What does Jesus have to say about church membership? Lots, actually! In this message, we'll see that Jesus tells His disciples to practice church membership. It's a practice that the King prescribes.
Transcription (automatically-generates):
The purpose of this series that we're in right now is really simple. I want to show you the biblical nature of something called church membership. I want us to see how the practice of church membership at the local church level is rooted in the Bible and therefore is something that we should practice here at Gospel City. Back in the introduction to this series, we saw that God has always made a distinction between the special group of people on the planet that has faith in Him and those who don't. He has always made this distinction and he always will.
And I said at the end of that message that church membership was the way we can know who is in this distinct group of people and who isn't. There's a way to know that we don't have to guess. Then last week we saw that a clear biblical pattern of formal membership has been practiced all throughout the Bible. Israel practiced it in the Old Testament, and the church practices it in the New. This week we're going to see that church membership isn't merely patterned for us in the Bible.
Tonight we're going to see that Jesus actually tells the church to do church membership. He prescribes the practice of it. Now, if you're joining us for the first time tonight, and you have no idea what I'm talking about when I use the phrase church membership, here's the definition that I shared last week. Church membership is a covenant of union between a particular church and a Christian that consists of the church's affirmation of the Christian's gospel profession, the church's promise to give oversight to the Christian, and the Christian's promise to gather with the church and submit to its oversight in church membership. The local church says to the Christian, we can see and affirm your faith in Jesus Christ as both Savior and Lord, and we give ourselves to help you and you grow in your love for Jesus in real and tangible ways.
And the Christian says to the local church, I want to have my faith in Christ affirmed by this body of believers, and I want to be discipled by this church. Church membership recognizes and identifies all the people who want to be in this kind of formal relationship with the local church that they are part of. Jesus tells us to do this. He tells the church to do what our definition of church membership is describing. I hope I don't have to tell you this, but if Jesus tells Christians to do something, we do that thing, whatever it is.
So if Jesus tells us to practice formal church membership at the local church level, then that is what Christians need to do. But some of you who know your Bible well may be thinking to yourself, wait a minute. Where does Jesus tell us to practice church membership? I've read the New Testament dozens of times and I've never read anywhere of him saying anything about it. If you're thinking that you're right kind of, it's true.
Nowhere in the Bible is Jesus quoted using the phrase church membership. He doesn't talk about Christians taking a class in order to become a member of the church. He doesn't say, Thou must go online and complete the membership pathway, and then you can become a member of my church. You can't find that verse anywhere. He doesn't say any of these specific words or phrases, but that does not mean he isn't telling Christians to submit themselves to the practice of church membership.
He does. He just doesn't use the specific words that we're looking for him to use. Jesus does this with other big issues too. There are times he'll make gigantic statements, but he makes them using words that we aren't accustomed to or looking for. Here's an example of what I'm talking about.
Do you know that in the Bible, Jesus claims to be God? He believed that about himself. But do you also know that Jesus is never recorded using the exact words I am God? He never says those three words in that exact order when he's referring to Himself. Those who oppose the deity of Christ today love to point this fact out in defense of their position.
They say things like, Jesus never said the words I am God. So that means he never believed himself to be God. They think they've just dropped the proverbial mic and walk away from the discussion thinking that the case has been closed. But just because Jesus has never used the exact words I am God in that exact way, that does not mean he never made the claim that he is and was the living God. Jesus claimed to be God on numerous occasions in the Bible.
In John chapter five, Jesus heals a paralyzed man on the Sabbath and then tells him to pick up his mat and walk. The Jews are furious that a man was commanded to carry his own mat on the Sabbath. And here's what happens next John, chapter five, verse 17. Jesus responded to them, to the Jews, my Father is still working, and I'm working also. This is why the Jews began trying all the more to kill him.
Not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal to God. Jesus never said the words I am God, but in John five, he said the words my Father is still working, and I am working also. And the Jews knew exactly what he was saying and what he meant by the words he chose to use. Jesus was claiming to be God when he called God his Father, Jesus knew what he meant. The Jews knew what he meant.
