“Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.””
Matthew 28:18-20 NIV
https://bible.com/bible/111/mat.28.18-20.NIV
Go and make disciples…a command that the church has held to for 2000 years. But what does this actually mean?
There are two verbs that drive this command. ‘Go’ and ‘Make’. This tells us quite a bit.
This is not a passive act. This is intentional and requires us to move. To go is to put myself out there. I may need to travel and most certainly I need to enter into someone else’s environment. We see this in Peter’s call in Acts 10, when he is called to ‘Go’ to the Roman soldier’s home. Not only is he traveling but he is entering.
Often the places we are told to go to are dangerous. The danger can be physical as countless martyrs can attempt to through the centuries. But they can also be dangerous to other areas of our selves.
Take Peter again and his call to go to the Roman soldiers home. Certainly there was physical danger. Roman soldiers were by their very nature, training, and orders, dangerous. But it is deeper than that. In order to get Peter to go, God had to provide a vision about clean and unclean animals he could eat. Peter was being called to do something that would threaten his stature in the Jewish community, his ability to be and eat with other Jews, his ability to worship in the temple, his relationships with family and friends, and,possibly, in the deepest way, his very identity.
““Surely not, Lord!” Peter replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.””
Acts 10:14 NIV
https://bible.com/bible/111/act.10.14.NIV
Peter, in his vision, is actually arguing with God because he is a man who did not eat unclean things. This took a lifetime of work and possibly had some pride entangled with it. Three times God has to show him this and push his understanding of what it means to be good, in order that when the call comes to go and speak with, share the good news with, stay with, and ultimately eat with an unclean Gentile, he would go.
How many times have we let fear keep us from our call to go? Do we fear the physical danger? How about the social danger, what will people say? Maybe it is the danger to who I think I am, my identity?
Take time, right now, to quiet yourself and seek Gods call. This is the heart of God, that all people would come to know Him. And this is the strategy of God, that it would be you who brings this Good News.