A sermon preached at Covenant Presbyterian Church of Fort Smith, Arkansas on June 15, 2025.
“Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. 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’” (Matt. 28:16–20).[1]
Matthew tells us that the eleven apostles, likely accompanied by other disciples, met Jesus on a Galilean mountain. There, he appeared to them, and they worshiped him, Jesus, the resurrected Christ. To which, Matthew adds, “but some doubted” (Matt. 28:16-17). As translated, this sounds anticlimactic, but the Greek word translated “doubted” here may be better translated “were hesitant,”[2] as it is the same word used of Peter’s loss of confidence unbelievably walking on water to Jesus on the stormy Sea of Galilee.[3] Likewise, on that mountain, Jesus’ disciples were witnessing the seemingly unbelievable, the Lord Jesus Christ not only resurrected but glorified before their eyes.
I am reminded of what Jesus said to doubting Thomas, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29). This would of course include everyone else after Christ’s ascension, everyone who would believe the gospel of Jesus Christ without seeing him. And it was to the blessed who have not seen that the church was sent, to welcome all people to believe the unbelievable.
Christ’s Authority
We refer to this sending as the Great Commission, which begins not with the implied imperative, “Go,” but with the indicative of Christ’s authority: “And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me’” (Matt. 28:18). Just as the imperative of obedience in the Christian life must follow the indicative of the gospel, so the imperative of the Great commission must follow the indicative of Christ’s authority. We carry out Christ’s Great Commission by and through his authority, and we are faithful to carry it out, because he who has all authority has commissioned us.
We see Jesus’ authority in the record of his earthly ministry, as he taught with authority as the living Word of God and healed with authority over demons and diseases. But after his death and resurrection, God the Father bestowed upon him full authority. Fulfilling Daniel’s prophecy of the Messiah’s regal reign over heaven and earth,[4] the apostle Paul explains, “God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:9-11). Jesus who first came to serve will now be served!
Seated at the right hand of God the Father, God the Son rules from heaven through God the Holy Spirit. His rule includes the earth, as creation belongs to him, and there is no place in heaven or earth outside his authoritative reign, no kingdom outside his authority, no king outside his dominion.[5] All authority has been given to the Son of God, not a pope, not a priest, not a king but Christ our prophet, priest, and king!
And he who has all authority has enabled, empowered, and commissioned his church under this authority. We see this immediately in the book of Acts as the gospel was preached and new converts were “baptized in the name of Jesus Christ” (Acts 2:38), meaning according to and under his authority. Every baptism according to Christ’s commission, in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, is according to and under the authority of Christ’s commission. And as we see in Acts, the church grew and multiplied accordingly.
Let us then thank God the Great Commission rests not on those commissioned but on Christ himself, and so it will never fail. While Christ’s church at times may be found unfaithful, the Great Commission will ultimately be accomplished. For, he who was born Immanuel, “God with us” (Matt. 1:23) personally promised, “I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:20b).
Christ’s Commission
It may surprise some to learn that the command within Christ’s authoritative commission is neither “Go” nor “baptizing” nor “teaching.” The command of the Great Commission, in fact the only imperative in this passage, is the verb translated “make disciples.”[6] The word “disciples” is implied in the verb, but the command is clear: Make them! As one commentator clarifies, The essential commission is not “Tell people about Jesus.” It is not “Preach the gospel.” It is not “Grow your church.” It is not “Make converts.” Jesus’ commission assumes all these, but goes deeper, commanding that we make disciples. To make disciples is to lead new believers to maturity . . .[7] A disciple then is one who believes the gospel, trusting in Christ alone for salvation and is baptized and is taught to observe Christ’s commands, unto maturity.
And if this is the case, then we should clarify: who is going, baptizing, and teaching? Who specifically makes disciples? As all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Christ, only the one to whom he has given authority may make disciples on his behalf. And he has given that authority to no one else but the “members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone” (Eph. 2:19b-20), Christ’s church. It is to his church alone that Christ has given “the keys of the kingdom of heaven,” to bind and loose in heaven what is bound and loosed on earth (Matt. 16:19). We are Christ’s commissioned church!
How then do we make disciples? The answer is found in the three participles: going, baptizing, and teaching. We are not a passive people, hunkering down in our holy huddles but mobilizing to make disciples “of all nations,” or as it may better be translated, “of all peoples.” While Jesus first came to Israel, in fulfillment of Scripture, the gospel was never intended for one ethnicity or nation exclusively. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
When Jesus said, “you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8b), he didn’t mean over the internet from a smart phone in Jerusalem. He meant that the real, live, in-person church would start in their neighborhood and then advance to the next neighborhood over and the next country over, going as commissioned to make disciples of all peoples. This doesn’t mean that we abandon the churches first planted or send all our resources to missionaries; how else will disciples mature? But the church must not remain static but make disciples inward and outward, which is what we see in the book of Acts, as Christians were forced to flee Jerusalem,[8] as Paul testified before Gentiles and even kings,[9] and as missionaries like Barnabas, Silas, Timothy, and Titus along with Paul, planted churches in pagan cities and regions.
