Let the Nations Be Glad!
Page 32
The ultimate goal of God in all of history is to uphold and display his glory for the enjoyment of the redeemed from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. The beauty of praise that will come to the Lord from the diversity of the nations is greater than the beauty that would come to him if the chorus of the redeemed were culturally uniform or limited. Moreover, there is something about God that is so universally praiseworthy and so profoundly beautiful and so comprehensively worthy and so deeply satisfying that God will find passionate admirers in every diverse people group in the world. His true greatness will be manifest in the breadth of the diversity of those who perceive and cherish his beauty. The more diverse the people groups who forsake their gods to follow the true God, the more visible God’s superiority over all his competitors.
By focusing on all the people groups of the world, God undercuts ethnocentric pride and throws all peoples back upon his free grace rather than on any distinctive of their own. This humility is the flip side of giving God all the glory. Humility means reveling in his grace, not in our goodness. In pressing us on toward all the peoples, God is pressing us further into the humblest and deepest experience of his grace and weaning us more and more from our ingrained pride. In doing this, he is preparing for himself a people—from all the peoples—who will be able to worship him with free and white-hot admiration.
Therefore, the church is bound to engage with the Lord of glory in his cause. It is our unspeakable privilege to be caught up with him in the greatest movement in history—the ingathering of the elect from every tribe and language and people and nation until the full number of the Gentiles comes in and all Israel is saved and the Son of Man descends with power and great glory as King of kings and Lord of lords and the earth is full of the knowledge of his glory as the waters cover the sea forever and ever. Then the supremacy of Christ will be manifest to all, and he will deliver the kingdom to God the Father, and God will be all in all.
1. The context makes it crystal clear that “his” refers to Jesus Christ: “[He] was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations” (Rom. 1:4–5).
2. David Doran, in his book, For the Sake of His Name: Challenging a New Generation for World Missions (Allen Park, Mich.: Student Global Impact, 2002), 131–54, has written a chapter called “The Territory of the Great Commission.” In it he gives a corrective to a lopsided emphasis on the people-group focus in missions at the expense of the geographic focus. In spite of our interaction, I do not think it necessary to change anything I have written. But I do alert the reader that Doran interacts with me in his book and so may provide a perspective that I am neglecting.
Afterword
The Supremacy of God in Going and Sending
TOM STELLER
There is a wonderful passage in the often neglected epistle of 3 John that sums up the burden of this book beautifully. We want to leave you with its truth ringing in your mind and heart. There are only two ways for us to respond to the truth we have been considering about the supremacy of God in missions. We must either go out for the sake of his name, or we must send and support such people who do, and do so in a manner worthy of God. Listen to the words of the apostle John, who heard the heartbeat of Jesus as he leaned on his breast and who listened with his own ears to the giving of the Great Commission.
The elder to the beloved Gaius, whom I love in truth. Beloved, I pray that in all respects you may prosper and be in good health, just as your soul prospers. For I was very glad when brethren came and bore witness to your truth, that is, how you are walking in truth. I have no greater joy than this, to hear of my children walking in the truth. Beloved, you are acting faithfully in whatever you accomplish for the brethren, and especially when they are strangers; and they bear witness to your love before the church; and you will do well to send them on their way in a manner worthy of God. For they went out for the sake of the Name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles. Therefore we ought to support such men, that we may be fellow-workers with the truth.
3 John 1–8 NASB
It is worth noting what makes a godly old man happy. The apostle John, who refers to himself simply as “the elder,” is overjoyed. He has just received word that Gaius, one of his spiritual children, is walking in the truth. There is no greater joy than this!
What evidence compels this old apostle to be convinced that Gaius’s soul is prospering? What is the truth in which Gaius is walking? Apparently some itinerant evangelists/missionaries, whom John knew, had visited Gaius and were loved by him in a special way. They returned to the church of which John was a part and testified that Gaius treated them well, even though they were strangers to him. This so moved John that he wrote Gaius a letter to encourage him for walking in the truth and for acting faithfully. He wanted to urge Gaius to continue all the more. “You will do well to send them on their way in a manner worthy of God.”
Gaius was admonished by the apostle to be a sender. This phrase, “to send on one’s way,” occurs nine times in the New Testament, and each one occurs in a missionary context.1
The most descriptive verse is found in Titus 3:13. In this verse, Paul writes to Titus, “Diligently help Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their way so that nothing is lacking for them” (NASB). From this verse we can learn that sending is something to be done diligently and is all inclusive— “so that nothing is lacking for them.”
