Article XI of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000: Evangelism and missions

Following is another in a series of columns on The Baptist Faith & Message 2000.

“Those who have received the gospel are to share it. This obligation God placed upon redeemed men, not upon angels. If men do not tell the story, it will not be told.”

– Herschel Hobbs

Article XI of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000 reads:

“It is the duty and privilege of every follower of Christ and of every church of the Lord Jesus Christ to endeavor to make disciples of all nations. The new birth of man’s spirit by God’s Holy Spirit means the birth of love for others. Missionary effort on the part of all rests thus upon a spiritual necessity of the regenerate life, and is expressly and repeatedly commanded in the teachings of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ has commanded the preaching of the gospel to all nations. It is the duty of every child of God to seek constantly to win the lost to Christ by verbal witness undergirded by a Christian lifestyle, and by other methods in harmony with the gospel of Christ.”

Evangelism and missions are the duties and privileges of every Christian in obedience to the command of Jesus to make disciples of all nations (Matt. 28:18-20). They are grounded in the authority of Jesus, and they find their source in the heart of God, who loves all people and desires them to repent and believe the good news (John 3:16; 2 Pet. 3:9). 

Simply stated, evangelism is sharing the gospel with the goal of leading others to repentance and faith in Jesus. The word evangelism comes from the Greek noun euaggelion (a good message) and the verb euaggelizo (to announce, declare, or preach this good news).

Notice that the Greek word for angel – aggelos – is tucked inside. An angel in Scripture is a messenger, sometimes heaven-sent and sometimes human. As Jessica Brodie writes, “Those who practice evangelism are indeed delivering a message: One of extraordinarily good news, life-giving and transformative, with eternal ramifications.” 

In Matthew 28:1-7, the Lord sends an angel to roll away the stone from Jesus’ tomb – not so Jesus may get out, but so the first eyewitnesses of his resurrection may see the empty grave. The angel tells the women, “Don’t be afraid, because I know you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here. For he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has risen from the dead and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; you will see him there .…’” (vv. 5-7).

These are the last recorded words of the angel on that day. He has fulfilled his mission. From that time forward, redeemed people bear the responsibility to proclaim the good news.

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The angel of the LORD in the New Testament

If the angel of the LORD is the preincarnate Christ, as we have argued throughout this study, then a dramatic transition takes place in the Incarnation. The prophesied Messiah, whose “origin is from antiquity” (Mic. 5:2), no longer appears in flaming thorn bushes, pillars of cloud and fire, or briefly as a man. Rather, the eternal Son of God comes permanently as the God-Man, adding sinless humanity to his deity through the miracle of the virgin birth. 

Jesus of Nazareth is completely human. He spends nine months in Mary’s womb, is born naturally, grows to maturity, eats, drinks, sleeps, experiences human emotions, suffers pain, and dies. Yet, he never sacrifices his deity, although at times he chooses not to exercise all the divine attributes available to him. As one who had to be “like his brothers and sisters in every way, so that he could become a merciful and faithful high priest in matters pertaining to God,” he is uniquely qualified to pay our sin debt (Heb. 2:17). 

In his physical resurrection, Jesus is the “firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Cor. 15:20). That is, he is the first to rise from the dead in a glorified body – an invincible body no longer subject to pain, sickness, aging, or death. And then he ascends to the Father in heaven, where he sits at the right hand of the Majesty on high, with angels, authorities, and powers subject to him (Heb. 1:3; 1 Pet. 3:22). Because of all this, followers of Jesus look forward to the day when we see him as he is and become like him (1 John 3:2). 

But what does the New Testament have to say about the angel of the LORD? If his role in the Old Testament is, at least in part, to prefigure his future incarnation and earthly ministry, then we would not expect to see Jesus in any form other than human after his conception in the virgin Mary’s womb. And that’s exactly what the pages of the New Testament reveal. 

While it is not impossible for the omnipresent Son of God to appear in various forms, even while in his mother’s womb and after his ascension into heaven, we never see the angel of the LORD in the New Testament. There are, however, several New Testament passages that subtly identify Jesus as the Old Testament’s angel of the LORD. 

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Article X of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000: Last things

Following is another in a series of columns on The Baptist Faith & Message 2000.

The world as we know it ends with the return of Jesus, but it’s not really the end of the world, for Christ creates new heavens and a new earth.

