Host answers whether launching a Christian school fulfills the Great Commission, affirming it does by integrating biblical principles into all subjects like math and science under theonomy. This framework treats God's law as sufficient for civil ethics and societal spheres, moving beyond mere spiritual matters to disciple nations through every realm of life. Referencing Matthew 28:19-20 and figures like Paul and Spurgeon, the discussion argues that true discipleship requires teaching obedience to all commands, ultimately promoting a conference on these theological views while challenging listeners to support the ministry financially. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: CohereLabs/cohere-transcribe-03-2026, WAV2VEC2_ASR_BASE_960H, sat-12l-sm, script v26.04.01, and large-v3-turbo
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Discipling Nations Through Scripture00:10:52
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Here we go.
Super chat from the McGlone Code.
The McGlone Code.
I think that's how you say it.
Here we go.
Hi, Pastor.
Is carrying out the mission of the church part of the mission of the church?
Is carrying out the mission of the church part of the mission of the church?
This is like inception, right?
This is a dream within a dream.
Okay, here we go.
To clarify, ah, ah, read on, just read on.
Just Joe Biden, stick to the teleprompter.
Here we go.
To clarify, is the mission just or merely the orders?
Oh, no, he means just, righteous, right?
Is that what he's saying?
Is the mission just the, okay, simply, merely, is the mission merely the orders slash goals of the mission, or does it include that which we do to carry out the mission?
Here we go.
Example.
If I open a school, that's not what Jesus specifically said to do.
Yes, he did.
Yes, he did.
Now, this is a great question.
All right, I see what you're going to.
If I open a school, that's not what Jesus specifically said to do.
But in so much as it is in service to the mission, and the mission, the Great Commission, is it fair to call it a part of the mission?
Can something other than disciple and teach the faith be part of the mission?
Yes.
And the example that you gave is not something other than disciple and teach the faith.
So that's the only pushback I would give.
So, to answer your question, absolutely.
Absolutely.
Are there other things outside of making disciples and baptizing the nations that still can be put, placed accurately and faithfully under the large banner of the Great Commission?
Yes.
And I'd be hard pressed, though, to find an example.
Why?
Because the example you listen to, I could think of several others, actually are directly fulfilling the Great Commission because the Great Commission is not just make converts, which, of course, we all know is good.
Good reformers that only the Holy Spirit actually can do, right?
But you know what I mean.
Preaching the gospel, right?
Go.
So, all right, so let me just break down the Great Commission.
Let's start with that.
First, Jesus prefaces, right?
The prelude to the Great Commission.
Jesus says, I have all authority, but only in heaven because radical two kingdom theology is true.
No, I have all authority in heaven, but also on earth.
Jesus is reigning physically, he is seated at the right hand of his father, reigning from heaven.
He has rule and reign in heaven, but also rule and reign authority on earth.
And he's carrying that out.
His rule and authority, his sovereignty, is being carried out by chiefly, by all things, but chiefly the church.
Okay.
So that's the prelude.
Jesus has all authority.
So, and not just in heaven, not just spiritually, but tangibly here on earth.
So listen up.
And here's what he says Go and make disciples of all nations.
Disciple nations.
Make disciples of all nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
So into the name of the triune God.
And the part we always leave out.
Teaching them to obey all my commands.
There's your theonomy as a part of the Great Commission.
Teach them my law and teach them obedience to my law.
Now, the way that I usually, the way that it helps me, the framework that I use to think of the Great Commission is the Great Commission is really just one command, but I would say that it has four components, right?
Four steps if we're going to faithfully fulfill the one command.
The one command is disciple.
Disciple, more particularly, the nations.
Disciple, the nations.
Disciple, the nations.
That's the Great Commission.
Now, how do you do it?
Step one go.
So it's going to involve going.
Many people stay because they're discipling the nation that God has providentially placed them in to begin with, the nation they're born in.
But some will have to go.
And especially early on in church history, where there was an epicenter for the Christian faith, and eventually it started to move, right?
And we see that just in the book of Acts, just in one generation.
The epicenter for the Christian faith moves from Jerusalem in the life of Jesus, where he appointed the apostles and commissioned them and all these things, to Antioch.
