Did Jesus Give the Great Commission?

Thomas Hudgins, writing on the Across the Atlantic blog he shares with Antonio Piñero, asks whether the gospel commission is original with Jesus, i.e., did Jesus say these words. I’ve been thinking of writing a post about historicity in general, though I’ve been focused on the Gospel of John, which I’m working through in a series of Google Hangouts on Air.

(I’ll be announcing details of the next hangout tomorrow, but I’ll let you know ahead that Dr. Bruce Epperly, author of Energion titles Process Theology: Embracing Adventure with God and Healing Marks, will be joining me this Thursday night at 7:00 pm central time. You can find this via my YouTube channel.)

Yesterday I posted on the issue of copying and translation, and there I deal only with the reliability of the transmission process. The original doctrine could be fiction or a forgery for that matter, and it wouldn’t impact my points in that earlier post. Discussing the reliability of scripture involves a number of different topics.

It’s unlikely to surprise any of my regular readers that I think this isn’t as simple a question as it might first seem, i.e., there are more than two (yes/no) answers available to the question of whether Jesus spoke these words.

Here are some possibilities as I see them:

1) This could be essentially a word for word record of words spoken by Jesus. The word for word accuracy could result from someone with an excellent memory, from someone who took notes (unlikely but not impossible), or due to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. (While I don’t see any evidence that the Bible’s words were dictated by God, I don’t doubt God could if God so desired.)

2) This could be a speech created to fill out a more general memory. In other words, the writer of the gospel might be recording a memory or tradition of a meeting with Jesus in which he gave such instructions to the disciples, but the words themselves could be a literary construction.

3) This could be an event that ratified the early church’s perception of a call to reach the whole world, with this call derived from various things Jesus said to them, and the guidance of the Holy Spirit in their lives (perceived or actual).

4) It could be a complete construction without any basis other than the goals of the early church.

The reason I think it’s important to break these differences out is that the binary response might result in an inaccurate perception. I, for example, believe that Jesus did meet with the disciples following the resurrection. Various stories of these meetings imply different things about spiritual vs. physical appearances, and I”m not concerned with that issue. For a church that believes in resurrection, things said by Jesus in either form of appearance should be regarded as things said by Jesus, just as Paul’s call, a visionary experience, is considered valid.

Nonetheless I am not convinced that we have an extremely close, word for word record of the activities of Jesus. I believe we have a record taken from memories and orally transmitted. Even if the gospels were written by eyewitnesses, they were written some time after the events were recorded, and recalling every detail of the speech is unlikely.

Again, I fully believe that the Holy Spirit could recall such things precisely, but I don’t see evidence that he did. In fact, to the extent that I see eyewitness testimony in the gospels, I see very human eyewitness testimony, with differences in perspective, in details, in focus, and so forth.

So if you asked me the original question in binary form, I’d feel obligated to say no, but that would tend to make hearers/readers believe that I don’t accept that the gospel commission originated with Jesus.

Quite the contrary, I believe it did, though I believe the church took some time to grow into it. So answering for myself, I would say something like my #2 above. I take this position because I believe that a robust set of appearances of the risen Christ would be necessary to launch the Christian movement.

On the other hand, while I consider #2 most likely, I have no problem with those who would choose #3. I believe that God led not only with the physical presence of Jesus, but with the presence of Jesus with the church through the Holy Spirit. Thus I am not disturbed by the suggestion that this is largely a construction.

Many of my more conservative friends are disturbed by what doesn’t disturb me. (One should note the tag line of this blog, “passionate moderate, liberal charismatic Christian.” There are reasons why I have been called liberal!) But the fact is that while I tend to be slightly conservative in my own assessment of historical issues, I find the reason for my faith more in an experience of the living God.

When asked why I believe, I quote the song: “You ask me how I know he lives, he lives within my heart.” When I returned to the church after a 12 year “wilderness wandering” following completing graduate school, it was not because I was suddenly convinced that the historical problems of the Bible had been solved. There was no change in my intellectual assessment of historical data. What actually happened was that no matter how hard I tried to avoid it, I truly did believe in God.

Fortunately I had already encountered ways of approaching scripture from various teachers that allowed me to re-encounter God in scripture. (Without intending to blame any of them for my own theological positions, I would mention Lucille Knapp, Dr, Alden Thompson, Dr. Larry Geraty, Dr. Sakae Kubo, and Dr. Leona Running, all of whom, and many more, helped shape the concepts that go into my understanding of scripture. Since my return to faith, I have added many more to that list.)

Because it was not a conviction about the historicity of scripture that brought my faith back into activity, debates about the historicity of scripture do not have the power to shake my faith. In fact, I welcome and embrace them.

I am truly delighted that there are people who see and preach the grace and love of God who differ in their understanding of historical (and even theological) issues. I welcome things that clear the way for us to look up (John 3:14-15).

I am confident in Jesus. I am not confident in any particular historical or theological construction. I can discover that I am wrong, and hopefully correct myself. He is always there and never mistaken.