An Exegetical Study of Matthew 28:16-20

An Exegetical Study of Matthew 28:16-20

by Karl Barth

55Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him they worshiped him; but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.’ MATTHEW 28:16-20

Here we have part of the New Testament testimony about events that took place during the forty days after Easter.

Let us recall what happened in those days according to the New Testament record. It was during this period that the purpose of Jesus’ life and death, and with it the mission of his followers, could for the first time be seen, heard, and grasped by men. It was the time of the Son’s coming in the glory of the Father, ushering in not more and not less than the approaching end of this world and the beginning of a new one. “To them he presented himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days, and speaking of the kingdom of God” (Acts 1:3). It became manifest in those forty days that neither the proclamation of God’s king56dom at hand, as first heralded by John the Baptist and later by Jesus himself, nor the miracles and signs accomplished by Jesus were empty words. The petition “Thy kingdom come” had not been uttered in vain after all; “this generation,” the generation of those alive at the time, was indeed not to pass away before “all these things” had taken place as foretold by Jesus according to Mark 13:30. It became manifest that some of the people who gathered around Jesus actually did not taste death before they had seen the kingdom of God come with power (Mk. 9:1). The disciples truly were not to go through all the towns of Israel before the Son of man came (Mt. 10:23). Now he came, and now “all these things” happened. Peter’s confession at Caesarea (Mt. 16:16), at the time premature, was now proven to be right and necessary. “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Right and necessary, therefore, was the name “Lord,” kyrios, which the disciples had given to their master. It became manifest, in other words, that the eschaton had really begun. All these things were revealed when Jesus, after his death and burial, rose from the tomb and appeared to his followers anew, thereby “coming again” already then and there. He appeared to them not in order to continue his ministry of teaching and healing so to speak during the second part of his earthly life, but to disclose the hitherto hidden purpose of his life and death to his followers and to give them the charge of proclaiming his Lordship and the kingdom now manifest before their eyes. This is, very briefly, the content of the Easter stories at the end of the four Gospels, at the beginning of the Book of Acts, and of 1 Corinthians 15. This is the fact of Easter.

Two preliminary observations about the form of these stories will facilitate our understanding.

1. We must be quite clear that these accounts relate a real event in space and time, and not just some thought or idea. They speak of an empty tomb (Mt. 27:62-66, 28:11-15), and of the newly visible, audible and touchable body of Jesus (Lk. Jn. 20:24 f.; 1 Jn. 1:1). These characteristics are all mentioned within the context of the story of Jesus and his followers, even of the history of the world (Pontius Pilate!). Christ’s appearance is in itself an historical moment, marking the end of all preceding, and the antecedent and the turning point of all coming events. To speak here of a “myth” would be to confuse categories. Easter is an absolutely unique event. We must immediately specify that this 57unique event is the beginning of a new heaven and a new earth (Rev. 21:1; 2 Pet. 3:13), of the Last Day, of the glory of God in the flesh (Jn. 1:14). It is the presence of the eschaton. Such an event could only be described in incomplete and contradictory terms, such as are used in the Easter narratives. Think of the relationship between the reports of Matthew and Luke, or of the Synoptics and John, or of the Gospels and 1 Corinthians. It is impossible to construe from these reports a history in our understanding of the term. The topographical and chronological precision is lacking. There is no clear differentiation of the various scenes and no corroboration by impartial witnesses of the events described. These narratives are recounted not in the style of history but, like the story of creation, in the style of historical saga. The content bars any attempt at harmonizing. All these narratives deal no doubt with a common subject and are in basic agreement. Yet each of them needs to be read independently, as a unique testimony of God’s decisive word and intervention at the turning point of the eons. Quite obviously each narrative needs to be consulted to clarify the others.

