leads to death, but to be subject to our Father’s mission leads to life and peace. Is your life and relationships at peace? Or is death slowly at work all around you? Your answer to those questions may determine what your life and your relationships—as well as those of your children and grandchildren—may be like in the future. Be subject to your own mission, and barrenness will work its way into your emotions and relationships. Be subject to the Father’s mission, and life and peace will begin to flow through you—spirit, soul, and body.
What Is Father’s Mission?
If pursuing our own mission leads to the lack of lasting fruitfulness, while the Father’s mission leads to life and peace, then it is important to know what Father’s mission is. Simply stated, Father’s mission is
for you to experience His expressed love and to give it away to the next person you meet
. Successful execution of Father’s mission is a matter of combining two elements in the proper orderand balance—the scriptural mandates many Christians know as the “Great Commandment” and the “Great Commission.”
Many believers consider the Great Commission the lifeblood of evangelical Christianity. This is, of course, Jesus’ well-known charge to His followers just before He ascended to Heaven 40 days after His resurrection:
Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age
(Matthew 28:19-20).
Who could deny that winning souls is seen as a top priority in the Kingdom of God? After all, the Bible says that Jesus came to earth and died on the Cross so that all people could be reconciled to God and that those who are reconciled have been charged with the ministry of reconciling others (see 2 Cor. 5:18-19). When I was in Bible school, the Great Commission was the emphasis that rose above all others. It was stressed even to the point of implying that unless you were willing to forsake your family and everybody else in order to “go,” then the sincerity of your commitment was in question.
As important as the Great Commission is, it is frequently overemphasized to the point of neglecting, and sometimes forgetting, another mission that is even more important—the Great Commandment. One day a religious leader asked Jesus what was the greatest and most important commandment in the law.
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments”
(Matthew 22:37-40).
In effect, Jesus was saying, “When you seek to know God’s love and to make it known, you are released from every other obligation in the Word of God.” Romans 13:8-10 tells us that love is the fulfillment of the law. Love is to be the inspiration, the driving force behind everything the Church does, including fulfilling the Great Commission. Jesus left no doubt about the priority of love:
A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another
(John 13:34-35).
John stressed the same point:
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.… This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another
(1 John 4:7,10-11).
Paul went so far as to say that without love, nothing else we do matters:
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all
What Is Father’s Mission?
If pursuing our own mission leads to the lack of lasting fruitfulness, while the Father’s mission leads to life and peace, then it is important to know what Father’s mission is. Simply stated, Father’s mission is
for you to experience His expressed love and to give it away to the next person you meet
. Successful execution of Father’s mission is a matter of combining two elements in the proper orderand balance—the scriptural mandates many Christians know as the “Great Commandment” and the “Great Commission.”
Many believers consider the Great Commission the lifeblood of evangelical Christianity. This is, of course, Jesus’ well-known charge to His followers just before He ascended to Heaven 40 days after His resurrection:
Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age
(Matthew 28:19-20).
Who could deny that winning souls is seen as a top priority in the Kingdom of God? After all, the Bible says that Jesus came to earth and died on the Cross so that all people could be reconciled to God and that those who are reconciled have been charged with the ministry of reconciling others (see 2 Cor. 5:18-19). When I was in Bible school, the Great Commission was the emphasis that rose above all others. It was stressed even to the point of implying that unless you were willing to forsake your family and everybody else in order to “go,” then the sincerity of your commitment was in question.
As important as the Great Commission is, it is frequently overemphasized to the point of neglecting, and sometimes forgetting, another mission that is even more important—the Great Commandment. One day a religious leader asked Jesus what was the greatest and most important commandment in the law.
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments”
(Matthew 22:37-40).
In effect, Jesus was saying, “When you seek to know God’s love and to make it known, you are released from every other obligation in the Word of God.” Romans 13:8-10 tells us that love is the fulfillment of the law. Love is to be the inspiration, the driving force behind everything the Church does, including fulfilling the Great Commission. Jesus left no doubt about the priority of love:
A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another
(John 13:34-35).
John stressed the same point:
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.… This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another
(1 John 4:7,10-11).
Paul went so far as to say that without love, nothing else we do matters:
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all
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