“The Great Commission”
Matthew 28:16-20
Woodland Christian Church
June 14, 2026
David A. Shirey
What do you make of the fact that the great commissionees – the people Jesus commissioned with the Great Commission - weren’t all that great? Here’s what I mean. They fell asleep on Jesus during his agonizing prayer in Gethsemane. They woke up only to run off when Judas came to betray him. They were nowhere to be found on Good Friday. There’s not a word of their whereabouts on Holy Saturday. According to Matthew, Mark, and Luke’s accounts of Easter, none of them were at the empty tomb on the morning Christ was raised from death to life. Those eleven were an imperfect bunch. In his comments on this passage Dale Bruner wrote, “The number ‘eleven’ limps; it’s not perfect like twelve…Jesus commands a defective eleven. The church that Jesus sends into the world is ‘elevenish,’ imperfect, fallible.[1]” I like that word “elevenish” to describe that imperfect bunch to whom Jesus gave the Great Commission. They weren’t playing with a full deck, weren’t the brightest crayons in the box, weren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer. They were a taco short of a combo plate. Their elevator didn’t go all the way to the top. Their lights were on but no one was home.
And here’s the best one of all: When they saw Jesus, “they worshiped him; but some doubted” (Matthew 28:17). What’s up with that? Even after standing face-to-face with him “some doubted?” Unlike John’s Gospel where Thomas doubted until Jesus stood before him and then he believed, in Matthew’s Gospel “some doubted” even after they saw him. But they worshiped him, too? I learned this week the word translated some is not found in the original Greek. The Greek text can literally be read: “They worshipped him and doubted.” So why is “They worshipped him and some doubted” in most English translations? Apparently, Matthew uses a grammatical construction that could mean the word some is implied. But in the seventeen other instances Matthew uses it no translators ever think the word some is implied in those places. So why here? One pastor, Mark Allan Powell, says he asked a Bible translator that very question one time and the guy said, "The verse wouldn't make sense otherwise. No one can worship and doubt at the same time" Whereupon Powell says, “I invited him to visit [my church]. We do it all the time.[2]”
How refreshingly honest! It’s possible to have doubts and still worship. To have unresolved questions and still believe. To be confident about some things and not so sure about others. A healthy faith can be seasoned with a measure of healthy doubt.
Frederick Buechner wrote: “Doubt is the ants in the pants of faith. Doubt keeps faith awake and moving.” Someone said the opposite of faith is not doubt, it’s certitude. Mark Allen Powell notes the one group of folks in the Bible who have no doubts are the Pharisees. He says, “They are always certain about everything…It never occurs to them that they might have overlooked something or misunderstood something. As a result, they are often wrong, but they are never in doubt.” Often wrong, but never in doubt. I know people who are often wrong, but never in doubt that they’re right! By contrast, disciples of the risen Lord Jesus Christ worship and doubt at the same time.
And tell me – what did Jesus do with those imperfect, ‘elevenish’ disciples who worshipped and doubted at the same time? Did he:
A) Scold and shame them?
B) Excommunicate them?
C) Did he tell them, “You’re not up for the Great Commission yet. Before I send you to teach other people about me, you need to get your act together first. You need to know your Bible forward and backward and be able to answer every question any skeptic, cynic, or non-believer throws at you.”
D) Did he send them to Disciple Finishing School – also known as seminary –where, when you finish you know it all, have no doubts or questions, and are fully equipped and empowered to change every heart, right every wrong, overcome every injustice, and usher in peace on earth, goodwill to one and all? You do know, don’t you, that Pastor Christy Jo and Dave and Vicki and Marsha and Ken and I have our M.Div. degree. Master of Divinity. We have mastered divinity. We know everything there is to know about God. Not!
What Jesus did with those worshiping/doubting didn’t know it all disciples was to commission them then and there and send them off “as is” saying, “Go, make disciples.” I wish he hadn’t. Because if Jesus hadn’t given them the Great Commission, then I could excuse myself from doing Jesus’ bidding in this world because of my own imperfect faith. If Jesus had given the Great Commission to Great Disciples with Great Minds and Great Souls then I could excuse myself for lack of greatness. Apply for a deferment – I have bone spurs in my soul. But since Jesus commissions them in spite of their doubts and incompleteness that leaves me on the hook…and you, too!