2. These texts speak of an “historically” inconceivable event, but do not mean that this event was subsequently interpreted or construed, much less invented by the faith and piety of the Church. They unequivocally refer to an event which laid the foundation of, and gave shape to, the faith of the emerging Christian community. The crux of it was that Jesus’ presence among his own revealed God to them. This revelation in Jesus’ presence, placing the faithful in the center of time, disclosed to them the past and the future will and work of God. It is therefore both a recapitulation of the history of Israel, culminating in the earthly life of Jesus, and an anticipation of the history of Jesus’ reign in the Church and in the whole world. God’s action, past and future, was present in those forty days as if it were still going on, or already going on.

One more preliminary remark about Matthew 28:16-20 as it relates to the other Easter stories. Two sets of narratives are to be distinguished among them.

1. The stories of Jesus and the women. These underscore the manifestation of the fact of the Resurrection (the empty tomb) and the identity of the risen Lord with the crucified (28:1-6 and 9). Add to it the charge to the women to tell the disciples what they had seen (28:7-8 and 10). This charge is particularly significant 58because, according to Mark 16:8, the women “said nothing to any one for they were afraid” and, according to Luke 24:11, their words seemed to the disciples ‘“‘an idle tale.” Incidentally this particular role of the women in relation to the disciples may be interpreted as an analogy of the relationship between the historical community of Israel and the now emerging Christian community of the end of time.

2. The stories of Jesus and the disciples. Here again the manifestation of the fact and of the identity (28:17-18; Lk. 24:37 f.; Jn. 20:19f.) is important. However, it is overshadowed by the charge to the disciples to go and tell the world what they had seen (28:19; Lk. 24:27; Jn. 20:21). The passage about Jesus and the disciples is missing in Mark’s original text. Mark 16:9—20 is a later addition. The charge to the disciples is validated by the pouring out of the Holy Spirit. John 20:22 indicates that the fourth evangelist understood Easter and Pentecost as one and the same event. In content, they most certainly belong together. Easter together with Pentecost, Pentecost together with Easter, constitute the gathering of God’s people at the end of time.

Our text clearly belongs to this second set of narratives about Jesus and his disciples. Parallel texts are Luke 24:36—49 and John 20:19-29. In addition Luke 24:13-35 relates the incident on the road to Emmaus; Luke 24:50—53 and Acts 1:4—12, the Ascension; John 21:1—23, the appearance at Lake Tiberias and the conversation with Peter. The Gospel according to Matthew, which offers the most coherent account, relates only the one appearance of Jesus before his disciples. To this we now turn our attention.

Verse 16

“The eleven disciples” (also Lk. 24:9, 33) are the first twelve of Jesus’ followers, whose number is temporarily diminished by the loss of Judas. They embody and represent the Israel of the end of time. These “eleven”—according to Biblical arithmetic!—equal “twelve,” for even in their incompleteness they account for the totality of Israel. 1 Corinthians 15:5 explicitly mentions Jesus’ appearance to the twelve. Judas could not impair the full number.

“… went to Galilee…” Significantly, Matthew leads Jesus’ history back to the place of its origin (Mt. 4:12-17); to the Galilee of the Gentiles, to the people who walked in darkness and have seen a great light. The history of the end stands in continuity with the 59previous events in the life of Jesus and the history of Israel, which in turn point to the end. (Luke transposes this scene to Jerusalem, to the life center of Israel, which is seen here—Lk. 24:47—as the point of departure for the eschatological proclamation to all nations.) Note how the two narratives, topographically incompatible and with different theological emphases, nevertheless agree in substance.

“…to the mountain…’ What mountain is referred to here—the mountain of the transfiguration or that of the Sermon on the Mount? (Cf. B. Weiss.) It might be better not to identify it geographically and merely think of a mountain opposite Mount Zion to the north.

“,..to which Jesus had directed them.” According to verse 7 it was the angel, according to verse 10 it was Jesus himself, by means of the women, who directed the disciples, “his brethren,” to go there. The order must have gone to the disciples, since now the eleven turn up. The combination with the appearance to the five hundred brethren (1 Cor. 15:6), as proposed by Olshausen and Schlatter, seems therefore unlikely.

