Go Ye Into All the World — Gerry Covenhoven

To them, and when they saw them they worshipped them, but some doubted, and Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.".

The Great Commission and the Gospel’s Worldwide Mission

So, unto all the world, I can imagine that as the Lord Jesus Christ spoke these words to his disciples they were utterly astounded by it. To think that here the Lord Jesus Christ was talking to a little group of eleven men and speaking to them about world conquest, telling them that they should go out over all the world spreading this gospel message, and a gospel message that was going to enter and permeate the culture of Greece, the military power of Rome, the religion of the Jewish nation, and was going to make a tremendous impact throughout the entire world.

I'm sure that they couldn't have realized what was going to be accomplished in thirty years, and yet here the Lord Jesus Christ was telling them that this is what they should do. I wonder how much they at this time comprehended what he was saying.

We know that as they moved along in the Pentecost and developed, why we say, well, good night. What's happening there in the book of the Acts is greater than what we see today, and yet I believe that as we look at some of the things here, we see the plan of the Lord Jesus Christ for this age.

I think there's some telling points in these verses that we have read that will show us that even with what the Lord Jesus Christ did, with what he started with, shall we say, it's just not so terribly different today.

Proportions have changed, or shall I say sizes have changed, different things have changed, and yet, attentionedly, we find that there are some things that are quite the same. You'll notice that the Lord Jesus Christ here is speaking, first of all, of his eleven disciples.

The Deficient Number of Disciples and the Church’s Shortage of Laborers

Does that number eleven strike you in any way as being out of order? He had started with twelve, hadn't he? The Lord Jesus Christ did have twelve disciples. He chose twelve, and yet here he is, after the resurrection, saying, well, of course, there's a difference, of course, you know.

And yet, what we have here is a deficient number. The Lord Jesus Christ chose twelve, and he had said that they were to be seated across twelve rooms, doesn't mean there's not a good deal, but here are only eleven.

Now we know that they chose another, Matthias, that he might be with them, so that on the day of Pentecost, they had that complete number of twelve, it was complete again. But here, at this point, when he gives them this great permission, their number is deficient.

I think that, in a way, this is the history of the church. The history of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ is continually a history of deficient numbers, a shortage of manpower, a shortage of people to do the work of God.

We don't have eleven here because the Lord Jesus had only chosen eleven. Eleven were not here because he said, that's all we need. Eleven were here because one had turned aside and was not following the Lord as he should.

And, as the Lord looks out on the bishop fields today, as the Lord looks out on his work in the United States and Canada and anywhere, I have the feeling that the Lord is looking at a number of eleven, so to speak, a deficient number engaged in the work of the Lord, not the number that he would intend that he would have in the works if he had his way, but deficient because we have our way, and we're not engaged in the work of the Lord has set out for us.

But, after a while, when we read this story in the book of the Acts, or shall I say, in the Scriptures continually, when Timothy says that all of Eurasia turned away from him, and then he ends up that letter by saying, turn in the paper often those works that mighty merits God so greatly do the man whom we think today, boy, that's running around Paul, let's see what he has to say, let's follow the principles that God gave him, and yet, in that day, many turned away from him.

And, as you know, it's easy for us to say, pardon, Paul's our champion in the missing number. We have men, some have turned away, some have thought the cross was too great, some have thought it's not worth it.

John Mark, he's an encouragement, and all those John Marks have been chosen to go with the apocalypse, have turned back. John Mark was one who, because of the care that farmers gave, and fear gave, said it was useful to Paul, though.

Even though he had at one time set his hand to the pile, and had turned back, and the word of the Lord Jesus had come to a mind where he said, such a word, doing such a thing is not worthy of the kingdom of God.

Very true, but he can become worthy of the kingdom of God by the name of the Lord. Never mind. Never think that it just drops out along the way, somewhere along the line, that you can't become worthy of the kingdom of God, you can't become a useful servant.

I think it is interesting and prominent also that even in the book of Revelation, there are those tribulation times that we read of two witnesses in chapter 11. Now, the scripture says that in the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be accepted.

