The Great Commission
Note: This article is adapted from my May 8, 2021 article, to remind us of the Purpose of Pascha (Easter).
Click the pic! Yeshua, the Messiah, known to the Greek-speaking Jews in the Dispersion as "Yesous, the Khristos – the Annointed One," whose followers saw him executed, dying on a Roman cross, suddenly came back to life and appeared several times to his eleven Apostles and many of his other disciples. Click on this photo to read about all of these appearances.
Scroll down a little further in the above photo's link, where you'll see "Yeshua Appears to All the Apostles in Galilee" and issues the Great Commission as follows: "16 But the eleven disciples went into Galilee, to the mountain where Yeshua had sent them. 17 When they saw him, they bowed down to him, but some doubted. 18 Yeshua came to them and spoke to them, saying, 'All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. 19 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, 20 teaching them to obey everything that I commanded you to do. Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.' Amen" (Matthew 28:16-20).
On May 6, 2021 at 10 a.m., a Thursday morning our time, which was 8 p.m. their time, I had the privilege of speaking on this Scripture passage to some evangelists and their house churches in Bangladesh. I'd like to share with you what I said: first of all, in v. 17 it states that still "some doubted." When people are presented with information – an event or an idea – that is entirely beyond anything they have experienced in their lives, they often simply can't comprehend it or believe it. Someone is standing here who was dead, many of these people saw him die, but here he is! Unbelievable! And so it is today, when people hear about the Virgin Birth of Yeshua, his miracles, his death and resurrection, they doubt it because it's entirely outside of their experience. I have had similar reactions from people who have never been outside the state where they were born when I tell them about our living in Russia for 17 years.
Then in v. 18, Yeshua says – "All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth." Older translations use the word "power" but the Greek word "exousia" is better translated as "authority" or the right to do something. In the first days of Holy Week, Yeshua was debating with the Pharisees, Saducees, and Scribes about his authority. They asked – "By what authority do you do these things? Or who gave you this authority to do these things?" (Mark 11:28). Then he told them three parables, all dealing with the question of his authority versus theirs. His authority was his own, from God, and legitimate, theirs was an assumed authority and was being used in an illegitimate way, only to continue their hold on power.
When you see the word "Therefore" in v. 19, you should ask yourself what's it there for: it is there to connect the previous verse about Yeshua's authority with v. 19! He is saying in effect: "I have God-given authority and I am giving you, my Apostles, this same authority to go forth and make disciples of all nations." In some older translations, it states – "teach all nations" but it is more than just teaching the doctrines of Yeshua and the historical facts about him. Making disciples of all nations is training believers to do the things that Yeshua did: he and his disciples baptized people in the name of the holy Trinity – the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, they healed them, they fed the hungry, cleansed the lepers, they even cast out demons and raised the dead.
Verse 20 is very important to read carefully and understand, because many preachers don't explain it correctly: they say it means to teach people the parables that Yeshua taught, tell about his death on the cross and his resurrection, and tell people to believe these things. But that's just the start, just the basic truths. This verse in older translations states – "teach them to observe all that I commanded you" but the word "observe" can easily be misunderstood to mean "watch" or be a spectator. Too many church-goers view church as a spectator sport: they sit in their pews and watch a performance by the choir and the preacher. Wrong! The Greek word for "observe" actually means to "obey" or to "fulfill a command." What did Yeshua command his disciples to do? In Matthew ch. 10 and in Luke ch. 10 and ch. 11, he sent out his Apostles, commanding them to preach the Gospel, heal the sick, care for the needy, and cast out demons. The demons of today are the false ideologies of atheism, materialism, and secular humanism that hold captive literally billions of people, saying that Yeshua was just a prophet or a moral teacher, he didn't really do anything miraculous and he didn't rise from the dead, or that you can believe whatever you want – all religions are OK – but just keep it to yourself.
So in Matthew 28:18-20 we have authority in the Great Commission, and we have a continuation of Yeshua sending out his Apostles, in Acts 1:8 – "But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. You will be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth." Here the Greek word for "power" is "dunamis" and we get "dynamite" from this word. It means the strength or the ability to do something. In Matthew 28, Yeshua gave his Apostles authority or the right, and here in Acts 1, he promises to give them power or strength and ability to preach the Good News, heal the sick, care for the poor, and drive out evil powers.
