This includes missions and world evangelism. This general principle, that God chooses to work through the prayers of His people, applies to every area of the Christian experience. It is no wonder that the Apostle James declared, “You do not have, because you do not ask” (James 4:2). Moody echoed the same sentiment, “Every work of God can be traced to some kneeling form.” We could go on and cite numerous quotations and examples from men and women of faith through the centuries - all affirming the same truth: God chooses to work through prayer. As the noted 19th-century preacher Charles Spurgeon once observed, “Like it or not, asking is the rule of the Kingdom.” John Wesley asserted, “God will do nothing but in answer to prayer.” Dwight L. The fact is, though, He has sovereignly chosen to accomplish His work through prayer. We recognize that God is sovereign and can do anything He chooses. Why do I say this?įirst of all, prayer is basic to everything that God does on the earth. But the witness of both Scripture and church history demonstrates the absolute necessity of prayer as a vital component in reaching the lost and unreached peoples of the earth. When considering the Great Commission, one may not readily consider prayer as an essential ingredient. There must be prayer for the messenger who is sent, for the message itself to be effective, and for the hearts of the recipients of the message to hear and actively receive the Good News of salvation. Yet I would submit that as fundamentally and vitally important as this is, there is one other factor that is also absolutely required. The basic requirement, then, is a messenger who is sent to proclaim the gospel. This raises the question: how are they to be reached? The Scriptures are clear that reaching the peoples of the earth is accomplished through Christian believers proclaiming the message of the Savior to those who have not heard (Matthew 24:14 Romans 10:12–15). Thus, these peoples remain “unreached.” The two requirements for reaching the unreached However, there is not enough of a gospel witness for the culture to experience the full transforming power of Christ’s message. For some of these groups, there may be a nascent or fledgling Christian presence. The world’s ethnic populations that have not been effectively impacted by the gospel are called “unreached people groups.” Of the more than 17,000 ethnic groups in the world today, a little over 7,100 are unreached. Thus the vital importance of the Great Commission is apparent. Since the gospel is the message of salvation (Romans 1:16), if these people do not have it announced to them (Romans 10:13–14), then they are hopelessly lost (Mark 16:16 John 3:3, 36). The Lord’s emphasis on announcing the Good News to the nations implies that there are people who have not heard the message - indeed, that there are people who desperately need to hear the message. In other words, Christ has commanded the church to proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom of God to all the various ethnic groups of the world. Rather it denotes the various ethnic or people groups of the world. This same directive was earlier stated by Jesus in Matthew 24:14: “And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.” In this verse we understand that the word “nations” does not refer to our modern concept of countries. This Commission is found in several places in the Scriptures, including Matthew 28:18–20, Mark 16:15–16, John 20:21, and Acts 1:8. It is the Lord’s great mandate to the church. He said a number of things, but in each of His final encounters with His followers there was one message that He repeatedly emphasized: take the gospel to the nations! We call this the Great Commission. With this in mind, it is important to consider our Savior’s last words before He went back to His Father. Final words will be remembered, treasured, and have lasting value. Whether someone is dying or leaving not to return, they weigh carefully what they say. It has often been observed that a person’s last words convey great significance.
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