So please do stand with me as we hear God's Word. First of all, in the 22nd Psalm. And then secondly, in the Gospel of Matthew. Psalm 22, and we will read from the 21st verse. These are the words of the Messiah Words that were on the lips of our Lord Jesus Christ as we saw this morning as He hung, abandoned, forsaken, humiliated, and derelict on the cross. And we pick up the psalm in verse 21, save me from the mouth of the lion. You have rescued me from the horns of the wild oxen. I will tell of your name to my brothers. In the midst of the congregation, I will praise you. You who fear the Lord, praise him. All you offspring of Jacob, glorify him and stand in awe of him, all you offspring of Israel. For he has not despised or abhorred the affliction of the afflicted, and he has not hidden his face from him. but has heard when he cried to him. From you comes my praise in the great congregation. My vows I will perform before those who fear him. The afflicted shall eat and be satisfied. Those who seek him shall praise the Lord. May your hearts live forever. All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord. and all the families of the nation shall worship before you. For kingship belongs to the Lord, and he rules over the nations. All the prosperous of the earth eat and worship. Before him shall bow all who go down to the dust. Even the one who could not keep himself alive, posterity shall serve him. It shall be told of the Lord to the coming generation. They shall come and proclaim His righteousness to a people yet unborn that He has done it." And then in the Gospel of Matthew, and we'll read from the beginning of the 28th chapter, Now after the Sabbath toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow. And for fear of Him, the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the woman, do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for He has risen, as He said. Come, see the place where He lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he is risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him. See, I have told you." So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy and ran to tell his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and said, greetings. And they came and took hold of his feet and worshipped him. Then Jesus said to them, do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me. While they were going, behold, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests all that had taken place. And when they had assembled with the elders and taken counsel, They gave a sufficient sum of money to the soldiers and said, tell people, his disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep. And if this comes to the governor's ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble. So they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story has been spread among the Jews to this day. Now the 11 disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations. baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. You will have seen from your programs for this weekend that I titled these five addresses, The Road to Calvary. Perhaps The Road to Glory might have been a more accurate title for the series of addresses. But for Jesus, The Road to Glory was a road that led Him to glory by way of Calvary. Without Calvary there would have been no glory, no cross, no crown. No cross, no crown. So with that thought in your minds, follow with me as we reflect together on this 28th chapter of Matthew's gospel. Matthew's gospel, as many of you, perhaps all of you know, began almost with an angel appearing to Joseph in a dream. And now Matthew's gospel all but ends with another angel appearing this time to two women. It seems that at every significant moment in our Lord's earthly redemptive pilgrimage, there were significant moments of heavenly punctuation. At His birth, We read of the angelic hosts appearing, singing and giving glory to God. We see at His baptism the heavens being opened and the heavenly Father declaring, this is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased. We find as our Lord encounters Satan in the wilderness in His temptation that angels were there to minister to Him, to support and sustain Him. We see in the transfiguration again the Lord God Himself splitting the heavens and punctuating time and space, declaring, this is My beloved Son. And as the Lord Jesus wrestles in the garden and as the dark shadow of the cross begins to penetrate His human soul, we find there is another angelic visitation. An angel comes to strengthen Him. At every significant moment in our Lord's earthly redemptive pilgrimage, there are punctuations from heaven to sustain, support, and strengthen Him. But not quite. At the moment of redemptive accomplishment, There was no punctuation from heaven. There was no angelic visitation to support and strengthen. There was but the Savior himself, upheld by the Spirit of God, bearing the sin of this broken world, alone, abandoned, cursed, experiencing God's just judgment and wrath, not on His sin, for He had none, but on our sin. For from times eternal, He had been appointed the covenant head, the representative head, of a great company of people who throughout the ages of history would be brought by the mercy of God to put their hope and trust alone in Jesus Christ. And on that cross there were no punctuations, there were no angelic visitations, there was no voice from heaven. to support and encourage him. Rather, we are told simply, do you remember, darkness was over the face of the land. I've known times in my life when darkness in some small measure has enshrouded me. But I've never known what it is to have darkness wholly engulf