The Presence of God – Matthew 28:16-20
The Presence of God – Matthew 28:16-20
By Pastor Lee Hemen
January 11, 2009 AM
The disciples had the presence of Jesus with them every day for a little over 3 years. They walked, slept, ate, argued, laughed, questioned, and discussed with Him everything in life concerning friends, family, enemies, politics, finances, and religion. We often wonder how in the world could they have been so dimwitted concerning who Jesus really was, but we forget that we enjoy the hindsight of the gospel narrative. They had the very presence of God with them daily and they did not understand its significance for their lives until after He was taken from them and had completed His mission. And, herein lies the truth of knowing the presence of God in our own lives as well.
After seeing so many miracles, partaking of so many discussions on hillsides; meals together in houses of the rich, famous, and insignificant; watching people’s sins forgiven; folks healed, restored and made whole or brought back to life -- it makes one wonder at being able to walk with Jesus daily. I know it does me. Yet here in these last remaining verses of Matthew’s gospel we discover the truth of just how we can also enjoy the presence of God in our lives. Jesus teaches His followers, and us, the truth of being able to have the presence of God. Let’s discover it anew today, shall we?
READ: Matthew 28:16-20
We all desire the presence of God in our lives but few of us truly enjoy it. Why is that? I believe we have forgotten or have not been taught how this is possible. It is more than following a set of guidelines, applying certain steps, or trying to bring back that Godly “feeling” in our lives. Here in Matthew we find that if we want to enjoy the presence of God, we have to…
I. Trust Jesus even when we doubt Him! (vv. 16-17)
1. Obedience to God doesn’t demand that we have a brain freeze! God desires that we use our brains to critically think. He does not desire Homer Simpson-like robots that are blindly in search of a spiritual doughnut. (Oh… doughnuts!) You know what I mean. The disciples were obedient in that they went to Galilee and they worshipped Jesus, yet some of them “doubted.” Why? It does not necessarily mean that they did not believe in Jesus, because they could see Him! In fact, they were more than willing, like I said, to worship Him! I believe they doubted because they were not exactly sure of who Jesus was and what this meant for them personally. Sound familiar? Like many of us, perhaps some of them wanted more “proof.” Seeing, was believing for them. But for those who want to discover the truth of the gospel, believing is always seeing. Many Christians today want “proof” from God before acting in faith. They want God to give them a “sign” or some sort of reason for them to invest their time or effort in Him. It does not work that way. This is profane. Jesus told the crowds that it was a “wicked generation” that “asks for a sign.” (Luke 11:29) Why? To ask for a personal proof from God so that you will begrudgingly give Him your faith is in fact trying to bargain with God! It is not faith. It is a sin. Faith is acting even when you do not see God in the circumstances. For the Christian “believing is seeing.” You “see” when you are willing to trust Jesus in every area of your life. The disciples had to trust the Lord even when they doubted. You want the presence of God? Trust Jesus even when you doubt Him!
EXAMPLE: Doubting God is nothing new. It began in the Garden of Eden when Satan got Eve to doubt God when he asked her, “Did God really say?” His implication was that God had not told Eve the entire truth of her situation or that God deliberately left out part of it for her to make her decision all on her own. God had abandoned her. Haddon Robinson writes that “We may not think we doubt God. But when events happen in our lives that make us question Him, that's exactly what we do. We seldom stop believing in Him, but we do stop believing in His goodness. And that is a faith-poisoning idea!” Here in Matthew’s gospel the final closing verses show us that if we want the presence of God in our lives, we must trust Jesus even when we doubt Him!
