Great Commission and Carole

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0:00 For the rest of us, we've been talking about how God has laid out a life for us to live and how we understand what we should occupy ourselves with. I landed on something, we went through the whole story of Scripture for like 30 weeks and looked at the story of Scripture, and then I was after doing that, I was thinking, sitting with the question, well what should I do with my life? What is the goal? What is the job of a disciple of Jesus?

0:31 How do I apply this great story to what I should do? I've got years here, what do I do with them? And I realize that the church has been answering that question, what do we do with our years, with our time, our talent and our energy? How do we build a life that we'll like better yet? How do we build a life that we were made for that is pleasing to God? And they talk about that theology is developed into this theology of vocation, way of thinking about God and our relationship to Him in terms of vocations.

1:01 And our vocations are grouped into three arenas, the arena of family, church, and what we're calling neighborhood, so like work and civic responsibility. And so that God has set out work for you to do in these three arenas. And one of the things that I really like about thinking about my life vocationally is that it doesn't, it means that I don't have to like go off and by myself and wonder,

1:32 what is the great purpose of my life? What is the thing that will bring me most fulfillment? I don't have to like try and figure out what is the one thing to which I am called and destined. If I'm dissatisfied, if I feel aimless, if I feel unfulfilled, the place to invest myself to begin is to look at the vocations that God has given me. I'm born into a world with people that need me. And so I start taking those vocations seriously. And it helps to go in order.

2:03 I'm called to a family. Then I'm called to a church and then I'm called to a neighborhood. And to go, what are my roles and responsibilities? Who can I be in this place? What do people need from me? How do I lean into these places in a way that kind of awakens me and livens me and brings me to life? And last two weeks we've been talking about family. And one of the things that stuck with me last week when we were talking about family, we were talking about Jesus on the cross and how he, as he's there,

2:34 hanging on the cross, how he gives John to his mother Mary and says, Mary, have your son John and John have your mother Mary. And the new idea that occurred to me last week in that text that I had never thought of before was that Jesus gives John to Mary and I always assumed it was because he didn't want her to be without a dude. Joseph wasn't there anymore. And so she needed someone to help take care of her. In that world, if you didn't have a son or a husband, you were a widow and it was hard to take care of yourself.

3:07 You couldn't have possessions in the same way, it was difficult. But last week what occurred to me that had never occurred to me before is as Jesus is hanging there and gives John to Mary that he has brothers actually. Other people who could take up that role and responsibility. And so I did a little bit of research last week and the idea that's been sticking with me is that the best guests scholars have on why Jesus did that is because the last interaction we see with Jesus' brothers, they think he's crazy and they have written him off.

3:37 And so he says this family that I was given won't take care of my mother in the way that we should. I still don't refuse, abdicate or neglect my responsibility as a son. I'll pick a new family to be family to her. So this idea that your family may have fallen down, fallen short, tripped up or abandoned, but you still then are called to be family to someone. Who will you be the sister, mother, husband, father, son, brother to?

4:09 And so anyway we've wrapped up family. We're going to start looking over the next couple of weeks at church and neighborhood. And the idea, the place I want to look for church this week is in Matthew chapter 28. If you would look there with me, Matthew chapter 28, right at the very end of Matthew's gospel, it's a pretty famous verse. Matthew chapter 28, start number 16. This is after the crucifixion of Jesus and the resurrection.

4:42 Matthew accounts, interesting, you know, the three gospels, especially Matthew, Mark and Luke, take a very, they tell a lot of the same stories coming up to the crucifixion. After the crucifixion and the resurrection, you can tell that the guys are like just so caught off guard by the resurrection and the appearance of their friend and rabbi Jesus. They include different stories.

5:12 Luke goes off and writes a whole little, you know, another book, the Acts of the Apostles, Mark, includes different stories. Matthew is the one that includes what has come to be called the Great Commission. But it's where Jesus, he tells the women at the tomb, tell the guys to meet me in Galilee. Now remember, probably half of the disciples were from Capernaum, which was a town on the sea of Galilee. And the reason they're from there is because Jesus, as he starts his ministry, he's in that region.

5:45 And so he's walking around that region. He takes a tax collector. He takes several fishermen from that region, right? He collects several young men from that region around the Sea of Galilee. And then a lot of this stuff happens around the Sea of Galilee. The Sea of Galilee is where he did the miracle of fish. It's where he walked on water, on the shores of the Sea of Galilee is where he fed the 5,000. Probably on this hill here that they're at is where he delivered his sermon on the Mount. It might even be near...

6:16 Well, they disagree on transfiguration. But when the women tell Jesus... When Jesus tells the women to have the disciples meet him in Galilee, it's like meeting them in their hometown. And they go there and they walk up to the hill of Galilee where Jesus has called them. And we're at chapter 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.

