Luke 24:47-49
We return to our Lord’s Great Commission, which you’ll find in Luke 24:44, Luke 24:44, and through verse 49. This is the epilogue of the Gospel of Luke that really is summing up the first volume for us. And then Luke points us ahead to the second volume, the book of Acts.
The theme of the first volume, which we learned about last week, is certainty in the truth. Like I say, we learned about it last week. We didn’t learn about it last week; we learned about it in Luke 1:1 and on. So for eleven years, now, we’ve been seeing and learning about certainty in the truth. That’s been Luke’s aim the entire time.
And that has set the stage for his second volume, which is all about the proclamation of the truth. And that makes perfect sense. You will never faithfully or zealously proclaim what you are uncertain about, right? You proclaim what you know to be true, and the more you know it to be true, the more rooted in the truth that you are, the more fervently, loudly, zealously, eagerly, cheerfully, and joyfully you will proclaim it.
And so when I see those Christians who proclaim very quietly and seem shy, I think they just need help in understanding the truth and growing to greater certainty about the truth. The more certain we are about the truth, the more eager we will be to proclaim it. The more bold, the more joyful, the more insistent we will be with people who don’t know the truth.
For a Christian to believe and to proclaim the truth from the certainty of a deep conviction in the truth, it just fills us with a contagious and indomitable joy, doesn’t it? Love to hear the truth proclaimed from those who really understand it, know it, have certainty about it, deep conviction in it, and proclaim it joyfully, joyfully.
Well, in reading Luke’s version of the Great Commission, the first part, verses 44–46, emphasizes that certainty we’ve been talking about, summarizes that theme from the whole Gospel. And that leads naturally to the second half of this final section, the epilogue, verses 47-49, which is on proclamation. See if you could distinguish between the two as we read verses 44 to 49.
“Now he said to them, ‘These are my words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things which are written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms must be fulfilled.’ Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and he said to them, ‘Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in his name to all the nations beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things, and behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you, that you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.’”
What I want you to see in that latter half of the Great Commission, 47 to 49, what I want you to see, there, is your role in this mission. Your role. If you’re a Christian, you do have a role in the mission, and it is a joyful privilege, an incredible honor that you’ve been granted to participate in this mission.
At the same time, I’d say it’s also a solemn obligation that you have, that I have, that we have, to share with others the Gospel that saved us. If you don’t sense that obligation, that the salvation that you’ve received, saving you from an eternity in Hell, there’s something wrong with you.
If you don’t sense that duty you have to share good news with others because you can tell them how they can escape the fires of Hell and the judgment of God, his condemnation, if you don’t sense that that’s a responsibility you have, to share good news with other people, better check your pulse because there is something wrong.
And what may be wrong is that you don’t really understand the gospel as you should. Maybe you don’t understand, you have maybe forgotten what it was like to be saved from your former sins. Maybe it’s some of these testimonies and baptisms. That’s why they’re so precious to us. They remind us all the time, Oh, yeah, that’s my story, too. Told five different times, five different lives, five different circumstances and occasions. Same gospel, same gospel that saved each one of us.
I’ve never met a Christian, knowing how valuable the gift of forgiveness is, a Christian knowing how freeing it is to have a clean conscience, a liberated heart, knowing personally the kind and tender and gentle lordship of Jesus Christ and the intimate ministry of the Spirit and the deep satisfaction that he finds in reading and understanding the Word of God, I’ve never met a Christian who’s content to hold all that inside.
I’ve never met a Christian who, who gets all that, who becomes a small-souled miser, stingy with what he’s received freely, with the treasure that’s been placed inside him, refusing to share what he’s enjoyed with those Hell-bound sinners who desperately, so desperately, need to hear good news. And I imagine them who do hold on to it, don’t share it, don’t proclaim it, to be the saddest, most pitiable of all people: professing Christ, then stifling truth. They have to be sad and pitiable, miserable because they’re half-hearted, double-minded, unstable, one foot in, one foot out. That’s no way to live. Perhaps they’re dangerously, hopelessly self-deceived. I’m concerned that there are many in our land that are like that.
But true Christians, true Christians, love, they love to find those who don’t know the gospel and tell them about it. They count that a good day; a gospel-sharing day is a good day, no matter what else happens. Financial ruin, cancer diagnosis, if I’ve shared the gospel, good day! True Christians love to talk to those who are strangers to Christ and make that blessed introduction to them. True Christians, knowing what it is to be reconciled to God through faith in Jesus Christ, they just love to tell those who are now enemies of God how they, too, can be reconciled to him as they once were; become his friends as they now are.
That’s what I want you to know, Christian, I want you to know and understand and live in the great joy and the exhilarating zeal, to take up our Lord’s Great Commission because we get to be partners with him, partners with the prophets and the Apostles, the risen and ascended Lord himself.
We join a long line of faithful men and women who have preached and proclaimed this repentance. Acts 20:21 says, “repentance toward God, faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.” That’s what we proclaim. That’s what we’ve got to tell people. So what I’m praying for you is an ignition of your zeal, an ignition of your joy and your fervor in proclaiming this truth, understanding what it is that we’re to do, by whose power we do it, what we get to do together.
Well, just keep the outline simple again, here, just three points, my favorite three-point outline: our work, our role, and our need. Our work, our role, and our need. First point, our noble work. Just insert that word “noble” in there. It is a noble work. We saw last time, I pointed this out to you, three parallel infinitives, those are verbs in verses 46 and 47. I’ll just name them for you. First verb is to suffer; to suffer, in the infinitive form. Second, to rise, and the third in verse 47, to be preached or to be proclaimed.
They don’t read in our English translation because the translators have done us the service of taking it out of the Greek form and putting it into an English form, so it’s communicable to us and translates well to us. But they are infinitives: to suffer, to rise, to be preached, to be proclaimed. The first two verbs, both of those in verse 46, pertain to the past, to what Jesus has already accomplished: to suffer, to rise. The final verb in verse 47 pertains to the present and the future work that is Christ’s.
