April 9: The Great Commission: A Call to Spread the Gospel
♫ Music:
Mark 16:14-16 (NKJV)
Later He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table; and He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen. And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.
Poetry:
“Baptism”
by Sarah Crowley Chestnut
I watch my father lean hard across the ski boat’s wake, slow
beyond the furrow, absorb the rope’s slack, pause, then
torpedo back toward the low sun and the western bank.
At last I see what this mingling of water, oil, throttle means.
Engine bawling, he skims across the spray.
Once, so young I didn’t think to be afraid, he and Mom roused me
before dawn to feel the tug: The water will be like glass!
Your feet go on my feet; hang on between my hands—
take a deep breath and hold it till we’re up . . .
Now I watch him throw the rope, toss arms to sky—
V of a victory cry. Silhouetted and sinking like a seed,
the water drinks him down. We circle back and there he is—
buoyed up and newborn, glistening like a grin.
The Great Commission: All Are Called to Preach the Gospel
My grandfather on my mother’s side came to Christ in a church service in Bakersfield, California, led by pastor C. M. Ward. By all accounts, my grandfather was a completely different man after he accepted Christ as Savior. His sins were many and they were the sort of sins that those who knew the former man could not reconcile with the reborn man. He was truly made anew by Christ’s gracious love.
What I knew of my grandfather as a small boy was that he could make silver dollars magically appear out of my ears when I visited my grandparents’ home, and that he was the janitor who cleaned our church. Many a Sunday night I saw him cleaning the pews, collecting the trash, and doing all the work around the church buildings that no one ever seemed to appreciate or say thank you for doing.
My grandfather also had a heart for men like himself who did not have the advantage of wealth or education and whose lives were defined by a series of poor choices and even failures. Every week he went to the Bakersfield Rescue Mission to preach to the homeless and those down on their luck, and he would also go to the county jail to preach the Gospel to men whose actions condemned them to time behind bars.
My grandfather had compassion for these men. He presented them with the only solution he knew from his personal experience for turning their life around, salvation through Jesus Christ.
In Mark 16:14-16 Jesus rebuked the disciples for not believing those who testified to his being risen, and he commanded the disciples to go to the whole world and “preach the gospel to every creature” and baptize those who believe. Wayne Forte’s painting “Go, Teach and Baptize,” illuminates in oil what Jesus commanded and what the world so desperately needs—the Gospel, the Holy Spirit, and the baptismal waters.
Curiously, Jesus didn’t say only some of you go, only some of you preach, only some of you do my work as professionals while others go about their lives as spectators or supporters of those who are paid to preach.
There are no exclusions, no passes, no opt-outs for any Christian.
Jesus’ command was simple and direct.
Everyone is to preach the good news that the Savior has come, has died, and has redeemed each and every one of us from the consequences of our sin if we only believe.
Jesus didn’t flinch about what would happen to those who reject Him. Jesus went on to say that anyone “who does not believe will be condemned.”
My grandfather knew the difference between the condemned life and the reborn life that Jesus offers. Knowing the reality of that difference motivated him to walk into the mission and the county jail to share Christ’s hope with those who knew hopelessness, addiction, bitterness, hate, crime, and violence.
Just like my grandfather who was a humble janitor condemned by a past that only Christ could use for His glory, we are all preachers and missionaries of the Gospel.
In a world that seeks the good life through possessions and the fulfillment of other earthly desires, Christ points us toward the only reality that will matter in the end—whether we have accepted Him as our Savior and whether we have made Him known to those who do not know Him.
Prayer
Father, you sent your Son, Jesus, to die brutally on the cruel instrument used to carry out a Roman death sentence, the Cross. He rose from the dead and told His disciples to preach the good news that he lives, that he has conquered sin and death, and that there is eternal life if we only believe in Him as our Lord and Savior. May your Holy Spirit enable us to be used by you to proclaim to a confused, rebellious, Messiah-denying world that Jesus saves. Send us as your missionaries and your preachers to those who have never heard that you love them. Through our lives and words let us share the joy of redemption as people who know the reality of the way, the truth, and the life through Jesus Christ. Amen.
Dr. Darin D. Lenz, FRHistS, FSA Scot.
Chair of the Department of History
Professor of History
Biola University
For more information about the artwork, music, and poetry selected for this day, we have provided resources under the “About” tab located next to the “Devotional” tab near the top of the page.
About the Artwork
Go, Teach and Baptize
Wayne Forte
2005
Oil on canvas
60 x 60 in.
Used with permission from the artist
Christ’s command to His disciples to spread the gospel by preaching, teaching, and baptizing in all nations of the world has become known as the Great Commission. The command in the Great Commission to “make disciples” means to teach and train people to follow and obey Christ. To fulfill this mandate, we are to be Christ’s ambassadors by acting as representatives for Him on earth, carrying the message of redemption made possible through Him. This role involves speaking and acting on behalf of Christ, embodying His love, grace, and truth, and reflecting the dignity and power of God's kingdom. In artist Wayne Forte’s painting Go, Teach and Baptize, those mandates of the Great Commission are clearly illustrated by the elements in the painting—the open Bible, the Holy Spirit as a triumphant dove, and the baptizing water being poured over the world. The menorah in the background represents the light of the gospel in a dark and fallen world—not the Edenic world that God had intended, but the present world that Christ came to redeem.
