Today I want to share a word about our Master and Commander as I comment on Matthew 28 verses 18-20. This very familiar passage reads:
And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you and lo I am with you always even until the end of the world. Amen.
Employed by the Human Development Center of a corporation in the Midwest, a young lady trained employees in proper dress and etiquette. One day, as she was stepping onto the elevator, a man casually dressed in jeans and a golf shirt got on with her. Thinking of her responsibilities, she scolded, "Dressed a little casually today, aren't we?" The man replied, "Well, that is one benefit of owning the company.”
Police officers also exercise authority. One officer reported, "It was the end of the day when I parked my police van in front of the station. As I gathered my equipment, my K-9 partner, Jake, was barking and I saw a little boy staring in at me. 'Is that a dog you have back there?' he asked. 'It sure is,' I replied. Puzzled, the boy looked at me and then he looked at the dog and then he looked back at me and said, "What did he do?"
We all know that teachers must control their classrooms for learning to take place and that's why one child reported this after she had just finished her first week of school” "I'm just wasting my time," she said to her mother. "I can't read, I can't write, and they won't let me talk."
Finally, there comes this story from the home front. A mild-mannered man was tired of being bossed around by his wife, so he went to a psychiatrist. This psychiatrist said he needed to build up his self-esteem and gave him a book on assertiveness, which he read. As soon as he had finished the book and confronted his wife. He pointed a finger in her face and said,
"From now on, I want you to know that I am the man of this house, and my word is law. I want you to prepare me a gourmet meal tonight and when I am finished eating my meal, I expect a sumptuous dessert afterwards. Then after dinner you're gonna draw me my bath so I can relax and when I'm finished on my bath guess who's gonna dress me and comb my hair?”
“The funeral director,” interrupted his wife.
We all like to exercise what little authority we may have but there is one person who has ultimate authority. He is Jesus our master and commander. Let's see his authority today.
FIRST, OUR MASTER AND COMMANDER HAS ALL AUTHORITY:
Jesus is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and because he is the sovereign ruler, he has all authority. This is what sovereignty means. Sovereignty means all authority. Our government in the United States is sovereign, but its powers are limited by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Jesus, however, is King and his authority is unlimited.
One great advantage of the church serving the King of Kings and Lord of Lords is that his church also has authority. Some people think that Satan rules hell like God rules heaven, but this is not so. Jesus is ruler over all of these things. And that's why Jesus told Peter this about the authority of the church in Matthew 16:18-19,
Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it, and I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
The authority of the Church doesn't come from what we do in church. It doesn't come from our worship or our worship music or even our pastors. The authority of the Church descends from our Lord. But not only that, but Jesus’s authority also extends to us personally.
We Americans are rebellious and we're individualist and we're proud. As an example, a kindergarten teacher, was observing her classroom of children while they drew. She asked one little girl, "What are you drawing?" The girl replied, "I'm drawing God." The teacher paused and said, "But no one knows what God looks like." And without missing a beat or looking up from her drawing, the little girl replied, “They will in a minute.”
We often forget that we too are under the authority of Jesus, and we can think we can do what we want, but we can't. 1 Corinthians 6: 20 says that we were bought with a price and therefore we should glorify God in our body and in our spirits which are the Lord's. They belong to God. We must to bow our knee to Jesus as our King, our Master and Commander is our Sovereign. He has all authority. And our Master and Commander sent us to all nations.
OUR MASTER AND COMMANDER SENT US TO ALL NATIONS:
Jesus gave us a mission. He wants all people to have a saving knowledge of Him. He wants all people to understand the truth and be set free from the lies of Satan. He wants us as His Church and as His people to be the tools to make that happen. To do this, we must have power.
The old television show, Home Improvement, always had a joke about “more power,” but Acts 1.8 says that God’s people will receive more power when the Holy Spirit comes upon us, Then, we will be witnesses to Jesus in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Jesus knew we couldn't do this work on our own, so He sent us power to give us the ability to do this work.
Today we have the Holy Spirit. Today we have the entire Word of God, the entire Council of God's Word, the entire Canon. We have our own testimony of salvation and so much more. We all those things He gave us, because our task is huge, and our task is difficult. And to do this task, we must go outside our comfort zone.
We often think that Jerusalem meant our hometown or the disciples' hometown, but that's wrong. The disciples were from Galilee. was not their home field. And it's not our home field either. This world is not our home field, we are just passing through it. We never have any advantage here except the advantage that God gives us.
So, our Master and Commander had all authority and he sent us to share the Gospel with all peoples. He also told us to do all things.