Now, two is a sufficient number, but three would be a more complete number. In chapter 11, you only find two. Clearly, that's not comparable to the 11 here. Just enough to get the job done, but really, not as many as should be there getting the job done, and not as many as could do the job better.

May the Lord help us that we may not be amongst those that have dropped out. Now, does Brother Paul love to mention the scripture from Matthew chapter 9, where the Lord Jesus is looking out upon the monks who had compassion upon them.

And in the hands of compassion, what did he say to his disciples? He says, the harvest indeed is plentiful, but the laborers are few. And the result of that was, he says, pray me therefore the Lord of the harvest that he'll send forth laborers into his harvest, in view of the deficiency of the number, in view of the fact that there are not as many in the work of God as there should be, pray that God will send forth workers into his harvest.

Do you know what happens when he says that? You read about the sequel to that, the command of the Lord Jesus Christ, pray me therefore the Lord of the harvest that he'll send forth laborers into his harvest.

And I believe the disciples prayed him. I believe they said this word literally, they began to pray about it. So the very next chapter, we find the Lord Jesus Christ choosing his disciples, sending them out.

All right, you're praying about it, now get going. Begin by praying, end up by going. Isn't it a wonderful privilege? So first of all, we find a deficient number, only 11. Well, then in the next verse, in verse 17, we read something that is even more tragic, I believe.

Little Faith and the Tragedy of Unbelief

And when they saw him, they worshipped him, but unbelief. I wonder, David, a lot of this. If God were to reveal himself to this, and do such a thing, because I think that we would all be ashamed of what God would do to someone else.

There's tremendous unbelief. I mean, isn't this what we find even in these disciples? Now, here I find another extraordinary thing, because these disciples, as we read about them in the book of Matthew, we find the Lord Jesus Christ speaking about these disciples and continually calling them, O ye of little faith.

I'd like you to just run through with me very quickly, Matthew 6 and verse 30. And notice, every time he speaks about faith in relation to the disciples, Matthew 6 and 30 says, verse 4, God so clothed the grass of the field which today is, and tomorrow will cast into the oven.

Shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? Chapter 8, verse 26. He said unto them, Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Chapter 14, verse 31. Insomuch that the most of them wondered when they saw that none could speak, and the name to behold, and the name to walk.

That's right, that's it. I'm here to glorify the God of Israel. All right, I'm looking at 15, 31. Thank you very much. 14, 31. And he that keepeth fresh forth his hand, and quartereth and severeth him, O thou of little faith.

Verse 4, it's found out. And 16, 8. Which when Jesus perceived, he said unto them, O ye of little faith, why reason ye among yourselves? Because ye have brought no bread. 17, 17. Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, and exclaimed unto his disciples, How long shall I be with you?

How long shall I suffer you? The gospel of Matthew. So, he goes on to correct this. Chapter 17, verse 20. He says, Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief, forbear me, I am. If he hath faith, hath the brain of much deceit, ye shall fail in this matter.

Remove him from yonder place, and it shall be removed. And, watch yourselves, the important one here, in chapter 21, verse 21. He hath faith, and God not. Ye shall not only do this which is done in the fifth tree, but also, if ye shall fail in this matter, be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea.

It shall be done. So, here's the word of Jesus, and every time he comments on the faith of the disciples, it is, Oh, ye of little faith! Oh, faithless and perverse generation! The only faith that he commends in the gospel of Matthew is the faith of unbelievers.

The faith of the centurion, when he says, Lord, just say the word, and my servant will be healed. And the Lord says, I have not found so great faith, not in all his fields. And then, the faith of that far-off Phoenician woman who comes to him, and he says, Woman, great is thy faith.

The only time he comments faith is the part of unbelief, so to speak. Do we have the faith that we really need for the work of God? Do we really cast upon him in a believing way? Do we really believe that the Lord Jesus is going to do great things now?

Surely, upon the cross, as we have his treasure in earth and vessels, that the excellency and the power may be of God, and not of ourselves. And, this, per se, will be the story of Christianity. God is doing his work through earth and vessels, through weak people, through people that in themselves have little faith, and yet, as in our little faith, we learn to cast upon God, we can accomplish great things.

