It was in my first year of university when God brought an older guy into
my life that began to meet with me regularly and I remember one day he came
in and, and we sat down we were talking he said, did you know that there were
five Great Commission verses in the New Testament? Four in the different Gospels
and one in the book of Acts? And of course I didn't know that, and so he so I
have a an illustration that I want to show you, and I call it the Archer
Illustration. And so he took out a piece of paper and you know he began to draw
this out, he first drew out a target and we turned in the Bible to Mark 16:15 and
we read there, where Jesus says, go into all the world and preach the gospel
it's good news to all creation, and so the emphases of that Great Commission
verse was, was the world or the target he had drawn a target on that illustration
and then he he drew a stick figure of an archer shooting a shooting an arrow
towards that target and he said well let's look at John 20:21 and we turned
to our Bibles there and we looked at where John records that Jesus said to
them as the father has sent me now I'm sending you and that Jesus was the was
the archer in this illustration, he's the one sending the arrow towards this
towards this target which was the world, and then from there he put a bow and a
and a you know a bowstring into the hand of of that archer and we turned in the
Bible to Acts chapter 1 verse 8, and in that in that Great Commission verse it
says, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you
shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends
of the earth, but in Acts 1:8 he began to explain how
how that verse represents the power source or the, the drawn bow as the arrow was to
be launched and that in that verse that the Holy Spirit is our power Jesus is
the sender, but it's the Holy Spirit that empowers us in order to be this, this
arrow that is launched towards the world. Then in his illustration he drew an
arrow with the tip, and kind of exaggerated the tip and then he said
well let's look at the next verse and we looked over at Luke 24:47 he says in
Luke 24:47, it says that repentance and forgiveness of sin will be preached in
my name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem, but the emphasis of that Great
Commission verse was the the content of the message, that it was repentance and
forgiveness of sin that was to be taken this message taken to the world and so
how that Great Commission verse represented the tip of the arrow, and so
he said turn in your Bible to Matthew 28, and we flipped the pages and in that
text in verse 19 and 20 we read, where Jesus said, go and make disciples of all
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy
Spirit, and teaching them to observe everything that I have commanded you.
And then he ends with, and surely I am with you always even to the end of the
age. And so the emphasis of Matthew 28 was on this this principle of, make
disciples. That was the the most effective means of the the shaft of this
arrow the means by which the the tip the message was to be taken to the world was
through this process of making disciples. And as we talked about that
I began to realize that's what he was doing with me, he was investing in me,
passing on to me the truth of this Great Commission, but he was actually discipling
me as we were talking about this command to go
and make disciples, and so this Great Commission of the archer shooting an
arrow towards a target and all of this to, to show in a picture that Jesus wants
to send us in the power of the Holy Spirit, taking a message of repentance
and forgiveness of sin to the world which is the target, but to do that
through making disciples, and you can do that, you can be a part of fulfilling the
Great Commission that Jesus gave.