CHAPTER & VERSE
TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH
DR. JIM DIXON
ACTS 1:8
MAY 22, 2011
On August 3, 1492, Christopher Columbus set sail from Palos, Spain, with the Pinta, the Nina and the Santa Marina. They set sail across the Atlantic Ocean and into the unknown. On October 11 of that same year, 1492, as they came into the region that today we would call the Caribbean they saw land. On October 12, 1492, they brought their ship to a touchdown point on an island in the Caribbean and they named it San Salvador, which means Holy Savior. Christopher Columbus had a desire to serve Christ in all that he did. The Santa Maria would never return home. It crashed into a reef and went down at sea. But Christopher Columbus returned home. He returned home on March 15, 1493, to Palos, Spain. He met with the king of Spain and reported the new world and all that he saw. This was earthshaking news. Prior to 1492, coins were minted in Spain and across Europe that showed the Pillars of Hercules from the perspective of the Mediterranean Sea looking out past the Pillars of Hercules into the vast Atlantic, into an endless sea and the Latin words Ne Plus Ultra, “No More Beyond.” After Christopher Columbus returned, having seen the New World, they re-minted those coins. They actually struck out the word Ne, and so the coins simply said Plus Ultra, “More Beyond.” It was the beginning of a new era, the beginning of the era of colonization.
So, Spain and Portugal and England and many other European nations began to colonize the world. This has always been controversial; it is today, whether the colonization of people groups is something that brings progress or regress to the earth. How does it affect indigenous people groups such as Native American Indians? Very controversial is the whole subject of colonization today. Analogous to it is the controversy that now surrounds the Great Commission, Evangelical missions, taking the gospel of Jesus Christ to the nations. It is no longer PC. There are those that would argue that it is arrogance to take the message and person of Christ to the nations. Who are we to think that our beliefs are any better than the beliefs of any other people group in any other part of the world?
So, there is this negative stigma now attached to mission and outreach, to the great commission, to the call of Jesus Christ itself. Jesus said, “You will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. You will be dragged before governors and kings; I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves.” So, we should not be surprised. What I would like us to do as we look at the Great Commission and the call of Christ to take his gospel to the uttermost part of the earth. I would like us to do two things: I would like us to look at some of the arguments used against the Great Commission, and then some of the arguments used to support the Great Commission, arguments from Holy Scripture itself.
First of all are arguments that are being used in churches today to refute the Great Commission. Fewer and fewer American churches are doing Evangelical missions overseas. In fact, much of Evangelical missions is now being sponsored and sent forth from other nations—South America, some parts of Asia like South Korea, different parts of Africa. But in America, the number of churches participating in Evangelical missions is actually shrinking. It is not PC. So, some of the arguments that are being used in the churches against the Great Commission include, first of all, universalism. You see this growing movement within Christian churches today, the teaching of universalism, what used to be called Apocatastasis. Apocatastasis is the old name for universalism. It is kind of a Greek word, coined by Greek scholars and it means restoration. Restoration in the Old Testament is the concept that God promised he would restore Israel to the Jews. They were exiled, they were scattered over the earth and God would restore them. But restoration in the New Testament was a different sort of thing. It was the promise of God that in Christ, he would restore all things in heaven and on earth. In Christ, God was reconciling the world unto himself.
This Apocatastasis is now more generally called universalism, the belief that ultimately everyone will be saved and go to heaven. Hell will be emptied, if indeed there even is a hell. Universalism. You can see where universalism would undermine the Great Commission. Why go to the nations, why be his witnesses in all Jerusalem, in all Judea, in Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth if they are all going to be saved anyway? Why go? Some Universalists argue that hell doesn’t exist, but many Universalists argue that hell does exist, but it is temporary, it is remedial, it is redemptive, it is restorative. This is why hell will eventually be emptied, according to Universalists, and everyone will find themselves in heaven. The cross of Jesus Christ, as taught in universalism, is an offering of universal atonement. Universalists believe that on the cross Jesus atoned for all the sin of the world and it doesn’t even have to be appropriated, this atonement is just given gratis, by grace, freely, unmerited, without any faith necessary. Everyone has had their sin atoned for, it is the power of the cross, the blood of Christ covers the world. Universalism.
Now, sometimes, in conjunction with this belief, Universalists will quote 1 John 2: 1-2: “Brothers and sisters, I am writing this to you so that you may not sin but if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. He is the expiation for our sins, he is the atonement for our sins, and not for our sins only but also for the sin of the whole world.”