And then, the apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ says before his ascension, says to his apostles, that you shall receive power after that, the Holy Spirit, which hath come upon you. And there's power then in their lives, the Holy Spirit of God, for us to move them along and carry them along in the work of God, in order that they might see some great things done by him.

Christ’s Sovereign Authority and the Believer’s Ambassadorship

But then, as we move down in our chapter to verse 19, I think we come to what is intended to be thought of as the sovereignty of the Lord Jesus Christ. This sufficient number, this number of deeds that were manifesting their lack of faith, would count upon the power of the sovereign Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus came and stood under them, saying, all power is in our community in heaven. To recognize the sovereignty of our Lord Jesus, and to recognize that it is in his name that we are to go, to recognize that the Lord's work is not our work, so to speak, it is his work, and we're to go then engaged in his work in his name.

Not depending upon our resources, not depending upon what we might be able to do with our education, or our gifts, or one thing or another like that, but to remember that it is the Lord Jesus Christ who says, all power, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.

You know that beautiful passage there in Philippians chapter 2 where it speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ and his condescension becoming a servant and going through the death of the cross. Therefore, God has given him a name that is above every name.

That is the name of Jesus of Arimathea God, and we are only to realize that more as we go forth and recognize that everyone will someday bow their knees to the Lord Jesus Christ, and we have the privilege of taking that moment and today, so that today they can do so voluntarily and find salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ, that here is one who has been made sovereign by God, who has been given that place of power and authority, and it is in his name that we can go.

Now, I think it's time to recognize, then, what the Lord Jesus Christ is to be to each and every one of us. In fact, the Prophets are concerned with this. In Isaiah chapter 49 verse 7, it says, Thus saith the Lord, the Redeemer of Israel, and his Holy One, to him whom man despises, to him whom the nation affords, for a servant of the Lord's king shall see and arise.

Princes also shall worship because of the Lord that is faithful, and the Holy One of Israel, and he shall choose you. Yet, the Lord Jesus Christ has been given that name that is above every name, that in his name the rulers of both states, the mighty of this earth, might bow down and acknowledge him.

We can thank God that God has reached some of such people in the past century over the earth, and there have been some who have definitely confessed that name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because of his authority.

For since it is in the name of that authority that Jehoiachin calls his own, the Apostle Paul recognizes it, and he says, we are ambassadors for Christ. While an ambassador does not go on his own authority, he goes in the authority of another.

And it is only as we recognize that we can go in the authority of another, that there can be real power in our lives. You know, even the Lord Jesus Christ here is in the name of another. He came in the name of the Apostle.

Remember from the century when he came to the Lord Jesus Christ, he says, Lord, just speak the word. He does. He says, I also am a man under authority. And when I say to one, go, and he goes, is there another coming in your house?

Would another do this to you then? He says, I'm under authority. So he says, it's not in the capacity of the word for you as being one that's under authority. Say the word, and it will be done. And you and I have been recognized that we're under authority.

I think this is the direction I've got all the time. We are under authority, and as being under the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, we can take that position of ambassadorship and go forth then in that name of the Lord Jesus Christ recognizing his authority.

So that not only is it authority, but the Lord Jesus Christ also has power. He's demonstrated that power here on earth. As the power of the Lord was with him, and I think it's pleasant that it is especially the Council of Luke that speaks about power in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Luke's got word of him on a number of occasions, and it speaks of that power. Now that the Council of Luke presents the Lord Jesus Christ as the perfect man, and as the perfect man there is power because of his being under authority.

And as we can avail ourselves then of that power of the Lord, that perfect man, and go forth in his power, proclaiming the wonderful gospel message of our Lord Jesus Christ. Remember that the apocryphal false testimony that God has not given us in spirit of peace, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.

The Lord Jesus Christ then is the sovereign of all, as the one to whom you and I owe allegiance. The one to whom you and I are responsible for giving allegiance, and for giving absolute obedience in all things, is the one who appears here, appears in the apocryphal, and he says all of power, all of soundness, that is what the Lord Jesus Christ.

And then we read the gift of these words that we so often forget about, glory to the Lord, and peace on earth. Now I think it's interesting as we stop and study these last two verses a little bit here in Matthew chapter 28, and consider what the central parts of these words are.

