Examining Matthew 28: The So-Called “Great Commission” (Pt. 2)
Discipleship as Story Participation—Pt. 3
In the last post, I highlighted how the four verbals in the Great Commission relate to one another. It was shown how the three participles—go, baptizing, and teaching—support the singular command—to make disciples. The means by which we make disciples is foremost demonstrated through going, baptizing, and teaching. I also examined the first verbal—go, and we concluded that it connotes urgency.
In this post I finish up the remaining two participles—baptizing and teaching.
VERBAL 2: BAPTIZING
First, baptism demonstrates that one has been gathered and united to Christ. To be united to Christ, the message of the Kingdom would, first, have to be proclaimed and embraced by those who heard it. We would, albeit imprecisely, within Evangelicalism, call this aspect of the Great Commission “evangelism.” We often use the term evangelism to infer proclaiming the Gospel to people who do not know Jesus, when in reality Christian themselves need to be evangelized on the daily. Yet, this aspect of the GC concerns more of what we would call outward mission to those who do not yet follow Jesus.
When Jesus’ disciples took the Good News of the Kingdom to the nations, those who responded in faith and repentance would then be baptized. Baptism does not save an individual. However, conversion and baptism were so linked in the NT that they are interchangeable. If an individual responded in faith, this would be manifested through baptism. Baptism is the outward evidence that a disciple has embraced the Gospel of the Kingdom and has been gathered to be a part of the new temple. Schnabel states, “Baptism is not the means by which people become disciples. Rather, baptism characterizes and explains the winning of disciples.”1 Baptism highlights that the message of the Gospel has been embraced; only those who have responded in faith to the announcement of the Kingdom are to be baptized.
Second, baptism demonstrates that one now identifies with the identity and the mission of Jesus. The purpose of Jesus’ baptism in Luke 3 and 4 was for the Father to identify Jesus through the descending Spirit as the eschatological Son who would fulfill both the Adamic and the Israelite mission. (Both Adam and Israel were called God’s sons, and both failed in fulfilling their mission as sons.) In Jesus’ baptism, the Father confirmed upon Jesus his identity as the Son, and the Spirit descended upon him to empower him to fulfill his mission. I would advocate that Jesus’ baptism serves as a type of the church’s baptism, representing this same reality. Those who are baptized into the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit are baptized into the mission and identity of the Son. Just as the Father declared that he was well pleased with his Son and the Spirit descended upon the Son to validate the Son’s identity and mission, so also those who are baptized through their union with Jesus are being declared by the Father as a well-pleasing son/daughter and given the Holy Spirit to confirm their new identity and mission. In other words, baptism is an outward demonstration of the inward reality that one has been gathered to Jesus and now desires out of his new identity to be about Jesus’ mission.
Lesslie Newbigin states,
“To be baptized is to be incorporated into the dying of Jesus so as to become a participant in his risen life, and so to share his ongoing mission to the world. It is to be baptized into his mission.”2
Baptism as an outward picture of one being identified with Jesus’ identity and mission has been eclipsed within Evangelicalism. Baptism has simply become a demonstration that someone has become a Christian, and often, only their new identity of being “saved” is emphasized. Many are left unaware that their baptism is a baptism into both the identity and the mission of Jesus. To be a disciple of Jesus is to be about his mission because of the new, transformed identity given through baptism. There can be no bifurcation between these two realities. There stands to be a rediscovery that baptism represents a disciple of Jesus who will urgently reorient their lives around their new identity of being included in the family of God and their new mission of completing Jesus’ mission.
VERBAL 3: TEACHING
Although much could be said about the phrase “teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you,” I will only examine two aspects.
First, the Great Commission necessarily involves obedience to Jesus through love for God and neighbor. For many, the GC is nothing more than a command to preach the Gospel. It is, for them, a command to evangelize, which is peculiar because that command is not even explicitly in the text. Moreover, many wrongly assume that discipleship is simply teaching individuals more about the Bible. Thus, after an individual is converted, they are immediately put into a discipleship class where they are taught the basics of Christianity.
Again, we have category confusion with the word discipleship. Many understand discipleship to be what happens after one becomes a follower of Jesus. If that was the case then Matthew would be saying, “Go, make disciples by baptizing and discipling.” So we make disciples by discipling?? It is like saying, “We make bread by using bread.” The old paradigm of evangelism and discipleship does not fit within the concept of the Great Commission. Discipleship should not be viewed as the divine successor to evangelism. It is not one part of the process; it is the entire process. It is urgently going and baptizing converts and teaching them to obey is the final component.
The church’s mission to make disciples, then, necessarily involves teaching others to obey Jesus’ commandments. This is the inward mission. It is the mission of the church to equip followers of Jesus to be faithful to observe all the things Jesus commands us to do.
The infinitive ‘to observe,’ is peculiar to Matthew (Luke does not use the verb, and Mark only once), and he always employs this verb in reference to keeping commandments. Regarding these commandments, Schnabel states, “The teaching of the missionaries focuses on the instructions of Jesus, not on the Mosaic law: his words are, like the words of sacred Scriptures, more permanent than heaven and earth (Mt 24:35), and their authority is like Yahweh’s authority.”3 Thus, the disciples are to teach others to obey the commands of Jesus as the fulfillment of the Law. However, these commands are not a mere list of moral virtues to be followed, for Jesus ultimately defines the greatest commandments in Matthew 22.36-40 as loving God and neighbor. These two commands are ultimate because they are the most comprehensive. If one loves God supremely, it will manifest in love for his neighbor. Thus, the Great Commandment epitomizes what it means to keep all of Jesus’ commands. Loving God and loving others encapsulates the Christian life. To make disciples is to teach people to love God and others. This is the telos of discipleship.
Second, the GC necessarily involves obedience in word and deed. If the goal of discipleship is love for God and neighbor, then the GC is necessarily concerned with serving one’s neighbor. It involves Kingdom justice issues, fighting injustices, and feeding those who are hungry. This is seen through the relationship between loving God and loving one’s neighbor. These two great commandments are not separate commandments that are to be compartmentalized. In other words, loving God and loving others are not two different realities. How love for God manifests itself is through loving others. If one truly loves God, it will show through his actions towards others. This is why John states, “But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth” (cf. 1 John 3.17-18). Talk is cheap; actions are where reality lies.
The church’s mission is not to end poverty, hunger, or injustice. Only Jesus can end it. However, the church must address these injustices. The church cannot remain silent nor inactive towards these issues. Why? Because the church is called to witness in their life together what the new world looks like in the present. In the coming new world there will be no economic, social, or spiritual poverty. Therefore, the church must seek to witness to these future realities in the present. The only way to witness to that future reality is by working for it in the present.
All throughout the Gospel of Matthew, he writes about seeking righteousness and helping the oppressed the marginalized. Teaching others to observe all the things
Jesus commanded necessarily involves a holistic mission. The GC is not simply a call to get people to heaven, but to bring heaven down to earth, or to bring the future, new world into the present world.
Now that we have established the parameters of the Great Commission and how Jesus calls us to make disciples, we are better positioned to define discipleship. Our next post will define discipleship.
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Eckhard J. Schnabel, Early Christian Mission: Jesus and the Twelve, 357.
Lesslie Newbigin, Gospel in a Pluralist Society (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989), 117.
Eckhard J. Schnabel, Early Christian Mission: Jesus and the Twelve, 360.