Notice, verse 46, “He said to them, ‘Thus it is written that the Christ should suffer and rise again from the dead the third day,’” past, and verse 47, “‘that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in his name to all the nations beginning from Jerusalem.’” See the pivot, there, from verse 46 to verse 47? What Christ has already accomplished and what Christ has yet to accomplish. But notice, what he has yet to accomplish, he does through us, through our work. What he accomplished in the past, didn’t need us, didn’t require us. He did it by himself. It was his burden to bear. It’s what he has done, what he has accomplished on his own.
Verse 47, though, he involves us. So good. Now with an open mind to understand the Scriptures, armed with certainty and deep conviction about what it is that Christ has accomplished, what he’s done, what he’s done on the cross, what he’s done in rising from the dead, we now have the privilege of joining him in his work. His work now becomes our work because he’s charged us with this preaching, preaching of repentance. It’s a blessed work, it’s an honorable work, a noble work, such a great privilege to carry this message, preach it among the nations, as he says, “beginning from Jerusalem.” So we go from Jerusalem to the USA to Greeley, Colorado. It’s our work.
The order in the original in verse 47 flows not like it says in your translation. As I said, that’s kind of smoothed out for us. But it flows like this in the original: “proclaim in his name repentance for forgiveness of sins to all the nations beginning from Jerusalem.” I’m going to follow that order in some points I make, here, just make a few comments as we go. And I’ll give you some key words: that our work is directive, authoritative, invasive, transformative, and extensive. Won’t say those again, but I’ll repeat them as we go through the points. Our work is directive, authoritative, invasive, transformative, and extensive.
First, our work is directive. That is to say, we proclaim, we preach, we speak as heralds. This indicates a communication of some sort using words. Yes, words are necessary. You may have heard that saying, someone says, “Preach the gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words.” Okay, that sounds cool, but it’s not true. Not true at all. You cannot show the gospel, live the gospel, walk the gospel, because the gospel is a message, not a drama. It’s a message.
I assume the best of people who say things like that. I understand what they’re trying to say. They’re trying to emphasize that we need to live consistently with the gospel. I get that, and I agree with that. There’s a better way to say it. You say, you can, you should, you must live consistently with the gospel you preach, the gospel you proclaim. Bible says, puts it this way, “Walk worthy of your calling.”
That’s true. But to proclaim the gospel, you have to use words. The gospel, euangelion, literally means good message. Doesn’t mean good drama, doesn’t mean good poetry. Good message, it’s a spoken gospel, it’s proclaimed verbally, taught verbally. So our work involves communicating words. Words, not emojis, not GIFs, not GIFs and memes, pictures posted, words. Words, not a wholesome lifestyle, not our niceness, not showing our love language, or some other vague notion that’s open to anybody’s interpretation. Words.
Some Christians feel maybe a bit intimidated to speak. I think that’s unnecessary. But I understand. Some find it hard to communicate verbally. They feel tongue-tied, get nervous, have a difficult time speaking clearly. In most cases, I believe that people like that simply need more practice to gain confidence speaking verbally, to quit thinking about their own limitations and think about the power of God that is within them to cause them to be able to communicate sufficiently to get the message across.
In many cases, people need to repent of fearing man, let love propel them into conversations with others, to care for them, to risk making people feel uncomfortable because we love them. On rare occasions though, I do find some Christians who really do find it challenging to communicate verbally, and they do a, do a great job though in communicating in other ways. They can write the gospel, send notes, letters, give tracts, give good, gospel clarity books to people and once that unsaved friend reads those saving words, whether by note or letter or e-mail or, dare I say text message. Okay, text the Gospel. Just make it clear. Once your unsaved friend reads the saving words, whether through your communication or a book or a tract, verbal communication inevitably and fluently follows.
For faithful proclamation, words are necessary, and our words are directive. They’re not suggestive. We don’t, we don’t just share and don’t then care about the verdict of the outcome. We’re directing them. We’re not just suggesting, this is a good idea. Give this a try. Give Jesus a try. We proclaim, we preach, that means we exhort, we direct, we tell people what they must do. We’re not there to debate with religious sinners. We’re not there to dialogue with bad ideas.
We’re not there to platform lies and errors and put them on par with the truth as if we’re just kind of dialoguing together. That is not it. We have a truth revealed from Heaven in the Word of God, and it trumps everything. And so when we preach that, proclaim that, it’s not that we’re proud. No. We need this just as they need that. We’re proclaiming to them the same truth that saved us. We just, by God’s grace, have recognized it to be the supreme truth, absolute truth.
Are we proud and arrogant for saying so? No, we’d be proud and arrogant if we did not say so. Our work is directive. We proclaim, we tell others what they need to hear, what they must do to be saved. And our chief concern in that proclamation is the right message, is to tell the truth because it’s his message, not ours. This is not opinion-sharing, this isn’t a good idea, this isn’t what worked for me; this is authoritative truth.
That leads to a second point. Second, our work is authoritative. Authoritative. That comes from the next phrase in the original, “we proclaim.” The next phrase in the original is “in his name,” “in his name.” So to proclaim, to preach, the verb kerysso refers to a herald making an announcement, not just any announcement, but an authoritative announcement. He speaks, that herald speaks in the city square, not in his own name or by his own authority, but in the name of and by the authority of the one who sent him, in many cases in the ancient times, a king.
Proclamation, here, is about the authority by which we speak, which is his authority. We proclaim in Jesus’ name, and when we’re conscious of the fact that we’re speaking in his name, not ours, we grow in the virtues that will help us in our proclamation. We grow in humility, confidence, boldness, and humility. We don’t preach by our own authority or by anyone else’s. We don’t preach in the name of a church. We don’t preach in the name of any favorite preacher, podcaster, YouTube personality, influencer, whatever. We don’t preach in the name of any historical or theological movement, either. We don’t come saying, in the name of Calvin, I command you to repent.
No. In humility we preach his name and no other, for it’s in his name and his name alone that salvation comes. We tell everyone there is salvation in no one else. Why? Because “there’s no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.” Well, that takes the pressure off, doesn’t it? It really does. Humility, this isn’t us, it’s him. I’m just, I’m a conduit, I’m a messenger for him. Takes the pressure off because it’s really not us; it’s his message. We’re just being obedient.
Leads us to a confidence. Confidence because we know personally the one in whose name we preach. Because we know him. We know him personally, we know what he’s like, we know what he can do. We find strong confidence proclaiming in his name and preaching his salvation, preaching his finished work. He’s done it all. We received the saving power ourselves. We know it. We’re confident in it. We know what this gospel can do because it transformed us.