About the Artist
Wayne Forte (b. 1950) was born in Manila, Philippines, in 1950, married in Brazil in 1981, and studied at the University of California at Santa Barbara and Irvine (B.A. 1973; M.F.A. 1976). Wayne lives with his wife and four children in Laguna Niguel, CA, and attends Coast Hills Community Church in Aliso Viejo, California. He has been a member of CIVA (Christians in the Visual Arts) for fifteen years and participated in the Florence Portfolio Project in 1993. He has also taught courses at Biola University and Gordon College, Orvieto Campus, Italy. Wayne was educated to paint in the self-referential modernist tradition but longed for that passion of an earlier age, a passion for the spiritual and the transcendent found in the biblical narrative paintings of Gruenwald, Rubens, Rembrandt, and Caravaggio. His goal is to create paintings with powerful messages about faith that can resonate with contemporary viewers. From an early age, Forte saw art-making as a religious activity. He remembers attending Mass in old Spanish mission churches when he was a child and creating decorative, small-scale altars, hidden away in his bedroom closet. A conversion experience on the island of Hawaii led Forte to look at art once again in sacred terms, this time as a tool for evangelizing the world. Forte saw his true calling was to bring art back into the church after centuries of neglect and sometimes open hostility to religious imagery. Forte found a community of like-minded art-makers in Christians in the Visual Arts (CIVA) and joined an arts ministry in a nondenominational church near his home in Southern California. After nearly four decades of what he terms “persistence and humility,” he remains true to his mission.
About the Music
“Go into All the World”
Go into all the world
And declare Good News
To all creation!
Go into all the world
Make disciples from
Every nation!
All authority
Has been placed in Me
Over all the heavens
Over all the earth
Go and teach them all
True obedience
To each living word
That I've shared with you singing...
Go into all the world
And declare Good News
To all creation!
Go into all the world
Make disciples from
Every nation!
And I will be with you
I will be with you
For ever more
For ever more singing
Go into all the world
And declare Good News
To all creation!
Go into all the world
Make disciples from
Every nation!
All authority
Has been placed in Me
Over all the heavens
Over all the earth
Go and teach them all
True obedience
To each living word
That I've shared with you. Singing…
Go into all the world
And declare Good News
To all creation!
Go into all the world
Make disciples from
Every nation! Singing…
Go into all the world
And declare Good News
To all creation!
Go into all the world
Make disciples from
Every nation!
And I will be with you
I will be with you
For ever more
For ever more
About the Composer
KDMusic is a collaboration between singer-songwriter Dave Whitcroft and his musician friends from North Ireland. Between them, they've served in the UK, Europe, North America, Southern Africa, and Southeast Asia. Whitcroft is a songwriter and guitarist whose musical journey is inseparable from the Christian faith that has pursued and captivated him since his teens. He is quoted as saying, "Like many of you, I understand how music and worship are a lifeline in hard times. My parents both had brain injuries from a road traffic accident when I was fifteen. I was responsible for their care for the next 30 yrs. So I have a real soft spot for kids who have to grow up quickly and care for their parents….So, I love writing songs about how God shares our tears as well as our joy. With God as our Father, even when it's really tough, joy is the new 'backdrop' for life's adventures.” Since then, he has looked after children's, youth, and worship ministries in his local church in Belfast, Ireland.
About the Performers
Johan Glidden and the Secret Choir
Johan Glidden is a prolific singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist working in Nashville, Tennessee. Since 2020, he has released twenty-six songs, including in the collections Unprepared, his debut full-length album, and Some Kind of Peace on Earth, a collection of original Christmas music. As a self-produced recording artist, he's enjoyed the adventure of releasing music in multiple genres, including the folk lament “On Rocky Ground,” and the all-out worship anthem “Still Small Voice.” Johan seeks to keep himself (and his listeners) entertained musically while sharing his honest journey through daily life as a Christian in the twenty-first century. His lyrics often explore questions about friendship, personal doubt, church hypocrisy, recovery, and nostalgia.
About the Poetry and Poet
Originally from California, Sarah Crowley Chestnut lives and works at L’Abri Fellowship in Southborough, Massachusetts, with her husband and two children. Sarah’s poetry has appeared in Crab Orchard Review, Every Moment Holy Vol. III, The Anglican Theological Review, CRUX: A Quarterly of Christian Thought and Opinion, Ekstasis, and elsewhere. Sarah has a Master of Arts in Theological Studies from Regent College and was the 2009 recipient of the Luci Shaw Prize for Creative Writing.
About the Devotion Writer
Darin D. Lenz, Ph.D., FRHistS, FSA Scot, is Professor of History and Chair of the History Department at Biola University.