It's one of the reasons they wanted to kill him. Now, there are many more examples of this principle that I could show you, but this one will suffice for now because we can apply this principle to what Jesus has to say about membership in the Bible. We need to pay attention to what Jesus says and we need to determine what he means when he chooses the words he does. And just because he doesn't use the specific words we might be looking for, doesn't mean he isn't using the right words to convey a very important truth to us. And so here's the punchline up front.
It's going to be the first fill-in on your outlines. Jesus prescribed the practice of church membership when he gave the Great Commission to his disciples. Jesus prescribed the practice of church membership when he gave the Great Commission to his disciples. I absolutely love that. It's rightfully called the Great Commission and not the Great Suggestion.
The words that Jesus spoke in the Great Commission are to be understood, cherished, and obeyed by all those who follow Jesus as Lord. The Great Commission cannot be optional for us to do as a church. And the Great Commission is a command from Jesus to practice church membership. Let me read this famous passage for us and then we'll unpack it together. This incredible scene is taking place after Jesus has resurrected from the dead.
Matthew, chapter 28. Starting in verse 16. The eleven disciples traveled to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped, but some doubted. Jesus came near and said to them, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.
Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations. Baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I've commanded you. And remember, I'm with you always to the end of the age. There are a few things that we need to see in this passage. The first one is this - Jesus authorizes his church to build his church.
Look again at what Jesus says in verse 18. All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations. All authority is mine. Jesus says all of it, all of the authority in heaven and all of the authority on earth.
Jesus is king everywhere. And whatever orders the King gives his subjects to accomplish, they go and do that. And they do it under the King's authority. With the king's authority. Jesus said to them, all authority has been given to me in heaven and earth.
Go, therefore, all authority is mine. Therefore, whatever I tell you to go and do, you get to go and do it with my authority. The King delegates his authority to his subjects when he gives them commands to accomplish. The subjects aren't going with their own authority, they're going with the kings. And what does King Jesus authorize his disciples to go and do?
Make disciples of all nations. Now what's another way of saying this? Go and build my church back in Matthew 16, Jesus promised his disciples that he was going to build his church. And there's no confusing these words of Jesus there. He said plainly to his disciples in Matthew 1618, I will build my church.
Here in Matthew 28 he's telling them that he's going to use them to build it. And what was Jesus promising to build when he made the promise to build his church back in Matthew 16? He did not promise to build a Sunday worship service that happened once a week. He did not promise to build a physical structure called the church. He promised to build for himself a distinct group of people called out from the world and separated from the world.
A people that has received forgiveness from God for their sins. A people that has recognized their sinfulness and repented of it. A people who loves Jesus. A people who has collectively and willingly laid down their lives in order to follow Jesus as Lord. A people who has received the Holy Spirit.
A people who has been saved. A people whose sole purpose for a living is to make Jesus famous in their lives. A people who death has no power over. A people that the Bible calls disciples of Jews. This is the church that Jesus promised he would build back in Matthew 16, a group of his disciples that belongs to him.
So when Jesus says to his disciples in Matthew 28, go therefore and make disciples, he is saying, go and invite people to become my disciples just like you've become my disciples. Go and tell them the good news about what I've done to make a way for them to come and follow me. And invite them to come and follow me. When Jesus says go make disciples, he's saying, go proclaim the gospel message to everyone. Tell everyone I'm God.
Tell them I came to die a brutal shameful death on the cross to pay the price for their sins. Tell them I substituted myself for them. I died so that they could live forever. Tell them I won't count their sins against them if they turn and put their trust in me. Tell them that if they follow me they will live forever because I've conquered death by rising from the dead three days after I died.
Tell everyone this glorious news. Now sadly, many people will reject this message that Jesus' disciple-making disciples share with them. But praise God, there will be people who receive it, those who receive it and believe it will be saved. Those are the ones who become his disciples and those will be the ones that Jesus builds his church with. He is going to use his people to add people to his people.
He's going to use his disciples to make new disciples. He is going to use his church to build his church. This is the beginning of the disciple making process that Jesus calls them and us to in the great commission. It's what the king authorizes his people to go and do. Now when a person receives the gospel message and believes it and becomes a disciple of Jesus, the work of making a disciple isn't over, is really just beginning.