Going, Making Disciples, Baptizing, and Teaching

You know as we read this in our King James Version, we find a number of verbs, words of action, commands of the Lord Jesus Christ, as first of all he says go, as we read here on the screen earlier, and then he says teach, and then he says baptize him, which is in verse 20, teachings once again in the participle form.

Actually, in the Greek, the word go is literally glory, and there's only one word that is given here as a definite pronoun. That is the second version we consider teach. But here again, this word that in our King James Version says teach all nations, in all of the newer versions it says making disciples.

It does not say teach all nations, and the Greek word is different from the first word of verse 20 which says teaching them who have heard all things. Now, verse 20 doesn't say teaching, that's exactly what that big word means.

But verse 19 says, going therefore, make disciples of all nations, there's the command, make disciples, and then baptizing them is a part of this making disciples process, teaching them is a part of this making disciples process.

First word, just as we have it in our Bible, go. You know it's such a small word, there's two letters, it's a couple of them. Participle, simply put it in a sentence. And sometimes it's the little small things that we stumble over every time.

And yet this word go is so tremendously important in this commandment by the Lord Jesus Christ. What does the Lord Jesus Christ mean by go? Remember when the Lord Jesus Christ came back they found this man perfectly clothed in his right mind and sitting there.

And this man wanted to go with the Lord Jesus Christ. I can certainly understand why he would have wanted to go. Having been under the dominion of demons, and having suffered so many things for so long, and now this man finally is a whole man once again.

A man in his right mind. A man able to be rational. A man who had known the touch of the Lord Jesus Christ and had known his right. He said, Lord, I want to go with you. I want to stay with you wherever you are.

The hope of the Lord Jesus said, you know, go back home. Go home and tell them what wonderful things you believe that all of us can do. It's not to start writing our own home. It's not to start writing our own offices.

It's not to start writing what we are now. If we can't be the Lord's servants, that's what we are now. We won't be able to be the Lord's servants out in Zambia, or in Peru, or in any other foreign country in the world.

We've got to be the Lord's servants. That's what we are now. And the Lord Jesus Christ then first of all told them that he said, you know, we tell these people what things they've done. You know the whole story behind that.

When these townspeople came out and they told us about what they've done, actually what part of them was what had happened to all the pigs that they'd been raising. All the pigs that were down in the Pacific Sea of Galilee and had drowned.

And they were all very upset about this, and they asked the Lord for the part of their coat. They didn't want it. And it wasn't until some time later when the Lord Jesus came, some people flocked around them and they received him gladly.

Why? Because that man who had been healed had gone back to his home. He had obeyed the Lord Jesus Christ. He'd given them what he'd learned of the Lord Jesus Christ. And these people then, later on, would have learned of the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ.

What a tremendous impact the testimony of that man had on those people. That God would give us such a testimony is our prayer, I'm sure. But then, the Lord Jesus Christ also there, as we've heard already, saying that we shall receive power after that.

The Lord Jesus Christ has come upon you and said, you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem, that's down in Rome, and all Judea, and in Samaria. And it was the animal part of this. And here then was this idea, this world conquest of the Lord Jesus Christ, which some of them had gotten engaged in, not a conquest of the story of iron and steel, but a conquest of the story of the spirit of the Word of God, to compliment the times that they might be going to fellowship with him, and acknowledge his sovereignty as they might have.

He said that the Lord shall send them to go, and so on and on. And this is how it goes. Every last one of them is not simply going to foreign fields. They're going to wherever the Lord has sent them to, home, the office, the school, wherever it might be.

The Lord wants them to go there. And then if he does call us from there to some other place, first of all, where do we need to go? That's important. And then the idea of making disciples of all nations.

Now, what does it mean to make disciples of all nations? Well, to make a disciple, first of all, it is enough to see a person come into a city known as the Lord Jesus Christ, except in Christ the Savior.

That is implied in this whole thing. As the Apostle Paul writes to the Thessalonians, that they had purged Pharaoh from idols. They had experienced conversion. It was a rite of outpacing their lives. They had turned their attention to the Lord Jesus Christ, touching him as their own Lord and Savior.