me. You know those words in Isaiah 50, is it verse 10? Let him who walks in the darkness and who has no light, no light, no light. I cannot imagine what it must be like to have no light. But that's what it was for our Savior Jesus Christ. For Him all the lights had gone out. There wasn't a pinprick in the cosmos of light for Him because He was experiencing the righteous judgment of God that our sin deserved. And yet, do you remember how Isaiah 50 verse 10 continues, let him who walks in the darkness and who has no light, Peter put it in his great sermon at Pentecost. This Jesus, the determinant counsel and foreknowledge of God, you crucified, but bodily and women are perhaps more sophisticated in their unbelief. but it's still unbelief. Jesus is transmogrified into a good man with a kindly ethic, but an ethic that changes with the times. But the real issue is simply they refuse to bow the knee before the Lord of glory. There is something utterly diabolical about religious unbelief. Unbelief in all its forms is diabolical, but there is nothing more diabolical than religious unbelief. Unbelief that comes to us with a veneer of religion, and increasingly, I want to say, with a veneer of evangelical religion. When people ask me today, are you an evangelical? I never ever say I am. I always reply, tell me what you mean, and I'll tell you if I am. And nine times out of 10, I say, oh, absolutely not. Well, what on earth then are you? Well, that leaves you the opportunity to tell them, doesn't it? And so Matthew begins with these three appearances. But it's verses 16 to 20 that I really want to focus on with you this evening, where Matthew takes us to Galilee. where the 11 disciples gather to meet with Jesus at His command. Now, we know from the other Gospels that Jesus had met them earlier in Jerusalem. We know that. We don't have time to piece together the different appearances of our Lord. But what I want to focus on with you in these closing moments is The great commission that Jesus entrusted to this fragile, feeble band of men who had so recently failed him so abysmally. It's to a weak, enfeebled church. that the Lord Jesus gives this commission. Let me notice five things with you, really very simply. Notice, first of all, it is a believing commission. Jesus says, go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Now, why do I call it a believing commission? Because when Jesus commands the apostles to disciple the nations in His great commission, He's claiming, He's claiming the promise of God that He finds embedded in the Old Testament Scriptures. Ask of me and I will make the nations your inheritance. He's clearly echoing the 2nd Psalm. Jesus is believing the Scriptures. He's believing the promise of the Father to His Messiah, whom He has set on Zion, His holy hill. Ask of Me, and I will make the nations your heritage. And the Lord Jesus Christ is exemplifying in Himself what it means to believe God. His whole life was lived in trustful, dependence on God and in believing dependence on God. He is the prototypical man of faith. His whole life is shaped and contoured and directed and styled by the Holy Scriptures. And from his own lips, he's saying, I am believing what my Father has promised to me. to give me the nations as my inheritance. He is the prototypical man of faith. And then secondly, notice it's an authoritative commission. He says, all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. All authority. And I've little doubt again that Jesus is echoing the Holy Scriptures. You'll probably know these verses in the book of Daniel, Daniel chapter 7. I think these verses run like a golden thread, actually, through the gospel narratives. Daniel says, I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven, there came one like a Son of Man. He came to the Ancient of Days and was presented to Him, and to Him was given dominion. and glory, and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and His kingdom is one that shall not be destroyed. To Him was given dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him." He has received authority and dominion from His Father as the reward of His obedience unto death. Now, understand what our Lord is saying here. As the Son of God, as God the Son, He always had all authority. Natively, by virtue of who He was, all authority always rested in Him. But here He is speaking about the mediatorial authority, the rewarded authority, the added authority and dominion that His obedience unto death merited. from the good hand of His heavenly Father. He is being here what Adam failed to be. When Adam was set in the garden by God, it's clear if you read the text of Genesis 2 and other passages It's clear that Adam was there in a probationary character. If he had obeyed God, if he had brought the garden, as it were, into dominion, he would have had all dominion. The garden was to be What would the word be? Apexegetical of the whole. The garden was to be programmatic of the cosmos. But Adam was not obedient. But here is God's better than Adam, the last Adam, the second man. And He is obedient unto death, and He now has all authority in heaven and on earth, entrusted to Him as the God-man, as the head of a new humanity. In Adam all die, in Christ all will be made alive. Jesus came into the world as the covenant head of a new humanity, and He was on probation He was placed in a wilderness, not in a garden, as if the Father was saying to Satan, do your hellish worst. My son, the better than Adam, will never fail me and never fail those whom I gave to him in times eternal in the covenant of redemption. And then thirdly, notice it's a universal commission. Go, he says, make disciples of all the