6:48 Verse 18. And Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. And that's it. You know, we know that then he ascends up.

7:24 But the part that I was looking at there is... I've talked about this before, but Jesus has accomplished the death and resurrection and now has all authority in heaven and on earth. And the next sentence is not the one I would have. All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. Therefore I'm sending you. I would probably say something like all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. So I like this spot. I'm going to be here. I'll set up a little spot. And if you guys have any questions or challenges or wonder what you need to do,

7:57 you just come here and I'll tell you how to handle it. I've got all authority. I'll make all decisions going forward. I'll stay here. You guys come and bring problems and I'll solve them. Right? But Jesus says, all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. Therefore I'm going to send you out. So the first thing about this great commission is God's like crazy persistence to continue to turn over responsibility to humanity.

8:27 You know, he made the earth and then gave it to them and they ruined it. And he continues to give it back to them over and over again. And the work of Christ accomplishes the great reversal of the fall. You know, whereas humanity is destined to be separated from God and head to death. Now the death and resurrection of Christ unite humanity and God again and destined them for life eternal.

8:57 Christ has like reversed the great problem of humanity. And he's done it right now. That's why he says, all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. So we got it. So then he's like, instead of me going around and delivering the good news that the problem of humanity has been solved, that now though you die yet will you live, that the sting of death has been gone, that the reign of Christ has been brought down to earth now, that all things will be set to right in the time to come. He's like, instead of me going around and now set, why don't you guys go around and announce that.

9:30 And I'll be with you. That's crazy. To me, that's crazy. I don't know if these guys would have registered it as crazy. Remember the system that they're in? Jesus is a rabbi. They've seen other rabbis. And when Jesus goes around teaching people are like, yeah, we know this form. We're just amazed that he teaches with such authority and new ideas. And so they would know that they were disciples of a rabbi. In any situation that happens, you are a disciple until your rabbi leaves.

10:03 He's got 12, then he dies. Now he's got 12 people taking on his teaching. That's just how the rabbinical system works. So Jesus doesn't blow up the rabbinical system. And when they get there and he's like, all authority in heaven has been to earth has been given to me. Now you therefore go and teach. This would be the model they expected. What kind of blows their mind though, I think, is when he says, go therefore and make disciples of all nations.

10:35 That then his teaching now, his teaching works for everybody. Wherever you go, you can make disciples of anybody. Of course, this phrase has been like, if you're around the church at all and looking at the room, these are people who have been around the church a fair amount. The great commission is, I think we talk about a lot, you know.

11:05 So a couple key things here. And we're going to a Greek lesson just for a little bit in order to get really what is happening here. But the first thing that's very conspicuous about this great commission is that it's to the eleven and not to everyone. It's to these leaders of the church. That's really interesting. Jesus could have done it anywhere.

11:35 He does it with the eleven in their hometown in a place where they're comfortable. The ones he's taught for three years. The ones who have been his disciples and following him around. The ones that have watched all the miracles. The ones that have been on the F-3 number tree. Like this is in a haphazard commissioning. This is people who have been steeped in the way of Jesus as intimately as anybody ever. Right? This isn't just, oh, you're just now here. Now go and take on the world. This is, I've been investing in you for a period of time. A significant period of time.

12:06 Now you take up and do what you know. The next thing that you have to under here, we're getting to the Greek. Especially this kind of Greek, it's called Koine Greek. It's New Testament Greek. It's built on a lot of participles. Anybody remember what a participle is? I had to look up the definition just to make sure I got it right for you. Koine Greek is built on a lot of participles. We don't use a lot of participles in English language, but it's because we've evolved to use a lot more prepositions to explain how things relate to one another.

12:36 But in Koine Greek, they use a lot of participles which are verbs that are used as adverbs or adjectives. So you use a verb to describe the way something is done, the time something is done, the means by which something is done. The easiest way to spot a participle in English language is a verb with I-N-G on the end. So you could say, Terry's going to go away running. Running in that sense is actually describing the way in which Terry is going away.

13:08 So the running is a participle there. Terry's going to go away running. That's a participle. This is why it gets important here. In this great commission, there are a couple of participles. First he says go, and we've talked about this before, but this go isn't like take off on a voyage. It's like as you're moving about the world, as you go in your places, this is why it's significant that it's all nations, wherever you find yourself, make disciples.

13:44 But these three verbs make disciples. That's two English words out of one Greek word, which is like, I mean it means make disciples, but it's one word, disciple making. Make disciples of all nations. So the make disciples, and then this baptizing, see how this is an I-N-G and teaching, are participles. They're describing the ways in which they're somehow describing the making of disciples.

