THE BOOK OF ACTS:

How come we do not find the apostles telling

the believers to ‘go preach into all the world’ ?

 

By  Jan Lilleby

 

 

There are few believers who will make a serious scrutinising reflection in studying the Bible, to find out how everything is regarding the gospel, and how things really was when it first got introduced.

 

Reading the Acts, it is unfortunately obvious to any sincere student of the Bible, that the average Christian believer is totally unaware of the fact that not anyone among the apostles ever told any of their believers to ‘go into all the world and preach the gospel’!  That is, passing the so-called ‘Great Commission’ on to every following generation of believers. As if the commission was given to each and everyone of the believers in the days of the apostles, and onward…up to this present time.

 

Studying the Bible will show us that the commission was exclusively for the apostles and their co-workers. No doubt.

 

Stop for a few seconds and think through my issue: Why are we reading to the candidates for a ministry to do missionary work, Matt. 28:18-20 or Mark 16:15-20, when we cannot find any of the apostles doing this?  The speeches referred to by Luke in Acts have no word of the apostles telling their believers to ‘go into the entire world’. For even if it is true that the four gospels were not written until after Israel had fallen from God, the apostles did recall to utmost detail the exact words of Jesus as He taught them (Acts 1:3).

 

Some Christians have thought that the command of Jesus to be ‘keeping my commandments and everything I have taught you’ must mean that we should go telling every believer to ‘go into all the world preaching’.  But Jesus spoke of the doctrine of faith, and not the work-order itself.  They were told to teach only the doctrine they had learned from Jesus. For why else would Jesus make a special appointment with only the eleven to meet with Him in Galilee?

 

The apostles are referred to by Luke, quoting their speeches through Acts, as I have selected:

 

Acts 2:14-40 – Peter and his famous Pentecost speech, to make Israel repent to Messiah Jesus, so they could have the promised kingdom on earth established as Jesus had promised to come again as soon as the nation had obeyed the apostles.

 

Should Peter had told these over 3000 new believers shortly after Pentecost, to ‘go you into all the world and preach’, then Luke would certainly have referred any such speech or exortation. But there is nothing of any such doctrine!

 

Acts 3:12-26 and Acts 4 – Peter, John and the brethren as they explained many details of the gospel of the kingdom on earth, before the amazed viewers of a miraculous healing, and defending themselves against the stern accusations of the priesthood thereafter – and Luke also describing some of the reactions among the members of the Jerusalem assembly. But not one word about any doctrine going out from the apostles telling the general believers to ‘go into the entire world and preach’.  It is obvious to us that they took the ‘Great Commission’ as an order that exclusively regarded them only, all twelve of them after Matthias had been chosen to go with them.

 

All the rest of the referred speeches in Acts, including also Paul and his co-workers as time went by and God had the offer to Israel to have their promised kingdom on earth extended out into the empire outside of the land of Israel – are likewise – no word to the common believer to follow the ‘Great Commission’.  There was absolutely no vast progress of electing and sending out numerous ‘apostles’ or ‘evangelists’ in all of the timeline of Acts epistle. There are no Biblical reports of hordes of evangelists and missionaries flooding into the empire during the 30 years of Acts history and events. Neither do we find any such phenomenon before Paul had his co-workers taking the new message out as he was in jail in Rome. We read of a short period of freedom when he went to Crete with Titus, asking Titus thereafter to establish the assemblies with a leadership of elders (not apostles & prophets).

 

So why are we using Matt 28 and Mark 16 to establish a doctrine with which we send out missionaries around the world, when the apostles did not do this?

 

Let’s remind ourselves of the historical facts: The gospel of Matthew with its ‘Great Commission’ was not written and published before AD 68, as the Jewish rebellion was 2 years old. This is the oldest of the four gospels. No common believer had any idea of each and every detail in this Hebrew gospel…other than the speeches held by the apostles, in which the emphasise always was on the fact that Jesus is Messiah and He shall come again to establish His Kingdom on earth, and Jerusalem (Throne of David) shall be His place of reign.  For this to take place – in the lifetime of the apostles – all Israel had to repent.

 

There existed no written doctrine like the four gospels during all the time (30 years+) of Acts events described.

 

The words spoken by Paul to the Jewish community in Rome AD 60-62 as we read in Acts 28:25-31 are the very last words spoken to Israel by God. After Paul quoted them Isaiah 6 (judgement) on Israel’s punishment, the Bible is entirely silent – there is no word from God to Israel after that.

 

Israel fell from God and He had to surrender them to destruction. As a matter of fact, the apostles were already finished with their work of preaching the promised kingdom on earth to Israel, as the year AD 62 came. This because the ‘client’ – Israel, were no longer God’s nation, He had cut all contact, and now shortly the destruction prophesied by Moses and the prophets, as well as Jesus and His apostles, would hit against them…the revenge of the Lord because of the murders and persecutions committed against them (Matt 22:7; Luke 13 and the dead fig tree; Deut 28:68 and Israel returned as slaves to Egypt by sea vessels, but no one would buy, etc. - fulfilled AD 70-71).