And it begins to have a Gentile epicenter as the Jews harden their hearts and reject Christ as the Messiah.
Okay?
So, you know, the book of Acts, first 15 chapters, give or take, really follow Peter.
And then it begins to follow Paul, who is apostle to the Gentiles.
So there's a going, and especially early on, if we're thinking of Christendom as a long work in church history, there's a lot of going.
And I'm not saying that we shouldn't have still international missions today, but I don't think it should be the emphasis that it once was.
I think that there's so much work for the average Christian to do in their home native land, the nation that they're born into, that there's a lot right there.
But go, okay?
So big command disciple the nations.
How do you do it?
Four sub commands.
Go, baptize, and teach.
Go, baptize, and teach.
And I said four because I think implicitly in baptism is preaching the gospel because we're baptizing converts, baptizing people into the name, nations into the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, right?
And so that involves also preaching the gospel, right?
That there's conversion.
So there's going, there's preaching the gospel.
And the Holy Spirit in His sovereignty regenerating hearts with the preaching of the gospel, Romans 10 14.
The Spirit's working in conjunction with hearing.
Faith comes by hearing.
That's actually Hebrews.
Faith cometh by hearing, hearing the word of Christ.
Romans 10 14.
How will they believe unless they hear?
How will they hear unless someone preaches?
So, the big headline one commandment in the Great Commission disciple nations.
You do it by going, you do it by preaching, you do it by baptizing, you do it by teaching.
And I'm contrasting preaching, you know, the distinction between preaching and teaching, preaching, gospel preaching, evangelistic preaching.
Conversion, and then teaching law.
And primarily, I think law, because it's at the end, this is a reference primarily not to the first use of the law, which would be involved in gospel preaching.
You've got to preach the law of God so that people know that they're a sinner, so that they know that they actually have a need for Christ.
Charles Spurgeon said, A man cannot appreciate the beauty of Christ unless he first comes to see his need for Christ, the necessity for Christ, and what makes us realize the necessity of Christ.
Obviously, the regenerative work of the Holy Spirit, but in terms of preaching, Our faithful preaching that the Spirit works in conjunction with, that's preaching the law.
In preaching the law, we see God's holy standard.
By virtue of seeing his holy standard, we see the holiness of God himself.
And we also see, by contrast, by way of consequence, in seeing the holiness of God, we see our sinfulness, the gap, this infinite chasm between sinful man and a thrice holy God, and therefore the need for a substitute, atonement, forgiveness, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, Christ.
You cannot preach Christ.
In a way that is compelling apart from preaching the law in its first use.
And the first use of the law is that it's used to reveal the holiness of God, the sinfulness of man, and the need for the gospel.
All right, so disciple the nations.
That's one command of the Great Commission.
But you got to go.
You got to preach law and gospel, first use of the law and gospel.
And as the Holy Spirit gives faith, baptize.
You're going to baptize.
And then lastly, you're going to teach.
And teach them what?
Obedience to Christ's commandments, which is again law.
But here, I don't believe that it's a reference because this is teaching them the ones who have already been baptized.
So, this is teaching those converts the law of God, which means the law of God in its first use has already been preached, preaching God is holy, you are sinful, and then the gospel, first use of the law and the gospel, producing converts as the Spirit gives grace, and then baptizing them, and then teaching them the law again.
But now I think the implication is, by necessary inference, the third use of the law, which is for a distinctly Christian use, that for the Christian, the law of God serves not just.
Not just as an indicator for my need for salvation, but the law of God also serves as a guide.
Once I've already received salvation by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone, now as a response, not works based, meritorious based salvation, but receiving salvation by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone, now as a response of gratitude for that salvation, my response is God, if you've loved me in the beloved, in Christ like this freely, I can't help but love you back.
And God, how can I show you that I love you?
Jesus answers that question, obey my commands.
So then we're teaching Christians what Jesus' commands are so that they may walk in them.
That's the third use of the law, that the law is not just reveals our need for the gospel, but then for Christians, it is a lamp unto their feet, a light unto their path.
The law is a mirror.
