Chapter 1: The Mandate of the Church

As Jesus spoke to His disciples in Acts 1: 4 - 8, He was fully aware of the fact that, within that hour, He would no longer be with them on earth. The disciples had already faced the discouragement of the events leading up to the crucifixion. Now He was about to leave them again. He did not want to leave them without direction or purpose. Peter had already aimlessly returned to his fishing nets (John 21). Jesus knew that there was no time to waste - He needed to infuse them with a sense of purpose. He needed to tell them the essentials for existing in the future. He must also impart to them a vision for bringing God's Kingdom on earth.

So what did He tell them?

Firstly, let's look at what He did NOT say!

• He did NOT say: "Guys, I am leaving, so you had better take care of one another."
• He did NOT say: "Love one another, pray for one another, give to one another, etc."
• (In actual fact, He mentions none of the thirty-four "one another" principles that are recorded in the New Testament.)

Although all "one another" principles are important, and a necessary part of the life and being of the church, only doing those will never make Jesus' enemies His footstool.

A careful analysis of the situation in the western church, and a number of Third World churches would soon reveal that most of our time is spent on establishing the "one another" principles in the church.

The church often becomes so introverted that all it can see is:

• Sunday services
• prayer meetings
• cell meetings
• youth groups
• crusades
• new staff etc.

If the above is true then it means that the church sincerely has to rethink its position, and look again at what Jesus actually told His disciples.

Now, what did He say?

1. The strategist of the Church is the Holy Spirit!

Acts 1: 4, 5: "….stay in Jerusalem and wait for the Promise of the Father…. You shall be baptised with the Holy Spirit not many days from now."

The scriptures say the Holy Spirit will lead believers into all truth! It is important to see the role of the Holy Spirit, not just as a member of the Trinity, but also as the Strategist who would mark out the route and set out the parameters for the function of the church. In other words, the Holy Spirit desires to lead the Church into fulfilling God's purposes on earth.

As Divine Strategist, the Holy Spirit marks out the route, and sets the parameters for the function of the church.

Many churches have failed to impact the world, because the Holy Spirit is not given the position of Strategist. It is almost impossible for a church to have an effective missions strategy unless it is under the direction of the Holy Spirit.

A church that is not vitally involved in missions must consider whether it is really under the control of the Holy Spirit.

2. The church must affect everything around it.

Acts 1:8 states: Jesus says to His disciples: "You will receive dunamis (English translation 'dynamite'), after that the Holy Spirit has come upon you."

When dynamite is set off, it affects everything around it. It is not passive. Therefore, when the Holy Spirit is allowed to come upon the church of the Lord Jesus, He will affect everything around it.

You see, in order for the church to advance and cause Jesus' enemies to become His footstool, all believers must be witnesses. As believers walk into the cities, countries, places of work, etc. they must allow the dynamite to explode and influence all those around them.

3. He never said it would be easy.

How should we affect the world around us?

Acts 1:8b states: "You will be my witnesses ('martereo' or martyrs)."

In saying to His disciples that they would be His martyrs, Jesus was saying in no uncertain terms that IT WOULD NOT BE EASY! He was intimating that there would be casualties among the disciples. THERE WAS A PRICE TO PAY for being a witness!

The latest statistics are that 324 000 were martyred for the sake of the Gospel around the world in 1990.

The mission-minded church must determine to pay the price to reach the lost with the Gospel.

4. He gave us the four-fold scope of the mandate.

Jesus tells His disciples the scope of their task:

Acts 1:8(b): " You will be my witnesses both in (en te - Greek) Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and to the ends of the earth."

This then could be geographically defined as follows:

Definition:

• Jerusalem - your city, town or village
• Judea - your country
• Samaria - your continent
• Ends of the earth - the rest of the world

The key, however, is to recognise that Jesus tells them to be witnesses in all four areas simultaneously.

Jesus said that they would be His witnesses both in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the ends of the earth.

His Word does not say, as is so often heard from pulpits, that Jerusalem must first be reached. If the goal were to first reach Jerusalem, the mandate of reaching the world would hopelessly fail, and the Church would face certain extinction.

