July 19, 2026 | The Great Commission

This is the holy gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew.

Glory to you, Lord Christ.

Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them.

And when they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubted.

And Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

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, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.

This is the gospel of the Lord.

Praise to you, Lord Christ.

You may be seated.

We have a special guest with us this morning, a friend of mine for many years, Rob Graff from All Saints in Pauli's Island.

He's been serving as the rector a little bit longer than this has been a church.

For those of you that don't know, there's a special connection between All Saints Church and St.

Paul's.

Many years ago, they sent T and Libby out from Pauli's Island to plant this church, and All Saints was instrumental in supporting this church plant as it got up and running.

And so it's an honor and privilege to have him here.

I think his probably the title that he's most proud of is not rector of All Saints Pauli's, but father of Haynes Graf, and a number of other children.

Haynes is married to our lovely Lauren Graff, who is our youth pastor here as well.

And so we we're really blessed that you shared her and Haynes with us as well.

So thank you for being here, and we look forward to the word that God has put on your heart.

Thank you, brother.

Appreciate it.

I love you too.

Thank y'all for having me.

It is a joy always to come and worship with you and be a part of the St.

Paul's family.

Y'all pray for us and you pray for me, I believe, every week.

And uh that that really makes us one, you know.

Prayer does something.

And we've been praying for y'all uh pretty faithfully as well, and lifting up T Brown by name.

We'll be lifting up Jonathan by name.

Um again, thank you for the prayers, thank you for the love.

It makes all the difference in the world.

We really are connected in a special way.

Um, I've been thinking a lot lately about 250 years of America.

It's all over the place.

And uh 4th of July was special for many of us because we got to be reminded that we are in kind of a long ripple effect of some pretty faithful men.

We call them founding fathers.

And I just want to throw this out as we step into a time in the Word together.

Do you think our founding fathers would recognize the country that we call America?

I'm not I'm not denigrating our country, I'm just holding up a light.

Would they understand the deficit that we're running?

Even a little bit?

Would they understand the debt that we carry?

Would they understand how our legislators spend more time listening to lobbyists than they do countrymen back home in their districts?

Would they recognize any of it?

We know.

They wouldn't recognize it.

And it is what it is.

But it teaches and it preaches if we'll face into it, and it's simply this there is in every institution, there is in every in every higher educational institution or hospital institution, certainly in government, there is a process that takes place.

It always, and I say always, begins with the barbarians, the pioneers, who have a vision.

In the case of the church, in the case of our country, I would even say, it is a vision from the Lord.

It is a spark of the Holy Spirit.

The barbarians carry the spark.

They carry the vision.

What is this institution going to be about?

And they launch something, and by God's grace, it becomes something.

And then inevitably, as time passes, as the institution grows and becomes more complicated, there has to come a new breed of leader in.

We call them the bureaucrat.

They're neither good nor bad, it is what it is.

The bureaucrats are inevitable.

You cannot sustain the vision without the bureaucrats.

And the bureaucrats are committed to what?

The spark of the barbarian.

They're going to help those wild-eyed pioneers keep this thing alive and keep it going and sustain it in a way that's feasible, that makes sense, that's.

Again, they are inevitable.

And they come not to sustain the spark of the barbarian, not to hold true to the original vision, but to let the institution, as it exists in all its glory, to let the institution serve them.

And we've seen it in our country.

And again, it just is what it is.

I'm not here to preach politics.

I don't think I'm surprising anybody.

We have, for our legislators, we have an aristocracy that truly believes it's kind of about them.

No longer the people's house.

We've seen it in our Episcopal church.

You know?

In 2000, we stepped out of the Episcopal Church, and your founding rector was a part of that movement.

Because the Episcopal Church had given way to the bureaucracy, which is inevitable and not necessarily bad, but had also given way to the aristocracy in the seminaries and all of the episcopal universities.

Most of the churches, the House of Delegates, the representatives of the churches, began to believe that it's all about them, that this church exists for them.

And I want to remind you the church is the only institution known to man that truly exists for those who are not yet members.

Y'all understand this, you get it.

You were founded by a barbarian.

I sat with T Brown.

He told me, I've got a launch.

I've been carrying this for decades.

I need to go to Greenville.

Libby and I are gonna plant a church in Greenville.

We're gonna reach those whom we can reach.

Was it convenient?

No.

Was it comfortable?

No.