It shows the holiness of God and reveals our own sinfulness and our need for Christ, but it's also a compass.
It directs the Christian, not in the path to salvation, but the path from salvation to salvation.
Obedience to Christ and further sanctification and making a difference, a real difference in the world.
If you're thinking, how do I love my neighbor?
Obey God's law.
God's law lends towards blessing.
Obedience to God's law is not just morally right, it's good and beneficial.
David delights in the law of God.
Paul says in Romans 7, he says, the law is not the problem, it's sin that's the problem.
Paul says explicitly, he says, the law is not only right and perfect, but the law is good and holy and right.
It is profitable.
It is beneficial.
So, when you have more people, not less, but more people obeying God's morally righteous, but also beneficial and profitable good law that lends towards human flourishing on the earth, if more people obey God's law, things are better.
And they're not just better for Christians, they're better for everyone.
Everyone benefits.
Unbelievers benefit by there being more Christians living in obedience to God's law.
So, the Great Commission is one commandment.
Disciple the nations, but there are four implicit steps or sub commandments all baked into the pie going, preaching the gospel, the first use of God's law that the spirit would use to make converts, baptizing, and then teaching the third use of the law, a lamp to our feet, how Christians should live in the world.
So, all that being said, go back to the question now.
Uh oh, same problem.
All right, he learned, he learned from the last time I did this.
Christian Math and God's Law00:05:57
Um, so all that being said, what do you do at school?
If I open a school, that's not what Jesus specifically said to do.
But in so much as it is in service to the mission, and I'm assuming here you mean capital T, capital M, the Great Commission, is it fair to call it part of the mission?
And the reason why I'm saying yes, absolutely, is because that is part of the mission.
Part of the mission is teaching, teaching them to obey all of Christ's commands.
And here's the deal Christ's commands, the law of God, has implications.
This goes back to our view of the sufficiency of Scripture.
There's a lot of people who believe in the inerrancy of Scripture, but not the sufficiency of Scripture.
And here's the follow up question you have to ask.
Even among those who believe in the sufficiency of Scripture, you have to ask the clarifying question sufficient for what?
Is the Scripture only sufficient for spiritual matters and salvation?
Or do we believe the scripture is sufficient for all of life and godliness?
And remember, if we do, that first word, life, all of life, that life is a very broad category.
Life involves finances, it involves economics, it involves markets, it involves beauty, the good, the true, and the beautiful.
It involves culture and arts, it involves medicine and welfare and health care.
And civil ethics and politics and governments and states and nations.
It involves all these things marriages and families and education, schools.
You bet you.
You bet you.
So, if we're called to teach people, if part of the Great Commission is to teach people to obey all of Christ's commandments, that's what school is.
If you think of school from a distinctly classical Christian category and an all of life for all of Christ category of what is Christian education, it is not.
Math, science, literature, and then a 45 minute Bible class at the end.
No, it's math, science, and literature, but all of it is Christian.
It's Christian math.
And you might say, there's no such thing as Christian math.
Yes, there is.
And you know how I know there's such a thing as Christian math?
Because there's such a thing as God hating math.
And in God hating math, non Christian math, two plus two can equal five.
And we just seen that in the last couple years.
So don't you dare tell me there's not such a thing as Christian math.
Of course there is.
There is only Christian math.
It's either Christ or chaos.
Not whether, but which.
And so when we're teaching people to obey Christ's commands, all we're doing is we're teaching the law of God and then teaching the law of God in reference to its application in each sphere of life.
All of Christ, we might say all of Christ's commands, but applied then to all of life.
All of Christ to every arena of life, every realm of life, the math realm of life, the literature realm of life, the science realm of life, the art realm of life.
So a Christian school starting a distinctly Christian school.
Is part of the Great Commission because part of the Great Commission, making disciples, you can't make disciples without going to people.
And you can't make disciples without preaching the gospel and the first use of the law that makes the gospel relevant, shows them they need the gospel.
And you can't make disciples without then baptizing these Christians who have been born again by grace and the hearing of the gospel and the work of the Spirit.
And you also can't make disciples without then taking these baptized converts and teaching them obedience to all Christ's commands.
