If missions are not careful, they may become like the old
empty cathedrals in Europe. Sidetracked, our main activities could become:
building retirement homes, increasing allotments, upgrading insurance, and
obtaining nicer offices instead of taking the Gospel to the masses.
If we get sidetracked
with the baby buster, seeker or warfare seminar mentality instead of taking the
message of the Gospel to the lost, missions in the future may be nothing more
than a shell, possibly with lots of activity but with no spiritual life.
As we approach 2017,
our purpose should be to “Proclaim Him [Christ], admonishing every man and
teaching every man with all wisdom, that we may present every man complete in
Christ” (Colossians 1:28).
All evangelical missions and churches need to plan to evangelize
and disciple the millions in India, in lost Europe, Muslim Africa, and the
Middle East, as well as the world’s 150 million street children, the 100
thousand children and 400 thousand estimated to be in the sex trade in the
Philippines, as well as the major unreached cities of the world. There are over
400 unchurched slum areas of Manila and the over nine million poor of Calcutta.
This will take more than “supporting a national worker or needy child” (each of
us should do both!).
Churches and missions need to recapture the word “sacrifice”
for the sake of the lost. Let’s not wait for the future. Let’s reach our
generation now with the Gospel.
Charles Spurgeon said from his bed of sickness, “If you do
not wish to be full of regrets when you are obliged to lie still, work while
you can. If you desire to make a sickbed as soft as it can be, do not stuff it
with mournful reflections that you wasted time when you were in health and
strength!”
Why don’t some of us older pastors and missionaries forget
about retirement, break out of the “we deserve a break” mold, and give all we
have before death for the Gospel’s sake and God’s glory?
We shouldn’t just talk about our heroes such as Paul, C.T.
Studd, Hudson Taylor, George Whitefield, David Livingstone, L.E. Maxwell,
William Booth, and Amy Carmichael; let’s emulate them!
Missionaries, pastors, and Christian workers today can
recommit ourselves to die in the battle if need be with our backs bent under
the Gospel plow and our bodies worn out in ministry for the masses who need the
Gospel of salvation in Christ. “And for this purpose [we] labor, striving
according to His power, which mightily works within [us]” (Colossians 1:29).
