The NXR Podcast - December 10, 2022


QUESTIONS - Is Starting A Christian School Included In The Great Commission？


Episode Stats


Length

20 minutes

Words per minute

179.94

Word count

3,663

Sentence count

194

Harmful content

Hate speech

16

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, we discuss the Great Commission and how to fulfill it in the modern world. What does it mean to be part of the church and what does it entail to be a disciple of Jesus Christ? What is the role of a disciple and how does it relate to the great commission?

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hey guys, real quick before we get started, I have a small request.
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00:00:17.520 Thanks.
00:00:20.700 Here we go. Super chat from the McGlone Code.
00:00:25.020 The McGlone Code. I think that's how you say it.
00:00:26.620 Here we go. Hi, pastor who's carrying out the mission of the church,
00:00:28.720 part of the mission of the church.
00:00:30.400 Is carrying out the mission of the church
00:00:31.880 part of the mission of church?
00:00:33.400 This is like, this is like inception, right?
00:00:35.640 This is a dream within a dream.
00:00:38.500 Okay, here we go.
00:00:39.440 To clarify, ah, ah, read on, just read on.
00:00:41.760 Just Joe Biden, stick to the teleprompter.
00:00:43.300 Here we go.
00:00:44.120 To clarify, is the mission just or merely the orders?
00:00:49.380 Oh, no, he means just righteous, right?
00:00:51.860 Is that what he's saying?
00:00:52.540 Is the mission just the, okay, simply, merely,
00:00:55.460 is the mission merely the orders slash goals of the mission or does it include that which we do
00:01:02.240 to carry out the mission here we go example if i open a school that's not what jesus specifically
00:01:08.860 said to do yes he did yes he did now this is a great question all right i see what you're gonna
00:01:13.620 if i open a school that's not what jesus specifically said to do but in so much as it
00:01:19.040 is in service to the mission and the mission i the great commission is it fair to call it a part
00:01:25.300 of the mission. Can something other than disciple and teach the faith be part of the mission? Yes.
00:01:32.100 And the example that you gave is not something other than disciple and teach the faith.
00:01:36.820 So that's the only pushback I would give. So to answer your question, absolutely. Absolutely.
00:01:41.760 Are there other things outside of making disciples and baptizing the nations that still
00:01:47.320 can be put, placed accurately and faithfully under the large banner of the Great Commission?
00:01:52.640 yes and i'd be hard-pressed though to find an example why um because the example you listen
00:01:59.980 i could think of several others actually are directly fulfilling the great commission because
00:02:03.680 the great commission is not just make converts which of course we all know is good good reformers
00:02:08.960 that only the holy spirit actually can do right but you know what i mean um preaching the gospel
00:02:15.680 right go so all right so let me just break down the the great commission let's start with that
00:02:20.320 First, Jesus prefaces the prelude to the Great Commission.
00:02:23.860 Jesus says, I have all authority, but only in heaven, because radical two kingdom theology
00:02:29.460 is true. 0.75
00:02:30.320 No, I have all authority in heaven, but also on earth.
00:02:33.920 Jesus is reigning.
00:02:35.380 Physically, he is seated at the right hand of his father, reigning from heaven.
00:02:38.260 He has rule and reign in heaven, but also rule and reign authority on earth.
00:02:42.000 And he's carrying that out, his rule and authority.
00:02:44.540 his sovereignty is being carried out by chiefly, by all things, but chiefly the church. Okay. So
00:02:51.440 that's the prelude. Jesus has all authority. So, and not just in heaven, not just spiritually,
00:02:55.480 but tangibly here on earth. So listen up. And here's what he says. Go and make disciples of
00:03:01.200 all nations, disciple nations, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them into the name of the
00:03:07.020 father, the son, and the Holy spirit. So into the name of the triune God, and the part we always
00:03:10.800 leave out, teaching them to obey all my commands. There's your theonomy as a part of the Great 0.53
00:03:15.660 Commission. Teach them my law and teach them obedience to my law. Now, the way that I usually, 0.99
00:03:21.980 the way that it helps me, the framework that I use to think of the Great Commission is the Great
00:03:25.260 Commission is really just one command, but I would say that it has four components, right? Four steps
00:03:31.460 if we're going to faithfully fulfill the one command. The one command is disciple. Disciple,
00:03:37.140 more particularly, the nations. Disciple the nations. Disciple the nations. That's the Great
00:03:43.960 Commission. Now, how do you do it? Step one, go. So it's going to involve going. Many people stay
00:03:51.060 because they're discipling the nation that God has providentially placed them in to begin with,
00:03:54.520 the nation they're born in. But some will have to go. And especially early on in church history,