So humility leads to confidence, and then confidence gives us boldness to speak straightforwardly to sinners. We’re not intimidated by them. We’re not intimidated. Man, who will die, who passes like the grass of the field, just like we do. It doesn’t matter what station they hold in life, what position they hold, how intelligent or unintelligent they are, how strong or strong-willed they are, how well-spoken. It does not matter. We can speak straightforwardly the truth because we’re bold, because we’re confident, because we’re humble.
Just as redemption was not ours to accomplish, so the success of our proclamation isn’t our chief concern. That’s his concern. We, we, we just, we just share, we preach, we proclaim the good news, the the message. That’s between that sinner and that God to make whatever is going to happen, happen. We’ve done our job. We can be bold in proclamation because the outcome is, really, it’s up to him. It’s between him and that sinner.
Third, we need to recognize our work is invasive, invasive. We’re directive by proclaiming, we’re authoritative by proclaiming in his name, and third, our work is invasive because we’re proclaiming repentance, and repentance goes right into the heart of every matter, and it penetrates into the heart of every sinner. That message of repentance, the word metanoia, to change the mind, I heard that language in the waters of baptism. I changed my mind. Changed my mind about who God is, who Christ is, who I am before him, what this whole life is about. Am I a sinner? Am I, am I in need of salvation? I changed my mind. I heard truth, I changed my mind.
It’s not a superficial change. It goes deep. It’s a heart change. It’s at the level of the mind, at what is in Greek the nous. And you can hear n-o-u-s, if you want to write that down, or nos, nos, metanoia. That n-o-i-a, noia, at the end refers to the mind, a metanoia, to change the mind. We’re talking about the spiritual, the immaterial self. This is the, the self that no one can see, the invisible aspect of us, the immaterial self. This is what we are thinking, happens is in the mind, in the heart.
Biblically, the mind works through each part of the heart, involving the intellect, the affections, and the will. It’s with the intellect that we understand or apprehend and assent to the truth. And that’s why we have to preach words, words that people can understand, words of truth. We’re targeting the mind. We’re targeting the intellect. They need to understand in order to believe. So we target the intellect, the mind. When that mind understands and apprehends and assents to the truth, when we speak and preach and proclaim, involved in that, and this is by God’s work, it targets the affections as well, with the affections: what we love, what we don’t love, what we hate, what we despise.
All those things are the affections, and you could call them, maybe if you want to, the emotions. The emotions, the feelings, but really they are more properly called the affections, what we’re affected by, so ‘A’, affection. By the affections we embrace the truth, we have a love for the truth. And then with a mind equipped with understanding, apprehension, comprehension, and assent of the truth, the affections, the emotions coming on board and, and seeing that and understanding it, it engages the will. And the will, the volition, then pursues the truth, acts on the truth, does something different. This is the invasive work of preaching and proclamation that only God by his Spirit can accomplish in the heart of a sinner. But boy, it gets into the heart of a sinner.
Those of us who are saved to practice repentance, we are the ones who are the right ones to preach repentance, right? We’re saved to practice repentance as a lifestyle from here on out. We are the right ones, then, to preach repentance because we know what we’re talking about. We’ve been practicing it. We do it every day. We put off and put on. We, our mind is renewed by the truth. We come to an understanding, and we see what it is that we need to repent from, what we need to put off in our lives, the sin.
We see through the study of the truth and understanding of the truth and worship of God, we see how excellent Christ’s character is, how great God is. We see his righteousness and his truth and his law, his commandments, and we want to practice that. So we put off what is our old self. We put off our habits and our behaviors, our words, our priorities from our old life, the life that many people still live in this world, which makes us feel like strangers, but really we’re the ones right side up in this earth, not them.
We put on, instead, a life that’s pleasing to the Lord. It’s righteous, true, joyful. It’s called repentance. We put off, we put on, we do it from a renewed mind, because of an understanding of the Scripture that God gives us. We’re saved to practice repentance, and therefore we are the right ones to preach repentance.
Dennis and I were talking a little bit just before the service about what it means to mortify and vivify. Mortify means to kill sin. Vivify means to put on and vivify, and enliven virtues of the Spirit. So we mortify all of our sin, and sin is death in us, so we kill death. We put death to death. Christ has put death to death in the death of Christ on the cross itself, but now by the Spirit we put to death all the deeds of the flesh, all the works of evil, all the things that are dead. We put off that sin. We kill it, we mortify it, we terminate it with extreme prejudice, and we vivify the fruits of the Spirit.It’s by the Spirit that he grows fruit within us. We grow in Christ-like character. That is what it is to live, to really live. Putting off, putting on. We’re practicing repentance and we’re proclaiming repentance. We know what we’re talking about.
If you’re a Christian, if you’ve been a Christian even for a short time, you understand this to some degree. You just need to grow in depth of understanding, in habit of practice of it. But I’m telling you, you know more than you think. So do not be intimidated to preach repentance to the lost. They need that saving message.
So we proclaim using words. We proclaim in his name. We proclaim in his name a deep change of mind that the sinner’s intellect can grasp and understand, that his affections can respond to, either accepting or rejecting, and that his will can choose to receive or reject, choose to obey or disobey. That really is between them and the Lord.
But to proclaim the gospel, you have to use words. The gospel, euangelion, literally means good message. Travis Allen
So our work is an invasive work, preaching repentance, but our work is deeply transformative. That’s the fourth word, there. Our work is deeply transformative. We preach repentance for forgiveness of sins. That’s transformational. Our invasive preaching of repentance penetrates into the heart to deal with the mother of all problems, the sin problem, which makes every sinner a sinner, it’s sin.
In other words, we’re, we’re not snake-oil salesman. We’re not peddling easy success. We’re not making false promises of health, wealth, and prosperity. We’re not motivational speakers. We’re not telling people how to become a better you or the best you you can be, or to fulfill all your potential. There are no promises that we offer of escape from financial ruin, relational turmoil, personal hurts, disappointments, affliction, suffering.
In fact, we tell people, if you come to Christ, you must deny yourself, take up your cross, which is a message of suffering, and follow him. And the more you’re like Christ, the more you look like him, sound like him, talk like him, walk like him, you know what they did to him? They crucified him.
