GENEROUS 2012
THE GREAT COMMISSION
DR. JIM DIXON
APRIL 12, 2012
MATTHEW 13, MATTHEW 28:18-20
The Great Commission is the mission given to the church of Jesus Christ. It is found in Matthew chapter 28, and in another form in Acts chapter one, and then still in another form in Mark chapter 16. In Matthew 28, the words of Jesus are these: “All power in heaven and on earth have been given to Me. Go, therefore, into all the world, and make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” In Acts chapter one, the words of Jesus just before His ascension into heaven are these: “You shall be My witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.” And then in Mark 16, the words of Jesus are these: “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation.”
Now, I think the Great Commission has been misunderstood. It has been misunderstood because I think some people believe that the call in this mission is to convert the world, or that the call is to convert your nation, or that the call is to convert your city or your next door neighbor. And of course that is the hope, but it’s not the call of the Great Commission. I think we need to understand we don’t have the power to convert anybody. We have the call to tell people with love and truth, to share the gospel and to be as witnesses. But we don’t have the power to convert anybody. Only God does. I think people have focused on Matthew 28 where Jesus tells us to go into the world and make disciples, but we don’t have the power to make those disciples. Those words are proceeded by His statement, “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Go, therefore.” He has the power. So our call is simply to speak. Our call is to witness. Our call is to preach in truth and in love. And this is the call of the church of Jesus Christ in every generation.
We’re told that as we are faithful to this call and as we go into the world and into our neighborhood, many will reject our witness. We’re told that many will not believe the gospel. This is the message of the parable of the sower in Matthew 13, which is also found in Mark eight and in Luke four. And this is also the message of the parable of the wheat and the tares found in Matthew 13 and even the parable of the dragnet, which is in Matthew 13. Through these parables, Jesus tells us as we go into the world many will reject the witness and many will reject the gospel. The seed of the gospel will fall on many soils and many will reject it because of a hard heart or because of worldly interests or because of the devil himself. Many will reject it, but some by His power will accept our witness to the gospel. And of course as Jesus sends us forth into the world, He reminds us that we’re not going to be liked always as we’re faithful to the mission of the church. And as we are His witnesses, some people will not like us. So in the Olivet Discourse, Jesus reminded us, “You’ll be hated by all nations for My namesake. If they hated Me, they will hate you. I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves.”
I think that’s why many of you do not witness, because you don’t want to suffer. And I think that’s why many of you are not faithful to share the gospel, because you do not want to suffer. And of course, we’re also told by our Lord Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapter seven that there’s probably going to be more people reject the message then accept it. “Wide is the gate, easy is the path that leads to ruin and destruction, and many there are who find it. Narrow is the gate and hard is the path that leads to eternal life, and few there are who find it.” And yet He sends us forth with a reminder that, in the last days, things will be particularly hard because many will depart from the faith, giving heeded to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons (1 Timothy four) and the time is coming when people will no longer endure sound teaching, but they’ll accumulate teachers to suit their own like liking and they’ll turn away from listening to the truth (2 Timothy four).
And of course, the final days will be the age of apostasy (2 Thessalonians chapter two). Yet He sends us forth. How in the midst of this call and commission are we to find fulfillment? And I promise you, fulfillment is not success by any worldly standard. Fulfillment is just faithfulness—to be faithful and to obey. And I believe with all my heart that when you’re faithful, there’s a joy, there’s a fulfillment. There’s a sense of completion that He gives. As you witness and as you share the gospel, there’s a fulfillment that the world will never understand.
Today we continue our generous series and we pose the question, how in our giving can we find fulfillment? And I’m going to suggest this morning that at least in part it’s tied to the Great Commission, because we support the Great Commission not only with our mouth and with our words but with our prayers and with our finances. And so today we look at what it means to be faithful in the sense of generosity. What does it mean to be faithful? I want to give two teachings.