But then they manifested that the short time that Paul had been able to be with them, and then, as Timothy continued with them a little while longer in Luke, that they had learned some more things as well.

And these people, while they had turned to the Lord from idols, they had gone around serving the Lord Jesus Christ faithfully, with the result that, as Paul says there in the first chapter of 1 Thessalonians, the word of the Lord has been sounded throughout all of Macedonia because of them, for a tremendous testimony, for an infant church.

How many years have we attended here in Minneapolis, and whatnot, as the word of the Lord sounded forth in all of Minneapolis and across the East? We ourselves, as Thessalonian Christians, were supposed to say, were we not?

We have a tremendous responsibility to be more active in evangelism, in getting out and saying the least of these things through the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, that we might truly serve the Lord as those Thessalonians served the Lord, as they were entering into a life of true discipleship, following the Lord Jesus Christ, and entertaining him as a true disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, as they were continually doing that.

Baptism as Immediate Obedience and Public Allegiance

And then he says, characterizing them in the name of a father of a son, you know, the matter of that, the matter of that is, and I think, Brethren, is something that we ought to be really negligent when it comes to really comparing our practice with the scriptural example.

So, what I mean is this. You search the book of the Acts of Scripture, and one thing that will strike you, I'm sure, is that these believers, the very minute they received the book of Jesus Christ, there was not a long period of time between their professional faith in Christ and their baptism.

We are negligent, and we who are responsible in the assembly for putting a time limit, for putting a period of waiting, for putting a period of analyzing and looking over and giving a person a chance to think it over and over again, we are negligent in the fulfilling of what we find in Scripture.

We profess to obey the Scripture. We say, we have the truth as to the local church. Well, do we have the truth as to baptism? You know, that's all a part of the puzzle. I really believe that if we were to teach what baptism means, now, it's an acknowledging of the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

If we were to just, in our preaching of the Gospel, put baptism along with it, recognizing that if a person gets saved, all right, we'll do all we possibly can to see that that person is baptized that same day.

Now, do you think I'm right or wrong on that? I think it's Scripture. Honestly, I believe that that's what the Scripture teaches. I know I've had missionaries tell me, well, man, you can't make that work today.

Well, you know, that's the story with Scripture all along, and what the church does is Scripture right along. You can't make it work today, they say. And so, they form their denominations. They've got this, and they've got that, and they've got the other thing, because you can't make the Scripture work today.

And, we find ourselves, we've been pulled along in the same current as far as certain lines go that we don't realize. We don't baptize as soon as we should. We don't encourage people to be baptized. How are we going to know that the people are going to be saved until we cast them to the cross?

Well, did the early Christians worry about that? Did Philip feel content because he had baptized a Simon, who it later turned out wasn't a true believer after all? There's absolutely no word of tension in the Scriptures concerning the baptizing of that unsaved man.

But, there does seem to be a structural precedent for baptizing people with no fellowship. And, I believe that if we did that, we would understand a little bit more of what the fellowship of Christ means.

The thing that we find in Peru, and this happens from time to time, if there is a person who doesn't want to be baptized, there's something wrong in that person's life. We simply take the attitude, now this person has made a professional mistake.

Now that we've taught them about baptism, and they don't want to be baptized, they always say, well, I'll be baptized the next time. We do not consider them to be believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. In Spanish, they have a very nice word.

They have the word simpatizer. Now, this is the type of person, if they like the gospel preaching, they come along, they've never made a profession of the Lord Jesus Christ. And, these who do not want to be baptized, we put them in the same class.

We do not count them as being true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, because they refuse to be baptized. In the Scriptures, we find that faith and baptism are given as a parcel, to the extent that Mark says, "...he that believes and is baptized shall be saved.".

Now, we know that the following verse says, "...and he that believes not is condemned," showing that the emphasis is upon the belief. That's very true. And yet, at the same time, it shows that these two things were bound together as a parcel.

I'd just like to tell you on that, by way of touching, I think that this is one area in which we have something to learn from Scripture, as far as the practice of the church's existence. We should definitely be engaged in baptizing these people, as soon as we possibly can.