Pretty soon thereafter, Deb and Tom Bellamy came to me and they said, We're supposed to be a part of this mission.

You've been preaching on it, Rob.

I said, I know, I know.

In good time, I think you should.

That's powerful.

They said, No, we need to do it now.

And I said, No, you can't.

At that time we had two simultaneously, we had two 10 o'clock services.

T had left, I'm by myself, I'm scrambling every week, doing what y'all are doing now, bringing people in, releasing them.

You go take that service, I'm taking this one.

Um, did I want to see Deb and Tom leave?

Absolutely not.

And I said, Deb, you might remember this.

You know, in about a year or so, they're gonna really need you.

But right now, you know, they're just gathering people, they're casting vision.

Deb said, I know what they're doing, Rob.

Tom and I have prayed it out.

We want to be part of the launch.

We need to be there.

And I said, off you go.

It was a spark, it was the vision of the barbarian, of the pioneer.

I need to be there.

I need to be pushing this thing out.

I'm part of the light and the darkness.

I say all this to say the bureaucracy, it's gotta come.

It's not a bad thing.

The aristocracy needs to be nipped in the bud.

Give it no room.

The church never can exist for those who are serving the church or running the church.

As Archbishop William Temple said in the 40s, the church is the only institution known to man that exists what?

For those who are not yet members.

Never ever lose that spark, that original vision.

You exist for the least and the lost and the lonely.

You exist for those in this Greenville community who do not know the Lord.

Never lose your church plant mentality.

Always hold true to the heart of the barbarian.

Because the heart of the aristocracy is creeping on all of us at any given moment.

So, Lord, we bow before you right now as we open up your word.

And we say, Come, Holy Spirit.

Remind us of who we are and whose we are.

Thank you for sharing and trusting us with this vision, this spark.

That we would be an extension of you.

That we would be an extension of your kingdom as we are empowered by your Holy Spirit even now, even here in Greenville, South Carolina.

So, Holy Spirit, do what only you can do.

Fan the flames.

Keep the vision alive in this church family.

Pour out on them, pour out on them the heart of the church planner.

We pray it boldly in the name of Jesus.

Amen.

All right, let's go to Matthew 28.

Let's go there.

If you have your Bibles, we call it the Great Commission.

Jesus is giving instructions to the church.

You know, when you hear Jesus talk in the upper room discourse or here at giving the Great Commission at the ascension, you know, these last-minute instructions, don't think that this is fresh information.

Don't think that this is the time our Lord would throw down some new material.

This is foundational bedrock material that he would have been breathing into his disciples for three years.

And now he's saying, as he is ascending, of course, keep in mind, I've called you to something.

The eleven disciples went to Galilee to a mountain to which Jesus had directed them.

Verse 16, a specific place at a specific time.

It's a specific calling.

He set this time apart.

He has something important to say.

He wants them to perhaps think of Moses and a new covenant being poured out on his people.

But it begs the question: where do you meet with the Lord when he has something important to say?

Are you faithful to set aside that time and listen that you might move out faithfully as he directs?

He called them to a mountain, a mountain to which he directed them.

And when he saw them, they worshiped him, but some doubted they saw him.

And they do what we do.

They worshiped.

I want you to see real clearly here, this is as he is ascending.

This is before Pentecost, before the pouring out of the Holy Spirit in Acts chapter 2.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

But still, you gotta wonder.

They worshiped, but some doubted.

Don't just gloss over that.

Keep in mind that you can do both at the same time.

And you're not playing games necessarily with the Lord.

You can worship him.

You can worship him with reckless abandonment.

And at the same time, you can carry some doubts.

Doubts are not the enemy.

Doubt does not disqualify you from moving out faithfully as he directs, as the disciple he's called you to be.

No, it's fear.

It's fear that leads to settled unbelief that disqualifies you.

Fear is the enemy, not doubt.

Doubt we can deal with.

Lord, I believe.

Now help my unbelief.

I'm putting my full weight into this.

And yet I carry some doubt.

I wonder how.

I wonder why.

I wonder, Lord.

Doubt's not the enemy.

Fear is the enemy.

Fear that leads to what?

Settled unbelief.

I'm going through the motions and I know this can't be true, this isn't true.

That's what disqualifies us, church.

Never believe the lie that you are lingering doubt or unanswered question or funny feeling about this, that, or the other.

Don't think that that gets in the way of you being faithful, even pushing out the kingdom.

