From the writings of Dr. John R. W. Stott

A Servant Church

I venture to say that sometimes, perhaps because it was the last instruction Jesus gave us before returning to the Father, we give the Great Commission too prominent a place in our Christian thinking.

Please do not misunderstand me.

I firmly believe that the whole church is under obligation to obey its Lord's commission to take the gospel to all nations. But I am also concerned that we should not regard this as the only instruction which Jesus left us. He also quoted Leviticus 19:18, 'you shall love your neighbour as yourself', called it 'the second and great commandment' (second in importance only to the supreme command to love God with all our being), and elaborated it in the Sermon on the Mount.

There he insisted that in God's vocabulary our neighbour includes our enemy, and that to love means to 'do good', that is, to give ourselves actively and constructively to serve our neighbour's welfare.

There then are two instructions of Jesus -- a great commandment, 'love your neighbour' and a great commission, 'go and make disciples'.

--From "Christian Mission in the Modern World" (London: Falcon, 1975), p. 29.