Verse 17

“And when they saw him…” This seeing (iSdvres) implies that the revelation of the fact of Jesus’ resurrection and of the identity of the risen Lord with the crucified, earlier accorded to the women, is now to be granted to the disciples as well. The expression “he came” in verse 18, however, suggests for the time being a certain distance and objectivity of this revelation.

.. they worshiped him,” as did the women in verse 9, and as

all shall do again at the Ascension (Lk. 24:51). Thomas’ confession, “my Lord and my God,” serves as a necessary commentary. Worship is offered in the presence of the revealed God. Jesus encountered them as God, and they encounter him now as worshipers.

“… but some doubted”; as in Luke 24:37 f. and John 20:24 f. (Thomas has suffered great injustice at the hands of exegetes. His insistence upon touching the body of Jesus to relieve his doubt is quite normal and apostolic!) Older exegetes (Starke, Rieger, Olshausen) found it inadmissible to ascribe the doubt to the aspostles, and accordingly assumed the presence of others. But this is improbable in the light of verse 17. J. Weiss finds the phrase linguistically crude, disruptive, isolated, and “against the temper of 60this harmonious ending.” Yet the comparison with Luke and John indicates the necessity of the element of doubt even for Matthew. Calvin correctly interpreted: worship and doubt have a common cause; the servant figure of the man Jesus was garbed in the glory of God. Revelation always has a terminus a quo and a terminus ad quem. Veiled, it arouses doubt; unveiled, it commands worship. All of us waver again and again between the two. Rieger is therefore right when he says that this sentence was included “as a reminder that faith requires struggle. Don’t be surprised if your belief is a continuous conquest of unbelief.” This element of doubt to be conquered by faith is represented here by “some” (oi dé), as in John by Thomas, and in Luke by almost all apostles. Only the gift of the Holy Spirit puts an end to the struggle and casts out doubt. Doubting apostles and a doubting church after Pentecost truly have no place in the New Testament. Spiritus sanctus non est scepticus, said Luther. But here the apostles are only at the beginning. They stand in the shadow of the death of Christ. They reenact the doubtful role they displayed at the time of the Passion.

Verse 18

“And Jesus came and said to them”: with these words Matthew perhaps hints at the event of Pentecost, not mentioned elsewhere in his record. It is at any rate certain that when Jesus drew near the objective revelation was subjectively appropriated. Bengel comments, “eo ipso dubitantibus fidem faciens.” By approaching them Jesus awakened faith in the doubters! This, then, is the “sequence” to the doubting in verse 17 which J. Weiss missed. ~

authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.’”

According to the (oiv) of verse 19, this affirmation of power is the objective presupposition on the part of Jesus for the immediately following imperative. As the one described in verse 18, Jesus has the power and authority to address the disciples the way he does in verse 19. Hence the disciples’ carrying out of the charge will not at all be determined by the excellency and strength of their own will and work; nor will it be jeopardized by their deficiencies. Behind the command of verse 19 stands the commander himself, Jesus, as described in verse 18. He assures the execution of the command over against both the disciples’ weakness and any interference by a third party.

61éefovcia means “right and power” and corresponds to the Latin term potestas. The parallel is only seemingly missing in Luke. The fact that Jesus is invested with the highest authority as a guarantee for his command is also attested by Luke inasmuch as Jesus is there both the content and the interpreter of the Scriptures. According to Matthew’s version, Jesus’ prophecy to the high priests (26:64) has now been fulfilled, “Hereafter you will see the Son of man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven,” and with it Daniel 7:14, “To him was given dominion and glory and kingdom.” The kingdom is truly his, and he will deliver it to the Father (1 Cor. 15:24). God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him a name above every name, the name of kyrios, that at this name every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth (Phil. 2:9 f.). He disarmed, according to 1 Corinthians 15:24 even destroyed, the principalities and powers and made a public example of them, triumphing over them in him (Col. 2:15). He is “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in that which is to come.” God “has put all things under his feet” (Eph. 1:21-22). “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever” (Rev. 11:15). What does all this mean? It means that the divine claim to all things created in heaven and on earth is, very concretely, Jesus’ claim; the divine authority is Jesus’ authority; the divine acting, ruling, and judging is Jesus’ affair. As the holder of this ééovcia Jesus stands behind the command in verse 19; he is the authority to those whom he sends out, and as such guarantees the implementation of the command to the disciples as well as against interference of third parties. Those who accept the command fall under this éfovoia; they are responsible to and covered by this authority.