Other times you will see Universalists quote John 3:17. I know Rob Bell in his recent book called Love Wins, quotes both 1 John 2:1-2, and John 3:17. In John 3:17, the Bible says, “For God sent his son into the world not to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.”
So, Universalists use passages like this to support their beliefs. The problem is many of these verses are pulled out of context, and many other verses are just entirely ignored. For instance, John 3:17, is preceded by John 3:16, and you all know John 3:16: “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life.” The cross is appropriated by belief. You must believe. John 3:17 is followed by John 3:18-19: “He who believes is not condemned. He who does not believe is condemned already for he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. This is the testimony: light has come into the world and mankind has loved darkness rather than the light.”
There is no hint of universalism in those passages. Indeed, universalism really does not fit the teaching of Holy Scripture. Many Universalists, however, do teach that the atonement of the cross needs to be appropriated by faith, but not necessarily in this life. They believe that some people will respond to the cross and believe in Christ in this life, other people will respond to the cross and believe in Christ beyond the grave. In fact, many Universalists believe in post-mortem evangelism. They use passages like 1 Peter 3 and Ephesians 4. First Peter 3 tells us that our Lord Jesus Christ, between Good Friday, when he died on the cross, and Easter Sunday, when he rose from the dead, in that interval of time between Friday and Sunday, before he had received his resurrection body, we are told he went in the spirit and preached to the spirits of those who had disobeyed in the days of Noah. Universalists take this as an example of post-mortem evangelism. Ephesians 4 tells us that Jesus has ascended, but he has also descended into the lower parts of the earth.
Ephesians 4 tells us that he has led a host of captives on high. Some Universalists, again, take that to referring to post-mortem evangelism. You have this universalism which teaches that there is no hell, or there is a hell but it is just temporary, it is remedial, it is restorative, it ultimately will be emptied because God’s love will win. God’s gospel is relentless and it pursues people, even in hell, and ultimately all will come to faith and hell will be emptied and heaven will be filled. Universalism. Of course, this does not completely undermine mission because you might argue that we should still take the gospel to the nations so that people don’t have to spend any time in hell, but it kind of undermines the Great Commission because ultimately everyone is going to heaven anyway.
The issue is, what does the Bible say? The Bible tells us very clearly that hell exists. The Bible says this again and again and again. In the Bible there are many images of hell, and they all connote suffering. There is the image of the lake of fire. There is the image of the outer darkness where men will weep and gnash their teeth. There is the image of the bottomless pit. There is the image of the garbage dump; Jesus used this image when referring to Gehenna. You have these different images of hell, all which connote some kind of suffering.
No one spoke more about hell than Jesus. Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, spoke more about hell than any other author or person in the whole of the Scriptures.. The Bible makes it very clear that hell exists and I would say the Bible makes it very clear that hell is eternal. It is not temporal. The word that is used to describe the length of time that a person spends in hell is the word aion and aionios. I read Rob Bell’s book, and by the way, I don’t have any question that Rob Bell loves Jesus and I don’t have any question that parts of that book are deeply powerful and very well written; parts of that book really touched my heart. There are parts of the book that concern me, and any of those parts that lean towards universalism certainly concern me.
The concept of aionios is diverse. Rob Bell points out in his book that this word aionios can mean an age, it can mean a long period of time, but a period of time that is finite, a period of time that actually comes to an end. He argues that maybe hell is not eternal, maybe it is just an age, and maybe it is just a long period of time that comes to an end. Rob Bell is right, aionios can mean an age, and it can mean a long, but finite period of time. It is also true that this word can mean forever and ever and ever, it can mean eternal, it can mean everlasting. The only way to find out what the meaning is to look at the context.
66 times in the New Testament the word aionios is used to describe heaven. In every case all biblical scholars, all Greek scholars, agree that in every case it means everlasting, forever and ever and ever, eternal. There is nobody that thinks heaven is just for an age, just for some finite period of time. The word aionios, all 66 times it is used in reference to eternal life in heaven is taken to mean everlasting. Here is the problem: there is the principal in Greek exegesis, in Greek hermeneutics, called parallelism. When you are looking at an equation and it has polarity, the word, if it is used on both sides of the equation, must be given the same definition on both sides. So, when Jesus said, “Do not marvel at this. The day is coming where all who are in the grave will hear my voice and come forth, some to everlasting life and some to everlasting ruin.” The word aionios is on both sides of the equation. It is in a parallelism, and you can’t give it an eternal meaning on one side and a temporal meaning on the other side. You can’t take “everlasting life” to mean “life without end” and “everlasting death” to mean “an age.” That is a violation of Greek exegesis.