A lack of vision and obedience in this area by the local church has caused the Lord to raise up mission agencies so that His Kingdom could challenge the powers of darkness at the ends of the earth. Praise God for those with a pioneer spirit who has gone before, and who, by going, caused the worldwide growth, which has taken place in the church!

How can the local church fulfill the four-fold scope of the mandate? How can it work in its city, its country, its continent and the ends of the earth simultaneously?

Here are a few suggestions:

Praying

A clearly defined prayer strategy that covers the four-fold scope of responsibility, needs to be established in the church.

The following guidelines are suggested:

1. Make public the mission strategy of the local church. This will cause the members to catch the vision and motivate them to pray for missions.
2. Convey the mission strategy to the intercessors of the church, giving them clear objectives to target in prayer.
3. Acquire overhead projector slides with specific maps and statistics of different countries. Take five minutes of each Sunday service to display slides of a different country and allow the church to pray for that country. (These slides can be purchased from World Mission Centre Publications Department.)
4. If you have, or know of, any missionaries in the field, put their details on an overhead slide and allow the church to pray for them.

Giving

It is important for the local church to be involved in giving to missions. Make sure that the church's missions giving is spread across the whole four-fold scope of Jesus' mandate to the church (i.e. not only giving locally but also to mission work in other countries). The giving does not have to be spread equally.

By only giving to the corporate missions endeavour of its denomination, the local church might feel it has now done its part in missions. However, it may actually be destroying the giving potential and involvement of the local church. This minimizes the blessing the whole church could have in giving to missions across the whole spectrum of the Great Commission.

Please do not misunderstand. It is not being said that the local church should not give to the corporate programme, but rather, each church should give, over and above any corporate programme, to its own mission strategy.

Going

The third way for the local church to get involved in the four-fold scope of the Great Commission is to GO.

1. THE PASTOR ought to ensure that he goes to the mission field, even if it is only once a year.This will give him first hand experience and enable him to assess the needs on the mission field. It will also give him the opportunity to minister beyond the walls of his local church.

CAUTION:

There must be a specific goal in mind.
This is not an opportunity to travel to see the world.

2. YOUNG PEOPLE ought to go. The most effective way to recruit missionaries for the future is to expose young people to short-term mission activities.

Such an endeavour should take place at least once a year, and these young people should themselves believe the Lord for the financing of the trip.

Short-term missions have often been criticised as being a waste of time, but great blessings have been seen to come to local churches following this principle. (It is also interesting to note that people who have been exposed to the mission field for a short period of time often end up as full-time missionaries.)

3. PROFESSIONAL PEOPLE ought to go. In a previous ministry involvement, which focused on church planting, I saw more churches planted by "tentmakers" (people who moved away from the mother church, for work reasons) than any other method.

Great blessing could come to the church, if it would realise that these professional people could be sent to different nations of the world to work in their professions and, at the same time, proclaim the Gospel.

When people are transferred away from their town or city, their churches are often negative instead of seeing it as a blessing from the Lord. If the amazing potential of these people moving from the churches could be realised, it could cause the church to expand and duplicate in different ways.

4. ORDINARY PEOPLE ought to go. Many members of the local church are waiting for the leadership to say, "GO!!!". Although some may not be in a position to go beyond their "Jerusalem", they want to be involved in some way. A relevant church with vision will be able to create opportunities and open doors for its people to get involved.

5. LONG-TERM MISSIONARIES ought to go. A mission-minded church will RECOGNISE, RAISE UP, TRAIN (or get trained), SEND AND SUPPORT full-time, long-term, cross-cultural missionaries.

Tentmaking

This is where mature professional people in the church take up a secular position in a limited access country (a country where normal missionaries are not allowed.). Such people are generally known as TENTMAKER missionaries, and begin to spread the Gospel message among those with whom they work and slowly establish a church.

It should be a specific goal of the church to sow some of these key people.

"Once the church understands and involves itself with the Great Commission, the above becomes an obvious next step."

In conclusion, it is important to understand the following principle:

• praying for missions
• sending missionaries
• supporting missions across the four-fold areas of the Mandate it involves itself in the Great Commission of Acts 1:8.