14:18 And the best way to understand the relationship, so now how you discern it, it could be a participle of time, it could be a participle of cause. The one I like the best is a participle of means. So this is why this is important. The job of the church is crazy. The call of the church is crazy, the responsibility of the church is crazy. Jesus takes 11 dudes, we are pretty sure Peter is the only one who is over 21.

14:54 11 young dudes who have been with him for three years and haven't figured it out yet. On the hill of Galilee, they're on the wrong side of the desert, they're separated from power, they're separated from money, they're not wealthy. They're like the blue collar guys, they're like the fishermen, they're the rejects, the tax collectors. He takes 11 guys and tells them, okay, you are going to make disciples of this teaching all across the world.

15:31 And what do they do, man? They run and hide. They're afraid. And actually then they stay in Jerusalem until they run for their life and wherever they find themselves, they can't not tell people how they're living because they saw the resurrected Christ. But in order to accomplish this crazy job, he gives them these two tools. He says, make disciples by means of utilizing these tools.

16:05 And most rabbis didn't have baptism. John the Baptist, when he's baptizing people, he's not baptizing people into his discipleship, he's baptizing them with a, it's called a ceremonial washing where they commit themselves to something new. Jesus says, now you can baptize people in the name of God, into me, Father, Son and Spirit. He says, make disciples and I'm giving you these tools, baptism and all the things I've taught you.

16:38 And these two tools together, we haven't used them perfectly, we haven't figured out always how best we can tort the teaching, we miss apply baptism, we forget it. These two tools then, right, within a couple hundred years, become, the way of Jesus becomes the dominant religion of the dominant empire of the world, not because it has run through the grassroots. And so the reason that the church endures is because we have these two things.

17:14 We have the words Jesus taught us and we can be baptized into his name. To me this is a great comfort because it means that this core arena of my life is not agreeing to a dead set of doctrines. It's not following a bureaucratic set of rules. It's not an appropriate membership card to the right association.

17:51 It is life empowered by the Spirit aligned with the ancient teachings of Jesus, baptized mystically into his kingdom. You have a family you get to live in. God has put the lonely into families and also a church to which you belong.

18:24 The church of Jesus stretching unbroken across every country through every nationality in every language all the way back to Jesus of Nazareth, his teaching and his baptism. So like the great call and opportunity is to lean in man. The church has never looked better than you. Nobody in church has ever been more holy than you.

18:54 More right than you. More capable than you. The world needs church. The world needs you. You are church. Lean in man. With all its attendant circumstances, opportunities and responsibilities, we get to be the church. Not alone. Not nothing. Not ill-equipped. Fully equipped with the tools of his teaching and his baptism. So I ask Carol to come and share a little bit about how she thinks about church. As we've been doing last two weeks ago, we heard from Amy about what it's like to be in family.

19:27 And last week we heard from Erin about what it's like to be in family. And so this week I'd like to hear a little bit from Miss Carol Forrest about how she thinks about being a part of the church. See if we can give her a seat. And a way to be heard. Thank you. Thanks for coming up, Carol. What do you want to do?

19:58 Want me to ask you these questions or do you have something you want to say? Sure. I just have answers to questions. Oh, nice. So the first thing I was thinking about is like, how do you think about church as a place where God works? Like you've been in churches. Obviously you've been here for a long time. This place has looked different every couple of years. How do you think about church as a place where God works? Yeah, I've been in churches my whole life. So I don't know what it looks like without church.

20:31 But when I was thinking about it for the last couple of weeks, I feel like I come to the conclusion that God kind of works in church here specifically. Like take it all right to our little place sort of as a collective nervous system regulation. Oh, wow. Like we worship together, we sing songs physically that is anywhere you go.

21:07 If you're singing songs at a concert in your house and your farm that actually regulates your body physically. And so to do it as a collective group of people with faith message is spiritual and physical. So I feel like church is significant in that way. Like physical, we're here together.

21:39 We love each other. We gather because of one single idea that Jesus is important. Yeah. And we need to be reminded of that. So I thought about that as a reminder that we're not alone. Yeah. We are together like we can touch each other, we can see each other and talk to each other and be reminded that this is where it is because of him. Yeah. Like that's different than anywhere else that we go or do in our lives.

22:13 So that's how I think God's works. I like that. And mentally. Yeah, there's a physical reality of it. You have trouble hearing her it was. Yeah. I think I'm going to go to that mic. What do you think church people owe each other? This is a weird question. Because my first thought is we don't really owe each other anything. But we do because of the way God works.

22:49 They, God, the Father, Holy Spirit, Jesus are not alone. They are three in one. God. And so showing up is what we owe each other to represent God is to show up for each other. And that's what church is. To me, it's a committed time where even if we don't see each other in real life every day, a lot of us do see each other in real life every day because we're intentional about it.

