Missions:overcoming barriers

to the fulfillment of

the Great

Commission

2.005, David Rogers

The Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20)

Jesus came to them and said: I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth!

Go to the people of all nations and make them my disciples. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

And teach them to do everything I have told you. I will be with you always, even until the end of the world.

In order to make disciples of the people of all nations...

…it is necessary to overcome 7 barriers.

Barrier #1

The

geographicbarrier

“Go to the people...”

You must go where the people are.

“Then you will tell everyone about me in Jerusalem, in all Judea, in Samaria, and everywhere in the world.”

Acts 1.8

“The Lord’s followers who had been scattered went from place to place, telling the good news.”

Acts 8.4

Some will have to intentionally go from places where there is a relatively high percent of believers to places where there is a relatively low percent of believers.

Missionary = Apostle = Sent One

“While they were worshiping the Lord and going without eating, the Holy Spirit told them, ‘Appoint Barnabas and Saul to do the work for which I have chosen them.’ Everyone prayed and went without eating for a while longer. Next, they placed their hands on Barnabas and Saul to show that they had been appointed to do the work. Then everyone sent them on their way.”

Acts 13.2-3

Barrier #2

The

languagebarrier

“In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe.”

Hebrews 1.1-2

“each one heard them speaking in his own language.”

Acts 2.6

“As the soldiers were about to take Paul into the barracks, he asked the commander, ‘May I say something to you?’

‘Do you speak Greek?’ he replied.”

Acts 21.37

“Brothers and fathers, listen now to my defense. When they heard him speak to them in Aramaic, they became very quiet.”

Acts 22.1-2

Barrier #3

The

culturalbarrier

“Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God's law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some.”

1 Corinthians 9.19-22

Normally, those who come from the same cultural context as those who are going to receive the message will be more effective at communicating the message in a culturally relevant manner than those who come from another cultural context.

However, there are situations in which there are not yet enough evangelists and disciplers from the local cultural context to effectively reach everyone.

In these situations, the most effective evangelists and disciplers (even though they come from outside of the cultural context) will usually be those who best adapt to the cultural context.

In any case, in order to reach a greater effectiveness in the communication of the gospel, it is necessary to always transfer the main responsibility of communicating the gospel to those who come from the same cultural context as much as possible, and as soon as possible.

Barrier #4

The

socialbarrier

You must win the trust of the people.

Trust is won by way of 4 main things...

1. Friendship

2. Good works

3. A life testimony consistent with your spoken testimony

4. The communion of the church

Friendship...

“People don’t care how much you know,

until they know how much you care.”

Good works…

“For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake.”

2 Corinthians 4.5

Life testimony…

“Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.”

2 Corinthians 4.2

The communion of the church…

“…that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”

John 17.21

“We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ… But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another.”

1 John 1.3, 7

Barrier #5

The

spiritualbarrier

Indifference

Hard hearts

Spiritual blindness

Spiritual strongholds

Spiritual Problems

Spiritual solutions

Prayer

Fasting

Spiritual warfare

Signs and wonders

The power of the Word

“And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”

2 Corinthians 4.3-4

“…I will rescue you from your own people and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.”

Acts 26.17-18

“The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”

2 Corinthians 10.4-5

“Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”

Acts 4:29-30

“But if an unbeliever or someone who does not understand comes in while everybody is prophesying, he will be convinced by all that he is a sinner and will be judged by all, and the secrets of his heart will be laid bare. So he will fall down and worship God, exclaiming, ‘God is really among you!’”

1 Corinthians 14.24-25

“But this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”

Matthew 17.21

Barrier #6

The

communicationbarrier

You must communicate the message of the gospel.

“God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.”

1 Corinthians 1.21

“How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?”

Romans 10.14

You must communicate the message in a way that is understandable.

“But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”

Matthew 13.23

You must communicate clearly...The message of reconciliation

more so than how to get to heaven, the gospel is about how to mend our broken relationship with our Heavenly Father

The message of gracea “gospel” that leaves room for trusting in good works is not an authentic gospel

The message of repentancethe prerequisite for receiving the gift of grace is a sincerely repentant heart

According to the Great Commission, the work of making disciples is made up not only of “baptizing them in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” but also of “teaching them to obey everything that Jesus has commanded us.”

