"Teach, Baptize, Teach" Matthew 28:18-20

There are three things in this text that will help us see why that period of time called the Reformation is so important in the history of the church, and why the Reformation has had such driving power in the history of the last four centuries.

The men of the Reformation tapped back into the tap root of Christianity and recovered a great deal of the force and energy that had driven Christianity in the first three centuries. If we are to know a resurgence of Christianity in our day, it will because we also tap back into these basic things and learn to apply them to our day, just as the Reformers did in their day.

It has to do with very basic things: how people become Christians and how they are to continue in the Church, and what the task of the church is.

Jesus said that the task that he set his disciples to do was not dependent upon their own power and wisdom. The power was from heaven and the Lord Jesus was sending them out in this power. Because he had risen from the dead, he was taking dominion over the earth, and they were going to be successful in what they did. He did not tell them to go and try to do certain things, but to go and do them. Of course, we know that they were extraordinarily successful in what they did. We can be successful, too, if we understand exactly what it was that they were sent to do. Because of this let us look at three things; illustrated by three words in our text.

These three words are these: teach, baptize, teach: 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 alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.

The first thing to note, is that the two words translated "teach" are not the same word. The first word is "to make disciples" while the last word is a broad word meaning to teach all manner of things. The last two words are verbals which tell the disciples how they were to do the first. In sum, this is what Jesus was telling the apostles: Go, and make all of the nations my followers. This is the way you are to do this: you are to baptize and to teach them. Baptizing and teaching will make all the nations my disciples.

So I want to look at these words and make some important observations that may be helpful to you.

I. Make Disciples: or teach. This means to enroll the nations in the school of Christ. The scope of this commission is breathtaking: there is no idea here that the church would be a tiny little remnant scattered in tiny little flocks here and there, but a vast sweep of victory that would cover the whole earth. There may be times, of course, when the glory of the church is obscured and a remnant of the elect may be hidden and scattered in tiny flocks, but it would not remain so.

It is true that the disciples did not understand the implications of these words, for they did not immediately go out into all the world; even after the H. S. was given. But the building of the church of Jesus Christ was to be his work; he drove the apostles away from Jerusalem with persecutions; he arrested Saul on the road to Damascus; The church is his work, and he calls forth instruments and vessels for his work throughout the history.

This is in line with the promises throughout the Old Testament: Psalm 22:26ff Ps. 2; Ps. 72

Note: They were sent out to do this; not to try to do this; and the guarantee of their success was the power of the Mediator: the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus builds the church; it is the work of his hands through the ministers that he has chosen.

But the other two words tell us how this is to be done:

II. Baptize: in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost. With respect to baptism, there were three very different views present at the time of the Reformation, and the Reformers developed their views in their conflicts with the other two views. There was the Roman view that baptism was a magical act, unconnected with teaching and understanding, that took away the inherited sin of Adam and Eve, and all sins prior to baptism.

The Anabaptists believed that baptism was a testimony of the one baptized to his faith in Christ and his commitment to live a new life. Hence, they saw it as identification with Christ in death to the old life and being raised to live a new life of holiness and godliness. It was a witness to the experience of the new birth. Hence, only adults could be baptized; those baptized in infancy were not members of the church. The true church was a fringe movement on the edges of the professed church, and existed only a tiny remnant at any time. They saw the church as an body of the spiritually elite, and condemned the entire professing Christian world as hypocrites. This spirit lives among their followers today.

The Reformers, studying the Scriptures and the Fathers saw it differently. For their view of Baptism they drew on several biblical concepts:

A. God's works of grace and judgment always included families.

1. Adam and all his posterity

2. Noah and his family; Unbelievers and their families perished.

3. Abraham and his family:

4. Lot and his two daughters--special plea to the other two....

5. Sodom and their children

6. Israel and their families; First-born of Egypt.

7. Joshua: As for Me and My House: We....

8. Explicit promises: In the Law: Blessed to you and your children if you obey; Curses to you and your children if you do not obey.

9. Visits sins of fathers to third and fourth; blesses to a thousand generations....

10. Abraham: Believed God, and circumcision given as a sign of his faith; he was circumcised as an adult; his children were circumcised. Circumcision was never an act that was only in the flesh, but promised the work of God's spirit: Deut. 30:5-6. God would give them these blessings.

