Are you sitting comfortably? Then let's begin at the end. At the end of Matthew's gospel, the women meet Jesus after his resurrection. He asks them to "tell his brothers to go to Galilee." The eleven remaining disciples go. They meet Jesus, who tells them to "make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." (Matt 28:19: "the Great Commission").
If you want to go on sitting comfortably, you can reflect that this commission was given only to the eleven, and not to you or me. Or that the commission transformed the disciples (Latin for "people who learn") into apostles (Greek for "people who are sent out with a message"), and that we are not all apostles (Eph 4:11). Can't we leave the job to missionaries? Isn't it their job, not ours?
The specific job of "making disciples" may well be a task for the specialized few. But the need to go "to all nations" has changed radically since Jesus' day. There are indeed a few remote corners of the world where the Bible has not been translated into the local tongue, where the gospel has never been preached, but the greatest need for mission is among the pagans here in Europe, in Switzerland, in England, in the countries around us.
We are all ambassadors of our faith, witnesses in a world that does not truly believe. And to be true witnesses, we have to cross barriers. Not mountains or seas, not international frontiers, but barriers of perception, of belief.
Jesus crossed barriers. He was a Jew from Galilee. But he talked with Sadducees, with prostitutes, with lepers, with Romans, with Samaritans, with tax collectors, with Syro-Phoenicians. He crossed the barrier and became their friend. Paul, too, "became all things to all people, so that by every method I might save some" (1 Cor 9:22).
We all have our own barriers, our own circle of friends and safe situations. We do not easily relate to people outside our barriers - we tend to avoid too close a contact with them. Some of us are more outgoing than others, some of us have wider barriers, but the barriers are still there.
So stop now and look around. Where are your boundaries? Are they at your workplace? Among your neighbours where you live? In your own house, even? Here at church?
Paul spoke of slaves and freemen, Jews and Greeks, men and women - as we might speak of refugees, Albanians, drug-addicts, or just people we don't care for. Part of his message to the churches was that all are now united, one in Christ, all can be welcomed and knit together into a single body.
Mission involves seeing where our boundaries are - and crossing them. We are not all called to preach the Gospel, but we are all called to reach out to love and support our neighbours. This means leaping over any barrier that divides us (and to understand what that means, read the story of the foreigner from Samaria in Luke 10:30-37). Christ is calling us across. He is on the other side, and waiting.
HD