In 3 John, this diligence and thoroughness is captured in the phrase “in a manner worthy of God” (v. 6). This elevates the importance of sending as high as can be imagined. It is a commandment of God (notice the “ought” of verse 8). The reason we must send them in a manner worthy of God is that they go out for the sake of the name. The name of God is at stake in how we treat our missionaries. God is glorified when we support them substantially with our prayers, our money, our time, and myriad other practical ways (notice the “whatever” in verse 5). God is not glorified when our missionaries are simply a name on the back of the church bulletin or a line item in the budget.
It is not of secondary importance to be engaged in this ministry of sending. It is a very high calling. It is walking in the truth. It is the manifestation of a healthy and prospering soul. Senders are fellow workers with the truth. To send in a manner worthy of God is a call to excellence in the support of missionaries. It is a direct participation in God’s purpose. The cruciality of sending cannot be overemphasized. Therefore, it must not be done in a shoddy manner but in “a manner worthy of God.”2 There is a world of difference between a church “having” a missionary and a church “sending” a missionary. When we send missionaries in a manner worthy of God, God is glorified, our souls prosper, and we are fellow workers with the truth. We are in sync with God’s heartbeat and his purpose to be glorified among all the peoples.
But just as there is a God-centeredness to sending, there is also a God-centeredness to going. In fact, the two are intimately related. Listen to the apostle John’s flow of thought. “You will do well to send them on their way in a manner worthy of God. For they went out for the sake of the Name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles. Therefore we ought to support such men.” According to this text, only a certain kind of person is to be supported and sent to the mission field (notice the word “such”). Only those who go out for the sake of the name ought to be supported.
Here is perhaps the best definition of a missionary in the New Testament. A missionary is someone who goes out for the sake of the name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles. Private material gain must not be the motive. Even genuine humanitarian concern, though crucial, must not be the driving motive. Rather, a missionary is propelled by a deep love for the name and glory of God. Like the apostle Paul, a missionary’s aim is to “bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles, for His name’s sake” (Rom. 1:5 NASB).
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The purpose of this book has not been merely to inform you of the supremacy of God in missions. Rather, from start to finish we have sought to invite you to become more personally engaged in the cause of missions with a heartfelt, God-centered passion. Our aim has not been to exalt the missionary but to exalt God and to exalt his mission. The precise nature of your engagement in the cause of missions will be different from that of any other person. Whether you go as a missionary or stay as a sender is a secondary issue. The primary issue is that whatever you do, you do it for the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31) and for the advance of his kingdom (Matt. 6:33) and with a view to its consummation, which will embrace every tribe and tongue and people and nation (Matt. 24:14; Rev. 7:9).
David Bryant calls one who has this mind-set a “world Christian.”3 Not every Christian is called to be a missionary, but every follower of Christ is called to be a world Christian. A world Christian is someone who is so gripped by the glory of God and the glory of his global purpose that he chooses to align himself with God’s mission to fill the earth with the knowledge of his glory as the waters cover the sea (Hab. 2:14). Everything a world Christian does is with a view to the hallowing of God’s name and the coming of God’s kingdom among all the peoples of the earth. The burning prayer of the world Christian is, “Let the peoples praise you, O God; let all the peoples praise you!” (Ps. 67:3). So whether we are those who send or those who go, let us glory in the supremacy of God in missions, and let us link arms together as we join in the refrain of old, “Let the nations be glad!”
Tom Steller is Pastor for Leadership Development,
Bethlehem Baptist Church, and Dean of Bethlehem College
and Seminary, Minneapolis, Minnesota.
1. See especially the uses of propempo in Acts 15:3; Rom. 15:24; 1 Cor. 16:6, 11; 2 Cor. 1:16; and Titus 3:15.
2. John Stott, commenting on verse 6, says, “They are not just to be received when they arrive, but to be so refreshed and provided for (no doubt with supplies of food and money) as to be sent forward in a manner worthy of God. . . . Such thoughtful sending forth of missionaries on their journey is not only a ‘loyal thing’ (v. 5 RSV), but a ‘beautiful’ thing (v. 6, kalos poieseis, you will do well).” The Letters of John: An Introduction and Commentary, Tyndale New Testament Commentary, rev. ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989), 225.
3. David Bryant has helped define and popularize the notion of “world Christian” in his book In the Gap: What It Means to Be a World Christian (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity, 1979).
A Note on Resources
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