Remember, faith is acting even when you do not see God in the circumstances. For the Christian “believing is seeing.” The disciples had to trust the Lord that He was who He said He was. If we want to enjoy the presence of God, we also have to…
II. Remember who Jesus is! (v. 18)
1. Jesus is more than the original “answer man” for all our problems! How do you view Jesus? It is a simple yet profound question and your answer reveals a lot, not only about your spirituality, but your faith as well. Jesus asked this question of His disciples as they were walking along one day. It is that famous section where Jesus asks, “Who do the people say I am?” and His disciples respond with differing opinions and answers. Then He gets to the heart of the matter and asks them, “Who do you say I am?” (Matthew 16:15) Interesting isn’t it? Notice that to those who “doubted” Jesus, He reminds them of who He is: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” All authority, all power, and all truth. “All” means everything that is at God’s disposal is at Jesus’ as well because He is God in human flesh! He is the Messiah in every sense of its connotation. He created all things and nothing existed before He spoke it into being. (John 1:1-3) There is no other name given to men by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:12) None. Jesus is not another spiritual truth among many. He is the only way, and the only truth, and the only life, and no one comes to the Father without believing in Him as their Savior and Lord. (John 14:6) If you do not believe in Jesus as God’s one and only Son, you are condemned to an eternity in hell already because you have not believed in the One whom God sent. (John 3:18) You want the presence of God, remember who Jesus is.
EXAMPLE: There are a lot of folks who see Jesus as a ethereal kind of figure going about doing good who was simply misunderstood. Some see Him as a mystic who taught “deeper” truths that were misconstrued or deliberately edited by His followers who only wanted “their” specific teaching about Jesus to come out. Then there are those who simply do not care and only know “Jesus Christ” as a swear word or punctuation point in their sentences. However, there are also those who call themselves “Christian” who still do not fully understand who Jesus is. They have reduced and morphed Jesus into being an answer man for all their problems. Want financial freedom? Come to the ultimate financial planner Jesus. Want a better marriage? Come to the marriage counselor Jesus. Want to be a better parent? Come on to the family man Christ! Want to be socially accepted as a teenager and get rid of those acne problems forever? Put on the skin cream of Christ! Want to be a better spiritual warrior? Be all you can be in the Jesus Army! I was therefore not surprised when I found a televangelists proclaiming Jesus was better for sex than Viagra®! Ugh! Matthew reminds us that if you desire the presence of God, remember who Jesus is.
Many believers love to moan and groan about the state of the church, the world, or our society in general but few, very few, are willing to tell others about Jesus, grab a new convert, and then see them through until they are completely trained in the Lord. Few do it because it demands time, devotion, responsibility, and it is doggone hard work, but it is what we as disciples of Jesus are called to do! If we want to enjoy the presence of God, we have to…
III. Do what He has commanded us to do! (vv. 19-20)
1. Are you a spiritually lazy bum? This is kind of a difficult question for some of us to answer. Jesus had just reaffirmed for His listeners, and us as readers, that “all authority in heaven and earth” had been given to Him. We recognize this when we pledge our allegiance to Him as our Savior and Lord. It means we not only trust Him to eternally save us from our sin condition and prepare a place in heaven where He is, but that we accept Him as our sovereign liege. You cannot say you know Jesus, love Him, and want to live for Him without accepting His command to “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations.” Be careful with your quick excuses: “Too busy, not enough time, don’t know Scripture, not my thing, let the “hired” help do it, I’m too afraid, shy, or… well, lazy.” Let me ask you a question: When God asks you to do something, when should you do it? For hundreds of years the early church did exactly what God told them to do and it was only after they began to focus on other things that the laity allowed it occur. But God’s marching orders have not changed. When was the last time you told someone about Jesus? When was the last time you personally discipled someone in Christ? You want the presence of God? It is time for believers to get off their bums and “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything (Jesus has) commanded you.” (Matthew 28:19-20a) You want the presence of God in your life, do what He has commanded us to do!
EXAMPLE: I was taught to respect authority as a child. When my parents told me to come, I came, and when they told me to go and do something, I went and did it immediately. Well, usually… however, I knew that if I lollygagged around too much about whether to immediately follow my parent’s instruction, I would suffer the consequences of my lackadaisical attitude. We have forgotten as Christians that we have been given marching orders that are to be followed immediately. There are those that claim to be within the Christian faith that in fact disdain any notion of adhering their loyalty to the marching orders that are given in every Gospel and The Book of Acts that have been given to them! This is spiritually immoral and bankrupt and deserves eternal punishment. If we desire the presence of God in our lives then we must do what He has commanded us to do!
Conclusion:
If we want to enjoy the presence of God, we have to trust Jesus even when we doubt Him, we have to remember who Jesus is, and we have to do what He has commanded us to do.
----
This article is copyrighted © 2008 by Lee Hemen and if you reprint it, reproduce it, or want to use it in any way, you must do so in its entirety or get the written permission of its author.
