“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.” (Matthew 28:19-20) As believers in Christ, our life motto seems to be to live out these verses, and often we get extremely discouraged when we feel as if we are not fulfilling this Great Commission. However, it is okay when we have a Gospel conversation with someone, and they do not get “saved.”
Salvation does not come through us, but only through Jesus Christ. In 1 Corinthians 3 Paul talks about how he planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. We as Christians are going to plant a lot of seeds and water a lot of seeds, and we need to recognize that the only one that can convict the heart of the need for salvation is the Holy Spirit. That moment also may not happen for that individual until way later in life, and you may not get to see the growth in that person until you get to heaven and that is entirely okay.
So you might be thinking to yourself why even share the Gospel then if God does all the work? Well first off, Christ commands it which is seen in the very first sentence of this article. Secondly, man needs it. We are lost and hopeless without the Gospel, and nobody is going to get saved unless we share it with those that don’t believe and lastly God is glorified by it because it is an act of worship and obedience to the Lord.
However, we must be aware that evangelism, or sharing the Gospel, is not all that Christ commands in these verses. He commands to make disciples, and that is where we lack as believers in Christ. Sometimes we can easily give a Gospel presentation or invite someone to church but once they are actually “saved” we think they are ready to go and move on to the next. We leave many baby Christians behind and never teach them how to live out their faith and be true disciples of Christ. This is part of the Great Commission too, not just the sinner’s prayer. So know that we as Christians can never “save” anyone but don’t be discouraged by that. If you want to be discouraged by something, be discouraged by the lack of discipleship happening within the body of Christ today and then do something about it by going out and being a true disciple.