I say all this to say none of us is qualified in and of ourselves to carry out the Great Commission of the risen Lord Jesus Christ. But neither were those first eleven perfect choices. The glory of the gospel, according to St. Paul (an utterly imperfect man!) is that God “is able by the power at work within us to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine” (Eph 3:20). Carolyn Morris, one the elders of Jennie and my North Carolina congregation, used to say to the nominees whose names were put forth by that church’s Nominating Committee, “God doesn’t call the qualified, but God qualifies the called.” The proof of that is what God did through those eleven who worshipped and doubted. God made disciples out of their imperfect witness who taught and baptized and made disciples out of their imperfect witness who in turn taught and baptized and made disciples down through twenty centuries until the imperfect progeny of those original elevenish disciples taught and baptized and made us disciples. Now, tag, you’re it. We’re it! We’re called, qualified, and sent by Jesus, imperfect as we are, to be his witnesses and to make new imperfect disciples.
So, what’s it take to be a witness? Think about witnesses in a courtroom. There are two prerequisites to be a witness: 1) You have to have seen, heard, or experienced something. 2) You have to be willing to talk about it. Both are required in order to be a witness. As one of my colleagues (Troy Sybrant) put it, if you didn’t see something but talk about, you’re not a witness. You’re a liar. And if you did see something, but don’t talk about it, you’re not a witness. You’re a coward. A witness is someone who has seen, heard, or experienced something and is willing to talk about it. Translated into Christian terms, being a witness means you’ve seen, heard, or experienced the presence and power of the Living God in your life and you’re willing to talk about it… and live it…albeit imperfectly.
Bottom line: the risen Lord Jesus Christ needs witnesses in order to “make his case” if you will, the case that God’s blessed kin(g)dom is breaking out here, there, and one glad day everywhere. Kennon Callahan, a Methodist pastor and fine church consultant, defined the kin(g)dom of God as God bringing “help, hope, and home” to one and all.
So what do you witness to? How when you were in a bad way, God brought help. How when you were in the depths of discouragement, God brought hope. How when you were alone, lonely, abandoned, excluded, relegated to the margins God welcomed you in gave you a home. Since I’ve been in your midst these past six months I have heard you witness to how God gave help, hope, and home to Woodland Christian Church. And now that witness is being shared, broadcast, written about near and far. That’s Great Commission stuff! What a witness! Three weeks ago, I listened as Jimmy, during his invitation before the offering, witnessed to how he found help, hope, and a home here. Wow, what a witness! We all have a story to tell - a witness to make. It’s up to you to fill in the blanks telling the particular circumstances in your life when you needed help, hope, or a home and how in your life God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and the church provided what you needed, but only you can do that. And there are people within your sphere of influence – friends, relatives, acquaintances, neighbors – who would be blessed to hear you tell your story in the way only you can tell it.
Look at it this way: Having made the Good Confession, we’re being sent out by the Great Commission to live out the Great Commandment: loving God and neighbor. Just as Jesus called those elevenish imperfect disciples to be his witnesses, so today he calls us, assuring us we do not go alone. “I am with you always,” he says, “to the end of the age.” Pastor Mike Stachura said, “The mark of a great church is not how many it seats but how many it sends!” So, let it be known that God is sending 65 this morning. We’re not ending this service with an altar call with everyone coming up here. We’re ending it with alter-nate call with everyone going out there to be a witness to a God, a Christ, a Spirit, a church named Woodland that offers all God’s children help, hope, and home.
I duly commission you with these words from the end of Matthew’s gospel, RSV edition: Revised Shirey Version:
16 Now the disciples went to Lexington, to the building at the corner of Kentucky and High to which Jesus had directed them. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit 20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Let all the 65 imperfect, elevenish, divinely called, greatly commissioned and duly sent disciples of Woodland say AMEN
[1] The Churchbook; Matthew 13-28, Frederick Dale Bruner pp. 805, 806
[2] Mark Allan Powell, Loving Jesus
