I had a conversation with a missionary-to-be the other day. She was amazing. She had caught the Heart of God. What I mean is, she had asked the Lord to show her what He loves, what He hates, and what He is really passionate about. And one thing came back in all caps - the lost.
And there was more - she was passionately asking me, "why doesn't the church today see this amazing need? Why don't they DO more about it? Why is our home church still feeding the homeless one time every four months and not building half-way houses, missions, expanding our outreach, getting these people saved and integrated into the church and then teaching them to reach out to their own peers? Why is it that we don't see that we are the light for the people God has place in our lives - our peers, coworkers, friends and neighbors? How could our numbers go any direction but up as we get more and more excited about what God is doing, and invest more and more of our lives into it? Don't people know that every one of us has a call on their life? How can we call ourselves Christians and have any non-saved friends? Why is it that we put such an emphasis on GOING to the mission field when we live in one? People need to get saved just as much where we live!"
For the full effect, try to imagine no perceivable breathing or pauses between these sentences, and imagine the intensity and pace quickening as she went along. Imagine the passion of God driving this young heart. Imagine walking the fine line of anger at the inaction of the vast majority of the church today. Imagine a voice choked with tears and emotion.
I wanted to calm her down. I wanted to tell her it will be all right.
But it won't.
God checked me at that moment and made me listen. I thought immediately of all the good things our local church is doing. We support a lot of missionaries, we send, we have ministries to people of all ages, we do outreaches to the community etc. I think ours is an exceptional church in many ways from the Pastor to the last usher. But she was talking about the ordinary "butt in the pew christian," because we are ALL called. And like most churches, the vast majority of the attendees do little more than that: attend.
And what do we do? We wait. But we shouldn't. We wait for schooling, training, etc. We wait to become married, we wait to become single. We wait for the evangelism class to be offered at church, we wait for somebody to ask us about Jesus. We wait. We wait for a missions trip, we wait for a missionary. We wait for a call to a foreign land. Or - we list our reasons for not being able to work the mission field all around us:
We have just been hurt - really hurt, so we wait to heal. Bad church, bad spouse, bad kids, bad dog, bad job, bad hair. Or we are perfectly healthy but we wait for the passion to come. We have some sort of 'destination disease' which has only one cure: do something. NOW. Nothing can possibly happen tomorrow which will suddenly make the timing perfect. It is perfect today, right now.
"Excuse me, but I know you are trying to find answers, and fifteen minutes of my time could possibly change your eternity, but I am late for worship team rehearsal. So sorry."
Make a fool out of yourself for Jesus. try. Fail. Try again. I would rather have a nice crowd of people meet me at the gate to Heaven than have a nice big mansion all to myself.
I hereby announce that today is the day. Now is the time. Pick it, plan it, prioritize it, - put it into motion - praise God for the power and the priceless results. I'll write you a note - I give you permission - it is your time - God is waiting, the people around you can not wait any longer. Do something!
"We then, as workers together with Him also plead with you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For He says: 'In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you.' Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation" (2 Corinthians 6:1,2)
I would say there is only one thing left. Simple question:
So - What are you doing today?
Hey daddy, two things:
ReplyDeleteThe comment: "How can we call ourselves Christians and have any non-saved friends?"
That is exactly the thinking that is getting me so worked up. We NEED "not-yet-Christian" friends. There is no way that we can make an impact of any kind without being able to interact with the world outside our little church bubble.
Second, "Make a fool out of yourself for Jesus. try. Fail. Try again."
The mantra we should live our lives should be this: "Try, fail, learn." (this is something one of the speakers at Fire Fall said last week). :D
Thank you. Other than that, this is awesome. Thank you daddy
I think we are on the same page. I didn't make it clear, but what I was trying to convey is that we should only have friends who are not Christians YET. I do not support cloistering or running away from the unsaved. Rather, I try to bring the light with me into the darkness.
ReplyDeleteI like that "Try Fail Learn" thing. I learn a lot from bruises.
With regard to friends:
ReplyDeleteI think it is extremely difficult to maintain friendships with lost people. Working at Century, it was easy to find lost people. All I had to do was turn around and there was someone breathing down my neck. The difficulty I had in hanging out with the lost was in not allowing people to influence who I was or should be. In hind sight, going to friends' drinking parties in the name of ministry probably wasn't the brightest thing to do.
That said, I agree, we should have friends that are not Christians YET. It's a good mentality to have. Just be sure that they are not influencing your behavior and character - and that's trickier than it may sound.
With regard to the heart of a missionary:
It's easy to just shrug it off and say, "well that's their heart." But it should be the heart of every believer. Every believer should be that passionate about it because it IS a serious thing. If God cared enough to find me, I should be paying attention to the need around me, and allow God to use me, even if I look like an idiot in the process.