No.

Even the disciples would deal with the same.

Verse 18, all authority has been given to me.

How much authority?

All authority.

He knew it.

He's going to hand it off to us, but first he reminds us just what is this exusia authority?

It's positional authority.

It's commensurate with being what?

King of kings, Lord of Lords, the great I am, the holy one of Israel.

It reminds me of Satan's tempting.

I find this so gratifying to hear Jesus stand before us and say, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

It's been given to me.

All of it.

It's so gratifying when you consider all that he has gone through for us.

I can't help but think of Matthew chapter 4, verses 8 and 9.

Matthew 4:8

We focus on it as we move through Lent every year.

The tempting of Jesus in the wilderness.

In verses 8 through 9, we see all of the kingdoms of man paraded before the Lord.

Jesus in his bedraggled state, hands and knees, hair in the dust, sweat drip off his face.

Remember, he's fully man and fully God.

It's not a fairy tale.

He didn't have some sort of superpower to insulate him from the effects of fasting for 40 days.

Remember, this tempting comes at the end of the 40 days, at his absolute weakest state.

He's half of a man.

And in that state, the enemy comes to him and parades before him all the kingdoms.

All the kingdoms that had been, all the kingdoms that ever will be, not just Rome.

Don't you know he saw our United States parade in front of him?

I will give this to you, all of this to you, says the enemy, if you will worship me.

Keeping in mind that Satan will always promise what he cannot deliver.

He will always promise big that which he cannot deliver.

Oftentimes he's promising to us what we already possess in Christ Jesus.

That's the flavor of the liar.

And so he does with Jesus, promising what he cannot deliver, all the kingdoms.

Incidentally, what Jesus as King of Kings and Lord of Lords already possesses even then.

How satisfying it is now on the other end of things, on the other end of the cross, on the other end of the empty tomb, to hear Jesus say, all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.

Therefore, verse 19, what a powerful, therefore, that is.

Jesus is saying, Because of this, because of this power and authority that's been entrusted to me, you will make disciples of all nations.

There is a connection between our calling to be disciple makers, and Jesus reminding us that he has all power and all authority.

His authority empowers us.

His authority empowers us to do all that he's called us to do.

Note, there's one imperative here.

The imperative, the command is not to go.

The way it's written in most of our translations, go, therefore.

That's really not how it is.

It's really like this: therefore, make disciples as you go.

The imperative is what?

Make disciples.

The one command is not to go.

It's assumed as you go.

The imperative is make disciples as you go.

Therefore, because of all this power and authority that's been entrusted to me, I share it with you.

Make disciples of all nations as you go.

Baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

We're called to do the baptizing.

And we think about it as good Anglicans, kind of 21st century perspective.

And we think of a baptismal font, or some of you may remember a big baptismal vat behind your altar.

We think of a formal sacramental baptism, and I think that's good and true.

I think Jesus has that in mind.

I think that's already taking place.

This cleansing work through a mikveh, this cleansing work that John the Baptist was kind of showing us that Jesus is going to transcend with a new kind of baptism.

Not just a baptism of repentance, but a baptism of participation in his life and death and resurrection.

But I want you to think the original understanding of baptism.

Just as Jesus would say, be baptized in the Holy Spirit.

You will be baptized in the Holy Spirit not many days from now.

You'll be empowered from on high.

He's talking about a full immersion in something where someone identifies and fully accepts something, symbolized by that word baptism.

The information that I hold on to is the understanding that a bolt of cloth in the first century would be baptized.

It would literally be submerged, baptismo, in a vat of dye per se.

And that bolt of cloth would begin to take on all that the dye has to offer.

Every crack and crevice, every corner of that bolt of cloth would fully receive that dye.

As it is what?

Baptized.

And as we are baptized into Christ's life, death, glorious resurrection, as we are baptized then in the power of the Holy Spirit, what we're saying is that all of us, every aspect of what we are, is taken on the die.

I think that's what he's talking about, but I also think there's more.

There's something that we can do, every one of us in the first century or 21st century, as we are called to baptize others, not just ritualistically, not just spiritually, but as we live and move and have our being, as I share the love of Jesus, as you share mercy, as you share forgiveness, as you open up your home, as you do what the Lord's given you to do, and you do it for his purposes, you do it for his glory, you were showing them Jesus.

In many ways, you were literally baptizing them in the name of Jesus.

Baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit, immersing them in his love and his forgiveness and his grace on the soccer field, in the coffee shop, walking with your friend.

You can be baptizing in the name of Jesus.

Teaching them to observe all that I have told you, all that I've given to you.

And this teaching, I think we understand.

Sharing that which He has given to us.

But there's more, it's teaching them to observe.

And this word observe, it literally means to watch over, to guard, to preserve, to protect.

Are we willing to preserve, protect, watch over, and guard the truth that's been passed down to us in the Word of God?

We're not called to teach our version.

It's not our take.

It's not what we would like it to say.

It sure would be easier if it said it this way.

Perhaps I'll just say it that way.

No, it's it's preserving and protecting as we teach what we have observed.

Teach them to observe, to join you in preserving and protecting, guarding over, watching over this word of God.

It's his story, it's his truth.

He's entrusting it to us.

Go, therefore, make disciples.

Therefore, make disciples as you go.

Baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, where you live and move and have your being.

Teaching them to observe all that I have given to you.

Guard it, preserve it, protect it in this crazy, topsy-turvy world.

Teach them to do the same.

And lo, I'm with you.

Don't you love that?

And lo, I'm with you.

Behold, I am with you always.

Just when we need to be reminded that we can't do it in our own strength, we don't have what it takes.

We can be reminded that He does, that He pays for what He orders.

As He sends us out as a bunch of wild-eyed barbarians, as pioneers, even still, church.

He says, I'm with you in the power of the Holy Spirit.

To the ends of the age, I am Emmanuel.

I am God with you always.

In the hard times, yeah.

In the easy times, sure.

All times I'm with you in the power of the Holy Spirit.

It looks like having a church plant mentality.

Y'all have become a beautiful, successful, large, influential church.

Amen.

How easy it is to coast.

How easy it is to come in as a new parishioner and coast.

It takes work, it takes diligence.

We have to remind each other constantly.

I'm reminding my staff at All Saints constantly.

Why do church plants push out the gospel better than anyone else?

Why did T and Libby want to, and Deb and Tom, why did they want to come plant in Greenville?

It wasn't because they were ready to leave the beauty of the creek and the beach.

It wasn't because they didn't have any friends.

They were covered up.

How hard it was.

It was because they'd heard a call, a stirring.

The Lord had given them a spark to go be the church and push out the church in Greenville.

How easy it is to coast and forget the original calling.

Church plants are the number one way the gospel is being pushed out in the West.

Why is that?

Because church plants are hungry.

Isn't that funny?

You know, if the youth pastor at the church plant isn't reaching out to other families at the volleyball game, that little group is not going to grow.

You know, the the children's pastor, if there is one, is going to be actively seeking to gather in new families.

Why?

Because the church is going to die without them.

That church planting pastor is going to be having people over and celebrating life and sharing life and pushing into others.

And why?

Because without it, church isn't going to make it.

We need to hold on to that deep, deep feeling that the Lord's work isn't going to be done.

His kingdom isn't going to be made manifest if we're not doing the work of the church plan.

Again, actively work against the aristocracies coming in, taking over, and turning this into a country club.

It can happen in the blink of an eye.

July 2017, Panama City Beach, Florida.

Roberta Urshi and her family are enjoying the beach, and Roberta looks up and she sees some heads kind of floating out in the water and she hears some cries.

She realizes that her family has been pulled out by some sort of undercurrent.

Roberta and five other family members begin to wade out to retrieve family members, and they too get caught up.

They're all trapped, floating out in about 15 feet of water.

They are slowly dying, drowning, being sucked out.

At the same time, Jessica Simmons has gone to the beach kind of for a cocktail.

She's going to meet her husband, just celebrate the end of the day.

And Jessica Simmons is waiting on her husband when she sees a bunch of people down on the shore and they're kind of pointing, and there seems to be some commotion.

So she makes her way down to the beach while she waits for her husband.

As she moves down to the beach, she sees a discarded boogie board.

She picks that up.

She puts it under her arm.

She gets down to the shore thinking that there's a shark or maybe some porpoises are making their way through.

And no, it's some bodies.

There's some people that are being kind of sucked out and they're in deep water.

They seem to be in distress.

By that time her husband has joined her, he looks at it.

They kind of catch each other's eye, and Jessica says, These people are not drowning today.

It's not happening.

