Our Mission:
I (Ben) recently had the opportunity to talk to a short-term mission
team the week before they went to Belize.
Below are the topics I discussed with them from God’s Word. Of
course, our mission is simple – we want to share Jesus with people – we want
people to understand the Gospel and the grace God has in place for them through
Jesus Christ – and we want to disciple new believers so that their faith can
grow and flourish in the way God has planned. However, just as I felt these ‘preparation
for missions’ topics were important for the team heading to Belize, it
certainly applies to us, as well, and provides more detail behind our mission.
1. Spiritual
Retirement:
Jesus never told us to prepare for ‘spiritual retirement’ –
we aren’t saving-up the gifts God has given us.
We are designed for this very moment.
All the moments in our past, all the failure, success, knowledge,
wisdom, studying scripture, and prayer has brought us to right now. God has us prepared to do the very next thing
– and then we are ready for the next, and the next…
Hebrews 10:23-25 – Let us hold tightly without wavering to
the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise. Let us think of ways to motivate one another
to acts of love and good works. And let
us not neglect our meeting together, especially now that the day of his return
is drawing near.
That’s an amazing statement!
Our family wants to be, and share, motivation brought on by the Holy
Spirit. And, we realize that God puts
people in our lives for specific reasons so that we can learn from them.
2. A
Battle of The Ages
Philippians 4:8-9 – And now, dear brothers and sisters, one
final thing. Fix your thoughts on what
is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and
worthy of praise. Keep putting into
practice all you learned and received from me – everything you heard from me
and saw me doing. Then the God of peace
will be with you.
It’s our responsibility to be prepared. We have to pray and come before God as humble
servants ready to do his bidding – He can do anything, but we are blessed to be
a part of that. Most of what we are
being prepared for is more about what God teaches us, and how He molds us
during that preparation, that really matters in our relationship with Him. The end result is where we see what He did,
not us.
To be fully prepared to do God’s work, we have to put all
our faith in Him. Our mission has a
physical element – we will get tired, hot, sick, angry, etc. – but we are also
in the midst of a battle of the ages: Satan hates when God’s people are
obedient. Satan desires the opposite;
that’s why he is a liar and deceiver, and he isn’t going to sit back and watch
when people step out in faith. But,
Satan has no power over Jesus Christ!
Christ has won the battle, it’s over!
Our job is to sing the victory song to all nations.
However, we are only human, not Jesus who was God in the
flesh. All that we do that is good, and
right, and pure, etc. comes from God.
So, we have to fill our lives with God like a spiritual diet: God in =
God out. More of Him = less of our
selfish desires and foolish actions.
3. Are
You ready? It’s Not About You!
All of that is great in preparation, but in the end we have
to completely forget about ourselves – it’s all about Jesus and God’s Kingdom.
1 Timothy 2:1-6 – I urge you, first of all, to pray for all
people. Ask God to help them; intercede
on their behalf, and give thanks for them.
Pray this way for kings and all who are in authority so that we can live
peaceful and quiet lives marked by godliness and dignity. This is good and pleases God our Savior, who
wants everyone to be saved and to understand the truth. For there is only one God and one Mediator
who can reconcile God and humanity – the man Christ Jesus. He gave his life to purchase freedom for
everyone.
The Gospel is so clearly articulated all through the New
Testament – we like this passage when we think about mission work. It’s about Jesus, the only one who can save
someone’s soul – he died for it. And, he
wants everyone to accept that gift – freely given because he already paid the
cost. Our mission is to keep telling
everyone about this gift and give all the glory to God.
4. GO!
We’re not smart enough to plan our lives; we’re just not
that clever. So, when God says do
something and you begin to see how He prepared you advance, you have to smile
and say, ‘Wow! I see what you were doing
there!’ We are in this situation because
it’s God’s idea – we only recognize Him.
James 4:14-17 – How do you know what your life will be like
tomorrow? Your life is like the morning
fog – it’s here a little while, then it’s gone.
What you ought to say is, “If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do
this or that.” Otherwise you are
boasting about your own plans, and all such boasting is evil. Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to
do and then not do it.
When we first heard God calling us to mission work, and
specifically being drawn to Kenya, I (Ben) had a small part of me that said, ‘God,
I’ll do this if you want, but I’m really hoping you tell me NOT to go.’ I’m being honest. It’s going to be hard. It’s going to take sacrifice. We don’t even know what God is getting us
into! But, our family will go where God
says to go, and wherever we are we will do what He says to do.
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