When I was a kid, we used to get dressified for church on Sundays. You didn't leave home without your tie -- or your Bible.
My first Bible wasn't just the great and good King James Version. It was the Scofield Reference Bible. It was the ultimate proof that you were a good Christian. I loved that Bible. I still have it. Growing up, I read it constantly. Not only that, but back in the day, VBS wasn't just fun and games. We did things called Bible drills and we even memorized verses of Scripture. Mark 16:15 was one of the first verses I committed to memory. Later I memorized it in Greek.
To this day it's one of my favorite verses in all Scripture. I often quote it to my students. And why not? It's a statement uttered by the Lord himself. It's a reminder that the earliest Christians were fully engaged in the work of worldwide evangelization. The early church did not consider missions an occasional activity. It reached out in witness. And why? Jesus had said, "Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature." How clear is that? Go everywhere. Tell everyone. As an example, let me mention my wife's parents, who brought the gospel to southern Ethiopia back in the 1950s and 1960s. Later, Becky and I had the opportunity to build on and expand their work. Our goal was to "make known by word and deed the love of the crucified and risen Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit, so that people will repent, believe, and receive Christ as their Savior and obediently serve him as their Lord in the fellowship of the church" (1988 Lambeth Conference Declaration on Evangelism).
Becky had grown up in Ethiopia near the Kenyan border among the Burji people.
The neighboring tribe had been difficult soil for the gospel, and few evangelists had gone there. God often seems to stimulate new initiatives in this way. Eventually, our partnership with the church in Burji led to an opportunity to evangelize this tribe. There were three of us, including one of my elders from North Carolina and a 24-year old student names James, who would serve as our interpreter.
We trekked from village to village, each of which seemed to have its own customs. In the first town we came to, we were offered a cup of coffee, well, not a cup of coffee but a cup of roasted coffee beans. I had never eaten coffee before but there's always a first. James laughed so hard at my misery that he almost passed out.
After introductions were made, I would meet with the "mayor" of the town and donate a sack of high-protein bean seeds for him to distribute among the local farmers. (It was an agricultural area.)
At that point, people began to gather around out of sheer curiosity. "Who are these strangers and what is their message?" Glad you asked!
I was reminded about what Paul said about Christian missions in 1 Corinthians. Although he was an experienced evangelist, he had come to them "in weakness and in much fear and trembling" (2:3). He also came with great simplicity: "My speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom" (2:2). He relied neither on ability or oratory, both highly prized at Corinth. His reliance was solely on the cross of Christ, and this he proclaimed, however weak and foolish it seemed to others. He knew it to be the very power of God (1:18).
After visiting 3 or 4 villages, the elders of the church in Burji ordered us to come out immediately due to an increase in persecution of the church there. I didn't want to leave, but they were our authorities and I'm sure they had our best interest at heart. After we returned to the states we got word that James was being hunted down because he had served as our translator. Shortly thereafter we got news that those searching for him had found him and had suffocated him in his sleep.
Again, my mind raced to Paul's teaching in his Corinthian correspondence. The cross, Paul says, is folly to the unconverted mind (1:18). Yet he was not afraid to appeal to his hearers. "We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God!" (2 Cor. 5:20). Our duty is not to judge others but to emulate the apostles and the Savior in suffering (4:1-13).
But if the early church was an evangelizing church, it was also a learning church. Converts "met continually to hear the apostles teach" (Acts 2:42, REB). Today, of course, the "teaching of the apostles" is found in the New Testament. The believer, therefore, is a lifelong student of Scripture. The teaching authority of the apostles is foundational to the ministry of the church, be it in Ethiopia or the U.S. Pastors and elders must be equipped to expound it.
This includes being instructed in the biblical languages.
And its members must read and reflect on it daily.
And so we come back to Mark 16:15. "If Jesus Christ be God and died for me, no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for him," said the great English cricket player C. T. Studd at the end of the 19th century. His logic is unassailable. He eventually became a missionary on three continents.
Dear friend, may I urge you to consider committing to memory the glorious "Great Commission" passages in the New Testament, including Mark 16:15? Then say, "Today, Lord Jesus, I am willing to go ANYWHERE and tell EVERYONE about you." As his disciples, Jesus is telling us: "There is a cost to this. Can you give up control? Will you trust me when I lead you out of your comfort zone?"
Come, then, my friend, to Jesus today. Tell him what you are willing to give up for him and to him. It's a demonstration of the highest level of our trust. He has a mission for you that's outside your control and beyond your management. This is the moment to say, "I belong to you, my Lord Jesus Christ, body, soul, and spirit."