 

The apostles, from AD 62 onward, had to be obedient to the new revelation given to Paul for us – the free grace of God, without Israel as a mediator. No more ‘Jews first, then Greek’ after the fall of Israel in AD 62 (Col 3:11).

 

The new revelation is thoroughly taught by Paul in the epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians, - and also the epistles to Titus, Philemon and the second epistle to Timothy were written in light of this new revelation – ‘one new man’ in Christ, placed in heaven up above the heavens (Greek: epiuranus). The Body of Christ, and He as the Head of His body, the Church revealed from a mystery which had been hidden and kept fully secret in God from before the creation of this world (Eph. 3:1-9; Col 1:25,26).

 

While the 12 apostles – from Pentecost AD 32 to AD 62 when Paul was given this new revelation from God – preached and taught the kingdom-gospel to Israel within the nation’s natural borderlines, - Paul in AD 43 was sent out by the Holy Spirit together with Barnabas to preach the very same offer of the earthly kingdom, to the Jews and proselytes in the dispersion, starting with Galatia and later on over to several of the larger provinces of the Empire. Paul did this ministry until it ended in Rome AD 62 as we read Acts 28:31.

 

None of the referred speeches in Acts held by Peter, Stephen, Jacob and Paul have any word of commanding the common believer to ‘go out into the entire world and preach’.

 

The reason is obvious: The command to Peter and the other apostles was given exclusively to them, and no others. Only Philip and Stephen are mentioned as preachers/evangelists  and as such they were submitted the ministry of the twelve.  Neither do we find Paul, Barnabas, Silas, Timothy, Titus and others, as people that taught the common believer to ‘go out into all the world and preach’ – while the kingdom still was offered to Israel and the nation still had not fallen away (they had only stumbled, see Rom 11:11, thus far in time, AD 58).

 

It was not before the Mystery mentioned by Paul in Eph. 3, that any word from God came that would imply every single believer and our common task – as I quote Eph. 3:9:

 

‘Also to enlighten ALL MEN and make plain to them what is the plan of the mystery kept hidden through the ages and concealed UNTIL NOW (AD 62, as Paul wrote this) in God Who created all things by Christ Jesus.’

 

When we read the four gospels (Matthew AD 68, Mark AD 73, Luke AD 75 and John AD 97), all writers wrote in past tense!  Last sentence of Mark’s gospel, for instance, tells us very shortly what Luke used the entire 28 chapters of Acts to tell us:

 

‘And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord kept working with them and confirming the message by the attesting signs and miracles that closely accompanied. Amen.’

 

When checking in Acts exactly where ‘everywhere’ was, regarding Mark 16:20, we find that the twelve preached everywhere within the natural borders and land of Israel.  And even if Paul went on outside Israel, he went exclusively to ‘Jews first, then Greek’ – never did he offer the kingdom to any raw unconverted gentile.  He allowed the Greek who already had been with the Jews in their synagogues, to receive Jesus as Messiah, becoming members of the Messianic assembly under the new covenant to Israel.

 

We read of a commission that once was started at Pentecost, and ended …if not before, at least when the Jewish rebellion arose in AD 66 in Jerusalem – shortly after the assembly had escaped to the little town of Pella – since Jacob was killed by the priesthood.  The separate commission we read of is the one given Paul and Barnabas by the Holy Spirit as they worked in Antioch in Syria AD 43, telling them to go to the Jews and proselytes (greek) in the empire outside Israel. Through personal visions and revelations given Paul during his ministry found in Acts, Jesus had the apostle preach the kingdom to Jews and proselytes, until he was stopped by the final revelation: The revelation of the Mystery, containing the Church dispensation, the ‘one new man’ in Christ, Jews and gentiles alike, because Israel had fallen away from God.

 

Eph. 3:9 is the real commission given the Church, and not the other commissions.

 

The other commissions were only for Israel, so they could have the promised kingdom on earth, the millennial kingdom spoken of by the prophets, and confirmed by Jesus and the twelve apostles, and later on by Paul.

 

The offer to Israel to have the millennial kingdom shall once again be preached to them, starting with Elijah coming from heaven before the great tribulation of Matt 24 emerges. But before this can happen, God shall conclude and end the present Church dispensation.

 

The Church, the ‘one new man’ in Christ shall be appearing with Christ in glory, in heaven.  Col 3:4.  Our promise of salvation does not contain any millennial kingdom on earth, for that kingdom is for Israel and proselytes only. We are promised heaven where Christ is sitting by the right hand of God His Father.

 

This article is based upon a wider exposition originally made in Norwegian, thus making a short concentrated version of that.

 

Bible verses quoted are from Amplified Bible.