B. I Cor. 10:1-4. They all were baptized: They passed from the old to the new; but the whole nation did: families and their children. THEY HAD THE SAME SPIRITUAL PRIVILEGES WE DO; BEWARE THAT WE DO NOT FAIL AS THEY FAILED. DO NOT THINK THAT YOU STAND!!!!!!! Israel did not deliver themselves in the Red Sea; it was God who was their savior. God, in the law,provided a way for them to overcome temptation; He has provided a better way for us. We must beware of idolatry and serve the Lord in the way He commanded, just as their way of escape was to worshp God the way He commanded.

C. Baptism is thus God's act, and not mine. A man cannot baptize himself and he cannot save himself. If a man is to be baptized, he must have someone do it; he must submit to the order that God has required. It is a sign of the promise of God to all who are in the school of Christ.

D. Romans 6:3 "Baptized into Jesus Christ" Not baptized while in Christ. See Acts 22:16. Paul was told to be baptized, and "wash away his sins..." But the promise of forgiveness of sins is for a lifetime. He does not forget me when I am old. He does not part way with me down the road of life. He does not begin a good work in me and fail to finish it. Baptism is for the whole of the Christian life; that is why it never has to be repeated. That is why it is common among the anabaptists to be baptized several times, for there if often no assurance that there was enough commitment the first time. But how much is enough commitment? Isn't there a better way? There is: Just as Abraham believed as an adult, was circumcised as an adult, and his children were circumcised on the eighth day, so believers and their children are baptized into Jesus Christ, with all the promises and blessings thereof.

E. Now Acts. 2:38-40 What shall we do? Here is the inauguration promise for the New Covenant in Christ. Just as the promises was to Abraham and his seed; so the promise of Jesus Christ is to believers and their children: John baptized with water, but Jesus baptizes with the Holy Ghost: and that promise is to us and to our seed.

F. What a wonderful picture in Matt. 10:13-16. He BLESSED them. Is this an empty blessing? Does it mean....WHAT???? Why did the people object; that the children were not worthy---not worthy to receive a blessing? Who Is? They whole point of the Gospel is that Jesus forgives the sins of those who are not worthy; those who are not seeking after him, who are not seeking God. Who will come to him in simple trust without proud adult powers. What a picture of the true gospel: Jesus taking us up in his arms and blessing us. What more could anybody want?

G. Baptism is then, for people at the beginning of their Christian life...not after they have obtained some spiritual milestone. Those enrolled in the school of Christ and placed under his discipline are to be baptized. If our children are under his discipline, then they are to be baptized.

III. Teach. Now we get to the nitty-gritty. Just as the Christian life is to be one of cleansing from sin; hence there is one baptism at the beginning that is sufficient for the whole life; so the Christian life is to be one of learning to do all the things that Jesus has commanded. We are to learn to love him; to pray for one another; to love one another; to bear faithful witness; to add to our faith; to put off the old and put on the new; to not fall into temptation, as the children of Israel did. And on and on.

Because Christ has loved us, he has put us under his discipline. He chastens us and teaches us through the means that he has established in the church, which is now found in all nations under heaven. To be in Christ is to be under his rule and authority.

Because of this the Reformers developed the catechism. Children, under the discipline of Christ, learned the catechism, recited it before the church as a confession of faith. Reformed Christian became such a formidable threat to Roman Christianity that the Jesuits appropriated the method in self-defense, and tried to stabilize their people by Romish catechisms. It is too bad that today people associate the catechism with Rome, when it was developed by the Reformed Churches of Germany and Switzerland.

It was the catechism and the catechism classes that gave the Reformation horsepower, for it gave to Europe a knowledgeable Christianity, a Christianity that could answer the questions and win the battle of ideas in Germany, Holland, England, and Switzerland that was to have such a profound effect on the world.

I have all power, Jesus said. You go and enroll the world in my school. Announce forgiveness of sins and baptize all those who hear, including their children; Then teach teach teach teach. Do not ever quit teaching. Let me close with a passage from the law that was so very precious to the people of the Reformation: Deuteronomy 6:

4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:

5 And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.

6 And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:

7 And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

8 And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes.

9 And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates.

God bless you.
Amen and Amen