Now THAT'S Power!

Prayer on Matthew 28:18-20 Written 3-1-2015

O Precious Father, there were only eleven of them. There had been twelve, but one of them had
proved to be a traitor and in his remorse had hanged himself. One of them had denied You, our
Precious Lord Jesus, and the rest of them had fled away in Your day of trial.

But You had never promised that supernatural strength would arise in them, O Lord. You knew how
weak they were and how frail. A puff of wind could blow them away, but they had Your promises.
Your strength is made perfect in weakness, O Lord, and so it proved.

“All power is given to me in heaven and in earth.” This is what You said, when You came to them in
Galilee, Lord Jesus. You had offered up Your body and soul as a sacrifice for sins and had risen from
the dead that we might know that God had accepted Your sacrifice. Now You must go to Your
Father, as You had said, so that the Holy Spirit might be poured out upon Your people. How great
that power would prove to be.

For You, Lord Jesus, had received from the Father the fullness of the Spirit and had received gifts for
men that God might dwell among us. This Spirit that we receive is not a spirit of fear, but of power
and love and of a sound mind. “All power” You said, “in heaven and in earth.” How feeble is our
faith and our reach, O Lord. How great the commission and how great the undertaking of those
eleven men.

“Go a teach all nations.” How large the scope and the vision! “All nations,” are to be discipled,
brought under the yoke of Christ. Not by swords of steel or men’s destructive instincts, but by the
power of the Gospel. It is the power of the Gospel, the preaching of the Cross of Christ which is the
power of God unto salvation.

Come unto me, is the way the Savior put it, and I will give you rest. The message has the same appeal
to day as it did then. But we must preach it, live it, love it, and oppose every hint of antichrist and
rebellion.

“Make Disciples, baptize, teach.” That’s the order. They come in as little children, are baptized in
terms of the adoption, and are then taught in the way of righteousness. Works every time, when we
do it right. The power of the Triune God guarantees it. 1 Peter 1:

2 Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto
obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy
hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
4 To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for
you,
5 Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
Now THAT’S power.