The Bible is really quite clear. Hell exists and it is eternal. There is not one place in the Bible where we are told that hell is remedial or redemptive or restorative. There is no reference to anyone getting out of hell. The Bible is clear. You might not like what it says, but what it says is clear: hell exists, it is eternal, it is punitive, and it is not remedial or redemptive. That is kind of a scary picture, but it is the biblical picture. We want to make the gospel palatable, but you can’t twist the Scriptures. The Bible says what it says. The Bible tells us that the cross must be appropriated by faith, the Bible makes that clear again and again and again. We must appropriate the blessings of the cross, the atonement of Christ, the forgiveness of sins through repentance and faith. This is the consistent call of the gospel. It is all throughout the Bible.
The opportunity for post-mortem evangelism is doubtful. First Peter 3 is a fuzzy passage with many interpretations. Ephesians 4 is a fuzzy passage with many possible interpretations. Those are the only two passages in the Bible that could possibly refer to post-mortem evangelism and I certainly wouldn’t put much hope in that. Post-mortem evangelism is doubtful. So, the call upon the church of Jesus Christ is to take the gospel to the world. So, much is at stake.
In the church of Jesus Christ, some also have diminished the Great Commission and also kind of made it less necessary by their view of annihilationism. Annihilationism is simply the belief that hell is simply annihilation. So, people who are not saved, people who do not go to heaven are simply annihilated, they cease to exist. Sometimes, annihilationists are mortalists. They believe that the soul cannot survive death. Sometimes they are psychopannychists; psychopannychists are those who believe that souls sleep. They believe that when you die your soul goes into a sleep state and they are saying that if you are not a believer that God will just let your soul sleep forever and ever and ever. God will never wake the soul up.
Then some annihilationists are mortalists in the sense of thnetopsychism, which has to do with soul death. They believe that the soul cannot survive without the brain, that the soul needs the neurons, the synapse patterns of the brain in order to function. So, when the body dies, the brain dies, the soul dies and eternal life requires resurrection of the body and the soul. These annihilationists say that God chooses with the unbelieving not to resurrect their body or their soul. He only resurrects the body and the soul of believers. Non-believers just cease to exist; there is no suffering.
Annihilationists argue that there might be a few people that go to a temporary hell because they are just really, really bad. People like Adolf Hitler, Ivan the Terrible, Attila the Hun, Joseph Stalin, may go to a temporary hell and then be annihilated. Most people don’t go to hell, they are just annihilated, they don’t ever suffer, they just cease to exist. This undermines the Great Commission because we might go to the nations to save people for something, but we certainly don’t go to save them from anything because there is no suffering that anyone is going to have. The passion for the gospel, again, is diminished. What is a biblical response to this? Sometimes, I think, people just sit around in rooms and make stuff up. Has that thought ever occurred to you? All over the world, there are just people sitting in rooms making stuff up. What does the Bible have to say about this?
In the Bible there are three words for hell, three words used to describe hell: apoleia, olethros, and diaphthora. These are the words are used, in the Greek, to describe hell. Understand this: none of them mean annihilation. Only one of the three is even capable of meaning annihilation, or secession of being, and it normally does not mean that. What these words refer to is loss of well-being. They don’t mean loss of being or ceasing to exist, they mean loss of well-being. There is huge difference there. Hell is not annihilation, it is not loss of being, it is the loss of well-being.
In fact, the word apoleia, is used not only to describe the future state or condition of hell, but it is even used to describe people in this world who are without Christ. They have already experienced loss of well-being, apoleia. They are already separated from God; they are already experiencing a little bit of hell. In the life to come, God will be utterly removed from them so God won’t be present at all and they will really experience the loss of well-being, but they will have made their choice. Hell is for people who want to run their own life, hell is for people who want to do it their way, hell is for people who want to live for themselves and God is going to respect that. God is going to give people that eternal opportunity, but he is not going to be there. When you live for yourself, it is vacuous. When you live for yourself, it is just desolate. If you are only around other people who are just living for themselves, it is really vacuous, but it is chosen by those so afflicted, the suffering their experiencing is self-chosen. God has honored their choices.