By Pastor Lee Hemen
January 11, 2009 AM
The disciples had the presence of Jesus with them every day for a little over 3 years. They walked, slept, ate, argued, laughed, questioned, and discussed with Him everything in life concerning friends, family, enemies, politics, finances, and religion. We often wonder how in the world could they have been so dimwitted concerning who Jesus really was, but we forget that we enjoy the hindsight of the gospel narrative. They had the very presence of God with them daily and they did not understand its significance for their lives until after He was taken from them and had completed His mission. And, herein lies the truth of knowing the presence of God in our own lives as well.
After seeing so many miracles, partaking of so many discussions on hillsides; meals together in houses of the rich, famous, and insignificant; watching people’s sins forgiven; folks healed, restored and made whole or brought back to life -- it makes one wonder at being able to walk with Jesus daily. I know it does me. Yet here in these last remaining verses of Matthew’s gospel we discover the truth of just how we can also enjoy the presence of God in our lives. Jesus teaches His followers, and us, the truth of being able to have the presence of God. Let’s discover it anew today, shall we?
READ: Matthew 28:16-20
We all desire the presence of God in our lives but few of us truly enjoy it. Why is that? I believe we have forgotten or have not been taught how this is possible. It is more than following a set of guidelines, applying certain steps, or trying to bring back that Godly “feeling” in our lives. Here in Matthew we find that if we want to enjoy the presence of God, we have to…
I. Trust Jesus even when we doubt Him! (vv. 16-17)
1. Obedience to God doesn’t demand that we have a brain freeze! God desires that we use our brains to critically think. He does not desire Homer Simpson-like robots that are blindly in search of a spiritual doughnut. (Oh… doughnuts!) You know what I mean. The disciples were obedient in that they went to Galilee and they worshipped Jesus, yet some of them “doubted.” Why? It does not necessarily mean that they did not believe in Jesus, because they could see Him! In fact, they were more than willing, like I said, to worship Him! I believe they doubted because they were not exactly sure of who Jesus was and what this meant for them personally. Sound familiar? Like many of us, perhaps some of them wanted more “proof.” Seeing, was believing for them. But for those who want to discover the truth of the gospel, believing is always seeing. Many Christians today want “proof” from God before acting in faith. They want God to give them a “sign” or some sort of reason for them to invest their time or effort in Him. It does not work that way. This is profane. Jesus told the crowds that it was a “wicked generation” that “asks for a sign.” (Luke 11:29) Why? To ask for a personal proof from God so that you will begrudgingly give Him your faith is in fact trying to bargain with God! It is not faith. It is a sin. Faith is acting even when you do not see God in the circumstances. For the Christian “believing is seeing.” You “see” when you are willing to trust Jesus in every area of your life. The disciples had to trust the Lord even when they doubted. You want the presence of God? Trust Jesus even when you doubt Him!
EXAMPLE: Doubting God is nothing new. It began in the Garden of Eden when Satan got Eve to doubt God when he asked her, “Did God really say?” His implication was that God had not told Eve the entire truth of her situation or that God deliberately left out part of it for her to make her decision all on her own. God had abandoned her. Haddon Robinson writes that “We may not think we doubt God. But when events happen in our lives that make us question Him, that's exactly what we do. We seldom stop believing in Him, but we do stop believing in His goodness. And that is a faith-poisoning idea!” Here in Matthew’s gospel the final closing verses show us that if we want the presence of God in our lives, we must trust Jesus even when we doubt Him!
Remember, faith is acting even when you do not see God in the circumstances. For the Christian “believing is seeing.” The disciples had to trust the Lord that He was who He said He was. If we want to enjoy the presence of God, we also have to…
II. Remember who Jesus is! (v. 18)
1. Jesus is more than the original “answer man” for all our problems! How do you view Jesus? It is a simple yet profound question and your answer reveals a lot, not only about your spirituality, but your faith as well. Jesus asked this question of His disciples as they were walking along one day. It is that famous section where Jesus asks, “Who do the people say I am?” and His disciples respond with differing opinions and answers. Then He gets to the heart of the matter and asks them, “Who do you say I am?” (Matthew 16:15) Interesting isn’t it? Notice that to those who “doubted” Jesus, He reminds them of who He is: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” All authority, all power, and all truth. “All” means everything that is at God’s disposal is at Jesus’ as well because He is God in human flesh! He is the Messiah in every sense of its connotation. He created all things and nothing existed before He spoke it into being. (John 1:1-3) There is no other name given to men by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:12) None. Jesus is not another spiritual truth among many. He is the only way, and the only truth, and the only life, and no one comes to the Father without believing in Him as their Savior and Lord. (John 14:6) If you do not believe in Jesus as God’s one and only Son, you are condemned to an eternity in hell already because you have not believed in the One whom God sent. (John 3:18) You want the presence of God, remember who Jesus is.
