Go Ye Means ME!

Matt. 28:19-20

I’ll never forget the old missionary leader at that mission’s conference for collegians in the late 1960’s. Well, at least he seemed old to me, a 20 year old junior in college. He spoke with a strong Texas accent. When he started explaining Matthew 28:19 and 20 to us, he said, “Now y’all know whut that means? That word ‘Go Ye’ is the same word the farmer’s wife uses when she sends her husband down to the barn to fetch some eggs, and she says ‘bein’ how’s yer goin’ take along a bucket and fetch some water as well.’ ”

“In other words,” he continued, “while you’re a goin’ you should be making disciples, teachin’, baptizin’. You shouldn’t wait ‘til you git to the mission field, but start right now wherever you are. Going to a foreign country doesn’t make you a missionary. Being a maker of disciples does.”

I went away from that conference with a new zeal and vision. I was already trying to be a “missionary” on my campus but had never thought about it as such. Before silk screened T-shirts came in vogue I took a magic marker and drew a globe on my sweatshirt I used to jog in every morning, and wrote “GO YE” above the globe, and “MEANS ME” below it.

Jesus gave his great commission to his disciples. But there was a mechanism for duplication and multiplication built into this “commission” – so that the command given to the 12 disciples is equally valid to His whole church today. “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen. Obviously, by teaching others to obey this command it should be self replicating until the end of the age.

If every one of we who are so-called Evangelical Christians would simply obey that command just once every five years, we could reach the entire world for Jesus Christ in one generation. However, the truth is that staggering few take up Jesus’ challenge and commandment. My hope and desire for this book is to incite a revolution, especially in today’s complacent generation. I would like to help light a fire in people’s hearts that would help bring about the harvest we have so eagerly been longing for. If just one person reading this book catches that vision, then my purpose will have been fulfilled - for one person, if he is the right person, can multiply to millions.