Intro to Missions Course- Part 2

This is the audio from an introductory course on missions that a missionary friend and I taught at our home church. This second lesson talks about what the mission is. It focuses on the OT prophecies of what this NT mission will be. How does Jesus Christ direct us to fulfill this Great Mission given to the church? How can a missionary and a church know what to include and exclude in all that is called missions today?  (58 min.)

Lesson 2 Missiology: What is the Great Mission?

Click on the link above to listen. Below are the notes for the course:

An Introduction to Missiology

Lesson 2 – What is the mission?

Introduction. The purpose of this session is to:

1. Feel the individual and the corporate nature of Great Commission as given by Jesus Christ.

2. Understand that missions is not peripheral or optional to local church ministry.

3. Fix our eyes on the accomplishment of the mission: Making disciples of Christ everywhere. 

Definitions:

1. Missionary- A sent one.

2. Mission- What the missionary is sent to do.

3. Missions- The central objective of the local church to organize and support the accomplishment of the mission by the recruiting, equipping, sending, and sustaining of missionaries.

1. The OT foresees a decentralization of God’s plan of salvation for the nations: Sending.

*God sent his Word by the Prophets to Israel (Heb. 1:1). The nations could come to the temple in Jerusalem to learn of God. (1 Ki. 8:41-43, 59-60)

*God promised to send His Word made flesh (Heb. 1:2, John 1:14), the Light of the Nations (Is. 42:6, Luke 2:30-32), the perfect Testator (Is. 53) to bring the New Covenant (Jer. 31:31-34, Ez. 36:24-32)

What are the details of the New Covenant?

1. God’s Word would be written on our hearts

2. God would be their God and they would be their people

3. An inner knowledge of God

4. Total Forgiveness

5. An indwelling Spirit

*God explains how sending saved Jews will result in recruitment of saved Gentiles for his sending plan (Is. 66:19-21). The period between sending and gathering is where we now live.

NT Missions: All believers going everywhere telling everyone

2. Jesus Christ inaugurates the mission

*The indwelling of the Spirit and the sending of the witnesses is prophesied again (Acts 1:6-8)

*Jesus explains that as the Father has sent Him, so He sends his disciples (John 20:21-23)

How?

1. He indwells and empowers them (vs 22) The indwelling Spirit not in the temple but in us (John 4:21-24, Eph. 2:19-22, 1 Pet. 2:5). The temple becomes mobile.

2. Their preaching bring forgiveness of sin (vs. 23) (Rom. 10:13-15, Is. 52:7)

3. They must now carry their cross (Matt. 10:38, Mark 8:34-35, Col 1:24)

His suffering was for propitiation, our suffering is for proclamation.

*Jesus Christ was sent as a King, Prophet, and Priest

*We are sent to announce the gospel of the kingdom to all peoples (Matt. 4:17, Matt. 12:28, John 18:36, Matt. 24:14, Acts 1:6-8, Acts 15) making us strangers in the kingdoms of this world

The signs of the kingdom (Matt. 12:28, Luke 10:8-11)

The parables of the kingdom (The Sower, The Wheat and Tares, The Net, The Mustard Seed, The Yeast, The Hidden Treasure, The Pearl of Great Price Matt 13:18-46) show us process of the spread of the Gospel until the day of judgement.

The preaching of the kingdom (Acts 1:6, 14:22, 19:8, 20:25, 28:23, 28:31)

*We are sent as prophets to preach the Word of God that people may believe (Eph. 4:10-13)

*We are sent as priests to offer the faith of the gentiles as a sacrifice to God (Rom. 15:15-18, Phil. 2:17)

*The mission is carried on by gentile local churches (Acts 13-28)