must…
3.) Reconstruct How We Do Church. V.20
-Why, because we know God is with us! God brings power to His people for His purpose! Acts 1:8
We must be about His business, not our business. We must hold everything we do under the microscope of the Great Commission!
We must not merely listen to the Word, we must DO what it says. (James 1:22)
-Our churches are filled with more consumers than reproducers.
-Some will go to church their whole lives and not be a part of fulfilling the G.C.
-We have conditioned ourselves to listen without a response.
-Knowledge based teaching vs. application based teaching.
-Imbalance between “knowing” and “going” (We know more than those in other countries, yet we go less)
-The church is meant to be a movement, not a monument
On a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occur, there was once a crude little rescue station. The building was just a hut and there was only one boat but the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and with no thought for their safety went out day and night, tirelessly rescuing the lost. Many lives were saved by this wonderful little lifesaving station. So it became famous.
Some of those who were saved and various others in the surrounding area wanted to become associated with the station and give of their time and money and effort for the support of its work. New boats were bought and crews were trained and the little life station grew.
Some of the members of the lifesaving station were unhappy that the building was so crude and poorly equipped. They felt a more comfortable place should be provided. So they replaced the emergency cots and beds and put better furniture in the large building.
Now the lifesaving station became a popular gathering place for its members and they decorated it beautifully and furnished it exquisitely because they used it as sort of a club. Fewer members were now interested in going to sea on lifesaving missions so they hired others to do the work.
The lifesaving motif still prevailed in the club’s decorations and there was a liturgical lifeboat in the room where club initiations were held. And about this time a large ship was wrecked off the coast and the hired crews brought in loads of cold, wet, half-drowned people. They were dirty and sick. The beautiful new club was considerably messed up. So, the property committee immediately had a shower house built outside the club where the victims of shipwrecks could be cleaned up before coming inside.
At the next meeting there was a split in the club membership and most of the members wanted to stop the lifesaving activity because they were a hindrance and unpleasant to the normal social life of the club.
Some members insisted on lifesaving as their primary purpose and pointed out they were still a rescue station after all. They were finally voted down and told if they wanted to save the lives of various kinds of people shipwrecked in those waters, they could begin their own rescue station down the coast…which they did.
As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that occurred in the old. It evolved into a club and then another rescue station was founded. History continued to repeat itself and if you visit that coast today, you’ll find a number of exclusive clubs along the shore, shipwrecks are still frequent but most of the people drown.