Article X of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000 reads:

“God, in His own time and in His own way, will bring the world to its appropriate end. According to His promise, Jesus Christ will return personally and visibly in glory to the earth; the dead will be raised; and Christ will judge all men in righteousness. The unrighteous will be consigned to Hell, the place of everlasting punishment. The righteous in their resurrected and glorified bodies will receive their reward and will dwell forever in Heaven with the Lord.”

Contemporary culture embraces the drama of a cataclysmic end of the world as we know it. In the 1979 film, Mad Max, a shortage of fossil fuels drives the breakdown of society, prompting leather-clad hoodlums in bizarre vehicles to terrorize anyone with a full tank of gas.

In Planet of the Apes, astronaut George Tayler discovers he has traveled through space and time, returning to an earth where humans are mute and loud-mouthed armor-wearing primates are in charge. 

And in Ray Bradbury’s short story, “August 2026: There Will Come Soft Rains,” a robotic house continues to serve its human tenants long after they have become burnt silhouettes on the wall, presumably the victims of a nuclear holocaust.

Whether entertaining or horrifying, the end of the world is a topic of great interest and much debate. World religions and cults often contrive detailed apocalyptic views, including specific dates that, when missed, leave their leaders red-faced and their followers asking neighbors to return the cookware they thought they would never need again.

Christians have reliable information about the end of days through God’s revelation in Scripture. And while we may vigorously debate the order of events surrounding the return of Christ, we can all agree on seven biblical truths about how the world ends.

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“Like the angel of the LORD”

The angel of the LORD is mentioned one last time in Zechariah:

On that day the LORD will defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that on that day the one who is weakest among them will be like David on that day, and the house of David will be like God, like the angel of the LORD, before them.

Zech. 12:8

While Zechariah 9-11 largely concerns Judah’s past and present circumstances, chapters 12-14 point to a glorious future for all Israel. The LORD tells the people “on that day” – a climactic future day mentioned sixteen times in Zechariah 12-14 – “the house of David will be like God, like the angel of the LORD.” This passage not only equates the angel of the LORD with God; it makes the audacious promise that the house of David will, in some way, be a manifestation of Yahweh.

Vern Poythress explains:

To a casual reader, this claim might seem improbable. But it turns out to be perfectly true in the time of fulfillment. “The house of David” has its fulfillment in Christ, who is descended from David and sums up the whole line of kings. He is the climactic and permanent theophany.

Theophany

New Testament writers focus on the Incarnation as fulfillment of God’s promise to come personally to us. Consider the apostle John’s testimony: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We observed his glory, the glory as the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). 

Later, Jesus confirms both his deity and his equality with God the Father: “Have I been among you all this time and you do not know me, Philip? The one who has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). 

And the writer of Hebrews sums up the eternal significance of Jesus this way: “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of his nature, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Heb. 1:3).

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Article IX of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000: The kingdom

Following is another in a series of columns on The Baptist Faith & Message 2000.

The kingdom is God’s reign, his authority to rule.

Article IX of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000 reads:

“The Kingdom of God includes both His general sovereignty over the universe and His particular kingship over men who willfully acknowledge Him as King. Particularly the Kingdom is the realm of salvation into which men enter by trustful, childlike commitment to Jesus Christ. Christians ought to pray and to labor that the Kingdom may come and God’s will be done on earth. The full consummation of the Kingdom awaits the return of Jesus Christ and the end of this age.”

The terms kingdom of God, kingdom of heaven, and kingdom (with reference to the kingdom of God/heaven) appear nearly 150 times in Scripture. None of these passages offers a straightforward definition of the kingdom. Yet the kingdom is proclaimed throughout the Old Testament and is the primary focus of Jesus’ teaching. 

Many of Jesus’ parables tell us what the kingdom is like. The apostles preach the gospel of the kingdom – the good news of redemption and restoration received through faith in Jesus Christ. And biblical prophecies of the last days point toward a time when God’s kingdom comes in its fullness.

So, what is the kingdom of God? Simply stated, the kingdom is God’s reign, his authority to rule. 

As George Ladd notes, “The primary meaning of both the Hebrew word malkuth in the Old Testament and of basileia in the New Testament is the rank, authority and sovereignty exercised by a king. A basileia may indeed be a realm over which a sovereign exercises authority; and it may be the people who belong to that realm and over whom authority is exercised; but these are secondary and derived meanings. First of all, a kingdom is the authority to rule, the sovereignty of the king.” 

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