By His grace, what the radical life of Christ should look in an American context!

Mark 1:8 – This is the baptism we must have, that of the Holy Spirit. If we have not been baptized with the Holy Spirit we are not His. We must receive this baptism from Him and He is the only one who can baptize us in this manner. He is the only one who can put His Holy Spirit in us.

1 Corinthians 1:17 – Paul was not sent to baptize, but to preach the gospel. What does he mean by this statement? Truly, Jesus has commanded us to ‘go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them’ so why does Paul claim he was not sent out to baptize?

Paul was pointing out simply this, that his primary mission was to preach the gospel, for they cannot hear without a preacher, baptize is secondary to the preaching of the gospel. Baptism is not the goal of our work, preaching the gospel is. Yes, baptism is part of the work, but not the primary work itself.

Psalm 72:8 – Why do we preach the gospel and ‘making disciples, baptizing them’? We do so because we want to see God’s dominion extend not only from one of our borders to the other, but because we want to see God’s dominion extend to the ends of the earth. His dominion extends as we preach the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Psalm 72:11 – My heart’s desire is that all the rulers and leaders of the nations would bow their heads and serve Jesus Christ.

Psalm 72:14 – Those who are poor, needy, weak, oppressed, and outcast have a refuge and solace from the wickedness of this world. Christ sees their lives as precious. He will deliver them and have pity on them and save them and be their help. He did/does this by redemption.

Factually, we must all come to the place in which we see ourselves as the needy, poor, weak, oppressed, outcasts that we are so that we will seek the redemption that can only be found in Christ alone.

Psalm 72:17 – The day is coming in which all people on earth will call this Jesus, whom they have despised and rejected and whose people they have tortured, oppressed, and killed…they will indeed call Him blessed and I cannot wait to see that day!

Joshua 1:3 – Joshua was to lead the people to claim their inheritance. Everywhere they stepped would be an extension of God’s dominion. We have the same promise, except we are not moving into the promised land, instead we are moving into the promised world (Psalm 2:8). All the nations to the ends of the earth are now the promised inheritance of Christ Jesus, our King. We extend His dominion as we preach the gospel and everywhere we place our foot we are staking a claim for His gospel to have dominion.

Joshua 1:9 – In order to properly understand the promise of this verse, one must properly understand the verse prior. Joshua was to be focused on God’s word and on God’s mission. As long as Joshua was in God’s word and on God’s mission, God would be with him. This calls to my mind Jesus’ talk about the vine and the branches in John 17:1-5.

So long as we are “in” Christ, abiding in Him (the Word of God) we will be on His mission for the nations, to the ends of the earth, and He will be with us.

Joshua 2:9 – I’m amazed at what sort of people we find in the pages of Scripture who are drawn to the life of faith. Not a single philosopher or scholar of Jericho was drawn to the life of faith. Yet this prostitute is the one who is drawn to the life of faith and is eventually grafted in to even the very lineage of Jesus Christ.