When we tell people to come to Christ, we’re talking about their sin problem, that that can be dealt with finally, fully, eternally, and they can be covered with righteousness and go to Heaven forever, that they can right now start walking in righteousness and truth and true life and know eternal life and have it flowing within them. But do you know what that’s going to bring on the outside? Oftentimes disappointment, affliction, suffering, relational turmoil, sometimes in some cases because of persecution, financial ruin, personal hurt. That’s what comes because the more we look like Christ, well, the more they want to crucify us, too. And when that happens at the family level, oh boy, that hurts, doesn’t it? It really does.
But what we’re preaching isn’t surface level at all. We go to the heart, and we call for a heart-level core transformation, repentance, a change of mind that moves the affections, directs the will, transforms the entire life. We’re telling people then that that happens by salvation from sin and sin’s consequences. We tell people that they need forgiveness of sins because sin is the problem. Sin in the heart, that is the hidden disease, that is the silent and invisible killer.
Sin manifests itself in manifold symptoms on the outside, each one of them deadly and damning on their own. Every conflict, every bad relationship, every divorce, every immorality, all greed, every lust, every lie, slander, resentment, bitterness, hatred, murder, all of it comes out of sin.
The real danger of sin isn’t what sin does to us, even though it does load us with guilt, fill us with shame, ruin our lives, destroy our relationships. Sin does all that. But that’s not the real danger of sin. The real danger of sin is divine condemnation. Sin isn’t really about what happens here to us or what we even do to others and how we hurt others through our sin or how others have hurt us. It’s not about the horizontal. It’s about this vertical problem we have with the God who hates our sin.
God the law-giver is also the prosecuting attorney when we come to court. He’s also sitting on the bench as the judge. He’s in the jury box as the jury. He’s everywhere. He’s even the executioner who executes sentence. You know who’s going to be overseeing the fires of Hell? It says in Revelation, it’s the Lamb. We need forgiveness from our sins to save us, not from our own brokenness, not from relational trouble, not from financial issues, not from fill-in-the-blank. We need salvation from God because God is a just and inflexible and righteous judge. He will execute his justice, his just sentence, his wrath. He will cause all unrepentant sinners to suffer eternally in the fire of Hell. For those who heed our proclamation that we proclaim in the authority of Jesus’ name, those who repented our preaching, they can stand in that day before the all-knowing judge of heaven and earth. They can stand there confident because they’re forgiven of their sins.
Forgiven, here, is shorthand because it doesn’t just talk about forgiveness of sins and the erasure of sins and the propitiation of sins, the satisfaction of wrath and the expiation of our sins, the removal of our sins from God’s presence “as far as the east is from the west.” It’s that, yes, but it also encompasses justification. Justification, which means to be declared not just sinless, not just forgiven, but righteous before God. To be justified is to be declared holy, righteous, yes, clean of all sin, but in a positive sense because of Christ’s act of obedience, positively righteous before God, because of Christ, who he is, what he’s accomplished, what he’s done.
He died to pay the penalty, the just penalty for our sins, to reconcile us to God, to transform us from enemy to friend. But he also covered us with his righteousness so that we stand before him, perfect, righteous, complete. There’s no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, who are reconciled to God. Those who don’t heed our proclamation, as John 3:18 says, “‘He who does not believe has been condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.’” So those who reject the preaching, reject the proclamation of repentance for forgiveness of sins, they remain in their sins. They’ve been offered the porthole of escape through Christ. They don’t go through it, and they’ll suffer eternal death.
But the focus, here, of Christ, the focus for the Apostles then and for us today, is on the privilege that we have to join in our Lord’s work of extending his offer. I love that. When he came in his first advent, he came gentle, meek, “a bruised reed he will not break, a faintly burning wick he will not extinguish.” He comes offering forgiveness. He comes leading with the benefits. We preach the gospel to the poor, proclaim release of the captives, recovery of sight to the blind. We set free the downtrodden. We proclaim to them the year of the Lord’s favor, just as our Lord did. We do it in his name.
So our work is directive, authoritative, invasive, and transformative. And finally, fifth, our work is extensive. Our work is extensive. The mandate we see, here, in Luke 24:47 is to preach universally to all the nations, even as it says we must start locally, tells them beginning from Jerusalem. So it’s a universal mandate with a local priority. Extensive work starts at the epicenter of God’s redemptive interest, which is Jerusalem, or another word for that, which we sang in our song just before I came up here, Zion, Zion city, Jerusalem.
At the epicenter of God’s interest is where this extensive work starts, and then it moves outward from there to envelope the entire world. In the geographic or spatial extension of the proclamation ministry, I just find it interesting, Jesus does not begin with the local priority, Jerusalem. He emphasizes, first, the universal intent of the proclamation work. He sets the broader goal, the farther goal on the minds of his men before he tells them where to start. He says, I don’t want you to think so regionally, locally. I don’t want you to get narrow in your focus. Why? Because the Jews had been narrow in their focus; this salvation was from the Jews and for the Jews.
Now he tells these Jews, no, you’ve got to think about the entire world.” In fact, we read a couple passages in Isaiah that talked about the Jewish people being what? A light to whom? Us, to the Gentiles, to the nations. You know what Israel did by sinning their sins and continuing to turn to idols and turn away from the living God? You know what they did? Well, in addition to their idolatry and all their sin against God and their spurning God’s grace and turning away from his law and becoming stiff-necked and hard-hearted, in addition to that, they’ve totally failed their mission.
Their mission is to extend the truth of God around the earth. And God actually did that in spite of them so many times. Many people heard of God’s wonderful acts in the Exodus and in the conquest of the Promised Land because of the reputation was getting out. God made his own name known even in spite of his people. But now we, as his saved, redeemed people, we have an opportunity to join in that mission and say, you know what? It’s a worldwide mission. It’s a universal thing. But we start right here. We do our part.
So Jesus sets the goal before his disciples, his Apostles, before he tells him where to start. This universal mandate of our proclamation says a few things about our task, and it gives us, I think, a great confidence in our chief work. We note that preaching itself is a universal medium. That is to say that preaching isn’t bound to any particular time, people, or culture. We don’t come in proclaiming and say, well, that’s how they do it in their culture, so we’ll honor their culture. But in this culture over here, they like cartoons. So we’re going to do cartoons or flannel graph or whatever.