And teaching them obedience to all Christ's commands means.
The implications and applications of all of Christ's commands in every single realm of life.
All of Christ's commands applied to every realm of life.
That's what Christian math is.
Christian math is theonomy.
Christian science is theonomy.
Christian literature is theonomy.
And theonomy is the teaching of the third use of God's law, Christ's commandments, which is baked into the Great Commission and explicitly stated in the Great Commission.
So I would say that starting a Christian school.
Is not only does it work towards the end of the Great Commission, it's explicitly listed by Christ in the Great Commission teaching people to obey all my commandments.
That means teaching people to obey all my commandments, and we know he's referring to the third use of the law here.
We know that because he's talking about what to do with the people who have now been baptized.
It's progressive, the steps that he's giving go, implicitly, then preach the gospel, and then explicitly baptize, and then explicitly again teach.
them to obey my commandments as a response to the salvation they've already freely received by virtue of the fact that they've been baptized.
So teach them to obey my commandments, third use of the law, not as a mirror revealing the need, our sin and the need for a Savior, but as a compass, a guide, a lamp unto our feet, light unto our path.
And we're not just teaching them to obey Christ's commandments in the third use of the law, the way in which we should walk, but we're also teaching all of Christ's commandments, which I believe necessary inference by way of implication, all of Christ's commandments also carries with it and All the applications of all of Christ's commandments.
So, all of his commandments, not some of his commandments, but all of his commandments, and I think that that implies applied to all of life.
So, not some of Christ's commandments for some arenas of life.
It's not just some of Christ's commandments in just some areas of life, like marriage and parenting.
No, all of Christ's commandments in all of its applications and implications, which would be every realm of life, which means Christian math.
These are Christ's commandments, the law of God.
The truth of the whole Council of Scripture and how it informs arithmetic, how it informs trigonometry and quantum physics and everything else.
This is how it works.
This is how it works.
And science and literature and art and the whole nine yards.
The Rise of Postmillennialism00:02:51
So, to answer your question, a resounding yes.
A resounding yes.
This is included in the Great Commission.
And not just because it's a permissible means of bringing about the Great Commission, but because it's explicitly stated by Jesus as the Great Commission.
All right, all right, all right.
Stop twisting my arm.
I know you want to hear the inside scoop.
Here it is the glorious vision of Right Response Ministries for the first half of next year, 2023.
We have not one, not two, but three massive endeavors that we will accomplish by the grace of God.
The first you already know about is our Theonomy and Post Millennialism Conference.
This is selling out incredibly fast.
By the time this commercial airs, you may not even be able to get a ticket.
I really don't know.
So don't waste another moment.
Go to rightresponseconference.com.
RightResponseConference.com to join us for the Theonomy and Post Millennialism Conference next year.
Now, this is where you come in.
We need your help.
Our next two endeavors are number one, a documentary style film, and number two, a brand new studio.
Both of these things are seeking to accomplish one primary goal, which is excellent, high quality, glorious Christian media.
We are tired of, as Christians, doing things poorly.
We've done our best with what we have, but by God's grace, we want to do even better.
This is not going to be just another video.
This is not going to be a sermon or an interview or a podcast, but we're going to make a documentary style film.
And we're going to be hiring Nathan Anderson, the director of On Earth as It Is in Heaven, a very, very successful post millennialism documentary that's on Amazon and YouTube, came out a couple years ago.
He's going to be flying in from Chile to help us direct this film.
And our documentary is going to be on postmillennialism and theonomy why it's biblically valid, why it's absolutely necessary, and why, by the grace of God, theonomy and postmillennialism are currently on the rise.
So, we're going to make this film, and we need your support.
And not just this film, but we're going to make all of our videos and podcasting and everything we do here at Right Response Ministries better.
We want to achieve the highest level of quality.
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That's where the new studio comes in.
This new film, our date that we're shooting for is that it would be complete and publicly available in May or June of 2023, next year.
The studio, our goal is that it would be completely done in its construction and the equipment and the setup and the stage and everything by January, February of 2023, next year.
Building Excellence With Your Support00:00:39
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