OUR MASTER AND COMMANDER TOLD US TO DO ALL THINGS:
Our Master and Commander also told us to do all things and to teach people all that He has taught us. So, we need to be “full gospel preachers”. I don't mean that in a Pentecostal sense. What I mean is that we need to preach the full counsel of the Word of God. We don't need to keep people in ignorance; we need them to know what the full richness of God's love is for us.
You don't need to know very much to be saved. You just need to know that Jesus died for you, and He wants you to commit yourself to Him, that you need to repent of your sins and that He would take care of the rest. But we do need to know a lot about being a disciple. The Psalmist said we should sing with understanding so we must teach people the full gospel.
So, what is the full gospel? Since we come to the Lord as a child. it can't be hard to understand. What we need to teach is that:
- The Son of Man came to seek and save that which was lost.
- That we need to love the Lord with all our hearts, souls, and mind and with all of our being.
- We need to love our neighbors as ourselves.
- We need to obey the commands of Christ and we need to help people become disciples.
Before we can help other people become disciples, we too must become disciples. Doctors were medical students first. Lawyers were flaw students first. Generals in the Army were first cadets first. Senior NCOs in the army began as privates. We must ourselves grow up to be disciples and we must be full gospel people before we are full gospel preachers. If we are not disciples ourselves, we can't make disciples. We can't lead by example if we don't know where we're taking people. We are not making disciples if we're disobeying our Lord and we really don't want to disobey our Lord, our Master and Commander, our King. Hebrews 10 :24 -27 says,
And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as ye see the day approaching. For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries.
The one organization in the whole world that I'm afraid of is the Internal Revenue Service, not because I cheat on my taxes but, because I'm afraid of making mistakes. Some people do try to cheat on their taxes, and the IRS is there to find them and to bring them to justice. Many of those tax cheats live in fear that they will be found out.
Our God wants us to obey Him. Jesus said if you love me, keep my commandments. We don't need to put ourselves in the position of becoming afraid of God because we have not done what He's asked us to do.
FINALLY, OUR MASTER AND COMMANDER IS ALWAYS WITH US:
In this passage we can see a final truth which is as, good thing for us: our master and commander is always with us.
We often let our fears prevent us from obeying God. We are just ordinary people. We feel incapable of doing the tremendous ask that He has given us. Sometimes we try to duck that task and let someone else do it who we think are more qualified. Sometimes we say, "Hey, I'm no hero."
Interestingly, I've actually known some heroes. There was a man by the name of Al. Al who served in the 3rd Squadron, 4th Cavalry, the old 3/4th Cav as is it was called in Vietnam. He wasn't in the country but for three months when he'd been wounded three times and sent home. He limped the rest of his days, but that didn’t prevent him from retiring as a senior NCO many years later.
My first platoon sergeant when I was a brand-new platoon leader in the Army was a man by the name of Chuck. He won a Silver Star escorting a convoy in Vietnam with the 4th MP Company because he was the sole survivor of the escort team.
I once knew a senior NCO when I was serving in the headquarters of the 25th Infantry Division in the United States Army, who won a Medal of Honor in Vietnam.
I know a fellow by the name of Jeff who was a missionary, but who had to resign because of a tropical illness that he caught in Africa, sacrificing his body for the cause of missions.
And then there's William, William who was a martyr at the Jibla Baptist Hospital, killed by an Islamic terrorist while helping to heal people in a very impoverished area of the world.
The truth is that each of these was an ordinary person:
- Al had a bad temper. A really bad temper.
- Chuck, had his own stubborn, crazy way of doing things. His nickname was Crazy Harold and he sort of was.
- Jeff had a fixation on a particular kind of theology. He was saved and a man of God, but he was fixated that if you didn't believe about a certain thing a certain way that your faith was flawed.
- Bill was a very mild, avuncular, unassuming man. He didn’t look like the popular image of a hero.
All these folks were heroes, but they were just real people, regular people. And they needed God's help to do the work that they did.
We can obey God because He's always with us. Jesus will never leave us, nor will He forsake us. He will always help us whenever we step forward for Him and He sent the comforter who will help us do the things He's asked to do.
An old recruiting poster says, “Uncle Sam wants you!” Well, Uncle Sam may not want you. He does not want me anymore as old as I am. But God wants us. Jesus, our Master and our Commander, wants us. So the question comes, are we obeying Him today? Are we allowing Him to be all authoritative in our life? Are we going to all peoples for the cause of the gospel? Are we doing all the things that Jesus asked us to do? Are we resting in the fact that God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is always with us?
Are we obeying our Master and Commander today?
Every blessing,
Dr. Otis Corbitt
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