Teaching Obedience Rather Than Mere Religious Theory

And, then the Lord Jesus Christ says, "...teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, whatsoever I have commanded you.". He puts the emphasis on teaching them all things. The idea that we are responsible for teaching all things that are in the Word of God.

Now, of course not. You read the Scripture, and you say, what do I mean? And you wonder how much you can get in, and how much you can teach, and how can we possibly be teaching them all things? Well, at the same time, the Lord Jesus Christ did not say, "...teaching them all things.".

I'm afraid that maybe some of us are afraid the emphasis is not there. He says, "...we are responsible to teach them all things, to observe, teaching them to put in practice all things, and then to use the essential things.".

What we need to teach from the Word of God is obedience to the Word of God. Teaching the people of God to be continually putting into practice the things that they hear. And, I wonder how oftentimes Christians, in our teaching of the Word of God, simply teach things from a theoretical point of view.

In many assemblies, the listeners have gotten the message of, well, we're supposed to think about this, and we're supposed to analyze it. Now, how does this fit into my theology? And, as far as we go, it's not the idea of a person sitting there and saying, well, now, what response does this demand from me?

How does this fit into my life, into my practice? Now, this is what the Lord Jesus Christ wants. "...teaching them to observe all things.". May the Lord then help us in our missionary work. "...the continuing purpose of the Lord Jesus Christ, right to the end of the age.".

In fact, he says, "...whatsoever I have presented you in the Lord, I will do always, even until the end of the world, or the end of the age.". The end of this dispensation of grace is what I live. We have this as the plan of the Lord Jesus Christ in this world.

The Gospel’s Cultural Adaptability in Missions

It's an amazing thing that the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is suited to all people. Black Africans in their tribal situations, Africans in the civilized cities, included in the South Americans with their different traditions and cultures.

And here is something that we need to learn also in missionary work. Not to impose our culture. Going along in missionary work, I realize that, at the beginning, this is what missionaries before us had done and what we were doing.

We were conducting meetings the way we would conduct them here in the United States. And there were certain things, and of course we realize that not all things were in the same pattern, but there were certain things that we thought should be done just the way we did them here.

But after all, there were certain things that really could be done in a slightly different way. Now, some of the younger people here might not exactly understand this, but you know, it wasn't too many years ago when all the ladies coming to the meetings would wear hats.

And you know, today you hardly know what a hat is. But it was one of the days when everybody would wear hats. And this, of course, was the fulfilling of the scripture that said that the women should have their heads covered.

So, when one missionary brother went to Peru, while he taught the women there in the church that he had suddenly thrown at him, for they had not been taught to have their heads covered, he said, dear ladies, dear sisters, you should have your heads covered.

That was, here's my wife, look how she's got a hat on to cover her head. Well, in this town where they were, you couldn't buy a hat anywhere. And yet, the dear ladies had to have hats to cover their heads.

So, they fashioned hats as best they could. This for their ladies. They would never be seen having a suit. So, they had shelves inside where they said, come in, pick up their hats, put it on, and then, after the meeting, they put it in a shelf again, and it would never be seen having a suit.

This dear missionary brother just thought that, well, a hat is the only kind of covering that is in use. Whereas, after all, in South America, the very common thing for the women going to the Roman Catholic Church would be to use the mantillas that the sisters are using so frequently today, and it would be by far the best thing, according to the culture of Latin America, to say, dear sisters, you should have a mantilla to cover your head.

Or, in fact, in the jungle where we were, we got that, get any kind of a cloth to cover your head. And many of them did have some rather colorful cloths to use in covering their heads, rather than simply a mantilla, which they would have to pay a bit more for in the store.

Another thing now, of course, when you go to a supermarket here in this country, why I say, no bare feet permitted for health reasons, according to the state's sanitation code and whatnot. And yet, we don't have such health reasons in these needy places, but we might feel a bit offended if somebody came in, say, from one of the western countries, some hippie-style person came in with bare feet, and yet didn't make any difference before the war.

And, in fact, in India, it is quite the custom to take off your shoes when you're going into a holy place. To the extent that Bhaktsingh, a real Christian brother over there who's been used by the Lord in the past with many attendees, teaches the Christians that when they enter their assembly in needy places, they should take their shoes off.