All authority in heaven and on earth! This affirmation i is exclusive. Objectively speaking, there is no authority besides the authority of Jesus. All power, all right, belongs to Jesus. Remaining are only principalities and powers already subjected to him, of which he is the head (Col. 2:10). There are therefore no such things as natural law and natural power, asserting their own domain over against Jesus’, deserving homage, trust, fear, and obedience in their own right. Thus it is impossible to postulate, on the basis of 62the éovola (Rom. 13:1f.) a secular power instituted by God alongside the kingdom of Christ, a political realm that would not be included in the kingdom of Christ.

But who is the holder of such éovela? Because all authority has been “given” to him we are prevented from thinking in the abstract of an eternal, nonincarnate Son of God, of the Adyos doapxos. To him authority need not be given; he holds it from eternity to eternity. The New Testament constantly speaks of this Son of God, yet never abstractly. The eternal Son is always man at the same time. Of him our text speaks. To the man Jesus is given the é£ovoia. The man Jesus is the commanding Lord in verse 19.

That all authority has been “given” to him must however not be interpreted to mean that he received it only in his resurrection. Such an assumption is refuted by a number of very clear texts in the Gospels where the affirmation made in verse 18 undeniably refers to Jesus before his death. “‘All things have been delivered to me by my Father’” (Mt. 11:27). “The Father… has given all things into his hand” (Jn. 3:35). Jesus knew “that the Father had given all things into his hands” (Jn. 13:3). “‘Thou hast given him power over all flesh’” (Jn. 17:2). “He taught them as one who had authority” (Mt. 7:29). ““The Son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins’ (Mt. 9:6). See also Matthew 21:23 f. égovoia is given to the man Jesus as divine authority can alone be given to a human creature. Only when man prays for it, believes in God, is obedient to Him, is it given as free grace. Because God’s free grace is eternal, authority is given everlastingly; potentially in God’s design to create and save the world, actually in the incarnation of the Word. “Er ist ein Kindlein worden klein, der alle Ding erhilt allein.” By forgiving sins and accomplishing signs and miracles, Jesus made at least a partly visible use of his authority long before his resurrection. There was never a time when he was devoid of it. His “emptying himself” (Phil. 2:7) was nothing but the hiddenness of his majesty, caused by human blindness. What he achieved in the state of utmost weakness, his death upon the cross, was truly a manifestation of his might. “Sa divinité se tenoit pour un peu de temps comme cachée, c’est a dire elle ne démonstroit point sa vertu” (Calvin). In the Resurrection, however, Jesus reveals himself to the disciples as the one who held, holds, and will hold all authority, a fact that had hitherto been hidden from the disciples 63as well as from the world. It is of this revelation of the risen Lord that verse 18 speaks.

Verses 19-20a

This is the crucial affirmation of the whole text. It is the charge and commission of the risen Jesus, the authority for which was asserted in verse 18.

“Go therefore and make disciples…” Make them what you yourselves are! Have them learn here, with me, where you yourselves have learned! Call them into the twelve of the eschatological Israel! Let them share in its place and task in the world!

We have already noticed the strangeness of Biblical arithmetic. The twelve are designed to be countless. In the same manner as Jesus “made” apostles from the first disciples (Mk. 3:14-15), the apostles are called to make apostolic Christians of all others. The kingly ministry of the Messiah is here entrusted to the first disciples constituting the king’s troops.