23:24 And just because naturally we've all kind of come together. But church to me as a worker of the church, as a love of the church, I love church. I feel like we owe it to each other to keep showing up. Because if we don't, then it doesn't exist. So also showing each other we're not alone.

23:55 That's what we owe to each other. Yeah, I like that. I like to tell people sometimes it's not like we all have brunch together every Sunday. And some of us go to different restaurants for brunch. Like there's something that happens when you're church for each other where there's a care that is legitimate. And I can't quite pinpoint on how it happens or where it comes from or where it goes when people leave. But there is something about the recognition. There's a fraternal love, I feel like, amongst the people of the church.

24:27 And that is important. I think we're not just experiencing something together. We're not just consuming something together, but we actually are something together. And how that bears out supporting each other's needs. So one of the things I feel like in addition to what you were saying about a bit longing and showing up. What showing up to me means is communicating need and then also responding to need.

24:57 And so yeah, showing up. Cool. This one I don't even know exactly what I meant, but like how does the church engage God or how do we engage God as church? Does that question make sense? Or does it make you sad something you want to say? Yeah, I kind of thought of it like how do we engage God as church? Like what do we do together to look at God?

25:27 And I thought of like my intention is to help facilitate community. So everywhere we go we kind of have different communities where we meet people and do things, but this community faces God. Like that's our one thing in common and we have a lot of other things. And the way we do that is church things.

25:57 Yeah. Singing together. It's not well. It's something we do outside of here together. Karaoke. It's not. Yeah, I feel like that's how we engage God as church. Like church is a collective. It's a family that we get to be part of that we pick. So like it's not like a hard obligation, but it's a joyful obligation.

26:31 I feel like obligation is a bad word. But it doesn't have to be. No, I feel like it's a great. I like my obligation. So yeah, I feel like God's always pulling us together. No matter how hard we try to not. If we're hurt or if we're scared or if the church is weird, I feel like the people of God are continuously pulled together. Yeah, yeah, I like that. Yeah.

27:01 And for what it's worth that, like pulling together, I think that where it said bank disciples by baptizing and teaching, so like I have this notion, it's not my own that I learned, that the word of God, capital W, second person of the Trinity, is active in the announcement of the person of Christ's teaching. So that when we announce the good news of Jesus is in charge, he's king, he's given you purpose and life, those aren't just words that you can ascend to or disagree with.

27:34 But the Holy Spirit comes with those words to pull us together, that the word of God comes with those words to pull us together. So there's something mystical happening when we announce the truth of God, the word of God goes with that. That's why it gave it to us as a means to accomplish the disciple making like you're saying we face God. How does faith interact with your church engagement? I didn't like to be by myself.

28:06 Where did you hear that? I like I do say. I really like to be by myself and I feel like if I didn't have faith, I could be by myself. Yeah. But I feel like my faith is so fulfilling and so joyful and so loving. That I can't do it by myself. Like there's no way I can, I have to care about people because that's what was put in me with my faith.

28:42 And I believe that's what God does for us and so that's what he puts in me to give, to make disciples to baptize. That is the part that my faith pushes me to be part of this because I don't. I wouldn't naturally want to deal with people. I don't want to be up here. I don't want to sing in a microphone. I do love to sing and I feel like it's a gift.

29:13 And for some reason it was given to me and so I feel like I can't keep it to myself. We're glad you don't. What's most effective in moving you toward church? I feel like being independent, being okay with being by myself also leads to sadness and depression and loneliness.

29:48 And so having a place that I know exists every single week to remind me of joy and faithfulness and all those fruits of the spirit and love. It keeps me alive and living and joyful and not drowning in an echo chamber of myself.

30:18 So does that answer that? Yeah, definitely. It takes faith to believe sometimes that continuing to engage with a group of people is good for you. And it doesn't always feel like it's time worth it or that there's something new there or but faith drives me in to go, no, I believe that this is a thing to which I am called. There are people there that need me. There is fulfillment in engaging and so I'll continue to lean in.

30:49 And that's what I'm trying to say I handle on how we can use these vocations is when we feel adrift or aimless or dissatisfied that the vocations are a place to which you move in. And sometimes action precedes attitude. Sometimes you move in and you find that you come alive and faith can drive you in there. Cool. Anything that we else that we need to say? Ms. Carol? Awesome. Let me pray and then we can worship together. Hey, Lord, thank you for Carol and for her gifts and her willingness to share those with us.

31:21 Thank you for bringing her to this crew of your church. Thank you for this room and all the people who called across Orlando Church teach us how to be church for one another well. Teach us that now as we sing and worship and this week as we ponder. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.