As disciples of Jesus Christ, we are called to one monumental task: sharing the Gospel. This is one of the most important calls in all of Scripture.
Jesus is the most important person you will ever know and follow. Everyone and everything else pales in comparison to Him.
Do you know the owner of the company you work for? Do you know the mayor of your town? How about the governor of your state? What about the president or vice president of the United States?
Do you know the Queen of England?
Do you know the Pope?
If you answered, ‘Yes’ to any of those questions, then you know one (or more) pretty important people.
Yet knowing any one of them – or even all of them – pales in comparison to knowing Jesus Christ. In fact, imagine you had a time machine that allowed you to freely travel to any time and place in history. Let’s also imagine that it’s your goal to become personally acquainted with every ruler the world has ever known.
If you succeed in your goal, and you personally know people such as Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Napoleon Bonaparte, Abraham Lincoln, and Winston Churchill, then you would still know nobody who comes even close to Christ.
Knowing Jesus is everything.
If you truly know Him, you will lack nothing. That is a fact. It is presented to us in Scripture. Psalm 23 tells us, “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.”
Jesus Himself says (in John 4:13-14), “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
If you know the Shepherd – that is, if you know Jesus Christ, the one and only Son of God – then you will lack nothing. You will be filled to the brim with a “living water” that satisfies everything you need.
Does that mean you’ll be free from desires and wants? No. Does it mean you’ll get everything you want in life? No. But it does mean this: if you know Jesus Christ, you will never lack what you need.
He will supply to you all that is needed in your life.
Sharing the Gospel: a Necessity in the Christian Life
It is necessary to share the Gospel. If you’re a believer, this is something you should – and need – to be doing.
Why?
Because Jesus is everything. Because He is Lord. Because others – your family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, fellow countrymen, and fellow human beings – need to hear about Him.
They need Jesus. Without Jesus, they will die. That’s blunt, but it’s true.
A person will perish without Jesus Christ. He is the only one who can redeem us.
Do you know the Lord Jesus? Do you truly know Him? If you do, then you have “springs of living water” welling up within you. You have the Gospel within you!
Translated directly, Gospel means “Good News.”
If you have the good news of Jesus Christ, then you are told (in no uncertain terms) to share it.
This is called the Great Commission. We read in Matthew 28,
And Jesus came and said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 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 all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age." [Matthew 28:18-20, ESV]
If you’re a Christian, you have probably heard the Great Commission preached on and talked about many times. In fact, the Great Commission is preached so often that, for many, its “impact” has worn off.
‘Yeah, I know. Go and make disciples of all nations. Got it. I’ll drop a check in the offering plate for 50 dollars and support the missionaries over in east Asia.’
Too often, our comfortable Western Christianity leads us to simply sit back and throw money at far-away missions. It leads us to put cash in the coffer to prop up nameless faces in distant lands, while we ourselves sit back and discuss who leads the NFL in rushing yards.
Now, is it bad to support missions by giving money to them? No! Absolutely not. It is necessary. Vital. Many forms of missionary work cannot go on without financial support.
We should be supporting foreign missions with financial gifts and time spent in prayer. That is important.
But here’s the rub: when we believe that we’ve done “our part” by simply depositing a monthly check and then walking out the door to go watch football or eat dinner on a Sunday afternoon, we’ve missed the point of the Great Commission entirely.
The Great Commission – the command by our Lord to share Him with the world – does not stop with giving money and expecting a select fraction of Believers to carry out the hard work of witnessing, discipling, and leading others to Jesus.
Re-visit the words of Matthew 28. Jesus says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations…”
Jesus doesn’t directly tell us who is supposed to “go,” but the grammar of the sentence reveals that for us. What Jesus uses here is called an “implied you.”
If I say, “Go to the store,” I’m not telling you who is supposed to go. But I don’t need to. If I’m directing the words at you, then I’m implying that you should go to the store.
That is an implied you.