Preaching isn’t fit only for certain demographics, certain personalities, certain intellects, certain educational levels. Preaching is a universal medium. And so wherever we go, we preach. It works everywhere. That’s why Christ told us to do it.
Another thing we see that comes in a universal sense, here, preaching in his name, in his name, that comes with the universal authority. Bill read it earlier. Jesus said Matthew 20:18, “‘All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.’” All authority, heaven and earth, that covers all created order. Everything that is in the created realm, that is anything outside God, if it’s in the created realm, it’s under his authority. Universal authority in the work to which we’ve been called.
You know what else is universal? The need for forgiveness. Forgiveness is a universal need. You can’t find anybody in any nation, whether it’s a pygmy in a cave or someone up on some high mountaintop in the Himalayas, someone who’s doing cave diving. Wherever they are on this earth, how high, how deep, how broad, wherever it is, you will find sinners in need of salvation. And they know they’re sinners. They have the law of God written on their heart. They have a conscience that either accuses or excuses them. They know that there is a should and a should not, a must and a must not. I haven’t found any culture in the world, yet, that thinks adultery is a-okay.
Do all nations have sins? Or do some cultures and nations have no sins or even fewer sins than others? I think that’s what we’re tempted to believe in our nation. We’re somehow superior to others. Our culture, our nation, does America need to repent? If it does need to repent, then why are so few willing to say that, now that they purported conservatism in the White House? Think about your own heart in this. If we had a different president named Kamala Harris, would you be more interested in proclaiming repentance to Washington and saying America needs to repent, that America’s under judgment, than you are right now?
Finally, repentance is a universal command. Preaching is a universal medium. Preaching in his name comes with universal authority. Forgiveness is a universal need, and repentance is a universal command. Takes us back to that local priority and clarifies why it is that we need to begin our proclamation locally. Because our work is not to sign online petitions for people to repent. Our work is not to create awareness for repentance. It’s not by clicking like buttons about who needs to repent and who doesn’t and all that.
We preach repentance to real people. We do so face to face. We do that where we see the whites of sinners’ eyes. And when we do that we see also in those same sinners’ eyes the pain, the sadness, the emptiness, the lostness, the need. Gets up close and personal for us. And that’s where sinners need to hear our anxious pleading. They need to hear the sobriety of our tone. They need to know through that the sincerity of our love. They need to be back and forth with us and asking questions and clarifying and understanding so they can understand and apprehend what it is we’re saying. That’s why repentance, though it’s a universal mandate, it happens locally. This is where it happens.
So that’s the work that Christ has commissioned for us to do. It’s directive, authoritative, invasive, transformative, and extensive. And if that seems daunting to you, and you’re like, oh, no! I don’t think I can do this. This is too much for me, you’re going to appreciate the next point. It clarifies and simplifies the task for you.
Number two: our simple role, our simple role. Note in verse 48 the role of the Apostles and the early disciples. Jesus says, “You” He’s emphatic in the text. “‘You are witnesses of these things.’” The emphasis in the original, “you, yourselves,” you could translate it that way. “You, yourselves are witnesses.” The term martys, we get the word martyr. In our time, come to refer to those who seal their testimony with their own blood. Martyrs are willing to die for the truth.
It’s a meaning that’s been passed down to us through the ages because the ancient Christian martyrs, starting with Stephen in Acts chapter 7, but most Apostles also were martyrs, many saints dying under the Roman persecution, many saints dying in the Protestant Reformation. These martyrs left such an indelible impression upon us, as they should, through their faithful witness, their faithful martys.
But more technically, if you back up and think about the meaning of that term, martys, refers to those who witness things, witnesses, someone who is there, on hand to see or experience something, who heard something, who can attest to the facts. They can witness something, say in a traffic accident, but then it becomes official and legal, a testimony in court when a martys, witness, enters into a courtroom to corroborate an account, tell what they saw, attest to the facts. In verse 48, Jesus is using the term in that sense of: What did you witness? What did you see?”
These Apostles, these first disciples, were witnesses to all the facts that he’s just cited. They themselves were “witnesses of these things.” What are “those things”? The things written in Scripture, verse 46, the things about Christ’s suffering, about his rising from the dead the third day. They were witnesses. Not only that, these Apostles, these early disciples, had first-hand knowledge about everything Jesus had spoken to them while he was still with them. They were there, they heard, they walked, they talked, interacted.
While he was still with them, verse 44, they heard him explaining about everything written about him in the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms, and particularly about his suffering and about his rising from the dead the third day. These things they saw. They saw it in Scripture. They heard him teach about it, and then they saw it fulfilled right in front of them. They witnessed it all. They heard his predictions of suffering, and then they witnessed the rejection of his people.
They saw Jesus handed over to die. They heard him predict he’d be mocked, mistreated, spat upon, then scourged and killed. Heard him say that afterward, the third day he’d rise again. And then they watched all those predictions come true, just as he said them, in detail. They saw one of their own betray him. They were there when the Roman soldiers arrested him. Two of them witnessed as the religious authorities of the Jews subjected him to hours and hours of trials, to brutal abuse. Then they watched as they handed and delivered over Jesus to Pontius Pilate. They saw all that happen.
The disciples watched as the Jewish leaders pressured, manipulated Pilate to condemn Jesus to crucifixion. And some of them, most notably the women, watched him die on the cross. They saw him die. They saw his body removed by Joseph’s men, prepared for burial, then placed in Joseph’s tomb. On the third day, the disciples and Apostles witnessed his resurrection, which was visible bodily. And yet in this power, unknown, resurrected power, resurrected, unprecedented glory, he was raised to this new kind of life. That’s why Jesus said to them, “‘You yourselves are witnesses of these things.’”
That’s their role, a special role, unrepeatable. It’s historical, that’s the testimony. In fact, Luke followed in writing his Gospel, as he says in Luke 1-2, “Those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses, servants of the Word, they handed those things down to us.” Then Luke, having investigated everything from the beginning carefully, he wrote it out for us in consecutive order, verse 3, Luke chapter 1, “so that we may have certainty as well.” That’s their role. That’s their apostolic purpose in the apostolic age, which these Apostles and these early disciples served faithfully in their time.
