“Accomplishing the Great Commission will not be easy, but we’ve been commanded by God to take the gospel to all people groups.” — David Platt
In his message at TGC's 2021 National Conference, David Platt urges local church leaders and pastors to prioritize the 3 billion unreached people across the globe. He reminds these leaders that God has commanded their obedience in the Great Commission for the sake of his global glory.
Platt gives 10 ways church leaders and pastors can shepherd their people to obey this command:
1. Preach the unfading Word of God in view of the unreached world.
2. Call people to a supreme love of Jesus and radical identification with him, for missions is the overflow of that.
3. Reorient local discipleship around the global purpose of God.
4. Train and empower people to make biblical disciples and multiply biblical churches without dependence on performances, programs, and professionals.
5. Lead the church to pray and fast for that which can only be accomplished by the Spirit.
6. Send missionaries to the unreached from your local church.
7. Promote multiple avenues for people to go to the unreached (on short-, mid-, and long-term trips).
8. Give wisely, generously, and sacrificially from the local church to missions.
9. Prioritize urgent spiritual needs in the world, while providing for physical needs.
10. Prepare people to suffer and die and shepherd them amid suffering and death as they make disciples among all the nations.
Platt ends with an exhortation that we're not living for this world—we have an enduring city to come. Platt says when our eyes are fixed on eternity and on Christ, whatever the Lord calls us to do for the sake of his name makes sense.