We have one of those in the Great Commission. Jesus is essentially saying to His disciples, “YOU Go… and make other disciples.”
Are you a disciple of His? If so, the Great Commission is aimed at you.
If you’re a disciple of Jesus – that is, if you know Him and follow Him – then the words spoke in Matthew 28 are words for you.
Jesus’s command is this: You know Me, so go share Me with others.
Share Jesus with people of all nations.
I think we too often have it in mind that the Great Commission is about packing our bags and moving to Africa, where we live for three years in a hut in the jungle.
Could it be that? Yes.
But all nations includes your nation. It includes your neighbor just as much as it includes those on the other side of the world.
Sharing the Gospel is not only for the small sliver of the Church that is called to move overseas. It’s for you and me, wherever we are.
If you’re a disciple, you need to be making disciples. You and I cannot get away from this.
A Call to Action
As I bring this to a close, I recognize that there is so, so much more that could have been said here.
I could have written about how to share the Gospel. I could have analyzed the Great Commission line by line. But that is not what I felt laid on my heart.
What I felt laid on my heart is this: we need to share the Gospel! It’s important. It is necessary.
I myself am as at fault as any one of you reading this. Do I share the Gospel? Do I witness to my neighbors and friends and co-workers and fellow citizens?
No. I don’t. I feel heavily convicted of that.
The truth is, I am afraid. So are many of you.
We’re afraid of rejection. We’re afraid of what others will say. We are afraid of persecution, of the biting words of angry men and angry women who hate God and want nothing to do with Him.
And that fear is natural.
But it must be overcome.
Whether we’re loud or quiet, extraverted or introverted, bold or timid, we’re called to share the Gospel and make disciples.
We’re called to this whether we’re young or old, rich or poor, sick or healthy.
The call to share Jesus Christ does not change depending upon your status. All disciples – that’s me and that’s you, if you know Jesus Christ – are called to make other disciples.
But we’re afraid, and that stops us.
How can we be un-afraid?
Well, just read on to the end of the passage in Matthew 28. Jesus says, “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
You see, our fear is real. We fear being shut down, spit on, cursed at, rejected, and alienated. We fear burning bridges or offending friends and family with the Gospel.
Our fear is real. But at the same time, it’s also an illusion. Why is that?
Because Jesus Himself promises us that He will always be with us.
I can guarantee you this: if you witness to others, you will be hated for it. Many people will not like you. It will be uncomfortable. It will be difficult. You will lose friendships.
But Jesus will draw nearer to you than you ever thought possible. Remember how He gives living water to all those who follow Him?
Go out and share the Gospel to His glory, and see what happens with that living water. Jesus will not forsake you. He will not leave you. There are stories all over this world of men and women who were put through the worst ordeals imaginable for the sake of Jesus Christ.
These are people who were jailed, tortured, beaten, hated, and even killed. They literally gave their lives for the sake of Jesus.
But guess what?
Of those who lived to tell the tale, not a single one of them has ever – EVER – said they regretted it. In fact, the presence of Jesus Christ was sweeter and more real to them in their darkest day than at any other time in their lives.
When we share the Gospel for the glory of Jesus Christ, we may lose relationships. We may be hated. If we live in a nation that actively persecutes Christians, we may even be jailed or killed.
But Christ will not forsake us. He will draw near to us.
Finally, imagine this: let’s say that you witness to a hundred people, and ninety-nine of them hate you.
But one receives the Gospel.
How sweet is the rejoicing in Heaven over that one person! That is a soul saved for all eternity, and God worked through you to accomplish this.
To bring this to an end, my challenge to you and to me is this: let’s get out there and share Christ.
Let’s proclaim the Gospel boldly, no matter who we are or what our personality may be. Let’s make disciples, acting as soldiers for Christ in a warzone. Let’s do battle in the trenches, relying upon Christ the whole way to transform others and bring them into the Church and into eternal life.
Let’s do this to the glory of God, because we are called to give our lives in service to Him.
After all, He gave His life in service to us.
God bless!