Now their testimony is written down by divine inspiration for us. Their testimony is now written down by divine inspiration that provides the church with this inerrant, infallible, perpetual, written, black-and-white canonical witness. It’s their witness here in Scripture to all of us. So what’s written in Scripture in the Old and the New Testaments is as inerrant and infallible as if each Apostle himself, as if each and every Christian disciple that were alive at that time, it’s as if each witness, one by one, could stand face to face with you and me personally, relaying to you his own account, giving to you his own eyewitness testimony, telling you verbally face to face what he saw, what he heard, what he experienced personally.
What is written in Scripture is nothing less than that, but it is strengthened by the guarantee that this is the inerrant, that is without any error, infallible, without any, without any falsehood in it, inerrant, infallible testimony of eyewitnesses, those who were there, guaranteed by divine inspiration, by the power of the Spirit of God himself.
So again, that’s their role. What’s ours? What’s yours? Your role, my role, our role, we must do our work of bold proclamation. Preach in his name repentance for the forgiveness of sins to all the nations. We follow the same pattern that was practiced in the preaching in Jerusalem. We look in the book of Acts, and we see what the Apostles did, what they said, how they said it. We do what the Apostles did. We preach what they preach. We point people that we talk to back to the inerrant, infallible witness of Scripture. We teach to them and explain to them the Word of God. Then we call people to repent of their sins, put their faith in Jesus Christ, who’s written and recorded in Scripture.
Man, the Scripture does a lot of heavy lifting for us. In fact, that’s a great way to proclaim repentance for the forgiveness of sins. It’s just to say, hey, I’m not really good, like, talking just on my own extemporaneously, and I don’t even know how to pronounce that word. So let’s just do, you and me do a Bible study together and just read through the Bible. How about that? And wherever you have a question, I’ll try to answer it. I’ll look in a commentary I have, and it’s just me and you, talk, learn together.
Great way to do it. Open the Bible with somebody, read the Bible to them, have them read with you. Explain, draw out its truths that you understand and they don’t. We don’t feel the need to feel any nervousness about the fact that we weren’t there to see this for ourselves, because in the wisdom of God’s perfect plan, this is how he separates believers from unbelievers. This is how he separates the truly repentant from those who are just pretending. Whoever hears and heeds and obeys the written record of his witnesses, they are his people. Whoever rejects Scripture? Not his people. Pretty clear.
Let the Word do the work. Let the Word do the work. That’s your role. Your role is to continue proclaiming, not as an eyewitness, because you weren’t there, but pointing back to the eyewitnesses who were there. It’s their testimony. It’s their witness written in the authoritative, inerrant, absolute, true Word of God.
We come to a final point, and this last point may seem a little bit counterintuitive, but I think you’ll see what I’m after here. When we recognize how deep our need is, how daunting the task may seem to us, you know what it does? It kind of sends us to Christ and his Spirit for his help. And then that has an effect of giving us great confidence once again. It actually fills us with unending excitement and a profound, lasting joy.
It’s by the Spirit that he grows fruit within us. We grow in Christ-like character. That is what it is to live. Travis Allen
Let me give you a third point: our humble need. Number three: our humble need. How is it that knowing how needy we are, how does that give us confidence? It’s not what they tell you in all the leadership seminars. They say, empower your people. Tell them how great they are, how, how they’re rock stars, and how they’re just going to crush it. This isn’t, isn’t a motivational seminar, here. I’m here to tell you, oh, you’re desperately needy. You’re desperately needy.
Doesn’t that give you strength and confidence? Let me tell you why. We don’t rely on our own strength. We’re conduits of his strength. Verse 49, “‘Behold, I’m sending forth the promise of my Father upon you.’” Huh. What’s the promise of the father? He elaborates, “‘You’re to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.’” Huh. Promise has something to do with power. Where do I find that in the Bible? “‘I’m sending forth,’” That’s the verb apostello. That may sound familiar. That’s where we get the term apostle. It means one sent forth.”
Interesting. He sends forth, here in this verse, in this expression, not men, per se, but “‘the promise of my Father’” is what he sends forth. He sends forth the promised Holy Spirit, who is the gift of the Father in the New Covenant to his people. So then he says, “I’m sending forth that promise of my Father, the Holy Spirit,” and that’s why he says, “‘Stay in the city,’” literally, “sit in the city,” kathezomai, as in, sit tight, wait patiently in an attitude of expectation and excitement and anticipation because there’s hope of soon fulfillment, here.
What are they waiting for? Why are they waiting? Put simply, the disciples need spiritual empowerment. They need special gifting from God, and Jesus is delighted to tell them, I’m doing that. I’m sending forth the promise of my Father. So sit tight, wait patiently. Know the waiting is not in vain. You’re going to be clothed with power. And my men, you’re going to know this. You’re going to know it.
It’s fulfilled in Acts chapter 2, but before we see some of that, let’s consider the implications of this on their confidence for these men. First, the source of their confidence. So confidence, here, in themselves and their own power. Remember, their own selves and their own power had very recently failed them, failed the Lord, failed one another. No, they’ve seen the need to anchor their trust in him. They see the need to put all their confidence, all their hope in God, his faithful Word. And Jesus taught them to trust God’s Word, see what’s written, that it must of divine necessity, as a matter of divine will, it must be fulfilled.
They get that now, the source of their confidence in what Christ has taught them and what he’d open their minds to understand in Scripture, verse 45, the reliability of God’s will revealed in his Word. God is the source of their confidence. This is getting good. Second, think about the hope of their confidence, not only the source of their confidence in God, but the hope of their confidence when Jesus says, “‘Stay in the city until you’re clothed with power.’”
Maybe before the events of the past few days, maybe Peter would have heard that, and he might have said, what? Sit? What? Sit tight and do nothing? Are you kidding me? That’s before his denials. Now, having relied on himself and having failed miserably, he’s like, sit and wait? Okay. Check. Got it. I’m receiving you now, Lord, loud and clear. I’m going to do what you say.