According to Jesus' words in the Great Commission. What are we supposed to do next after a person becomes a disciple of Jesus? Well, Jesus says that the church is to baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Now here's another question for you and this one's kind of a trick question. Who decides who gets Baptist and who doesn't?
Does that decision rest solely with the person who just became a new disciple of Jesus? Well, not solely, but yes. They have a part to play. They have to make the decision for themselves if they are going to follow Jesus through the waters of baptism. But is that individual the only one who has a say in whether they get baptized or not?
They aren't. According to Jesus. The church makes the final decision if they are to be baptized or not. Write this down and then we're going to talk about it. Jesus authorizes his church to affirm a new believer's profession of faith by baptizing them.
Jesus authorizes his church to affirm a new believer's profession of faith by baptizing them. Baptism is a formal process that requires more than just a person's desire to get baptized. Now you have to make the decision to get baptized when you become a Christian. Nobody can make that decision for you. It should be a relatively easy decision because it's something that Jesus tells you to do.
But nobody is going to horse you under the water. You have to choose to do it. But the church also plays an important role in deciding if you should be Baptist. Baptism is not just a personal decision, it's also a corporate decision. It's a church decision.
The church has been given the responsibility to discern if your profession of faith is credible. The church has to come to the conclusion that you have heard the true gospel, understood the true gospel, and believed the true gospel. That's it. And if there's evidence that you have received those gospel and believed it, then the church will Baptist you because you have to believe the gospel in order to become a Christian, and only Christians are to be baptized into Jesus' name. The church has to make that decision in concert with you making that decision, the church has to affirm your profession of faith.
That's what's implied when Jesus says to his disciples and not the ones that are going to become his disciples, but he says to his disciples, he tells them Baptist new disciples. It's implied that the disciples had to be able to recognize if the person they were going to baptize had actually become a disciple because Jesus says to baptize disciples only. Now I don't know if you know this, but maybe you did. Did you know that it's possible, it's possible for a person to call themselves a Christian when they aren't actually a Christian? Sometimes people mean well when they take the name of Christ upon themselves.
Sometimes people are simply confused about what the gospel is actually saying and what it means. Sometimes people can be confused about what it means to be a Christian. So, there are times when a person can say they are a Christian, but they simply do not understand what they are saying when they make that proclamation. And it's the church's responsibility to determine whether a person's profession of faith in Christ is genuine or misguided. Here's another point that we need to talk about when it comes to baptizing new disciples.
This is something that I don't hear a lot of today. Now, the new believer doesn't have to clean up everything in their life before they get baptized. The pattern that we see in the New Testament is that when a person professed faith in Christ and became a Christian, they got baptized immediately. Was their life perfect when they got baptized? No, not even close.
But had Christ's perfect life been given to them when they had believed? Yes. And having Jesus is what makes us right with God. And if we have really received Christ, then we have everything we need to begin our new life of following Him. A new life that's identified by our baptism.
So, you don't have to clean your whole life up first before you come to Jesus and get baptized in his name. But you do have to communicate that you understand what kind of relationship you're entering into with Jesus. You're entering into a relationship where Jesus has now become the Lord of your life. And because you understand that, you acknowledge that the Lord may require certain things of you. Some of those things he may leave till later to work on with you, but he may require some things of you right away.
There are some things that some people will need to walk away from in their life right out of the gate if they are going to begin following Jesus. In a couple of weeks, we're going to be back in our series walking through the Book of Acts. And when we get there, we're going to see an example of what I'm talking about. The Apostle Paul was in Ephesus preaching the gospel and trying to make new disciples. There, a bunch of people who practiced forbidden magic arts were saved when they heard and believed the Gospel message and listen to what these new believers did right away.
Acts, chapter 19, starting in verse 18. And many who had become believers came confessing and disclosing their practices, while many of those who had practiced magic collected their books and burned them in front of everyone. So, they calculated their value and found it to be 50,000 pieces of silver. In this way, the word of the Lord spread and prevailed. Now, the text isn't clear if they were baptized before or after they burned all their books.
What is clear from this passage is that they could not go back to practicing something God explicitly forbids in His Word. They could not practice magic arts and be a disciple of Jesus at the same time. They had to choose, and they chose wisely. So, the person who gets radically saved by the grace of God doesn't have to get their whole life cleaned up before they get Baptist or even all cleaned up right away after they get baptized. It's going to take the rest of all of our lives to grow into spiritual maturity and become more and more like Jesus.
