Note that JESUS commands:
"Go ye into all the world,"
If "Go" is gone from the
gospel, is the gospel go-ne? Our world consists of a little
sphere of influence and travel, "the
world" is hostile and foreign to truth. Our
world is confined and comfortable, "the
world" is vast and foreboding.
"Let this mind be in you, which was also
in CHRIST JESUS:" It is helpful, when fearful, to
remind ourselves of the travel expense incurred by CHRIST to
deliver the gospel to us. "WHO,
being in the form of GOD, thought it not robbery to be equal
with GOD: But made HIMSELF of no reputation, and took upon HIM
the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And
being found in fashion as a man, HE humbled HIMSELF, and became
obedient unto death, even the death of the cross."
"gospel"
= good news ... but apart from the bad news, it is viewed as a
recreational drug to a sinner willfully oblivious to his
symptoms. The frustration among many of the Great
PHYSICIAN'S pastoral interns today is due to the futile attempt
to disciple the dead. The ministry of the gospel has
turned into a mortuary for still born sinners to socialize
instead of evangelize. We have gone half-hearted
"into all the world" with false doctrine, sloppy
diagnostics, and a pike full of guile and glitz. I wonder
if we have dispensed the placebo of clever programs for so long
that we too are unable to distinguish it from the real.
If the gospel is the death, burial, and
resurrection of JESUS CHRIST and we color it's implications, are
we guilty of baptizing for the dead?
"... if the dead rise not at all? why are
they then baptized for the dead? And why stand we in
jeopardy every hour?" Paul took so seriously
his commission from CHRIST that he jeopardized his life to death
for the gospel. But as a result,
"all the world" of his day had a preacher for
"every creature".
It is convicting to consider the
commission on a personal level, is it not?
"Go ..."