by Neil Cullers
For the missionary, deputation can be a grinding process through which to progress in order to get to the field.
This is a time that can, in a weak moment, feel as if it is an absolute waste. Strangely, at the same time it is such an essential time of personal growth and focus, a challenging of God’s people across the nation, and a linking of prayer warriors with the front-line soldiers across the globe. I am, however, eager to get to the field to win those precious souls to Christ and to make a difference. I do not want to stand at the Great White Throne one day being safe and secure while watching person after person who I was committed to reach dropping to their knees to confess Christ but being cast into an eternity apart from God. It will be too late to reach the lost then!
Is my mission field just one day only? Is it just in Taiwan?
If we are not careful, we can become so caught up in thinking about the “someday” that we fail to see the obvious scene of spiritual carnage around us right now—families shattered and reeling, young ones broken and betrayed by their supposed protectors, and calloused faces hiding raw and pain-stricken hearts.
Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?… (Lamentations 1:12)
As David said in 1 Samuel 17:29, …Is there not a cause?
What am I going to do about it? May I ask, what are WE going to do about it?
It is great that our churches have a time for soulwinning, but do we? It is wonderful that we can point to people in our churches who care about others and who pray with tears in their eyes for those who are lost, but do we care? Who is on our hearts right now?
I fear it is so frighteningly easy to walk on by while being unseeing and unfeeling. While on deputation, it is not a difficult thing to soak in the prayers of others and to covet more prayer while never once praying for my supporting churches or for power and for protection for their pastors. We are in this thing together!
The common thread in worldwide missions is that God is not willing that any should perish! When I do not care, God does! When I will not go, God searches for someone who will. What does it say about our hearts when we do not care and He does? What does it say of our vision when we cannot see reality as He does? What does it say about our spirits when we cannot even hear God or sense Him directing us but we are okay with that? I love that our Lord said, And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. (Luke 24:47) Where does missions start for all of us? It starts right at our feet and right where we are.