Also, in the churches there are some who have lost their passion for the Great Commission because of pluralism. Is it not true that pluralism is kind of the great religion of our culture? I am not talking about sociological pluralism; I think most of us would affirm it is kind of the American ideal. Sociological pluralism refers to a melting pot of ideas, it refers to Pluribus Unum, and that as a nation we would be one people out of many, out of great diversity, many races, and many ethnicities. This is kind of the essence of democracy, sociological pluralism. There is a sense in which we would affirm that. I am talking about theological pluralism. Theological pluralism is apostasy. Theological pluralism from the teaching of the Bible, from a Christian perspective, theological pluralism is heresy.
Theological pluralism is the teaching that every religion leads to heaven. All faith systems lead to God. You have your religion, I have my religion, they have their religion, and it doesn’t matter. You don’t need to take your religion to anybody else, you don’t need to take your faith system to anybody else because they all lead to God, and they all lead to heaven, many paths to God. Pluralism. This perspective is rationally ridiculous. Cognitively it creates dissonance. Quite obviously, tautologically, the religions of the world are not the same. There are huge differences. There are some religions of the world that actually worship the Devil and demons. There is and there have been throughout history, religions that practice human sacrifice. There are religions that have practiced cannibalism and the eating of one another. You can’t tell me that all religions are the same! Just on the face of it that is ridiculous!
The truth is, what Jesus Christ claims and what Jesus Christ teaches is diametrically opposed to every other religion in the world, to all the religions of the world. The religions of the world teach salvation by works, that what the religions of the world all teach. That is what Buddhism teaches, that is what karma is about, that is what the Tripitika is about, that is what the three baskets are about, that is what Hinduism is about, that is what the Vedas teach, that is what the Gita teaches, that is what Islam is about, that is what the Quran teaches and the Hadith, that is what Parahs say Judaism teaches, that is the way it approaches Torah and law, we are saved by works. Jesus says, “No!” The message of Christ is contrary to all of that. Jesus said, “You can’t be saved by your works, you can only be saved by my works.” Jesus says, “You can’t merit salvation, you can only be saved by grace and through faith and your faith must not be in yourself or in your own righteousness.” Your faith must be in him and in his righteousness. You trust his atonement, his sacrifice, his shed blood. He is the savior; he is Yeshua and he has sent us to the nations. “You shall be my witnesses,” and it is a message never heard apart from Christ. We have been called, and as Christians, are called in every generation no matter where they live on the earth to take that message to the rest of the world. That call is upon us.
In the Bible, God hates pluralism. God calls it idolatry. It violates the first commandment, it violates the second commandment, it violates the Decalogue, and it is called idolatry in the Bible. You cannot have other gods, other faith systems; you can’t just add a bunch of religions and put them all together. From Ahab to Omri, that is what caused God to judge those Old Testament kings. When Paul spoke to the Areopagus in the city of Athens, he didn’t say to them, “Hey, you have got all of these gods up here on the Acropolis, don’t worry because Jesus is speaking through all of these gods. All of these different names are Jesus.” He didn’t say that! He said, “You have got to turn away from all of this and come to Jesus.” This is not a politically correct thing, this Great Commission. The call of Jesus Christ upon his people is clear, and it is passionate and he is looking for faithfulness.
Let’s look at arguments for the Great Commission. First of all, the Bible says we must do the Great Commission because people are lost. That is why Jesus uses this word apoleia, because the world has already lost well-being. It is separated from God, it is already lost. Jesus used the word zamia, which is another word translated lost, but it means damaged. Everyone in the world is lost and damaged, loss of well-being and damage to everyone. That is why in Luke 15, as you go through that Gospel, Jesus tells the parable of the lost coins, then he tells the parable of the lost sheep, he tells the parable of the lost son. Lost. Lost. Lost. He came to seek and save the lost. It is not just the Gentiles and the nations that are lost, even Israel is lost. Jesus said, “I have come for the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” That is how he refers to Israel. Everyone is lost. He is the Savior.
