The Great Commission (The Mandate): Matthew 28: 16 – 20: Part Three (Final)

The Great Commission (The Mandate): Matthew 28: 16 – 20: Part Three (Final)

John Wesley, another great evangelist, sets out his methods to accomplish the command of Jesus Christ in the Great Commission with the resources given by Jesus Christ. Wesley’s methodology emerged by borrowing ideas from a wide range of diverse models, and the final product was a refined synthesis of proven techniques.

Wesley’s awareness of the Assurance of God’s favor became the cornerstone of his methods. Lorrie Sanny, the Chairman of the Board of the Navigators, defines evangelism as “taking a good look at Jesus Christ and then telling someone what you saw” this John Wesley did in his evangelical approach by:

• Making people Recognize their need for Jesus Christ and
• Understand how to Receive Jesus into their lives.

 Evangelism, to John Wesley, was both an act and a process. He did not just make converts but trained and mobilized them to share the good news effectively. Wesley’s evangelical revolution illustrates that long-lasting Spiritual transformation is not the product of dynamic preaching or correct doctrine but comes only through serious disciple building in keeping with Christ’s Great Commission.

Wesley used three distinct modes of evangelism and disciple-making in early Methodism.

The Modes are:

• The Society Meetings that aimed at cognitive instruction
• The class meetings that provided an environment for behavioral changes
• The Band that facilitated effective redirection.

“Metaphorically, the Society Meetings aimed for the head, the Class meeting for the hands and the band for the heart.” (Quote from D. Michael Henderson as written on page 112 of John Wesley’s Class meeting).

The three modes were built into the early Methodism and complemented each other. Wesley used them as tools for evangelism and disciple-making. The field preaching was also not neglected but used for effective evangelism to increase the numbers of participants in the modes and to spread Scriptural holiness throughout the Land. Wesley directed the community’s poor and the downtrodden people to the Scriptures. He pointed them to Biblical examples of people who had experienced a powerful, loving, and personal God at work. These are the People who believed in the ‘living faith.’ Wesley’s Methods of disciple-making are still potent today as they were in his days.

The learning progress of the disciples was to be demonstrated in their daily lives. Wesley defined a mark of a mature Christian as “consistent obedience to God, in which the new relationship of justifying faith is no longer interrupted by a wayward disposition but firmly grounded in a service of love.” His modes provided sequential order, with each phase building on the previous one, and this is the actual process of discipleship development Today. The Society Meetings of the Methodist systems are like what is today known as covenant groups called ‘Come and See’ phase. Wesley’s Class Meetings represent the basic accountability group known as the ‘Come and Follow Me’ phase of Today. Wesley’s Band represents the ongoing accountability group of ‘Be with Me,’ while Wesley’s Select group is the ‘Remain in Me.’

 Wesley’s principles are more potent Today for a disciple-making Church to grow spiritually and numerically. The Ministry in Africa Today has mature churches that are diverse and better articulated than at the time of John Wesley. Idol worshipping was more prevalent at that time. Missionaries like John Wesley brought Christian religion to Africa through their evangelical outreach. Wesley’s timeless discipleship principles were to define the end product and develop the recipe at each phase of the process. It has helped disciple-making churches to:

• Help newcomers understand the ministry they need when they join.
• Help Ministry leaders understand precisely their objective in discipling persons.
• Articulate church programs with “all the things” on their ladder.

How It Affects Our Theologizing:

Theology is an instrument of sound evangelical strategy. The word of God is the revelation, while theology is the indispensable support of the revealed Word of God. Our theologizing, therefore, must be the precise map of the knowledge of God for non-Christians. After Christ determined the pattern and end of all theology for His Church, the glorified Christ commissioned His Church to disciple the nations, baptizing and teaching His followers to obey everything He had commanded. The Great Commission then places upon the church specific intellectual demands. There is the evangelistic demand to contextualize, without compromise, the Gospel proclamation to meet the needs of every generation and culture.

There is the didactic demand to correlate the manifold data of Scripture in our minds and to apply this knowledge to all phases of thinking and conduct. And there is the apologetic demand to justify Christianity’s existence as God’s revealed religion and to protect its message from adulteration and distortion (Tit. 1:9). Theology has risen in the life of the Church in response to these concrete demands of the Great Commission. The theological enterprise serves the Great Commission as it seeks to clarify logically and coherently for men everywhere the truth God has revealed in Holy Scripture about Himself and the World He has created.

 The ways it affects our theologizing then include but are not limited to the followings:

1. Negligent Reflection

Reflection, at times, could be seen as an adversary of Gospel proclamation. According to Tite Tienou, this perception is a theological decision; African Christians should refrain from making the Gospel Kerygmatically Universal.

2. Denominational and Doctrinal Fragmentation

The various denominations and different theological doctrines upheld by African Christians prevent evangelicals from working together on a standard theological plan to advance the Great Commission.

3. Theological Failure

Our theological failures arise from:

• Our silence, allowing others to formulate African theology without our contributions; this situation is evident by the lack of evangelical presence in recent publications on African theology.
• Spiritual immaturity: even though Africa is reputed to have the fastest growing Church in the world, it could also be said to have the fastest declining Church due to a lack of Spiritual depth, Education, and Knowledge. This Spiritual immaturity has greatly impacted the fulfillment of the Great Commission.

4. Lack of Spiritual Commitment and
5. Lack of contextualization throwing away our African Culture.

Conclusion:

The justification of theologizing as an intellectual discipline could be adduced by five reasons, namely:

1. Christ’s theological method.
2. Christ’s mandate to his Church is to disciple and to teach.
3. The apostolic model.
4. The apostolically approved example and activity of the New Testament church
5. The nature of the Holy Scriptures.

The Church must remain committed to the theological task for these five reasons. And it can do so with the full assurance that its labors will not be a waste of time and energy. No intellectual pursuit will ultimately prove to be more rewarding than acquiring knowledge of God and his ways and works. Indeed, the scriptural mandate for the theological enterprise is so clear that the Church’s primary question should not be whether it should engage itself in theology; the Lord of the Church and His apostles leave it no other option.

The Church must be engaged in theology to be faithful to Christ. Instead, what should be of more significant concern to the Church is whether, in its engagement in theology, it is listening as intently and submissively as it should to the Lord’s voice speaking to His Church in Holy Scripture and, most significantly, the command in the Great Commission! 

In summary, the Church’s primary concern should be not whether to engage in theology but is its theology correct. Is it orthodox? Or perhaps better: Is it Biblical? How the theological task is described will be determined by the ‘Sitz im Leben’ of the individual theologian, governed by his academic qualifications, socio-economic, historical, learning, and theological situation.