In themselves, no confidence. In themselves, they want to mortify all pride and humble themselves and put their hope in him. They have no hope in themselves that they can stand firm. No hope in themselves that they can go out and do what he commanded. But in the Lord’s power, trusting his promise, great hope. Had he not said this, that “I’m going to suffer many things, be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, the scribes, be killed, be raised the third day”? Yeah, he said all that. Did all that happen? Yeah, it all happened exactly like he said.
So they should have believed the word of Christ before, but they didn’t. And if they had believed, they would have found all their hope in him, but they didn’t. Now? They’re not going to same make the same mistake twice. They’re not going to commit the same error of sinful judgment. God’s Word fulfilled in Christ, that’s a proven, that’s a given, and they can hope in him.
Third, the joy of their confidence, the joy of their confidence. It’s so good, here, because this is how this connects with us today. Having noted what Jesus had just accomplished, his suffering and death, and then his rising from the dead, Jesus now points to what remains. He says, “‘Behold, I am sending forth the promise of my Father upon you. But you, you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.’” There’s the, I and the you, and the you, is in the plural.
Seeing the source of their confidence in the eternal will of God revealed in his Word, finding the hope of their confidence in Christ and how he fulfilled God’s Word, the disciples now hear what had to be the most gracious and kind-hearted expression of love that could ever come forth from the lips of Christ to them in that moment. These men who’d failed so miserably, who had only recently failed him, Jesus gives the most wonderful, the most encouraging news. He says to them, men, I’m not through with you yet. You’re still on the team. You’re still my witnesses. In fact, you’re still my plan A. And yes, I still have a crucial role for you in fulfilling my plan. And I want you to get to work. Wait until you’re empowered and get to work.
Notice what’s going on, here. There’s been a monumental change and a profound shift in the nature of their fellowship, their relationship. Back in verse 44, Jesus alluded to the change when he said, “‘These are my words which I spoke to you,’” and then he said this, “‘while I was still with you.’” What’s the significance of that? He’s no longer with them now in the same way as he was before the resurrection. He’s no longer in the body of his humiliation as he was when he walked with them. And now he’s in a glorified state, a resurrection body dwelling in heaven, not on earth.
According to William Hendrickson, he says, “‘“While I was,” by saying, ‘“While I was still with you,”’ Jesus wants his disciples to realize his former mode of association with them has ceased and will not be resumed.” Frederick Gaudet adds this; he says, “The expression proves that in the mind of Jesus, his separation from them was now consummated. He was with them only exceptionally. His abode was elsewhere.
You’re like, What? To say Jesus is now with them only exceptionally means that his physical, visible presence is now the exception and not the rule. His abode is elsewhere. That is to say, his abode is in Heaven with the Father. And so when Jesus told the thief on the cross, “Today you will be with me in paradise,” look, he meant it. In these final forty days between his resurrection and his visible ascension to Heaven, yeah, he’s spending time with his disciples, teaching them, preparing them for what’s ahead.
But he’s no longer with them in the same way that he was before. Jesus is no longer traveling with them. He’s no longer eating and drinking with them each day. He’s not sleeping under the stars at night. He’s not staying in the homes of friends. And that’s what makes the Emmaus journey narrative that we just went through so remarkable because that’s now the exception rather than the rule.
This helps us to understand the special nature of Jesus’ commission, the instructions here in verses 47-49. His words are setting an expectation, here, for a new kind of relationship, a new mode of his being with us. And it’s actually an improved fellowship. Improved. He’s involving his disciples in the continued mission of proclamation and preaching. It’s based on the eyewitness testimony of the Apostles, and it’s a shared ministry of universal proclamation, a universal proclamation that was enabled, inaugurated when he ascended into heaven and sent the Spirit.
Jesus wants them to know whether the Apostles, the early disciples, faithful servants of the Word, whether it’s the church fathers, or whether it’s the faithful saints down through church history, reformers, Puritans, down to you and me today, Jesus wants us all to know our desperate need, that we cannot, we must not attempt this proclamation ministry on our own strength, in our own power, using our own voice, techniques, strategies, tactics. Jesus sends the message to us all right here in verse 49 that we must be supplied by the Father. We must likewise be clothed with power from on high. And the implication is that without any of that, we fail. We need them.
Is the manifestation of the Spirit going to look the same to us today as it did back then? No, there were different things going on, then, in the apostolic age, the need for the Spirit to visibly manifest to them, through them, through their work, through their ministry. Now that their work is written in canonical form, that’s no longer needed. That’s been done. We still, nonetheless, need the Spirit to empower our ministry, preach and teach and proclaim.
So with the promise of the Father, when we are clothed with his power from on high, what Jesus commissioned for his church to accomplish, it most certainly will be fulfilled. Most certainly will. Didn’t take too long for them to wait for the promise of the father. Go ahead and turn over to Acts chapter 2, kind of wind up our time, here. Acts chapter 2 in verses 1-8. I’m going to read a good chunk in Acts chapter 2, but I’ll read it quickly.
“When the day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all together in one place, and suddenly there came from heaven noise like a violent rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. There appeared to them tongues like fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues,” which means languages, “as the Spirit was giving them utterance.
“Now there were Jews living in Jerusalem, devout men from every nation under heaven.” How about that? “And when the sound occurred, the multitude came together, and they were bewildered because each one of them was hearing them speak in his own language or in his own tongue. So they were astounded and marveling and saying, ‘Behold, are not all of these who are speaking Galileans?’”
Down in verse 12, “They all continued in astonishment, great perplexity, saying to one another, ‘What does this mean?’ There’s others, there, mocking and saying, ‘They’re full of new wine.’ Peter stood up to stop that rumor. No, we’re not drunk. Drunk people don’t make sense like this. He set the record straight by telling them what was really happening. In verse 14, “Peter, taking a stand with the eleven, raised his voice, declared to them, ‘Men of Judea and all you who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you and give heed to my words, that these men are not drunk as you suppose, for it’s the third hour of the day.
“‘This is what was spoken of through the prophet Joel: “And it shall be in the last days, God says that ‘I will pour out my spirit on all mankind. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your young men shall see visions; your old men shall dream dreams. Even on my male slaves and female slaves I will in those days pour out my spirit, and they shall prophesy.’”’” He’s quoting from Joel 2:28-29, there.