EXAMPLE: There are a lot of folks who see Jesus as a ethereal kind of figure going about doing good who was simply misunderstood. Some see Him as a mystic who taught “deeper” truths that were misconstrued or deliberately edited by His followers who only wanted “their” specific teaching about Jesus to come out. Then there are those who simply do not care and only know “Jesus Christ” as a swear word or punctuation point in their sentences. However, there are also those who call themselves “Christian” who still do not fully understand who Jesus is. They have reduced and morphed Jesus into being an answer man for all their problems. Want financial freedom? Come to the ultimate financial planner Jesus. Want a better marriage? Come to the marriage counselor Jesus. Want to be a better parent? Come on to the family man Christ! Want to be socially accepted as a teenager and get rid of those acne problems forever? Put on the skin cream of Christ! Want to be a better spiritual warrior? Be all you can be in the Jesus Army! I was therefore not surprised when I found a televangelists proclaiming Jesus was better for sex than Viagra®! Ugh! Matthew reminds us that if you desire the presence of God, remember who Jesus is.
Many believers love to moan and groan about the state of the church, the world, or our society in general but few, very few, are willing to tell others about Jesus, grab a new convert, and then see them through until they are completely trained in the Lord. Few do it because it demands time, devotion, responsibility, and it is doggone hard work, but it is what we as disciples of Jesus are called to do! If we want to enjoy the presence of God, we have to…
III. Do what He has commanded us to do! (vv. 19-20)
1. Are you a spiritually lazy bum? This is kind of a difficult question for some of us to answer. Jesus had just reaffirmed for His listeners, and us as readers, that “all authority in heaven and earth” had been given to Him. We recognize this when we pledge our allegiance to Him as our Savior and Lord. It means we not only trust Him to eternally save us from our sin condition and prepare a place in heaven where He is, but that we accept Him as our sovereign liege. You cannot say you know Jesus, love Him, and want to live for Him without accepting His command to “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations.” Be careful with your quick excuses: “Too busy, not enough time, don’t know Scripture, not my thing, let the “hired” help do it, I’m too afraid, shy, or… well, lazy.” Let me ask you a question: When God asks you to do something, when should you do it? For hundreds of years the early church did exactly what God told them to do and it was only after they began to focus on other things that the laity allowed it occur. But God’s marching orders have not changed. When was the last time you told someone about Jesus? When was the last time you personally discipled someone in Christ? You want the presence of God? It is time for believers to get off their bums and “go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything (Jesus has) commanded you.” (Matthew 28:19-20a) You want the presence of God in your life, do what He has commanded us to do!
EXAMPLE: I was taught to respect authority as a child. When my parents told me to come, I came, and when they told me to go and do something, I went and did it immediately. Well, usually… however, I knew that if I lollygagged around too much about whether to immediately follow my parent’s instruction, I would suffer the consequences of my lackadaisical attitude. We have forgotten as Christians that we have been given marching orders that are to be followed immediately. There are those that claim to be within the Christian faith that in fact disdain any notion of adhering their loyalty to the marching orders that are given in every Gospel and The Book of Acts that have been given to them! This is spiritually immoral and bankrupt and deserves eternal punishment. If we desire the presence of God in our lives then we must do what He has commanded us to do!
Conclusion:
If we want to enjoy the presence of God, we have to trust Jesus even when we doubt Him, we have to remember who Jesus is, and we have to do what He has commanded us to do.
----
This article is copyrighted © 2008 by Lee Hemen and if you reprint it, reproduce it, or want to use it in any way, you must do so in its entirety or get the written permission of its author.
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