You may spend the rest of your life learning how to battle the sin of lust in your heart, but you can stop sleeping with your boyfriend or girlfriend starting today. You may spend the rest of your life battling the sin that's in here, but you could move out today if you're living with your boyfriend or girlfriend outside of marriage. That's something that you can do. And that, by the way, is what repentance looks like. And if someone is not willing to give up something like pagan worship or sexual immorality in order to become a follower of Jesus, then they are not ready yet to become a follower of Jesus.
Jesus is worth loving up whatever he is calling you to give up so that you can come and follow Him. He's worth it. He gave everything up for you, and he asks us to do the same for Him again. One more time. Although you don't have to clean your whole life up before coming to Christ, there might be some big things that you need to give up right away, even before you get baptized.
That's what's meant by the phrase repent and believe the Gospel. And the Church needs to know as best as they can that you are giving yourself to live. For Jesus, to have every area of our life brought under his care and control. The church needs to know this before they baptize a person. While we're on the subject, here's something else we need to know about baptism.
When a new Christian is baptized, they are not baptized into the ether. They're not baptized only into the mystical, spiritual body of Christ. They are baptized into a living, breathing, tangible group of disciples that is a localized expression of the universal body of Christ. New Christians are baptized into a local church, likely the one they heard the Gospel from. Their baptism is visible and meaningful.
It formally incorporates them into a specific body of believers. You can see an example of this in Acts chapter two. The Church was birthed in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost and on day number one of the Church's existence. They began to fulfill the great commission that they had received from jesus. Peter opened the way for people to enter the kingdom of heaven.
When he preached the Gospel, people believed it and Peter told those who believed it to get baptized just like Jesus said to. And the people responded by getting dunked. And those who the church identified as receiving Christ were added to the church in Jerusalem. 3000 people were added to their number the very first day. Jesus's church-building project got off to an incredible start.
And then we can see that this pattern is replicated wherever the Gospel traveled throughout the book of Acts. Gospel preached, Gospel believed, then new believers baptized and added to the new church that was just birthed in the city where the Gospel reached. There's an exception to this pattern? A couple. We read in Acts chapter eight that an Ethiopian eunuch was baptized by Philip and then Philip was taken away from him.
And we're not told what happened to the eunuch who had just become a follower of Jesus. We're not told in the Bible that he was added to a local church there. But history suggests that this Ethiopian eunuch ended up going back to Ethiopia where he shared the gospel, and a local church was birthed there. So, there are exceptions in the Bible where a person who was baptized is not added formally to the number of disciples that make up a local church. But that's why it's called an exception.
It was just that it did not follow the normal pattern which was disciples were Baptist into local churches. This brings us to our next Fillin. Go ahead and write this down on your outline. Jesus authorizes his church to provide oversight to the believer's discipleship. The church does this by teaching disciples how to obey Jesus.
Jesus authorizes his church to provide oversight to the believer's discipleship. And it does this by teaching disciples how to obey Jesus. Take a look again at Matthew 28. Jesus says Go therefore make disciples of all nations. When they become a disciple, you baptize them and then teach them to observe everything I've commanded you.
When a person is baptized, they are baptized into a local church where they begin to experience the relationship of belonging to the people of God. And that relationship is marked primarily by the church teaching the new believer how to live as part of the church. When a person is added to the church, they become a part of God's distinct people. And our distinction is recognized in part by the way that we live. God's people live according to the word of God.
The Bible functions as a parameter around our lives, governing and influencing the way we live within its boundaries. New Christians don't know how to live this new life instinctively. We have to learn how to follow Jesus. We have to be taught how to obey Jesus. This requires that a new disciple submits themselves to the teaching that the church provides them.
Now, if you get a little nervous around the words authority and submission, then please hear me say this when it comes to placing ourselves under the authority of the church, nobody is going to make you do anything that you don't want to do. It's a big reason why we check to see if you've actually become a Christian before we formally bring you into the church. Because Christians are the only people on the planet who want to obey Jesus. We are relying on the fact that the Holy Spirit is in a person when we teach them to obey Jesus because that is what the Holy Spirit will do in us. He will produce in us a desire to obey Christ.