The sweeping imperative, “Go therefore,” rests on the authority which is given to Jesus. As soon as his authority is announced in verse 18 there follows the charge, “make disciples!” The reminiscence of the “sending” in Matthew 10 and of its parallel in Mark 16:15, “‘Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation,” largely obscures the peculiarity of our text. The same reality is envisaged here as in chapter 10. Yet there it appears in its implicit and hidden form, while here in its explicit and visible form. In both instances the founding, through Jesus’ word, of the apostolic Church is envisaged. It is the Church that receives the apostles’ word and actively transmits it. ““As the Father has sent me, even so I send you’” (Jn. 20:21). This apostolic Church, existing not for itself, but “for Christ,” on behalf of him (2 Cor. 5:20), is the decisive event of the eschaton that has broken into time. The existence of the new community consists not only in the apostles’ preaching of the Gospel and their fellow men’s listening. It is constantly renewed as the listeners themselves become “apostolic” and, as new disciples, begin to proclaim the good news. Consequently the charge is not only xypvéare but pafyretoare, “make disciples.” John 17:20-23 might well be the appropriate commentary to this charge. “‘I do not pray for these only, but also for those who are to believe in me through their word, that they may all be one; even 64as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that thou hast sent me… and hast loved them even as thou hast loved me.’”

And now the great problem of our text:

nations…” wévra 7a €6vn. On the basis of these words

the text is called “the great commission.” What does “all nations” mean?

It means, first of all, people from among all nations who are received into discipleship. They become significant for the existence of their respective nations because the nations now come within reach of the apostolate and its proclamation and receive their concealed center through the Christian community living in their midst. Note the airovs, which occurs twice. It cannot refer to Not the nations as such are made disciples. This interpretation once infested missionary thinking and was connected with the painful fantasies of the German Christians. It is worthless.

“All nations” means, furthermore, people from Gentile lands, from the goyim. This does not exclude Israel. Her right of the first-born, her dignitas primogeniturae, as Calvin called it, remains unimpaired. Yet the disciples are summoned to go out to the Gentile people and nations. For now the eschatological Israel shall appear, the people gathered by the Messiah who appeared at the end of time. This is the new eschatological community. It is gathered from among the Jews and Gentiles. The doors and windows of the house of Israel, so far closed, must open. The apostles’ mission is “‘to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Rom. 1:16). Accordingly, Mark 16:15 states, “‘Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation.’ Matthew expresses the same idea, only in more concrete terms, when he speaks of “all nations.” Through this mission the community of Jesus becomes manifest in his resurrection as the universal community. It is the eschatological Israel, the Israel which receives into its life and history the chosen ones from among the Gentiles. In fact it had never been anything else. Even during his life before death Jesus had never given it any other foundation than that which now became apparent: not as a special community within Israel, and hence not as a new form of the previous Israel in history, but as the Israel of the end of time, fulfilling the destiny of the historical Israel, as “a covenant to the people, a light to the nations” (Is. 42:6, 49:8). It is important to see this. Already the relationship to verse 18 and its parallels rules out any 65limitation of Jesus’ dominion. How could he, to whom all power is given, have ever intended founding a pious little Jewish club? The name of the “Son of man” is the name of him whom “all peoples, nations, and languages” shall serve (Dan. 7:14). The field where the Son of man sows the good seed is the world (Mt. 13:38). The ransom for many (dvri Mk. 10:45) and the shedding of blood for many certainly imply Jesus’ identification with the suffering servant of God in Isaiah 53 (sce in particular verses 11-12). Of him it is said, “‘It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth’” (Is. 49:6). “He shall be exalted and lifted up, and shall be very high. … So shall he startle many nations; kings shall shut their mouths because of him” (Is. 52:13 f.). From the very beginning Jesus calls his disciples “the salt of the earth” and “the light of the world” (Mt. 5:13-14). Already John the Baptist had proclaimed that God would raise up children to Abraham from the stones (Mt. 3:9). Jesus himself spoke of the many that will come from east and west and sit at table with the patriarchs (Mt. 8:11); of the angels whom the Son of man shall send out at the Parousia to gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other (Mt. 24:31; see also 25:31-.); of the servants that will go out to the streets and gather all they find, both bad and good (Mt. 22:9 f.); even of the testimony his disciples will bear also before the Gentiles (Mt. 10:18).