“If we ever have to choose between how much Bible is understood or how much Bible is obeyed, my prejudice is in favor of obeyed truth.”

Carl George, The Coming Church Revolution

This task of “post-conversion discipleship” normally is best carried out in the context of a local church, with a personalized methodology, either one-on-one or in small groups.

If we are able to overcome these first 6 barriers, almost certainly, we will have at least made some disciples.

But...

…the Great Commission will still not have been fulfilled.

In order to do this, there is one more barrier that must be overcome...

Barrier #7

The

logisticbarrier

We must have a strategy of

multiplication.

Multiplying disciples,

multiplying disciple-makers.

“But he said, ‘I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent.’”

Luke 4.43

“This went on for two years, so that all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord.”

Acts 19.10

Multiplication models...

Cell churches the “G-12” model the “5 x 5” model

“Simple” churches or house churches

“Pioneer Evangelism”

The key...

Training, mobilizing, and

multiplying evangelists, disciplers,

and “lay” leaders

“The main limiting factor in the part of the harvest that corresponds to the church, is, very probably, the lack of trained leaders.”

Carl George, The Coming Church Revolution

“Learn to develop cell-group leaders. That is the most important single thing that you need to do as a leader of a church.”

Carl George, The Coming Church Revolution

“No church can reach everyone on its own. Therefore, it will be necessary to multiply the amount of available units to serve a greater quantity of demographic segments and different communities within a general population.”

Carl George, The Coming Church Revolution

“The secret of the expansion of the Christian movement is the mobilization of more workers. The key is not just new churches, but also new units. It is a model based on harvesters. The more units there are, the more harvesters there will be who can be effective. The best way, then, of preparing for a greater harvest is training more leaders who will be able to care for people.”

Carl George, The Coming Church Revolution

There will never be enough “pastors,” “missionaries,” or “full-time workers” to reach all the people that need to be evangelized and discipled.

Also, many times, the most effective evangelists and disciplers are those who work side by side with non-believers and have more natural opportunities to win their trust.

However, it is not sufficient to train “lay people” to evangelize and disciple, without giving them specific structures to put into practice the training they receive.

The problem with many missionary models...

They focus on overcoming one or some of the barriers to the fulfillment of the Great Commission to the exclusion or near exclusion of the rest.

For example...

“Good works” ministries that do not emphasize the need to verbally communicate the gospel

“Evangelistic” ministries that do not emphasize the need to win the trust of the people by way of “good works”

Ministries that underestimate the importance of prayer and spiritual warfare

To pray without evangelizing

It doesn’t make much sense...

But neither does it make sense...

To evangelize without praying

Many times we cannot make any significant progress towards the goal of making disciples among all the nations as long as there are still some of these barriers left to overcome.

At times, some barriers must be overcome in a certain order.

For example...

It doesn’t make much sense to try to win someone’s friendship, if you don’t speak their language.

Neither does it make much sense to try to communicate the gospel with someone who doesn’t trust you as a person.

In some places and contexts, overcoming some of these barriers will take on a higher priority at a given time than overcoming others.

For example...

In a postmodern context, overcoming the trust barrier will be a very important priority.

In a so-called “harvest field” context, giving immediate attention to the communication of the gospel will take higher priority.

Although efforts to overcome each and every one of the 7 barriers are important and have their place, it can sometimes be a bad stewardship of resources, and even counterproductive, to work too much on certain barriers outside of their proper order.

This is one of the main problems, for example, with many short-term projects. They focus on overcoming only one of the barriers independently of a broader strategy for addressing all of the barriers in their appropriate time and order.

In one way or another, the job of the missionary strategist is to analyze the situation at hand in order to determine what are the main barriers that are standing in the way of the fulfillment of the Great Commission in a given context and time, and propose adequate strategies for overcoming those particular barriers.