00:04:00.240 where there was an epicenter for the Christian faith, and eventually it started to move, right?
00:04:05.600 And we see that just in the book of Acts, just in one generation, the epicenter for
00:04:09.280 the Christian faith, it moves from Jerusalem in the life of Jesus, where he appointed the
00:04:14.120 apostles and commissioned them and all these things, to Antioch. 0.98
00:04:17.420 And it begins to have a Gentile epicenter as the Jews harden their hearts and reject 0.94
00:04:22.220 Christ as the Messiah, okay? 0.88
00:04:24.540 So, you know, it's, you know, the book of Acts, first 15 chapters, give or take, really
00:04:28.360 follow Peter.
00:04:29.420 And then it begins to follow Paul, who is apostle to the Gentiles.
00:04:33.140 So there's a going, and especially early on, if we're thinking of Christendom as a long
00:04:37.220 work in church history, there's a lot of going.
00:04:39.600 And I'm not saying that we shouldn't have still international missions today, but I
00:04:43.120 don't think it should be the emphasis that it once was.
00:04:45.680 I think that there's so much work for the average Christian to do in their home native
00:04:50.840 land, the nation that they're born into, that there's a lot right there, but go, okay?
00:04:55.280 So big command, disciple the nations.
00:04:57.780 How do you do it?
00:04:58.460 Four subcommands, go.
00:04:59.800 baptize and teach. Go, baptize, and teach. And I said four because I think implicitly in baptism
00:05:08.120 is preaching the gospel because we're baptizing converts, baptizing people into the name,
00:05:16.000 nations, into the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, right? And so that involves
00:05:21.780 also preaching the gospel, right? That there's conversion. So there's going, there's preaching
00:05:28.280 the gospel and the Holy Spirit in his sovereignty, regenerating hearts with the preaching of the
00:05:33.140 gospel, Romans 10, 14, the Spirit's working in conjunction with hearing, faith comes by hearing,
00:05:38.600 that's actually Hebrews, faith cometh by hearing, hearing the word of Christ, Romans 10, 14, how
00:05:43.620 will they believe unless they hear, how will they hear unless someone preaches? So the big headline,
00:05:48.240 one commandment in the Great Commission, disciple nations. You do it by going, you do it by preaching,
00:05:52.840 you do it by baptizing, you do it by teaching. And I'm contrasting preaching, you know, the
00:05:57.720 distinction between preaching and teaching, preaching, gospel preaching, evangelistic
00:06:01.620 preaching, conversion, and then teaching law.
00:06:06.380 And primarily, I think law, because it's at the end, this is a reference primarily not
00:06:11.040 to the first use of the law, which would be involved in gospel preaching. 0.60
00:06:14.300 You've got to preach the law of God so that people know that they're a sinner, so that
00:06:19.000 they know that they actually have a need for Christ.
00:06:20.880 Charles Spurgeon said, a man cannot appreciate the beauty of Christ unless he first come
00:06:24.840 to see his need for Christ, the necessity for Christ, and what makes us realize the necessity
00:06:31.200 of Christ, obviously the regenerative work of the Holy Spirit, but in terms of preaching,
00:06:35.200 our faithful preaching that the Spirit works in conjunction with, that's preaching the law.
00:06:40.560 In preaching the law, we see God's holy standard. By virtue of seeing his holy standard, we see
00:06:44.600 the holiness of God himself, and we also see, by contrast, by way of consequence and seeing
00:06:49.380 the holiness of God, we see our sinfulness, the gap, this infinite chasm between sinful man and
00:06:55.820 a thrice holy God, and therefore the need for a substitute, atonement, forgiveness, the Lamb of
00:07:01.740 God who takes away the sins of the world, Christ. You cannot preach Christ in a way that is
00:07:06.680 compelling apart from preaching the law in its first use. And the first use of the law is that
00:07:12.360 it's used to reveal the holiness of God, the sinfulness of man, and the need for the gospel.
00:07:16.080 All right, so disciple of the nations, that's one command of the Great Commission, but you
00:07:21.360 got to go, you got to preach law and gospel, first use of the law and gospel, and as the
00:07:27.040 Holy Spirit gives faith, baptize, you're going to baptize, and then lastly, you're going
00:07:33.140 to teach, and teach them what?
00:07:34.700 Obedience to Christ's commandments, which is again law, but here I don't believe that
00:07:38.900 it's a reference because this is teaching them the ones who have already been baptized.
00:07:42.680 So this is teaching those converts the law of God, which means the law of God in its first use has already been preached, preaching God is holy, you are sinful, and then the gospel, first use of the law and the gospel, producing converts as the Spirit gives grace, and then baptizing them, and then teaching them the law again.
00:08:03.920 But now I think the implication is by necessary inference, the third use of the law, which
00:08:08.740 is for a distinctly Christian use that for the Christian, the law of God serves not just
