Gospel – Matthew 26-28

We now come to the climax of the Gospel of Matthew – the bitter anguish of betrayal and sufferings to the triumphant resurrection from the grave.

Bible Passage:  Matthew 26-28

All these stories are familiar to us.  So are the teachings.  But what else do we see from here?

First of all, I am touched and comforted by the fact that Jesus tended to surround Himself with or be surrounded by relatively average people of little social standing or influence.

This happened at His birth – a minor priest and his barren wife, a small town girl and a poor carpenter, shepherds, and elderly woman and others.

Now at His final days, we also see minor characters, all playng their part in seeing Jesus to the Cross and His resurrection. Who you might ask?

• Simon the leper who had been an outcast – he hosted Jesus in his house (Matt 26:6)
• An unnamed woman (probably Mary of Bethany) used expensive ointment to anoint Jesus’ head (26:7)
• An unnamed homeowner in Jerusalem who opened his house for Jesus and His disciples for the last supper (26:18)
• Simon of Cyrene was just someone watching in the crowd but was pulled in to carry Jesus’ cross (27:32)
• An unnamed crowd member who offered Jesus a drink when Jesus was at the brink of death (27:48)
• An unnamed Roman centurion who recognised what the Priests, Pharisees and baying crowd did not – Jesus must be the Son of God (27:54)
• Some loyal women from Galilee who looked from afar (27:55-56)

Jesus was never out of touch from the common man despite His status as a Teacher and Master.  And some of these minor characters played important roles, though they may appear insignificant, so much so that the Bible chooses to record their deed down even if the authors do not know their names.

It tells me that our Lord Jesus is willing to use common people like you and I.  We need not be princes or kings or even high ranking officials to work with and for the King of Kings.  No… our Lord is willing to use all of us and appreciates all our ‘little’ deeds.

And this brings me to my second point in Matthew 28:20. Famous last sayings. 🙂

Yes, again we all know them.

“Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit….”

Go and preach.  Go and make people His disciples.  Go and get people to come under the same name as all are under – Jesus!

We know that.  We have heard that.  Many many times.  Over and over again.

I am always curious to know what the disciples were thinking of when they heard Jesus saying this.  After all, in this age of technology, it is very easy to get news spread throughout the world in hours, if not seconds!

“All the nations” – were the disciples really interested in the world?  What happened immediately after the Pentecost showed that perhaps they were not.  They preached amongst their own people and culture.  They were happy to think that the Gospel included only the Jews.

But obviously Jesus did not mean this and subsequent events showed that they had to step out of their comfort zone and reach across cultures and nations to get this same message across – Jesus is the Saviour of ALL mankind.

And in my usual roundabout way, I am now arriving at my point – are we willing to step out of our comfort zone and start preaching the Gospel to others?

I am not sure how many of you are aware but the Church at Adam Road has started doing door to door evangelism regularly.  They go house to house, knocking on doors to introduce the Gospel to complete strangers.  Talk about stepping out of our comfort zone – I mean, for a lot of us, even the thought of sharing the Gospel with our friends and relatives strike us with dread and fear.

But that is what these believer have been doing – approaching complete strangers to make them disciples of Jesus.  Some of our members (sisters in fact) have joined in this form of evangelism.

We should be doing likewise.  Not tomorrow but today.

The members doing the work are not the church leaders.  They are just ordinary believers, very much like the minor characters we talked about earlier.  But they all share the vision of Jesus and heed the commission of the Lord.

We can play our part.  When the time comes (and it may come very soon) – will you step out and join in this great work?