Jesus at first kept this universality of the new community relatively hidden, as he did with the power and authority given him (verse 18), and with the name of Messiah (Mt. 16:20). Why? The previous, historical, Israel had not yet run its course before Jesus’ death. His life had not yet been spent as a ransom for many. Not everything was ready yet. The table had not been set. The guests could not yet be invited. Israel was not yet fully prepared to fulfill its eschatological mission. Aware of this “not yet,” Jesus understood his mission to be—temporarily—to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. But even as he pronounced this rule, he made an exception (Mt. 15:24). In the very strange passage of Mark 4:10—12 an even stricter rule is announced. Initially he did “not yet” address himself directly and properly to the whole people of Israel, but only to his disciples. Aware of this “not yet” he charged his 66disciples to go—temporarily—nowhere among the Gentiles and to enter no town of the Samaritans (Mt. 10:5). This “not yet” again overshadows the relative seclusion of the primitive apostles in Jerusalem. They had first to overcome their reluctance to get in touch with the Gentiles (Acts 10), and finally entrusted Paul with the mission to the Gentiles (Gal. 2). Nevertheless, while this “not yet” casts its shadows even over the time after Easter, it was in fact overcome. The great turning point in history had since been marked. The “delivering” of Jesus to the Gentiles, foretold in the second and third announcements of his imminent suffering, had taken place (Mt. 27:2). This event separates the times. Now the eschatological Israel begins. Jesus’ rejection by the Jews becomes the offer of grace to the Gentiles. In the rejection and death of its Messiah, the history of Israel has reached its end and goal; the hidden church of Jews and Gentiles awaits its revelation. The messianic Israel is in fact revealed by the words of verse 19. What does it matter if the revelation was apparently not fully realized right away? The number twelve of the eschatological Israel is even externally again complete by the addition of Paul. The activity of the apostles must set in with this very revelation: “Make disciples of all nations.”

This “all nations” in no way contradicts the earlier teaching and practice of Jesus. The narrow path within Israel had to branch out into the wide world of all nations, and the inroad into the wide world had to begin as the narrow path within Israel. “Salvation is from the Jews” (Jn. 4:22). From the Jews—this is the first, limited, and hidden form of the eschatological community, represented by the eleven. Salvation comes from the Jews—to the Gentiles—this is its second, unlimited, and manifest form, represented by the eleven plus one.

To say that the primitive apostles acted as if they had not heard the Great Commission (J. Weiss, Klostermann) is misleading. Already the eleven, as Jesus saw and addressed them, are the eleven plus one who shall carry out the mission. The Church as a body will obey the command: its proclamation, first exclusively addressed to Israel, is immediately understood by the Jews of all lands in their own language (Acts 2:6f.). Spread by Paul, the twelfth apostle, it becomes the message to the Gentiles.

It is therefore not necessary to draw upon the assumption of a “backward projection on the part of the later Church” (Kloster67mann) in order to explain verse 19. Nor do we have to declare the commission as “interpolated,” to justify the mission to the Gentiles by the “supra- -Jewish substance of the Gospel,” and to find its Magna Charta in the history of “early Christian missions” (J. Weiss). As recapitulation and anticipation, revealing the hidden reality of the eschatological community, the Great Commission is truly the most genuine utterance of the risen Jesus.

. baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son

and of the Holy Spirit.” The making of disciples is achieved by baptism and teaching.