The first is this: if we’re faithful with our money, we must support the vision of God in Christ. And what is that vision? I would submit to you that, primarily, essentially, that vision is the church. That’s why we have Matthew 16:18, the words of Jesus, “I will build My church, and the powers of hell will not prevail against it.” And of course, the church, as we shall see, has broad scope. It’s not just local congregations, but it’s the cause of Christ on earth, and indeed the kingdom of heaven on earth.
Now, in the year 1853, a British archeologist named JG Taylor was digging around, as archeologists tend to do, in Mesopotamia, 50 miles from the Euphrates River, in the midst of the desert. He was digging around and he made an amazing discovery that shocked the world. JG Taylor discovered the ancient city of Ur, the capital of the kingdom of Sumer, a city that had been lost for thousands of years. He found it beneath the sand.
Then in 1922 to 1934, during that 12-year period, the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania joined hands in a great archeological dig at that site that JG Taylor discovered. They unearthed the city of Ur. They found streets just radiating outward from a center core with homes and buildings. They found a great temple in the center of the city, a giant ziggurat, a stepped pyramid rising to the heavens. And they realized as they did further examination that this city was 6,500 years old. But they also discovered that something happened there about 4,000 years ago, about 2,000 years before Christ. They discovered Euphrates River changed its course. The Euphrates River was flowing right into the city of Ur, right by this great capital city of Ur, which the Bible calls Ur of the Chaldees. And it changed its course and went 50 miles away 2,000 years before Christ, 4,000 years ago. At that time, archeologists tell us, people began to abandon the city of Ur. They began to just leave en masse. The water, the source of life, was gone.
One of those who left the city at that time you know his name because his name was Abraham. He fled the city of Ur where he had lived. The Euphrates had left, and afraid he had left water was scarce. Abraham fled west to Haran. There with his father, Terah, his wife, Sarah, and his nephew Lot and perhaps other extended family members, he lived for a time in Harran. It was there that God gave the vision to Abraham, “You shall leave your father’s house and go to the land that I will show you. Those who bless you, I will bless. Those who curse you, I will curse. And I will make of you a great nation, and your descendants shall be as the stars of the heavens.”
So he went in faith and he birthed the Arab people and the Jewish people. And he established from his line the nation of Israel, as promised by God. The vision of God. Many supported that vision through the centuries. Some fought it. Even today, as Israel has been restored in fulfillment of biblical prophecy, many support it and many fight it. But God gives visions. And the great vision that God has given this world through His Son is the vision of His church, the church of Jesus Christ.
I know that when this church began, God gave us a vision. I mean, you might doubt that, but I have no doubt. 30 years ago, God gave us a vision to birth this church. And when I first heard the call to this vision, I said no. When I heard it again and then again I said, no, no. But ultimately I knew in my heart this was the call of God and this is the vision of God. And He saw what we could not see. So when this church was birthed we had no idea what it would ultimately be like. But we knew that God was calling us to start a community and that He was calling us to honor His Word and to live by the authority of His Word. And He was calling us to fall in love with Jesus and to serve Him as long as we draw breath.
This was the vision He gave us. And many of you through the years have given to that vision and you have supported that vision. And I pray and I hope you have found some fulfillment in that. I hope you know that every person who’s accepted Christ in this ministry, through your giving, you’re part of that. Everyone who’s accepted Christ, every kid in a Sunday school class, every student in the youth ministries, everyone who’s accepted Christ, you’re a part of it through the gifts that you’ve given. And every missionary that has taken Christ to foreign nations, you’re a part of that through the gifts you’ve given. And every inner-city child who is poor or has been oppressed but has been mentored through our programs, you’re a part of that. Through the gifts you’ve given of your time and your treasure, you’re a part of that. And every marriage that was broken but has been healed through the ministries of the church, you’re a part of that. And the gifts you’ve given, every person who was just so filled with despair—they didn’t want to live another day—but found hope in Christ to continue on, you’re a part of that.