nations. Now, we're going to have a little bit of grammar here. Now, this might leave some of you behind. That's fine, that's fine. Ask somebody later who knows maybe a little bit of grammar. Let me tell you what Jesus isn't saying here. He isn't saying, as you are going, make disciples. Now, if you know any grammar, and if you know any Greek grammar, you might be thinking, well, I don't think that's right, Ian. It's a participle here. And it is a participle. But here's the thing. It isn't a present participle. It's an aorist participle. Just bear with me. I know I'm Scottish, but bear with me. The accent will help you, just stick with me. Just stick with me. If it were a present participle, it would be, as you are going, as you go about your daily work as a butcher, baker, candlestick maker, preacher, pastor, evangelist, as you are going, make disciples. That's not what Jesus is saying. It's an aorist participle. And when aorist participles, just bear with me again, when they precede a particular form of a verb, they're a command. It's not as you were going, but go. Now, there are passages in the Scriptures which say, as you are going, as a teacher, as a pupil, as a student, as a homeschooling mum, as a restauranteur, as a beekeeper, whatever it may be, as you are going, bear witness to Me. That's true. That's a great truth. It's not the truth that Jesus is teaching here. He's saying to the church, go, send men and women to go into the ends of the earth. to the people groups of this world, to the ethnicities of this world. Send them. And that's why it's translated as an imperative. Because the point is that Christ is issuing a unilateral command to His church. Not just to go about faithfully day by day, wherever He has set them in this life, to bear witness to Him. He's saying, my church is a militant church. It's a missionary church. Go, send people out. I think one of the marks of a healthy church, a gospel church, is that it's a sending church. Are you sending people out? Are you praying that God will raise up people to go to the ethnicities of this world? You know there are over 3,000 languages that don't have one word of gospel truth in their language. Some of you know this far better than I. I was deeply moved recently. A friend of mine, I hadn't seen him for six years since I left Cambridge. He was a fellow pastor. He was in a large Baptist church, Eden Chapel. Very fine, conservative, 1689 Reformed Baptist church. Large congregation. We got on very well. I'd sometimes preach there. We'd have him preach here. He'd been there 25 years, 26 years. God had blessed his ministry and literally hundreds of students would have passed through that church over the years. And at the age of 58, he sends me an email and says, I just want you to know, Ian, that Debbie and I, his wife, Debbie and I are laying aside the work in Eden Chapel and we're going to Madagascar. because God has called me to go and to serve the cause of Jesus Christ in Madagascar. Now, you could hardly have a more privileged place to minister in the face of this world than Cambridge in England. I was there 17 years. It's perhaps the foremost university city in the world. You've got people of brilliance passing through your congregation who are going to rise to positions of eminence, and he says, I'm off to Madagascar. You know, I had to stop and ask myself, Ian, what have you ever done in your life for the kingdom of God? It's a universal commission. Joan and I pray most days for two girls we met a few years ago in the States. One's now in Chad. One's now in Southeast Asia. She can't tell us where she is. Two young girls in their early twenties who have decided and determined to bury their lives for the cause of the kingdom of God. They've been sent out by the church, trained and equipped and prepared. And not every time I pray for them, but often when we do pray for them, I think, where are the men? I'm not demeaning women, you know that. Where are the men? But then fourthly, notice it's an ecclesial commission. Let me explain that. He says, go and make disciples. Now there are mission agencies that focus on seeing people converted, and well, praise be to God for anyone who's converted. Jesus is not sending the church forth to make conversions, but to make disciples, to baptize them into the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the risen Christ who has all authority in heaven and earth, to whom the nations have been given as his inheritance. is looking for His church to go and plant gospel, faithful communities of believing men and women, boys and girls, who corporately and unitedly will call upon Him in an embodied, communal way. It's an ecclesial commission. You know, when you read the New Testament, I've just finished reading through Acts and the Mornings a week or two back. It struck me again how every time anyone is converted, any time, they're baptized immediately. We separate the reality from the sign, because we don't want people to think that the sign belongs to the reality. But in the Bible, the sign is conjoined to the reality. In fact, at times the sign is called the reality. Circumcision is sometimes called the covenant. It isn't the covenant. It's the sign of the covenant. But the sign is significant because we are baptized into the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, and into the community of faith. And Jesus is summoning the church, commanding the church to go and plant living communities of faith. Not content to see people confess Christ, but to see them brought together as the family of God. That's why those early chapters of Acts are so important, the 3,000 converted at Pentecost, baptized immediately. In fact, when they