The authority that Jesus gives the church to teach disciples is confined to what the Word of God says. Now, some church leaders abuse the position of authority that's been entrusted to them by stepping out of bounds when it comes to instructing church members to do things that the Bible is silent on. For example, a church should never tell you who to marry. It can tell you who not to marry because the Bible tells Christians they can only marry another Christian. But a church cannot say, Susie, we want you to marry Bob.
Marry whoever you want as long as they belong to Christ. And ladies, if Bob belongs to know, give him a chance. But you don't have to. You don't have to marry him. A church can't tell you who to marry, where to live, what kind of house to rent or buy, what kind of car to drive, what kind of job to work at.
This may sound ridiculous to you, but there are churches where this kind of stuff actually happens, and it shouldn't. And if anyone has experienced this, they will be extremely wary and tentative of anything to do with church membership. I get it. But the scope of the church's authority is bound up and limited to the plain commands of Jesus. That's it.
That's what we've been authorized by the King to teach. And so, the church teaches new disciples how to obey Jesus because this is exactly what Jesus has commanded the church to do. Jews was the one who kickstarted this process for us. Jesus taught his disciples how they were to obey him. The disciples, in turn, taught the church that was birthed in the Book of Acts how to obey Jesus.
Those new disciples taught the new disciples that came after them, and they taught the ones that came after them all the way up to today. Now, let me ask you this what if a Christian refuses to obey Jews? Here's a hypothetical scenario for you to consider. A person hears the gospel and believes it. The church baptizes them and brings them into the church where they begin teaching them how to follow Jesus.
The new disciple seems to be growing in their faith. They are building deep and meaningful relationships in the church. It's awesome. Everything's hunky dory for about nine months. Then it comes out that this new disciple has been gossiping and spreading false rumors about a bunch of people in the church.
Nobody knows why this is happening, but the fact remains that this new disciple is straight-up lying to people. And those loves are creating a lot of division and leaving a lot of relational carnage in their wake. This kind of activity is firmly addressed in the New Testament. Paul writes about it in his letter to Titus and I put the reference down on your outline for you. So, brothers and sisters go to this person to try to help them see the error in their ways.
People go individually first and have one-to-one conversations with them. And when the person doesn't respond, then one or two others are brought along with them to try and reason with this person. But even these attempts to change the person's mind are futile because they remain unresponsive to the pleas from their brothers and sisters to change. The final stage comes when every single member of the church comes together in a sort of intervention, and the entire church tries to get this person to change. And after all of that, the person still refuses.
What is a church supposed to do in this hypothetical situation? There's only one option at this point. The church has to stop treating that person like they are a Christian, and they have to start treating them like they aren't one. They can no longer publicly affirm this person's profession of faith in Jesus. I've just paraphrased for you what Jesus instructs the church to do in Matthew, chapter 18 when a situation just like this arises, Christians in a local church have an obligation to look out for one another.
And it is so great, it's such a sweet feeling to have people who know you and who love you and have your back and want the very best for you. And if or when a member of the church sees another member practicing sin practicing sin? I'm not talking about making mistakes. I'm talking about something devastating, like in our hypothetical scenario. Then they will try and shine a light on the issue to help their brother or sister see where they're going astray and call them to make the necessary changes that will allow them to bring that area of their life back in alignment with how Jesus wants them to live.
Christians should want people who will point these things out in us in loving and gracious ways. And if they do, our response should be to repent and to thank them for loving us enough to say something that would keep us from spiritually walking off a cliff. Sometimes churches will come across a disciple who will refuse to acknowledge their problem, and therefore they will refuse to change their destructive pattern. Sometimes a person will dig their heels in even more. If, after following all the steps that Jesus lays out for us in Matthew 18, the person still refuses to repent, and there's no desire to obey Jews in that specific area that he's calling them to address, the Church may have no choice but to remove that person from being a member of the church.
I don't have to tell you this, but this is so painfully sad when it happens. It's so painful for everyone involved. But it's necessary at times. And why is it necessary to do this? First, Jesus tells us to handle the situation this way, so we obey Jesus.