That should bring fulfillment through your generosity. And of course, it’s taken many faithful people. I just want to introduce you to one family in our church who has learned to give sacrificially and faithfully. Their names are John and Natalie, and they have three kids. And we want you to see this little video of this family in our church.
“My name’s John, my wife is Natalie. I have a son, Blake, who’s at Baylor University. I have a daughter, Elena, 13, and a son, Alec, 12. I did not grow up in a Christian family, so there was no talk of God, much less giving any of your money to the church. So when I would go to church, tithing would come up. I would be like, why do they want your money? And it seems like every time I come, they just want to talk about gimme money, gimme money, gimme money. So I struggled with it. I can understand the purpose of giving to the church, so the church can turn on its lights and hire people and blah, blah, blah. I can understand the business side of it. I did not understand the principles behind it via God.
“It came down to… Natalie and I describing like, if you grab whatever you want to hold onto, you’re going to grab it tight. You only have so much room in your hands to hold whatever you’re trying to grab. What God is saying is, if you’ll open your hands and give me that 10th with a cheerful heart, I will fill it fuller than you can hold. And what I had to own was really it’s all God’s. So God has a hundred percent. He’s really willing to give you 90%, and all He asks in return is to give a 10th back.
“The biggest thing that that changed in my heart was I got away from thinking it was my money and realized that God gave me the talent. God gave me the mind that I have to earn a living. God gave me the work ethic. God gave me everything. I don’t deserve to have the company I have. I don’t deserve to have what I have based on who I am, in my opinion. So it is a gift from God solely. So it’s very easy, when I change my heart, to give my 10% because it’s not mine anyway. I still have a hard time writing that check. I’ve gotten to where it’s, nope, I take the checkbook to church and I write it in church. I don’t write it before church. I write it right when they’re singing. I put it right in the offering and love it every time I do it. But I battle it the day of so much. So sometimes where I’m like, you know, I could just kind of hope that maybe something comes up and we just can’t go to church today. So I think, you know, I’m not perfect. I don’t want to come across as perfect. I do believe that it’s God’s. But once it’s in your hands, it’s still difficult to let go, even if it’s not yours.
“My hope for my children is that they love the Lord, they see God’s grace, and they see Him working. They see the path. They can look back and be like, okay, I did this and I see how He used it. And as soon as you open your eyes and really see the Lord working in your life, it makes it so much easier,because it’s a step out in faith. I want them to fully believe, be all in. And that is my hope as their dad and as their parent. I just want them all in. If they’re all in, they’ll be all in with their 10th and tithing is real easy.
God touches their heart for the vision of the church. And we thank God for them and all who are like them. But we know that God is working in our hearts to give us a vision of His church in all of its forms. Of course, churches vary in size. Some churches are large, some churches are small. And I think that’s all part of the plan of God. And they’re equally precious to God. A large church and a small church are equally precious to God. For God, it’s just about faithfulness. Are you faithful? That’s what it’s all about for God.
Of course some churches are very small. I read some time ago about a person traveling through Kansas. It was a Saturday and he was unfamiliar with a little town, but he wanted to go to church. He got out his directory and called a local church pastor and said, what time are your services tomorrow? And there was a pause. And then the pastor said, well, what time can you be here? So that’s a small church. But I think in the plan of God it’s all part of the plan. He wants you to have a vision that He’s called you to and for you to learn to give to it and support the greater cause of the kingdom of God.
Of course, understand that it’s not just local congregations that compose the church. There are so many other ministries that are so important as the kingdom of God is served on earth. I look back on church history, and I really think there were periods of time where God poured out His Spirit in power and there were special anointings in the church. I believe that that was true in that 10-year period between 1945 and 1955. From ‘45 to ‘55, there were 10 years of a tremendous outpouring of the Holy Spirit. And amazing things happened in the 1940s. There was a man named Torrey Johnson, and Torrey Johnson was a young man and he fell in love with Christ. And then Christ gave him a vision to take the gospel to high school kids. And so Torrey Johnson established a ministry called Youth for Christ. And it began to spread not only across America, but around the world. I traveled with Torrey some years ago to Singapore. What a great man of God Torrey Johnson was. And he had a vision from Christ to take the gospel to high school kids. And he recruited millions of people to support that vision that it might reach fruition.