And to Joel’s prophecy we could add Jeremiah 31:33, “‘This is the covenant I will make after those days. I’ll put my law within them, and on their heart I will write it. I will be their God, and they shall be my people.’” And how’s that going to happen, Jeremiah? Because Israel’s track record of covenant-keeping isn’t good. God says in Ezekiel 36:26, I got that covered. He says, “‘I’ll give you a new heart, put a new spirit within you. I’ll remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I’ll put my spirit within you, to cause you to walk in my statutes, and you’ll be careful to observe all my ordinances.’”
Listen, that happened, Day of Pentecost. That happened. I don’t have time now to go into issues of continuity and discontinuity between Old and New Covenants except this, to affirm in no uncertain terms that Jesus inaugurated the New Covenant by the sending of the Holy Spirit. This is the promise of the father. Clothed with power, now, from on high, what do the Apostles do? They begin preaching in his name. What do they preach? Repentance for the forgiveness of sins. To whom do they preach it? To all the nations. Where do they begin? They begin right there in Jerusalem.
All the nations were there, as Luke has listed in Acts 2:8-11, people from all those different nations. In Acts 2:22-23, we see the suffering of Christ that they preach, the suffering that Jesus reminded them of in Luke 24:46. Look at Acts 2:22, “‘Men of Israel, listen to these words. Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs, which God did through him in your midst, just as you yourselves know, this man delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of lawless men and put him to death.’” Then he preaches the resurrection of Christ.
Also Luke 24:46, we saw that. Here’s their role of witness, as witnesses to the fact from Luke 24:47. Look at verse 24, “‘But God raised him up again. You put him to death by the hands of lawless men, but God raised him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for him to be held in its power. For David says of him, “I saw the Lord continually before me because he’s at my right hand, so that I will not be shaken. Therefore, my heart was glad, my tongue exalted. Moreover, my flesh also will live in hope, because you’ll not forsake my soul to Hades, nor give your holy one over to see corruption. You’ve made known to me the ways of life. You’ll make me full of gladness with your presence.”’” David said that? Wait, wait. “‘Men and brothers, I may confidently say to you regarding the patriarch David, he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day.’”
What’s he talking about? “‘Because he was a prophet,’” verse 30, “‘and he knew that God had sworn to him with an oath to set one of the fruit of his body on his throne, he looked ahead and spoke of the resurrection of the Christ, that he was neither forsaken to Hades nor did his flesh seek corruption. This Jesus God raised up again, to which we are all witnesses.’”
Peter cites the promise of the Father sent by Jesus, as we have seen in verse 49 of Luke 24. Notice how boldly he’s preaching and proclaiming all this. Look at verse 33, “‘Therefore, having been exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he’s poured out this, which you both see and hear.’” Now you’re witnesses, you’re seeing it, you’re hearing it. David did not ascend into the heavens, but he himself says, “The Lord said to my Lord, ‘Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies as a footstool at your feet.’” Therefore, let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.’”
Man, he’s bold. This vacillating Peter, who just few days ago denied him, now he’s preaching like this. Why? How? He’s clothing the power of the Spirit, the Spirit whom Jesus poured out upon his men. There is an immediate effect. A small percentage of the Pentecost pilgrims who were calling on the name of the Lord received that same Spirit. They alone were affected. It says in verse 37, “When they heard this, they were pierced to the heart. They said to Peter and the rest of the Apostles, ‘Men and brothers, what should we do?’
“Peter said to them, ‘Repent and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you’ll receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call to himself.” Verse 47 of Luke 24, That happened, that day. Peter and the Apostles preached repentance for the forgiveness of sins in Jesus’ name. “‘The promise both of forgiveness and of the Holy Spirit is for Israel, for her children, for all who are far off among the nations, as many as the Lord our God will call to himself.’”
Is it any wonder that after Jesus’ ascension into heaven, Luke 24:51, these men went back to Jerusalem not with any sorrow at all? They went back with great joy. Why? Because they get to join in this fellowship with the father and his son. And now by the promise of the father and the sending of the son, they get the gift of the Holy Spirit as well. Triune fellowship, that’s what this means; especially considering all their failures, their sins, they’re abandoning him, Peter denying him. But wonder of all wonders, Jesus re-enlists them, and they get to do this.
Beloved, let this settle in your hearts. Turn it over in your minds, and let the Lord inject this kind of holy zeal into all of us, this holy affection, this singular devotion, excitement to do the work of the ministry, taking a meaningful part in the proclamation of the gospel, the commission of Jesus Christ that he’s given to our church. Folks, we get to do this together. This is our task for the rest of our days on earth. And then, that’s it. Then that’s it. Once this life is over, whether the Lord calls us home or whether Christ returns for us, once this life is over, we’re never going to have the opportunity again that we have right now, this day, to evangelize the lost. Never have the opportunity again to preach the gospel of God’s forgiveness in Christ, to see souls snatched out of the flames of Hell and out of the jaws of death and transferred into life eternal, life everlasting.
What is better in your life? I ask you, what is better than this? What enterprise are you involved in? Building a business, good as far as it goes. Raising a family, very good. All these things are wonderful, great. Is it better than seeing souls eternally saved? Just put that before you. You can answer that between you and the Lord. Because if you believe that this is a good and noble work, and you see your own need for the Spirit, you realize that he will empower you and simplify your task and send you back to the Scripture.
You can do this. He’s called you to do this. This is our commission. We have a noble work, a simple role, humble need. But through it all, God magnifies Jesus Christ and his grace. He shows the greatness of salvation in his name and transformed lives like ours, like theirs, who we’re going to tell and they’re going to be saved. So don’t miss out. We’re going to do this noble work, and we’re going to do it together. Let’s pray about that.
Our Father, we thank you for the joyful privilege that’s ours to participate in the work of the Great Commission. We thank you for the clarity with which the Lord Jesus Christ proclaims it, teaches his disciples, instructs his men, and gives them hope and confidence and joy in their task ahead.
We ask, Father, that you would bring us into their joy, the joy of the fellowship with the Father and his Son Jesus Christ, the joy of the Holy Spirit, the joy of the saints, past and present. Let there be a line of continuity through us to future saints as well, through our witness, through our testimony, through the Word of repentance and faith in Christ. We ask that you would do this for the sake of Christ in his glory, his great gospel. Amen.