But disciples are made not only through evangelism but as churches are planted, disciples are made through baptism, as it signifies our “engrafting” into Christ and “partaking of the covenant of grace.”[10] Through baptism, we are admitted into the visible church but also nurtured through it, as the Westminster Larger Catechism explains, the “duty of improving our baptism” is a lifelong endeavor that consists partly in “growing up to assurance of pardon of sin, and of all other blessings sealed to us in that sacrament.”[11] In this sense, through baptism we enter into the church as disciples and through baptism we are discipled. And this applies not only to new converts but to our covenant children as well. As historian D.G. Hart explains,
In the past, confessional Protestants, such as Presbyterians and Lutherans, planted new churches . . . [when] families would move away from a community with an existing congregation to one where none existed. . . . Some of the new growth came from grafting believers from other traditions onto the vine of a particular confessional tradition. Some came from the children who grew up in the new congregation and became families of their own. And, of course, some came from new converts to Christianity. This older model of church growth and planting was inherently organic and covenantal. It ran along lines of familiarity; the core group had grown up in the particular communion. And it was zealous about retaining the covenant children. The church followed those members who had been reared in her bosom, and the success of a new plant depended on another generation of believers remaining in the fold to support the new church.[12]
This is one of the many reasons we should make sure that our children are not only baptized but that they understand what it signifies and the gospel that it preaches. Disciples are not only made but also mature through baptism.
Part of this instruction comes through the sacramental language of baptism, as we are baptized in the (singular not plural) “name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 28:19). Throughout Scripture, when God establishes a covenant, he did so with a name. For example, with the Abrahamic covenant, God revealed his name as El Shaddai, God Almighty.[13] Or with the Mosaic covenant, God revealed his name as Ehyeh, “I will be who I will be” (Ex. 6:3). But as the covenants are fulfilled in Christ, he commissioned his new covenant church to make disciples baptizing them in his covenant name in its fullness, the one name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.[14] And this informs our discipleship, for we come to God the Father only through God the Son by God the Holy Spirit. Or, as the apostle Paul puts it, “Through [Christ] we both [Jew and Gentile] have access in one Spirit to the Father” (Eph. 2:18). Let every baptism we witness teach us of this truth!
Finally, disciples are made through teaching. The church is to teach the baptized to “observe” (that is, “to obey,” “to keep,” or “to guard”) all that Christ has commanded. This means that teaching and preaching must be primary in the church. Through reading, teaching, and especially preaching the Word of Christ, the Holy Spirit works, “convincing and converting sinners, . . . building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith, unto salvation.”[15] “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom” (Col. 3:16a), Paul counsels. For, a particular church that does not faithfully teach and preach the whole counsel of God[16] will eventually find itself a gathering of no disciples at all.
Christ’s Commandments
What then does Jesus mean by “all that I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:20)? The two Greek words translated as the word “all” connote comprehensiveness. There is nothing that Christ has commanded that we should not teach, and our learning should include all that he commanded. If “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to [Christ]” (Matt. 28:18), as it has, then what Christ has commanded is supremely authoritative for us.
What all does this include? First, it includes all that he has fulfilled, namely the law and prophets, an expression meaning the entirety of the Old Testament.[17] Second, it includes his explicit commands recorded in the Gospels, such as this Great Commission. Third, it includes all that the Holy Spirit delivered to the church through the apostles,[18] specifically the remainder of the New Testament. And so, we make disciples through teaching them to observe what Christ commands in Scripture, which means that we are to read all of Scripture through the lens of Jesus.
We do not read, teach, or preach the Old Testament, for example, as if Christ has not yet come but in light of his life, death, and resurrection. We do not read, teach, or preach the Gospels as mere historical accounts but as the Word of Christ. And we do not read the New Testament epistles as if they are in contradiction to Christ’s commands but in agreement with and clarification of them. This is why we must be in the Word and under the teaching and preaching of the Word, learning all of it through the lens of Jesus, if we are to mature as disciples.
And so, as maturing disciples, we make disciples by going, baptizing, and teaching, but we do not make them for ourselves. For Christ has promised to be with us “always,” not only for today but “to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:20). Through his Spirit, he is with us when we go. He is spiritually present at every baptism. And by his Spirit, he teaches us through his Word. He has indeed commissioned his church, but he has also told us, “apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5b). And so, we go, baptizing and teaching, making disciples, not alone but with and through him, as Christ’s commissioned church and for his glory alone. Amen.
[1] Unless referenced otherwise, all Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (Wheaton: Crossway Bibles, 2001).
[2] R.T. France, The Gospel of Matthew (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2007), 1110-1111.
[3] Matt. 14:31
[4] Dan. 7:27
[5] Rev. 1:5
[6] The verb “Go,” as translated, is conjugated as a passive participle but translated as an imperative due to its proximity to the imperative “make disciples.”
[7] Daniel M. Doriani, Matthew, Vol. 1 (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2008), 532.
[8] Acts 8:1
[9] Matt. 10:5, 18
[10] “The Shorter Catechism” Q. 94, The Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms (Lawrenceville: PCA Christian Education and Publications, 2007), 398.
[11] “The Larger Catechism” Q. 167, The Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms (Lawrenceville: PCA Christian Education and Publications, 2007), 319-321.
[12] https://www.modernreformation.org/resources/essays/the-biblical-methods-of-church-growth
[13] Gen. 15:1
[14] Robert Letham, The Holy Trinity: In Scripture, History, Theology, and Worship, Revised and Expanded (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2019), 55.
[15] “The Shorter Catechism” Q. 89, The Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms (Lawrenceville: PCA Christian Education and Publications, 2007), 396.
[16] Acts 20:27
[17] Matt. 5:17
[18] John 14:25-26
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