And of course, in 1945, a young man joined Torrey Johnson in the very beginning of the Youth for Christ Ministry and served with Torrey and Youth for Christ. The name of that young man was Billy Graham. That’s how Billy Graham began. He began by working with Torrey Johnson and Youth for Christ. And then God gave a bigger vision to Billy Graham that he wouldn’t just reach high school kids, but he would reach men, women, and children, people of all ages with the gospel. And so in 1949, Billy Graham had his first great crusade in Los Angeles, and he established the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.
And of course, in that same timeframe, God raised up a man named Bill Bright. And Bill Bright was part of the college and career group at Hollywood Presbyterian Church. He’d been discipled by a marvelous woman named Ms. Henrietta Mears. And Bill Bright received a vision from God that he was to take the gospel to college aged kids. And so he shared his vision and people gave time, talent, treasure, and they prayed. And what was launched was Campus Crusade for Christ. That was the vision God gave Bill Bright. Campus Crusade for Christ expanded to become the largest parachurch ministry in the world, with over 15,000 employees.
And of course, around that same timeframe, Jim Rayburn was called by Christ to establish another ministry to young life, to kids. And that became Young Life. What an amazing ministry Young Life is.
About that same period of time, Bob Pierce received a vision from God to take the gospel to the poor and the oppressed of the world and to share with them the gospel, but to also bring them food and clothing, and he established World Vision.
And about that same time, Dawson Trotman started thinking, hey, we can’t just bring people to Christ. We have to disciple them. So God gave Dawson Trotman a vision for The Navigators. And of course, The Navigators is centered right now today down in Glen Eyre in Colorado Springs. What an amazing ministry.
All these ministries take money. They all take significant amounts of money. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association is not as large as it once was when Billy was younger, but even today has an annual budget of $350 million, all going to incredibly critical needs. And Franklin Graham, Billy’s son, established the Samaritan’s Purse by the vision of God. And that ministry is twice the size now of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, with an annual budget of $700 million. You might be thinking, wow. Yeah, it takes a lot of support to serve the cause of Christ on earth.
There are a lot of Christians who are generous, a lot of Christians who are willing to seek first His kingdom and His righteousness. If you’re a Christian, you’ve taken the “sacramentum.” This is the Latin word that was used to describe a sacred oath. The word sacramentum means “sacred oath.” It’s the word from which we get the word sacrament. And of course, this was the word that was used in the Roman world for the oath that Roman soldiers took before they joined the Roman legions. You had to take the sacramentum before you could join the Roman Legion. That meant that you pledged your life unto death for the cause of the emperor and empire. This was true of the Roman legions.
The Christians took this word and adopted it for the early church—they even referred to baptism as the sacramentum and the Lord’s Supper as the sacramentum—because they knew that they had pledged their lives unto death to king and kingdom. So you’re sitting there and I don’t know what you’re thinking. Maybe you’re just thinking, well, I’m just happy to be saved and now I want to have a good time. Maybe you’ve never caught a vision for the kingdom of Christ, you’ve never even thought about what it means to serve the king. Maybe you’ve never really thought about the words of Christ that, “I will build My church and the powers of hell will not prevail,” or the call of Christ to give to these purposes. But this is, I believe, the source of fulfillment. You can give your life to so many things, but if you give your time and your talent and your treasure to the cause of Jesus and to the kingdom of Christ and the church, you’ll find fulfillment in this life and in the life to come.
Which leads me to my last point, and that is that if you’re really faithful, you not only support the vision of God in Christ, you wait for the final judgment. You wait and you trust. You wait with confidence for the final judgment because you know that that’s when your fulfillment will be complete. I don’t know about you, but I just long to hear Jesus say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” And of course, that’s Matthew 25, the Olivet Discourse, the parable of the talents. And you can look in Luke 19 at the parable of the pounds and it’s similar wording. Do you want to hear Jesus say those words?