Baptizing is the priestly function of objectively introducing others into the realm of God’s reign. Initially it is the function of Jesus himself. Yet here he transmits it to his first disciples after he had them taste in advance the fruit of his sacrificial death—at the Last Supper—and then had suffered death.

Baptizing in a name meant, in the Jewish custom of the day, to administer to someone a cleansing bath intended to certify a state to be attained. A Gentile slave, for instance, was administered baptism as a sign of his liberation when he left. Baptizing in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit means to give to someone the cleansing bath which certifies to him and to others that he belongs to this God. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, then, are for him what the name of the triune God really stands for. He in turn has to confess and to confirm that he belongs to this God.

Some special observations:

1. If the BD reading² Banricayres (“after having baptized them’) were correct, the administering of baptism would only be a secondary task to laying the groundwork for the task of teaching.

2. The text does not propose a liturgical—to be used for baptism (as maintained by Zahn). Baptism “in the name of Jesus Christ” (Acts 2:38) therefore does not speak against the authenticity of the text (as has been suggested by J. Weiss).

3. Stress is laid, not on the act of baptizing itself, since cleansing rites attesting initiation were a current Jewish practice of the time; rather, the emphasis is on the particular kind of baptism the disciples are asked to administer. A Gentile becomes a disciple when 68he is assured of his belonging to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

4, The external act of baptizing is a signum pro re. The disciples are commanded, and therefore they expect to be able, to bring about the state of affairs to be certified. By the intermediary of the disciples the Gentiles shall be joined with those who belong to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, thereby becoming themselves disciples. Luke 24:47 explains the meaning of this incorporation. Repentance and the forgiveness of sin shall be preached to the Gentiles in Jesus’ name. They become disciples as sinners who, set free by God and thankful to God, are wrenched from the separation from God.

The command to baptize is to be understood in the same light. It is the transferral of the messianic power of Jesus, the priest of all men, to Peter. “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven” (Mt. 16:19), a most genuine word of the risen Lord. Genuine and very significant, furthermore, is the invocation of the name of the triune God at the very moment when the universal existence of the apostolic Church at the end of time is revealed. This is the only place in the New Testament where this name is invoked with such simplicity (cf. 1 Cor. 12:4-6; 2 Cor. 13:13; 2 Thess. 2:13—14; Eph. 4:4—6; 1 Pet. 1:2).

“,.. teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” As baptism constitutes the existence and the nature of discipleship, teaching constitutes the ways and works of the disciples.

“Teaching,” Sddoxew, is the function of the prophet and teacher by preaching and instruction. Now Jesus appoints his disciples to this teaching office. To become a Christian means to become a Christ to others by participating in Christ’s kingly, priestly, and prophetic ministry. The apostles accede to this ministry after passing through the crisis, i.e., through their failure during the Passion when their apostleship, humanly speaking, had become utterly discredited. They had failed in rypeiv, in observing what Jesus had commanded them. Yet without inquiring into the validity of their conversion (see, however, Lk. 22:32), Jesus freely entrusts them, the undeserving, with teaching the Gentiles this “observance,” and with guiding them in the ways and works of disciples. means “to keep,” “to preserve,” to protect something entrusted to one’s care.)

“… all that I have commanded you.” What did Jesus command them to do? To follow him, in order “to be with him” (Mk. 3:14). 69They are to live within the earthly confines of the kingdom of God and to submit to the order of life established there. All this not as an end in itself, for the sake of their own personal morals and salvation or of the well-being of society, but that the order of service be preserved which he had given them, his heralds and apostles. All “baptized” become eo ipso subservient to this order of service, the very foundation of the Christian community. They in turn need to be called to acknowledge, to keep, and to confirm their belonging to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They need to be nurtured in this service in order that their works may become those of disciples and a Christian community may exist in the world. It exists only where the things commanded by Jesus are “observed.” This nurturing of the Gentiles who, by baptism, become servants of the triune God, is the task of the apostles. As the witnesses to Jesus’ life and resurrection, they are entrusted with the task for all times and in all places. All others receive it only from them, secondhand. The apostles, and they alone, are called to teach in the Church. For there is no room in the Church for any other object of rypev but the one commanded by Jesus to the apostles. What they have been commanded, they must teach without omission, the whole content of the order of service. This is the New Testament affirmation of the self-sufficiency of the Scriptures, the crossroad where we must part from the Roman Catholic Church. Teaching in the Church can only be repetitive of apostolic teaching.

