Why We Do Missions

What are you passionate about? Music? Sports? Maybe you follow the Tar Heels or the Blue Devils. I follow my Demon Deacons pretty closely, which has led to my share of misery of late. Maybe you are passionate about something you do. I enjoy cooking and find recipes to try out on my family (the Cornish game hen was dismal). Maybe your passion is your family, your children or grandchildren. Most of us can talk a while when someone asks us about our family. Whatever your passion is, I hope you have one! Passion is what drives us and gives meaning to our lives.

Many years ago, during a revival meeting, I walked down the aisle at Westfield Baptist Church. What does a 9 year old boy understand about Jesus? In a very important way, he knows enough. “Jesus loves me and I want to be more like him.” In the intervening years, I have learned more about Jesus, but the confession holds fast. This is where a Passion to Serve begins. It is accepting and believing in the love God has for us through Jesus, realizing what an incredible gift that is, and being willing to share that gift with other people. It’s not that complicated. It is why we do missions—we are trying to be more like Jesus.

I have to note our pastor’s words from his sermon last week: “It is impossible to live like Jesus, without Jesus.” Isn’t that the truth? I know I cannot be forgiving, committed, persistent and relevant enough without standing next to him. I have tried it and still try it, and it doesn’t work. So, we can be good people, we can donate to causes, we can be sensitive to people’s needs. But if we are Christians, our passion to serve comes from a relationship with the One whose life was about being a servant.

As we look headlong into this new year, let’s consider our place in our church and outside of it. President Jimmy Carter tells the story of when, as a young man, he served as a kind of missionary in a poor urban area. An Hispanic man pastored a store front church and Carter would accompany him as he tended to the people in his neighborhood. The ministry was very difficult and things at times seemed bleak, even hopeless. Carter was amazed at the pastor’s attitude and willingness to serve every day in the face of despair. He asked the pastor about it. He seemed startled to be asked such a question, since it did not seem to occur to him to do anything else. He replied, “There should be two great loves in your life—God and the person standing in front of you at any given moment.” Who is standing in front of you?

The Rev. John Perkins is a founder of the Christian Community Development Association. He was also a friend of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. and a leader in the civil rights movement. He puts it this way, “We religious people tend to lean on the supernatural. We always want God to prove Himself with a sign. But God works through people. That’s the incredible thing about grace. God doesn’t only save us, He works through us—redeemed sinners—to redeem the world. Even more incredible is the fact that God is sovereign and doesn’t need us at all. But he chooses to work through us. I don’t know if we really understand grace until we grasp this idea that God chooses to need broken people like us in his plan to redeem the world.”

You see, something BIG is happening. You should be a part of it.