And both of those parables, the talents and the pounds, are monetary parables. Both the talents and the pounds were monetary units of exchange. In both parables, Jesus is the owner or the king and He’s leaving to receive kingly power, but He is going to come back and He’s entrusted money to His people—time, talent, and treasure to his people. And He is going to come back and see whether you’ve used it to serve His kingdom. As He goes to receive kingly power, He’s going to come again. Have you used what He’s given you to serve His kingdom? And He wants to be able to say to you, “well done, good and faithful servant.”
And you know, the word “good” there is so important. There’s two different Greek words for good. One is the word “kalos,” the other is the Greek word “agothos.” And this is the word agothos. This is so important. See, if Jesus has said, well done, good and faithful servant, and he had used the word kalos, it’d be a completely d different meaning, because kalos refers to moral goodness. It refers to intrinsic goodness—ethical, moral, righteousness. So Jesus didn’t use the word call. He wasn’t saying to the servant, hey, well done, righteous servant. He wasn’t saying that.
Now, Paul uses the word kalos in 2 Timothy when he says, “I fought the good fight. The point of my departure has already come. I’m already at the point of being sacrificed. I fought the good fight. I’ve kept the faith. I finished the race. A crown of righteousness is laid up for me.” The good fight is the fight for righteousness. He uses the word kalos, that moral and ethical goodness. And he had fought—the word “agonizomai”—he had agonized after righteousness and now he’s going to get the crown of righteousness. That’s one meaning.
And certainly, we fight that fight for righteousness. But that’s not what Jesus is saying to this servant in Matthew 25 in the parable of the talents. No, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” is the word agothos. And agothos means good in the sense of “beneficial in your effects.” So the king comes back and he is going to look for who has benefited the kingdom, who has had a beneficial effect on the kingdom. So ask yourself, are you having any beneficial effect on the kingdom of Jesus Christ? Because that’s what prompts the words well done, good and faithful. Are you benefiting the cause of Christ? And of course, we want to hear Him say, “Come, blessed of My Father. Inherit the kingdom,” because it’s all about the kingdom. It’s the kingdom we’re serving.
The word blessed can be “makarios,” which means happy. And as we serve the kingdom, it makes us happy. But the word that’s actually used here is “eulogeo.” And this word eulogeo for blessed is the word from which we get the word eulogy. It just means good word. So God is saying, if you serve the kingdom, He’ll say a good word about you. He will speak well of you, think well of you. That’s the greatest blessing of all. I long to see that.
I was reading in Archeology Magazine… I love the world of archeology. It’s one of my avocation. I get Archeological Magazine, which is a secular publication. I also get BAR, or Biblical archeological review, which is a religious publication. A third of the archeologists are Christian, a third are Jewish, and a third are secular in BAR. But there are fascinating discoveries that relate to the cause of Christ and they’re being made all the time. In this recent issue of Archeology Magazine, there’s a story about the lost churches of the medieval Sudan. And this is a story about, in the Sudan in Africa, they’ve unearthed now all these medieval churches that come from three different medieval kingdoms that were Christian kingdoms. One was the Kingdom of Makuria, one was the Kingdom of Axum, and one was the Kingdom of Nubia. And they found that the Kingdom of Makuria was actually centered in the Sudan, although they had power from the Red Sea all the way through the west side of Africa. And then the Kingdom of Axum was centered in Ethiopia. And then the Kingdom of Nubia was centered in Egypt. It was kingdom of Black-raced people and they ruled Egypt for hundreds of years. And these three kingdoms all became Christians—Makuria, Axum, and Nubia.