There remains one more question with regard to verses 19—20a. What about the explicitly stated task (Mt. 10:8 f.) to heal the sick, to raise the dead, to make clean the lepers, to cast out evil spirits? We know from Acts and from several Letters that such special. “gifts,” though not widespread, were not lacking in the later Church. Nevertheless, the part of Jesus’ commandment dealing with doing signs has been fulfilled and become superfluous with the Resurrection of Jesus, the sign of signs. Signs may happen again. But they cannot be postulated as essential marks of the eschatological community. In its past, the forty days, as in its future, the Second Coming, this community is surrounded by the one “sion of the Son of man.” When in Mark 16:17 ff. the gift of “accompanying” signs is declared to be an almost indispensable attribute of faith, it only shows the noncanonical character of that text. The task of the apostles, and therefore also of the apostolic 70Church, consists in baptizing and teaching in the light of this sign—in the light of Easter morning, in the light of “the hope laid up for you in heaven” (Col. 1:5).

Verse 20b

“And lo, I am with you…” The Church of the eschaton which broke into time and now is manifest and recognized is not left alone. Its founder possesses not in vain all authority in heaven and on earth (verse 18). “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Mt. 18:20). Jesus himself, with all his power and authority, stands behind the apostles when they carry out his command and commission. ‘““He who hears you hears me” (Lk. 10:16). “So every one who acknowledges me before man, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven” (Mt. 10:32). Ergo nunquam plane exspirabit ecclesia christiana (Bengel). This is why the Christian Church can never speak or act on its own authority and for its own cause. The selfseeking and self-exalting idea of the Roman Catholic Church is thereby attacked at the very roots.

“I am with you” is, according to Genesis 28:15; Judges 6:12; Haggai 1:13, the affirrnation of the immediate presence of God. In making it, Jesus once more says who he is. “I am with you.” This is not to say that he will always be with his people in the same way as he is now. These forty days are unique, only to be compared with the return in glory which, rightly understood, begins already with the forty days. However, the Church between Ascension and Second Coming is not without a master. And because the Church is in the world, the world is not without a master either. The Church has no right to consider the world as “masterless,” merely neutral or even hostile, or else it has not grasped Jesus’ “with you.”

“J am with you”: in remembrance of my past life, death and resurrection, I speak and act today. In the Holy Spirit I fill and tule the present, any present, with my word. I will come with the future, any future. I stand at the door and knock. With my past, my present, and my future J shall be with you evermore.

This is the promise of the risen Lord, covering the time beyond the forty days. It is the point of departure for the subsequent events at the end of time. As the apostles receive and grasp this promise and stand on this firm ground, they are the rock on which Jesus builds his church, stronger than the gates of Hades.

71“…to the close of the age.” We must reckon with three different times or ages. From creation to the appearance of Christ: the time as it passes, and is actually past, with the appearance of Christ. From Christ’s appearance to his return in glory: the eschaton as revealed in Christ’s resurrection. From his return in glory into eternity: God’s own eternal time in which the temporal is suspended. Accordingly, the close of the age,” of this age, must signify until the time when the eschaton, ushered in with the appearance of Christ, will have run its course, when the universe will be subjected to God’s reign, when the distinct reign of Christ will come to an end, and God will be everything to everyone (1 Cor. 15:27 f.). Because of Jesus’ presence, the sum and substance of our text, the Great Commission of the risen Lord to baptize and evangelize is valid throughout the days of this “last” age.

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