You Gotta Go

May 08, 2014 | By Chuck

"You Gotta Go" Let me start by saying my family loves Coach Leon White. Coach White was my daughter Faith's 8th grade science teacher last year. Coach White is one of my eight elders in the church here in Cabot and my occasional partner in golf. He has been Dylan's high school track coach the last two years. As you can see Coach White knows the Ball family probably better than he'd like. (hopefully not) As Dylan runs around the track during competition he told me he can always hear Coach White repeat the same motivating phrase, "you gotta go Dylan, you gotta go". Coach White is not only watching the clock to keep Dylan's time but he is cheering him on and pushing him to "go" run his best time. As I think about the phrase, "you gotta go", I quickly see the spiritual parallel with the church. Jesus said, "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."(Mt.28:19) Mark records it like this, "He said to them, Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation."(Mk.16:15) There are similarities in both texts of course since both writers are recording what is known as the Great Commission. Teaching and baptizing are taught and are usually where we put our emphasis and rightly so but I tend to believe the key word or thought in this text is "go". That's right, Jesus is saying to His disciples then and to the church today, "you gotta go". Very little teaching and baptizing will take place if we don't "go". The church today has "gotta go" outside our buildings into our communities, neighborhoods, inner cities, jails and foreign fields. Yes, we want to teach and baptize as many as possible but to do that we "gotta go". Jesus is standing near the track saying to the church, "you gotta go", as we run the race of the Christian life and seek to make disciples. Chuck Ball