But second, this scenario is necessary only if you understand what the church actually is. The Church is a bunch of jacked-up sinners who have been radically saved by the grace of God, and now we exist. Our whole existence is built upon this. We exist to love Jesus, trust Jesus, and obey Jesus. That's it.
That's all we do. We're one trick ponies. That's what we live for. That's what marks us. That's our identity.
So, it's an oxymoron to call someone a Christian who refuses to obey Jesus. Refuses. I'm not talking about wrestling against sin, fighting it, trying to put it to death, and making mistakes along the way. There is all the grace and patience in the world for a saint going to war against their sin like that. A person who calls themselves a Christian who refuses to agree with Jesus and who refuses to even try to obey Jesus might not actually be a Christian.
And if they might not be, the most unloving thing a church can do is to pretend that they are one for sure. The removal of a member from the church is supposed to produce repentance in them. It's supposed to open their eyes to the seriousness of the situation that they're in. The church says, in effect, you claim to be a Christian, but we can't see into your heart to know for sure if you are one or not. But we can see your life.
And over this season of your life, we cannot see the evidence that you are a Christian. For that reason, we can no longer affirm your profession of faith in Christ in this local church. Now, the best-case scenario the person who is removed from the church receives the grace from God that leads them to genuine confession and genuine repentance. And if that happens, the church walks with them gladly down the path to being reinstated in the Church, which is what everybody wants. It's what the whole church celebrates when it happens.
We rejoice. We party like it's 1999 when the one lost sheep comes back to join the 99.
I have this sneaking suspicion that nobody likes talking about church discipline, but we need to include it in this discussion because it falls under the banner of teaching disciples to obey Jews. The church has been authorized by Jews to teach his disciples to obey him. It's the teaching obedience to Christ that is the distinguishing mark that identifies us as Christians. The local church draws a line around the membership of the church and says, these ones inside this line, these ones belong to Jesus. We can't speak about anyone outside of this line, but we can and do affirm the ones inside this line because they love and obey Jesus.
That's what Jesus has authorized his church to do. And this is what genuine Christians want to do and want to be a part of. Share the gospel, baptize those who believe, teach those who have been baptized. The church doesn't do these things because we came up with those ideas. We do these things because Jesus told us to do them and because he gave us authority to do them.
This is what is meant when we say that Jesus authorizes his church to build his church. Now, at the beginning of our time, I said that in the Great Commission, we are given a prescription by Jesus to practice church membership at the local church level. And now I'm going to tell you why I can say that this is going to be the next fill-in on your outline. These words of Jesus found in the Great Commission cannot be applied in full at the universal church level. The Great Commission cannot be applied in full at the universal church level.
They can only be applied in full at the local church level. Making disciples according to Jesus requires that we baptize them and teach them. Both are required. It's not either or. We're not called to baptize new Christians and then source out the teaching part to other churches who are to disciple them or vice versa.
In Matthew 419, Jews told the first disciples that he was going to make them fishers of people. And he didn't have a catch-and-release idea in mind when he said that. He wasn't thinking, "Haha! My disciples will get people saved, and then they're going to turn these freshly saved believers loose to go and figure out how to be a Christ follower all on their own. And hopefully maybe one day they stumble into it." No, being a fisher of men requires that we keep the ones we catch, so to speak.
Making disciples requires sharing the gospel, baptizing new believers, and teaching them to obey Jesus. It requires all of these things because of technology. I can preach the gospel to someone who lives in Switzerland. And because of that same technology, I can also hear the profession of someone's faith who lives in Thailand. And I can affirm what I hear.
But even with all the advancements of technology, I cannot baptize either of them unless I jump in a plane and go to them. And I cannot teach them to obey Jesus, at least not the way that Jesus modeled teaching for us. That's because teaching is more than simply relaying information to someone. It's not less than that, it's just so much more. Consider how Jesus taught his disciples.
He called them to follow him. They left everything to do it. They spent their lives together with Jesus. They heard him teach the crowds, they heard him talk with them privately. But they also saw his life.