They all became Christian kingdoms and they built churches, many of them in the region of what is now the Sudan. They built churches, and some of these are great cathedrals and amazing ruins. And it’s just amazing how committed and devoted and the wonderful things that these Christians did. And they were all ultimately defeated by Islam. When the Muslim world came with a sword and they came with their military might, they destroyed the kingdom of Makuria in the 14th century, the Kingdom of Axum in the 10th century, and the kingdom of Nubia in the 14th century as well. So two of the kingdoms fell in the 14th century Islam with its military might, and of course, Muhammad had commanded his followers to take up the sword and to, if necessary, kill the infidels.
But Jesus gave a different message. Jesus said that we should not take up the sword, that the kingdom of heaven is not defended with the sword, but that he who lives by the sword will die by the sword. Now, it’s true that in Romans chapter 14, earthly governments are appropriately given the sword to deter evil on the earth. And it’s also true that even as Christians we might serve in an earthly government. But for the church, we’re not given the sword other than the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. So here came the Muslims, and they just slaughtered these three kingdoms, according to this secular magazine.
You might ask the question, will all these Christians who lived and died all stand before Christ at the last judgment? And what will Christ say to them? Will He say, “Well done”? And of course, it’ll depend on whether they were faithful unto death. Understand, though, as even the archeology magazine points out, the Christians in these three kingdoms did not all die. They just moved. Some of them died, willing to give their lives, but the others just moved. It was like whack-a-mole. Have you ever played whack-a-mole? Wherever you hit ’em, they just popped up somewhere else. These Christians did that, as they just rose up in other parts of the world and continued to witness for Christ, continued to proclaim in truth and love the gospel of Christ. And it’s on the basis of that they will be judged faithful in their time.
Of course, Christ builds his church. Today, as He has promised, today there are 1.6 billion Muslims in the world, but 2.4 billion Christians. We’re winning, by the numbers. And of course, only God knows the heart and who really believes. But you don’t need to worry about the church. Jesus said, “I’ll build My church and the gates of hell will not prevail.” Just be faithful. Just be faithful and you’ll find fulfillment in this life and, oh, what fulfillment you’ll find in the life to come.
Part of that fulfillment, part of that faithfulness, relates to the use of money. And as we close, I just want to mention one other story in this archeology magazine concerning China. You know, China for 700 years was the equivalent of the Roman Empire. China had the power in the East and the Roman Empire in the West. And a lot of American students are not fully aware of the magnitude of what happened in China. And you know, with the fall of the Qin Dynasty, about 200 years before Christ, and of course the great ruler of the Qin Dynasty was Qin Shi Huang, who built the great wall of China. Qin Shi Huang in Xi’an built that famous burial chamber for him to rule in the afterlife, with these cavernous skies that are painted like the stars and with rivers and cities built for him to rule in death all under the earth. And he created terracotta replicas of each individual member of his imperial army.
I mean, this guy was amazing and maybe a little crazy, but he united China. And after the fall of the Qin Dynasty there rose up the Han Dynasty, and the Han Dynasty is what the archeological magazine is about. And when Jesus was born in Bethlehem, it was the Han Dynasty that was flourishing in China and in the East. And they required great wealth for their growth and power and scope. And where did they get it? Well, this archeological dig in China near the city of Xi’an, has unearthed a giant mint. And we’re not talking about a breath mint. We’re talking about a place where currency was minted.
They found that in this mint that over a period of 700 years 48 billion coins were minted. How they ascertained that conclusion I don’t know. They reflected wealth that was accumulated through precious metals and through the productivity of their industry and through the spoils of war. But it takes money. It’s always been like. It that takes money to fuel a kingdom. It’s even true of the kingdom of Christ. So when you look at the church as large and small, and when you look at the parachurch and you look at World Vision and Campus Crusade for Christ and Young Life and organizations like Fellowship of Christian Athlete and all the different kinds of organizations that are out there, just know they need your support. It’s a test of your generosity. Fulfillment comes in faithfulness. Fulfillment comes not only in this life, but all in the life to come. Let’s look to the Lord with a word of prayer.