"Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:19, 20).

There are few passages of Scripture more familiar to Christians than these words of our Lord Jesus Christ recorded in the 28th chapter of Matthew. In our age, in fact, they are perhaps too familiar. They are so familiar that many who claim to follow Christ have forgotten their significance, weakened their impact, and narrowed their scope. 20th century evangelicalism has lost sight of the greatness of Christ's Great Commission. To most Christians of the 1990's, the scope of the Great Commission has been reduced from the glorious task of bringing entire nations into subjection to Jesus Christ to the futile task of an evangelical mandate doomed to failure.