say, what must we do, Peter says, repent and be baptized, and be baptized. When I first went to Cambridge, I met three young students who said, we'd love to come to the Lord's table, Mr. Hamilton. I said, that's great. They'd been morning and evening at worship. They were coming to the prayer meeting. In the two or three weeks just after I arrived, I met with them. And I said, it's just wonderful that you want to come and share in the supper of our Lord. And I said to one, I said, When did you become a member of your local church? Oh, I'm not a member. Oh, oh, I said, you're not a member? Oh, he said, oh yeah, I'm a Christian. I love the Lord, I trust the Lord. But you're not, no, no, I'm not a member yet. I'm still thinking about it. I thought, you're still thinking about it? And the next boy, I said, are you a member? Well, no, I'm not a member, but I go to the Lord's table in my church. I said, you're not a member, you haven't confessed Christ. I said, well, England, what a crazy country this is. And then the third boy, I said, and what about you? Oh, he says, yes, he says, I'm a member, but I've not yet been baptized. I thought, this is crazy land. This is strange. I said, you've not been baptized? Oh, he says, I'm seriously thinking about it. I said, you're what? It's a command, it's not a suggestion. Do not steal, do not kill, do not commit adultery, be baptized. And in the early church, what were we told? They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. to the fellowship, the breaking of bread, and the prayers. You know, doing church isn't rocket science. It isn't rocket science. Devote your, and proskatereto, isn't that the verb? Isn't that the verb, proskatereto, if you know any Greek at all? It's a verb of force. They devoted themselves. It wasn't, well, oh, it's Sunday again. Well, yeah, maybe nice to go along to Covenant Presbyterian this morning. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. It was an ecclesial commission. And then, fifthly, it was a reassuring commission. And behold, I am with you to the end of the age. Now, that would later be enlarged upon Remember the beginning of Acts, wait in Jerusalem until the promise of the Spirit comes by the Holy Spirit, Christ would be with them. And behold, I love these beholds, I am with you. Now I'm a Presbyterian by conviction. Wasn't always, but I am. I believe in an educated ministry. I believe it's important to be enculturated as best as you can in order to communicate the gospel as meaningfully as you can. But you know, our greatest need isn't an educated ministry. Our greatest need is a new, fresh conviction that the Lord Jesus Christ, whom we serve and love, to Him all power and authority has been given. We need to become pneumatic men and women. We need to become more aware of the presence and power of God, the Holy Spirit. Now, don't misunderstand me. Yes, I believe. I'm the president of a small seminary. I believe in theological teaching and theological education. I've tried to do it all my life. But the great need of the church is to rediscover the presence and power of God, the Holy Spirit in our midst. You know, it was said, Benjamin Warfield said this, John Calvin, John Calvin wasn't really an original thinker. He was a phenomenal thinker, but he wasn't actually that original. But in one area he was. And Benjamin Warfield rightly said, Calvin's one significantly major contribution to the Reformation was his doctrine of the Holy Spirit. He said nothing new about election and predestination. Others had said it before him. Some said it better. But he understood this. We desperately need the internum testimonium spiritus sancti. We need the internal witness, presence, and power of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church, in its ministry, in its witness, in its testimony. God uses means, we know that. God ordinarily uses means to accomplish His ends. But our confidence is not in the means. Our confidence is the one who is at the right hand of the Father, to whom all authority in heaven and on earth has been given. Behold, I am with you always. That's a glorious promise, isn't it? I don't think I could get out of bed in the morning if I didn't believe that. You see, we need to rediscover how weak we are because it's when we are weak that we turn back to God. It's when we become proud of ourselves and our resources and our capacities that life goes on and church goes on and people come and we think all is well, and too late we discover the glory has departed. I am with you always. You see, ultimately, I'll just end with this, ultimately it's all about Jesus Christ. I am with you always. I don't know what you pray for this church, hope you pray for it, but I hope you pray this, come Lord Jesus, come. Fulfill your promise to be with us. Make your presence known to us. Make your presence felt by us. I'm a feeling Christian. I'm all for feelings. As long as those feelings are mediated through the head into the heart, we need to feel more, feel more our need. and feel more the presence and power. By my God, I can leap a wall." So, the Savior rose from the dead, never to die again. He's enthroned at the right hand of the Father. All authority in heaven and earth has been given to Him, and He will not lose one. Not one for whom He shed His precious blood, not one. Not one will be lost, not and one. He will see to it. But let's make sure as much as we are able, God helping us, to be the kind of men and women and boys and girls that the risen Lord can safely use, can safely use to gather in that great innumerable company of men and women from every tribe, tongue, people and nation that He bought with His own blood. May He do it to His praise. Amen.