Key Text: Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised) Hebrews 10:23.
The Great Commission is the pronouncement of victory by our risen Saviour, Jesus Christ, through His disciples. All power or all authority was now in the hands of Christ, in heaven and on the earth so that Christian disciples could carry out the Great Commission of the Church v 18. The idea expressed in the commission is that “as you are going,” make disciples, and ‘teach all nations (convert all Gentiles), baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” v 19. We can see that the church is the vehicle of Christ’s mission to the world where the church and her mission are inseparable. To attempt to eliminate this commission from the church age would be to leave the church without an assigned purpose from her Lord. Baptizing the converted disciples is the first step of outward obedience to the Lord and brings entrance into the membership of the local congregation. The Doctrine of Baptism continues to be debated: We ask the new convert to “believe and be baptized,” as a testimony to one’s faith. By the way, baptism is not a condition for being saved. You can get to heaven without being baptized (like the thief on the cross). Matthew 12:41 seems to say that the remission of sins is the basis for being baptized and not the aim of baptism. John 6:29 seems to make it clear that the Lord and the apostles require faith in Christ alone. These baptized converts are to be taught all things that Jesus taught, thus the edifying and exhorting ministry of the church v 20. “I am with you alway,” is Christ’s promise of His presence and it guarantees the success of the church’s mission carried out by His called-out disciples “unto the end of the world” (the end of the church age) v 20.
If the believer does his or her part, there is no question that God will fulfill His part of the agreement. Evidently some believers had stopped attending the worship services of the church and for that reason Paul’s first exhortation to the Hebrews deals with the heart. “Let us draw near” to hear what Christ has accomplished for the believer. What the law could not do, Christ has now accomplished. As the sprinkling of blood and the washing with sacrificial ashes ceremonially cleansed those under the old system, so Christ’s sacrifice has sprinkled us in regard to our hearts and washed us in regard to our bodies. The second exhortation deals with the mouth (confession) and is one of endurance to “hold fast the profession or our faith without wavering” Hebrew 10: 23, the reason God is faithful in regard to His promise. The third exhortation deals with conduct and it states that the reason Christians are to assemble for reciprocal encouragement, for strengthening and stirring up what they can gain from one another. If a man’s faith will not get him to church, then is it doubtful that it will get him to heaven? The church is a body interacting as the assembly was made for man. Since the assembling of the believers is one measure that indicates the condition of the heart, Paul encourages the believers not to desert the assembly, “And so much the more, as ye see the day approaching” v 25, involves obedience in light of Christ’s second coming. Amen!
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