The Apostle Peter writes about this: "God waited patiently in the days of Noah, while the ark was being built. In it, few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water. This is a symbol of baptism, which now saves you - not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ" (1 Peter 3:20-21). The Ark is a symbol or a type of the Church, the Bride of Christ. The eight souls – Noah and his family – were the only ones saved from the flood. So to believe in Christ and be baptized is to be in the Body of Christ, the Church. There is no salvation outside of the Church, the Body of Christ. The Apostle Peter is teaching us that the flood was a symbol of baptism. The ark is the symbol, baptism is the reality: baptism in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit saves us, it's not simply like taking a bath to wash away the filth of the flesh, but it cleanses our conscience, our hearts' desires. We are resurrected with Christ in baptism into a new, spiritual life.
The Apostle Paul also writes on this The Great Commission: "He [God the Father] put all things in subjection under his [Christ's] feet, and gave him to be head over all things for the Church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all" (Ephesians 1:22-23). The Church is the Body of Christ, and only in the true Church we can experience the fullness of Christ. The Bible is very important – the services of the Orthodox Church are full of Scripture, about 75% of each service is direct or indirect quotations, reading the Scriptures, or references to the words of Scripture. But the Bible isn't the source of all authority, Christ received "all authority" – he is the source – and he gave this authority to his Apostles.
The Apostle Paul writes – "These things I write to you, hoping to come to you shortly; but if I wait long, that you may know how men ought to behave themselves in the house of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth" (1 Timothy 3:14-15). The Church is " the pillar and ground of the truth." In verses 1-7, Paul writes about the qulaities and duties of "overseers" or priests/pastors. The word "priest" is a shortened form of "presbyter" ("prest"). Timothy was bishop over the churches in Ephesus (ch. 1:3), and in ch. 5:17-22, Paul instructs him again about the virtues that an overseer should have before Timothy would ordain them – see v. 22. And the Apostle Paul appointed Titus as bishop in Crete (Titus 1:5-8) to ordain priests/pastors on that island.
The Church was established on the Day of Pentecost, when the promise of Acts 1:8 was fulfilled. God sent the Holy Spirit to give the Apostles power to go from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria and then to the uttermost parts of the earth – to the Gentile nations. In Acts 11:19-26, we read how "ordinary believers" went from Jerusalem to Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, where they began sharing the Good News about Yeshua. When the Apostles in Jerusalem heard about this, they sent Barnabas to help the believers in Antioch organize a local church. He sent for Saul to help him. We know that Barnabas was a Levite (ch. 4:36) and Saul (later Paul) was a Pharisee: both of them were well-trained in the Scriptures. And so, they taught the believers in Antioch, and v. 26 states – "The disciples were first called Christians in Antioch." They weren't called Christians at the time Barnabas and Saul were there, church history tells us that it was Euodias, the second bishop in Antioch, who later called the disciples "Christians" – not all the facts are in the Bible, so it's important to also study church history. But the point is this: to be a Christian is to be a disciple, you can't be "just a Christian" and go to church once a month or a few times a year, and lead a moral life. A disciple isn't a super-Christian, someone who has decided to go all-out for Christ. A disciple is a Christian, and a Christian is a disciple. A disciple is someone who obeys and fulfills Christ's commands.
There were other bishops beside Timothy and Titus: after Euodias, Ignatius was bishop in Antioch, he was the little child that Yeshua took on his lap and said – "Let the little children come to me, for such is the Kingdom of Heaven." Both Ignatius and Polycarp were disciples of the Apostle John. Polycarp was the bishop of Smyrna. So what we see here is that the Apostles appointed well-trained and godly men to be bishops over the churches in various areas. This is how the Church is to be governed. This authority to ordain bishops and they would ordain overseers (priests/pastors) is the model established in the first century and continues to this day. These councils of godly men, bishops, are responsible to maintain true doctrine and practice.
Well then, what is the Church and how do we know if we are in it? Several Orthodox theologians have said – "We know where the Church is, but we do not know where the Church is not." There are genuine Christians, disciples of Yeshua, the Messiah – the Christ, who might not even know about Apostolic authority to ordain priests/pastors. But these disciples believe in Christ's birth from the Virgin Mary, his death for our sins and his resurrection. They believe in and were baptized in the name the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They believe that the Lord's Supper in some mysterious way beyond rational understanding is really the Body and Blood of Christ, and that when we partake of it, we become partakers of the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4). An Orthodox priest in Moscow (he's now a bishop) once told me: "If you believe these three things, you are Orthodox, whether you know it or not."
So there are members of the Body of Christ who are out there, waiting to be taught these truths, to learn that they are in the Church, Christ's Body. They are sharing the Good News of Yeshua, the Messiah. In extreme situations ("in extremis") when no bishop or priest is available, they are permitted to evangelize, baptize, and even conduct the Lord's Supper without official ordination, but they need to eventually be organized under Apostolic authority, like the disciples in Antioch were. This is how the Great Commission works!
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