And Jessica Simmons' husband begins to organize a group, and Jessica's right in the middle of it.

And they take the folks that are standing, gawking, pointing, watching on the beach, and they form a chain.

And it's amazing how far this chain reaches out.

Pretty soon they're ferrying back Roberta Urshury's family, just arm to arm, person by person.

Roberta Urshury would say later, I'm so grateful.

These people were God's angels that were in the right place at the right time.

I owe my life and my family's life to them.

Without them, we wouldn't be here.

This story ministers to me.

I need to be reminded.

Do you need to be reminded that people are drowning?

That heads are bobbing all around us at work?

Where we play, where we golf, there they are.

Can we see them?

Do we care?

Can we find the resolve to say, as Jessica Simmons whispered to her husband, not today.

Not today.

These people aren't drowning.

That's the cry of a barbarian.

All we have to do is do our part.

We can't be every member of the chain, but we can be our part of the chain, right?

Is that not the body of Christ?

Is that not St.

Paul's Greenville?

Doesn't matter what part, what link of the chain you are.

All that matters is that we are faithful.

Sometimes we get to be the closer.

Do you know how much God loves you?

Do you know he's for you?

Do you know we could pray right now?

That you could receive him as Savior, Redeemer, and friend just like I have.

Do you want to do that?

Sometimes we get to be the closer, but not all the time.

Sometimes we're simply going about our business, reflecting the love, baptizing a friend, even without knowing it, in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, by how we handle a difficulty, by how we handle being falsely accused, whatever it may be.

We're all members of the chain and we're all doing our part.

I want to close with this.

You don't have to be an evangelist to be an evangelist.

There was a story of a young farmer who was turned on to the Lord, 1934, rural North Carolina.

His name was Albert McMain.

And Albert was turned on to the Lord.

He heard a traveling evangelist was coming through, and he really wanted his peers to receive Jesus, not just go through the motions at church, but really get turned on by the Lord.

And he knew that this evangelist was good, so he was going to fill up a truck and take them to the place where the speaker was going to be preaching.

And he knew that if he could get this one fella who's one of the key leaders in his little peer group, if he could get this one farmer's son to get on board, the rest would follow.

But this one young farmer's son wasn't interested.

He said, You can have it.

Really not into that.

And so Albert McMacon said, You don't have to go.

You just drive.

You can be a part of the fun.

You drive the truck.

So the young farmer's son agreed to drive the truck, and the rest of them went to the revival.

And by the second night of the revival, the young farmer's son had gotten out of the truck and stuck his head in the tent.

And by the end of that night, the story goes, the young farmer's son had given his life to Jesus and he would forever be changed.

His name was Billy Graham.

You don't have to be an evangelist to be an evangelist.

None of us are called, I don't believe, to be a Billy Graham.

But all of us are called to be an Albert McMahon.

To reach out beyond ourselves.

That we would not become complacent or blind to the heads that are bobbing around us.

Simply do this: take the Great Commission seriously.

St.

Paul's, go.

Make disciples as you live and move and have your being.

Teach them all that I have commanded you.

Teach them to observe it, to protect it, to guard it.

Develop relationships with people who are not yet in Christ.

Not as projects, but as people.

Earn the right to lift up the name of Jesus to these folks who don't know the Lord.

Y'all are growing leaps and bounds.

Y'all are doing everything right.

Continue to reach out beyond yourselves.

Make time for people who are not a member of the church.

Earn the right to lift up the name of Jesus and let him take it from there.

So, Lord, I bow my head and I thank you for what you're doing at St.

Paul's.

I thank you for the beauty of this place.

And at the same time, I ask that you would forever pour out a spirit of the church planter.

That this church would always make room for the barbarian, for the pioneer.

That the original spark would continue to be alive in this place.

And as the bureaucracy manages and makes things just flow a little bit better, I pray that you would protect St.

Paul's from any semblance of the aristocracy in the name of Jesus.

I thank you for the new rector, for Jonathan Bales and the family that's coming.

We pray that you would continue to minister and prepare this church for all that's coming.

We thank you for the staff, for Clay Milner, for Cindy, for all those who've been holding the reins, faithfully serving, continue to minister to them as well and get the glory.

So we thank you for your church, Lord, for the beauty of your church.

Thank you for trusting all this authority, even to us.

May we be found guarding your word and proclaiming it in our day.

We pray boldly and expectantly in the name of Jesus.

Amen.