The Worldly Church

For the past two hundred-plus years, the Western Church has been in the grips of a dualism that pits the material world against the non-material world (which they unadvisedly call “spiritual”). This is nothing new in the church. We have been fighting this for almost two millennia in one form or another. Material things are intrinsically evil and must be shed. The great salvation will come when I die and shed this mortal coil to live in a disembodied bliss in heaven. When Jesus comes again, he will destroy this mortal world, putting an end to its evil.

This dualistic view of reality affects the way we understand Jesus’ commission in Matthew 28:19-20. Whatever Jesus tells us, he is not telling us our mission has anything to do with this material world. Fighting culture wars with the gospel is like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic … or entering into a theological debate on social media: a waste of time. Jesus’ Commission is all about snatching souls out of the world so that they can leave this world behind along with us.

If this dualistic view of reality is correct, Jesus’ Commission is curious. Nations as nations are to be discipled. The structures and strictures of societies must be consciously committed to all Jesus commanded. Kings of the nations will bring their glory, the products of their dominion, into the church, the New Jerusalem (see Rev 21:9).

But then there is the issue of how we make disciples, “as we go,” we are to be “baptizing” and “teaching them to guard” all that Jesus commanded us to do. Baptism involves water, and water is a material substance. It is worldly. The church is to use water to make disciples.

There is also the issue that one of the commands Jesus gave us that we are to guard is the command to eat bread and drink wine as his memorial. Bread and wine are not dispensable substances, empty metaphors. They are worldly substances.

In water, bread, and wine, we see the nature of the mission Jesus gave us. The world is not being destroyed but transformed.

As has been commonly observed, though the first participle, “go,” is rightly understood as a command, there is also the connotation of “as you go.” As you go through your daily tasks. This is a way of life in which all your common duties are kingdom work.

Bread is one of the most fundamental elements of life. We must eat to live. Bread is fairly pedestrian when it comes to food. But it is bread that we have at the Lord’s Supper; it is not unprocessed grains. We have bread that has developed from someone planting seeds, cultivating fields, harvesting grain, crushing the grain, combining it with other ingredients, and then putting it in the “fire” to transform it. Bread is this world transformed through dominion. Jesus commands us to eat bread at his memorial meal, identifying his body with the bread. Jesus is pleased to say about the work of our hands, “This is my body.”

The same can be said of wine. We don’t eat the seeds of grapes. Rather, we drink the product of work that planted, pruned, harvested, crushed, and carefully fermented the juice of grapes. Wine is this world transformed by the Spirit’s work in and through us. And Jesus says, “This is my blood.”

At the Supper, we present ourselves and the transformed world to God. This is our mission.

Your most mundane tasks are kingdom work. Whether you sweep floors, change diapers, turn wrenches, or run a Fortune 500 company, you are doing kingdom work, fulfilling the Great Commission. Discipling the nations is more than this, but it is not less. We are to be proclaiming the gospel, calling people to repent and pledge their allegiance to Jesus as Lord. When they repent and believe, we then teach them to do all that the Lord commanded, and what the Lord commanded is for us to transform the world around us by the power of the Spirit whom he gives us.

Don’t be sucked by the guilt manipulators that what you do daily is some kind of second-tier Christian work that only finds its value in supporting the real mission, which is winning souls done by the professional kingdom workers. Jesus’ Commission is fulfilled in even our most mundane tasks. None of your labor is in vain in the Lord (1 Cor 15:58).