When you look at the religions of the world, they would have you believe life and eternity hangs in the balance and it is in your hands. Depending on how you live your life, or maybe depending on how you live many lifetimes, you determine your destiny, whether your good stuff exceeds your bad stuff. You control that. The Bible has a whole different message. The Bible says, no, it doesn’t hang in the balance. The world is already lost. Everybody is lost and needs a Savior, needs someone to rescue them. We are all sinners. The Bible says, “There is none righteous, no not one. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” In the sight of a holy God our righteousness is as filthy rags. “All we, like sheep, have gone astray.”
My wife Barb and I last Sunday went with many of you out into Love in Action. We went out into the neighborhood and we had a great time being with you and helping some others. Our son Drew and his fiancée Rachel were visiting us that weekend from Wisconsin, they came to church and then went out and did Love in Action with us. Later in the afternoon, Barb took Drew and Rachel to the airport so they could fly back to Wisconsin.
She was driving on E-470, talking to Drew and Rachel, and suddenly she sees the blinking red lights coming up behind her. Her heart kind of skips a beat. The cop pulls her over. She was only going 90. The speed limit on E-470 is 70 miles an hour. Actually, she was going 89, just about 90. She got herself a ticket. That is her first ticket in over eight years, she has done pretty well. It was a little over eight years ago when she got her last ticket on Highlands Ranch Parkway and that was when Heather called her that day and said, “Mom, I am pregnant. I am going to have a baby and you are going to be a grandma!” So, Heather had called Barb that day to tell her she was pregnant with Abigail and that Barb was going to be a grandma for the first time. Barb was really excited as she was driving down Highlands Ranch Parkway. She didn’t notice she was going 60 in a 40. She likes to go about twenty over the speed limit. So, the cop pulls her over and says, “You are going 60 in a 40.” She says, “Oh, I am so sorry. I didn’t realize it. I am just so excited. My daughter just called me. I am going to be a grandmother.” He said, “Well, drive like one.”
Wouldn’t you like to be a cop just for a day so you could say that? We are all messed up. We can’t keep the law. We can’t even keep human laws. ls there anyone here that has never ever, even without someone seeing it, violated human laws? We all break even the laws of men and how much more do we break the laws of God? That is why Jesus gave the Sermon on the Mount, so we would understand our desperate need for a Savior, so that we would understand the essence of our lostness. That is why Jesus said,
“You have heard it said of old, thou shall not commit adultery. I say to you anyone that looks upon a woman with lust has already committed adultery in his heart. You have heard it said of old, thou shall not kill. Whoever kills shall be liable for judgment. I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother or sister will be liable for judgment. Whoever calls his brother raca, or fool, shall be liable to the Sanhedrin. Whoever calls his brother morose, which means moral fool, will be liable for hellfire. You have heard it said of old, thou shall not swear falsely. I say to you don’t swear at all, by heaven because it is God’s throne or by earth for it is his footstool. You have heard it said of old an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. I say to you if anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other as well. You have heard it said of old, thou shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. I say to you love your enemy. Do good to those who hate you, pray for those who despitefully use you, bless those who curse you.”
He wants us to understand his standards are too high. We are all lost. We all need a Savior. He is the Savior. He died offering atonement for sin. He makes that offer to the whole world. When we say, “We don’t need to take him to the nations,” we are denying his cross. Buddha didn’t die on the cross for the sin of the world. Muhammad didn’t die for the sin of the world. The Hindu avatars didn’t die for the sin of the world. Moses didn’t die for the sin. Only Jesus. He so loved the world he died in substitutionary atonement and we can’t deny him. We take him to the world. We are his witnesses.
I used to have in my office a picture of a ship called the Andrea Doria. The Andrea Doria was the pride of the Italian Merchant Marine, a great sea vessel that held 2,000 people, with elegant staterooms. It was just a floating, luxurious hotel that could cross the Atlantic with speed. In the picture I had in my office, the Andrea Doria is racing across the Atlantic to New York and Nantucket. Today, the Andrea Doria is on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.
It was July 25, 1956, when the great ship went down. The picture in my office showed the Andrea Doria in the midst of a thick fog, about to collide with the Stockholm. The Stockholm ran right into the starboard side of the Andrea Doria in the midst of the fog, and it drove the hull of the ship right into the starboard side of the Andrea Doria 30 feet deep. When the Stockholm reversed its engines and disengaged, it left a hole in the starboard side of the Andrea Doria 30 feet deep and 80 feet wide. Even that great ship could not survive such damage. So, the starboard side began to tilt by 18 degrees. The eight lifeboats on the starboard side all went underwater and were no longer useable. The eight lifeboats on the other side of the Andrea Doria could only hold 1,003 people, not nearly enough. So, the S.O.S. went out, the panic went out. “Save us.” Miraculously, four great ships were close enough to respond and they raced to rescue the people and save the people and they did. One of the greatest sea rescues in the history of the naval world. Pretty amazing.
