Mark 16.15-18.
In the Long Ending of Mark, Jesus gives his followers some instructions. Sometimes Christians refer to these instructions as the great commission. Often they capitalize it—the Great Commission—but they really don’t have to. But it’s not actually Jesus’s great commission. It’s certainly a commission; it’s something he expects all his followers to do. (Yes, us present-day Christians included.) But the great commission is given in Matthew after his resurrection. This is Jesus’s lesser commission. Lesser in that it’s from the Long Ending; it wasn’t written by Mark himself; Jesus may have said it, or something quite like it; it at least accurately expresses his sentiments. But it comes from tradition instead of a unimpeachable apostolic eyewitness account, so it’s always gonna have that against it. Hence “lesser.” And no, I’m not gonna capitalize it either.
The lesser commission goes like yea:
- Mark 16.15-18 KWL
- 15Jesus tells them, “Go into the world
- and proclaim the gospel everywhere to every creature.
- 16Those who believe and are baptized will be saved.
- Those who don’t believe will be judged.
- 17Miracles will accompany the believers:
- In my name, people will throw out demons.
- People will speak in new tongues.
- 18People will pick up snakes in their hands,
- and if anyone drinks poison, it won’t injure them.
- People will lay hands on the sick,
- and they will be well.”
Various Christians are fond of saying πορευθέντες/porefthéntes “Go,” as stated in both this and the great commission, Mt 28.19 isn’t properly a command. It’s not an imperative verb; it’s a participle. One could also translate it, “While going into the world,” or “As you go into the world.” Thing is, the verb which follows, κηρύξατε/kirýdzate, “preach ye!” is a command, and it turns all the participles in the sentence into commands. Preach—and go. It’s not about passively doing your thing, and while you’re at it, sharing Jesus. Go find people to share Jesus with.
The lesser commission shares that in common with the great commission: Go share. The great commission instructs us to teach every people-group what Jesus teaches, and baptize ’em in the trinity’s name. The lesser commission instructs us to proclaim the gospel to every creature. Lots of overlap; so much so people will mix the commissions up and say the great commission is about preaching the gospel. No; that’s the lesser commission. Do that too. But the great commission is about sharing Jesus’s teachings. Which includes the gospel—
- Mark 1.15 KJV
- And saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel.
—but Jesus teaches a lot of other great things, like the Sermon on the Mount, and the great commission tells us we oughta share that too. Preach the gospel! But definitely not just the gospel.
It doesn’t stop at verse 15.
Some have claimed the lesser commission is just verse 15—“Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.” (KJV) But no, there’s more. Jesus’s instructions include how it’s to be carried out. Baptism is part of it. Unbelief is not. And when people believe, miracles will follow.
I grew up among cessationists, who went out of their way to downplay everything Jesus has to say about miracles in this passage. These instructions, they insisted, were only for the first-century followers of Jesus, who had to do miracles because they hadn’t yet written the New Testament. But once they did, God turned the miracles off. Now, when we preach the gospel, we gotta show people the New Testament, and expect them to believe God did miracles in spite of the fact God doesn’t do miracles. That’s a miracle in and of itself.
Of course I don’t bother with any such rubbish intellectual exercises. If we’re truly following Jesus, we oughta see the same miracles Jesus describes in the Long Ending of Mark. Throwing out demons, speaking in tongues, surviving deadly animals and poison, curing the sick.
Cessationists will be outraged when I say this, but I’m gonna nonetheless: If we don’t see these miracles, feel free to question whether these are legitimate followers of Jesus. They might be! I’ve met many a saintly cessationist who honestly, truly, devoutly trusts in Jesus. Only problem is… these folks don’t trust Jesus when he says they can do all the same miracles he did and more. Jn 14.12 You can’t honestly claim you totally trust Jesus when you make exceptions for some of his more obvious, more radical, more in-your-face teachings. Nor when you try to explain away why you can’t—really won’t—follow him in every single way he tells us to, yet pretend you totally do.
When you’re sharing the gospel with others, miracles will follow. They just will. You’ll encounter sick people, who will ask you to pray for them, and you do, and God’ll cure them right in front of you. You’ll encounter devil-plagued people who will likewise ask you to pray for them, and you do, and God’ll cure them too. When you pray, you might pray in tongues; you don’t have to, but if the Holy Spirit empowers you to, may as well!
And when you encounter pushback—when people sic the guard dogs on you, or coworkers try to slip a few Carolina reapers into your lunch in order to haze the Jesus freak—sometimes God will bail you out. Not always, but I’ve heard a few miracle stories where someone tried to assault a missionary and got hoisted on their own petard. I suspect most of the reason God doesn’t rescue everyone who shares Jesus is because some of them are being dicks about it, and deserve a little slapdown. So don’t be one of those Christians! Love the people you share Jesus with. Love ’em like God does.
Obviously when miracles follow, people are more apt to believe the gospel. Now of course there are gonna be holdouts who won’t believe any miracles they see; who will embrace any kind of “reasonable explanation,” no matter how unreasonable, rather than turn to Jesus. Don’t debate them, don’t fret about them; shake the dust off your feet and move on. But when miracles follow, it’s because the Holy Spirit knows they’ll make a serious impact on the people who saw them, and those people will be receptive to the gospel. Concentrate on them.
