Jesus is our Lord and He is the Christ of God, so He has the standing to commission us for His gospel.
After all authority had been given to Him in heaven and on earth for the establishing of the kingdom of the heavens, the Lord as the King-Savior commissioned His disciples to go and disciple all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to observe all that He had commanded them, to make them citizens of His kingdom of the heavens (Matt. 28:18-20). Christ is the King. All the authority in heaven and on earth, in the whole universe, has been given to God’s Christ. This authority given to Christ is for the establishing of the kingdom of the heavens. In Matthew the Lord is the King-Savior who commissioned His disciples to go and disciple the nations by baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. This is to bring the people out from the nations into the Triune God. The intrinsic purpose of our preaching the gospel is to bring people of the nations into the Triune God, to make them the citizens of the kingdom of the heavens.
Many in Christianity say that to preach the gospel is for winning souls. But there is no mention of winning souls in the New Testament. The first book of the New Testament tells us that the preaching of the gospel is to bring people into God to make them the citizens of the kingdom of the heavens. This is very high and very deep. To preach the gospel is not to win souls, but to gain people from different countries and put them into the Triune God that they may become the citizens of the kingdom of the heavens for the establishment of this kingdom. When we go out to preach the gospel, we should not forget this purpose.
In His resurrection the Lord as the Slave-Savior charged His disciples to go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to all the creation (of which mankind is the main item) to redeem and save God’s lost creation from the vanity and slavery of corruption back to Him to enjoy the freedom of His glory (Mark 16:14-15; Rom. 8:20-21) in His new creation (Gal. 6:15b). In the Gospel of Mark, the Lord charged us to preach the gospel, not just to all men but to all the creation. Sometimes we have to preach the gospel to the birds, the horses, and the other living creatures. Mankind takes the lead of all the creation. Mark reveals that we preach the gospel to make people of the old creation the members of the new creation. In Matthew the preaching of the gospel is for setting up the kingdom of the heavens, but in Mark it is to bring a part of the old creation into the new creation. The creation was lost, so it needed to be redeemed, saved, back to God from the vanity and slavery of corruption. All the creation is under the vanity and the slavery of corruption and is waiting for a time when it can be redeemed and saved back to God to enjoy the freedom of God’s glory in His new creation.
In Matthew the Lord is the King-Savior. In Mark He is the Slave-Savior to serve people that they may be redeemed and saved back to God. In Luke He is the Man-Savior. After the accomplishment of God’s redemption for man through His death and resurrection, the Lord as the Man-Savior charged His disciples to proclaim repentance for forgiveness of sins in His name to all the nations that the fallen men may be redeemed back to the way of peace that leads them into the blessing prepared by God for them according to His eternal economy (Luke 24:46-48; 1:77-79; 2:30-32). In Mark it is the fallen creation, but in Luke it is the fallen men who need to be redeemed back to the way of peace.
When God created man, God ordained blessing for man, but man fell from that original blessing. All the people on earth are seeking for blessing because they have lost the God-ordained blessing. Now a redeemed person should be redeemed back to the original blessing which God prepared. We need to consider what this original blessing is. First, man was ordained to express God (Gen. 1:26). To express God in His image is a great blessing. This blessing was also for man to have dominion over all things. The believers in Christ enjoy such a blessing. We are those who express God, have the dominion over all the creation, and one day will inherit the earth (Matt. 5:5; Heb. 2:5-8; Luke 19:17, 19).