The Bible tells us that is kind of like Jesus. We all desperately need a Savior. This world is going down, and he is the rescue ship. He says, “Come on board.” You have all read Genesis six, seven and eight, where you have the story of Noah and the ark. I don’t know whether you are aware of this, that in other religions and in other cultures and in other ancient cultures there are traditions of a great flood and a rescue by an ark. This teaching is in many religions and ancient cultures. You can read the Gilgamesh Epic, written over 4,000 years ago in Mesopotamia, A copy of which was found in the library of Ashurbanipal. You can read it and it describes a great flood and an ark of salvation rescuing people and animals. You can go and look in the ancient Hellenized literature, in the oldest Greek literature, and it will tell of a great deluge and an ark that rescued people and animals. The hero of the Greek flood story is Deucalion, instead of Noah, but the same kind of a story. Even Native American Indians have within their ancient teachings the story of a great deluge and a ship of rescue.
The beauty of the Bible, the memory of that great deluge, is residual in the ancient of cultures of men. But, in the Bible you have the beautiful account that is so different from the other accounts. Scientists tell us that the ark in Genesis six, seven, and eight actually was seaworthy. If you look at its dimensions, the way it was shaped, its length, its width, its depth, and its craftsmanship, it would have been seaworthy. The size was sufficient to contain most of the species of life on the earth. Amazing! The length of time that it rained, meteorologists tell us, would have been sufficient to create a great deluge, and the length of time it took for the waters to dissipate are appropriate to the facts. You look at the Gilgamesh epic, and the ark in the Gilgamesh epic is shaped like a cube. It would not have been seaworthy at all; it would have just gone end over end, killing everything on board. In the Gilgamesh epic, the reason the floods were sent by the gods was because there was too much noise. It wasn’t because there was sin, it was just too noisy. You look at the Greek story of the flood, and when the waters dissipate, in only seven days, Deucalion comes off of the ship with a woman and they don’t know how to repopulate the earth, they don’t know how to procreate, they don’t know how to create more people. So, in the Greek story, they go to the Delphi Oracle, who somehow has survived the flood and they said, “How do we repopulate the earth?” The Delphi Oracle said, “You have to cast the bones of your mother, you have to throw the bones of your mother.” They took that to mean the needed to pick up rocks from the earth, mother earth, and throw them. They did. Every time they threw a rock, it became a person. Everywhere they went they picked up a rock and threw it and it became a person. Your neighbor was literally only a stone’s throw away. You see the beauty of Holy Scripture, the beauty of this book. The deal is, the Bible tells us in 1 Peter 3 Jesus is the ark. He is the ark of salvation; he is the hope of the world. People are eating and drinking and laughing and mocking, but he says, “Come on board.” He is the hope of the world. So, we are his witnesses, we take him to the nations and so much is at stake. According to Joshua Project there are 6.75 billion people on the earth and (I have heard different estimates from different organizations) 2.8 billion have never heard of Christ. Most of them in the 10/40 window never have even heard the gospel. 2.8 billion. On this earth, 2.3 billion have heard the gospel and have responded positively, at least nominally. So, 2.3 billion and 2.8 billion. That makes 5.1 billion people who have never heard the gospel or heard the gospel and accepted it, which means 1.65 billion people have heard the gospel and rejected it, at least apparently so. Think of the fact that of the 17,000 people groups in this world, 7,000 people groups have never heard the gospel. They have never seen a church, they don’t have the Bible in their language, and they know not Jesus, never heard of him. The Bible says that the gospel must be preached to every ethnicity, to every tribe, tongue, people, and nation before Jesus will return. That is just one of the crazy things about Harold Camping’s prediction yesterday, not to mention the fact that the Bible is clear that no one knows the day or the hour. But the time is getting shorter and much is to be done. We are called to faithfulness to take the gospel to every tongue, to every ethnicity, to every part of the world. So much is at stake. The command of Christ is upon us. Let’s look to the Lord with a word of prayer.