00:08:14.240 not just as an indicator for my need for salvation, but the law of God also serves as a guide.
00:08:20.800 Once I've already received salvation by grace alone, through faith alone and Christ alone
00:08:24.200 now as a response, not works based meritorious based salvation, but receiving salvation by
00:08:30.920 grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone now as a response of gratitude for that salvation
00:08:36.540 my response is God if you've loved me in the beloved in Christ like this freely I can't help
00:08:42.600 but love you back and God how can I show you that I love you well Jesus answers that question obey
00:08:47.940 my commands so then we're teaching Christians what Jesus commands are so that they may walk in them
00:08:53.740 that's the third use of the law that the law is not just our reveals our need for the gospel but
00:08:58.420 then for Christians, it is a lamp unto their feet, a light unto their path. The law is a mirror.
00:09:03.540 It shows the holiness of God and reveals our own sinfulness and our need for Christ,
00:09:07.300 but it's also a compass. It directs the Christian, not in the path to salvation,
00:09:13.540 but the path from salvation to obedience to Christ and further sanctification and making
00:09:19.700 a difference, a real difference in the world. If you're thinking, how do I love my neighbor?
00:09:24.600 Obey God's law. God's law lends towards blessing. Obedience to God's law, it's not just morally
00:09:30.840 right, it's good and beneficial. David delights in the law of God. Paul says in Romans 7, he says,
00:09:36.800 the law's not the problem, it's sin that's the problem. Paul says explicitly, he says,
00:09:41.500 the law is not only right and perfect, but the law is good and holy and right. It is profitable.
00:09:48.400 It is beneficial.
00:09:50.260 So when you have more people, not less, but more people obeying God's morally righteous,
00:09:56.980 but also beneficial and profitable good law that lends towards human flourishing on the
00:10:04.080 earth, if more people obey God's law, things are better.
00:10:09.020 And they're not just better for Christians.
00:10:10.640 They're better for everyone.
00:10:12.840 Everyone benefits. 0.96
00:10:13.820 It's unbelievers benefit by there being more Christians living in obedience to God's law. 0.97
00:10:20.900 So the Great Commission is one commandment, disciple the nations. 0.96
00:10:25.120 But there are four implicit steps or subcommandments all baked into the pie.
00:10:30.740 Going, preaching the gospel and the first use of God's law that the spirit would use
00:10:35.880 to make converts, baptizing, and then teaching the third use of the law, a lamp to our feet,
00:10:41.900 how Christians should live in the world.
00:10:43.260 So all that being said, go back to the question now. 0.98
00:10:46.320 Uh-oh, same problem?
00:10:48.300 All right, he learned.
00:10:50.600 He learned from the last time I did this.
00:10:52.640 So all that being said, what do you do at school?
00:10:55.760 If I open a school,
00:10:57.000 that's not what Jesus specifically said to do.
00:10:59.360 But in so much as it is in service to the mission,
00:11:02.760 and I'm assuming here you mean capital T, capital M,
00:11:05.860 the Great Commission,
00:11:07.200 is it fair to call it part of the mission?
00:11:10.040 And the reason why I'm saying yes, absolutely,
00:11:11.820 is because that is part of the mission.
00:11:13.260 part of the mission is teaching, teaching them to obey all of Christ's commands. And here's the
00:11:18.580 deal. Christ commands the law of God has implications. This goes back to our view of
00:11:23.100 the sufficiency of scripture. There's a lot of people who believe in the inannancy of scripture,
00:11:26.900 but not the sufficiency of scripture. And here's the follow-up question you have to ask. Even among
00:11:31.020 those who believe in the sufficiency of scripture, you have to ask the clarifying question, sufficient
00:11:34.820 for what? Is the scripture only sufficient for spiritual matters and salvation? Or do we believe
00:11:41.240 the scripture is sufficient for all of life and godliness. And remember, if we do that first word
00:11:47.440 life, all of life, that life is a very broad category. Life involves finances. It involves
00:11:57.220 economics. It involves markets. It involves beauty, the good, the true, and the beautiful.
00:12:02.980 It involves culture and arts.
00:12:06.280 It involves medicine and welfare and healthcare and civil ethics and politics and governments
00:12:13.880 and states and nations.
00:12:15.720 It involves all these things, marriages and families and education, schools.
00:12:21.000 You betcha.
00:12:21.920 You betcha.
00:12:22.700 So if we're called to teach people, if part of the Great Commission is to teach people
00:12:27.620 to obey all of Christ's commandments, that's what school is.
00:12:30.600 if you think of school from a distinctly classical christian category and all of life for all of
00:12:38.180 christ category of what is christian education it is not um math science literature and then a 45
00:12:46.260 minute bible class at the end no it's math science and literature but all of it is christian it's