They saw how he talked, how he loved, how he humbled himself, how he served, how he died, how he lived. And he was able to see them and hear them and be with them. He could see how they were struggling at some times and how they were getting it right at other times. He saw when they needed encouragement and when they needed correction. Jesus didn't say to them, here's a list of everything I want you to do now go and do these things and report back in ten years.
He said, "Walk with me and watch me do these things, and then you go and do what you've seen in me." And what did Jesus say at the end of the Great Commission? The sweetest words a believer will ever hear and remember I am with you always. To the end of the age, Jesus was with those he discipled. When the disciples heard Jesus speak the Great Commission to them for the very first time, I bet they knew immediately what he meant when he said go and teach the new disciples to obey everything I've commanded you.
That's because they had just been taught personally by Jesus for three years, they knew what was involved with teaching the way Jesus wants us to teach. They experienced it firsthand for themselves. We have to love the ones we're discipling. And to lovingly disciple someone, we have to be with them. That's the way of Jesus.
So, therefore, the only way we can actually obey all of Jesus's Great Commission is to do it at the local church level. It's the only way it's possible to do the things he's telling the church to do in it. Well, what if the Great Commission is to be well, if the Great Commission is to be done only in the context of the local church, then how is the church built around the world? How is it built in Switzerland, in Thailand? How are disciples being made there?
How are they being baptized? How are they being taught to obey the commands of Jesus? How are they practicing church membership the way Jesus lays it out for us in the Great Commission? Answer through the local churches that are in those areas, of course. And what if there are no local churches in those areas?
Then we ask God if he wants us to send disciples from our local church over there so that they can preach the Gospel, baptize new believers, and teach them to obey Jesus. We send disciples to plant local churches there and to practice church membership, just like Jesus commanded us to, just like he prescribed it for us. And with that, I'm going to invite the worship team to come and get ready. I'm going to wrap this message up with a question and an invitation. If Jesus has authorized the church to affirm a Christian's profession of faith and to oversee their discipleship by way of teaching them to obey the commands of Jesus, shouldn't every Christian choose to submit to that authority that Jesus delegates to his church?
Shouldn't every Christian want the church to affirm their faith and teach them how to follow Jews? If you're a Christian and you're not a member of a local church yet, I hope you're thinking through the things that you're hearing in this series. And if you're wrestling with any of the things you hear me share, or if you have questions that I haven't addressed, please, please reach out to me or Jeff so that we can talk with you about them. We want to hear from you. We really do.
We want to hear from you about these things, and we want to have this conversation with you. So please reach out to us. So, with that said, I'm going to pray. Jesus, I thank You we could never run out of things to thank you for, but I'm going to be really specific here. Lord.
I thank you that we're not trying to be a church and build a church and live on purpose and on mission. We're not trying to do this scrambling in the dark without a blueprint. You care about the building of Your church infinitely more than we care because the building of Your church means that people are getting eternally saved and being brought into Your family where they experience heavenly, supernatural love and power on this side of heaven. You want people saved. You want people to become more and more like your son Jesus, Father.
You want that. And so, you tell us what to do so that we can see that accomplished in and through our lives. Thank you. Thank you for not just telling us what to do and showing us how to do it. Thank you for giving us the power that we need to actually do it.
Thank you for Your spirit that's in us collectively as Your church. We're not bringing a knife to a gunfight here, Lord Jesus, and we praise you for that. We are equipped with everything that we need to do, everything that you're calling us to do. So, I pray for us as a church here at Gospel City, Lord. Expand our vision, grow our vision for how you'd want to use a little band of disciples like us here at Gospel City, members of Gospel City, how you'd want us to leverage everything in our lives to live.
Sold out to you, sold out to doing Your will, no matter what it costs, no matter where it takes us, no matter what it looks like. Because if we do Your will, that means you're going to be glorified and people are going to be added to your church. So, give us that compassion, that conviction, to see that done here. Do it, Lord, we pray. Do it for the reason we pray, all the things we pray.
Do it because that's the way that you're glorified maximally. And that's the way that we're going to experience the deepest, richest, most profound life in you. If we're a part of a life that does that, have your way in Gospel City Church. Have your way in all of your local churches that you spread across the globe. Be Lord Jesus, not just with our words, but in real, tangible ways.
Be our Lord, in your name, we pray these things. Amen. Amen.