00:12:51.860 christian math and you might say there's no such thing as christian math yes there is and you know
00:12:56.520 how i know there's such a thing as christian math because there's such a thing as god hating math
00:12:59.960 And in God-hating math, non-Christian math, two plus two can equal five.
00:13:03.860 And we've just seen that in the last couple of years. 0.86
00:13:06.220 So don't you dare tell me there's not such a thing as Christian math.
00:13:09.680 Of course there is. 0.98
00:13:10.860 There is only Christian math. 1.00
00:13:12.800 It's either Christ or chaos. 0.98
00:13:15.360 Not whether, but which.
00:13:17.040 And so when we're teaching people to obey Christ's commands, all we're doing is we're
00:13:20.240 teaching the law of God and then teaching the law of God in reference to its application
00:13:24.640 in each sphere of life.
00:13:26.240 all of Christ, we might say all of Christ's commands, but applied then to all of life,
00:13:32.340 all of Christ to every arena of life, every realm of life, the math realm of life, the literature
00:13:38.840 realm of life, the science realm of life, the art realm of life. So a Christian school starting a 0.82
00:13:45.400 distinctly Christian school is part of the Christian, the great commission, because part
00:13:50.260 of the Great Commission, you can't make disciples without going to people. And you can't make
00:13:57.240 disciples without preaching the gospel and the first use of the law that makes the gospel relevant,
00:14:01.720 shows them they need the gospel. And you can't make disciples without then baptizing these
00:14:06.400 Christians who have been born again by grace and the hearing of the gospel and the work of the
00:14:10.380 spirit. And you also can't make disciples without then taking these baptized converts and teaching
00:14:16.740 them obedience to all Christ's commands. And teaching them obedience to all Christ's commands
00:14:20.780 means the implications and applications of all of Christ's commands in every single realm of life.
00:14:27.260 All of Christ's commands applied to every realm of life. That's what Christian math is. Christian
00:14:34.400 math is theonomy. Christian science is theonomy. Christian literature is theonomy. And theonomy
00:14:41.560 me is the teaching of the third use of God's law, Christ's commandments, which is baked into the
00:14:47.760 Great Commission and explicitly stated in the Great Commission. So I would say that starting
00:14:52.040 a Christian school is, not only does it work towards the end of the Great Commission,
00:14:59.060 it's explicitly listed by Christ in the Great Commission, teaching people to obey all my
00:15:03.940 commandments. That means teaching people to obey all my commandments. And we know he's referring
00:15:08.800 to the third use of the law here.
00:15:10.720 We know that because he's talking about
00:15:12.800 what to do with the people
00:15:13.680 who have now been baptized.
00:15:15.640 It's progressive, the steps that he's giving.
00:15:18.240 Go, implicitly then preach the gospel
00:15:21.100 and then explicitly baptize
00:15:23.760 and then explicitly again,
00:15:26.820 teach them to obey my commandments
00:15:28.680 as a response to the salvation
00:15:32.100 they've already freely received
00:15:33.280 by virtue of the fact that they've been baptized.
00:15:35.500 So teach them to obey my commandments,
00:15:37.520 third use of the law,
00:15:38.220 not as a mirror revealing the need, our sin and the need for a savior, but as a compass,
00:15:43.120 a guide, a lamp unto our feet, light unto our path. And we're not just teaching them to obey
00:15:47.580 Christ's commandments in the third use of the law, the way in which we should walk,
00:15:52.200 but we're also teaching all of Christ's commandments, which I believe necessary
00:15:56.120 inference by way of implication, all of Christ's commandments also carries with it and all the
00:16:01.300 applications of all of Christ's commandments. So all of his commandments, not some of his
00:16:06.080 commandments, but all of his commandments, and I think that that implies, applied to all of life.
00:16:11.440 So not some of Christ's commandments for some arenas of life. It's not just some of Christ's
00:16:17.020 commandments in just some areas of life, like marriage and parenting. No, all of Christ's
00:16:23.140 commandments in all of its applications and implications, which would be every realm of life,
00:16:27.700 which means Christian math. These are Christ's commandments, the law of God, the truth of the
00:16:33.580 whole council of scripture and how it informs arithmetic, how it informs trigonometry and
00:16:40.800 quantum physics and everything else. This is how it works. This is how it works and science and
00:16:47.420 literature and art and the whole nine yards. So to answer your question, a resounding yes,
00:16:53.620 a resounding yes. This is included in the great commission and not just because it's a permissible
00:16:58.540 means of bringing about the great commission, but because it's explicitly stated by Jesus
00:17:03.460 as the Great Commission.
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