“Jesus said to
them again, "…As the Father has sent Me, I also send you."” —John
20:21
“A missionary is
someone sent by Jesus Christ just as He was sent by God. The great controlling
factor is […] the command of Jesus. The source of our inspiration in our
service for God is behind us, not ahead of us. […] The goal is to be true to Him— to carry out
His plans. […] We tend to forget that the one great reason underneath all missionary
work is not primarily the elevation of the people, their education, nor their
needs, but is first and foremost the command of Jesus Christ— “Go therefore and
make disciples of all the nations…” (Matthew 28:19).” CHAMBERS
The words “missions”
and “missionary” are not in the Bible. “The
word "mission" originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members
abroad, derived from the Latin missionem (nom. missio), meaning "act of
sending" or mittere, meaning "to send".” (Wikipedia) No
matter where the words come from, the command
to go, the idea of being sent is clear. Jesus
said go … but go where? (Acts 1:8) “But you will receive power
when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends
of the earth.” The principle at work here is that we (none of us) are
not to keep our faith to ourselves.
We are to share the Gospel with our families, our friends, our
neighbors. Imagine concentric circles
(circles inside of circles). The
innermost circle is our family and the outermost circle is the uttermost parts
of the earth. We tend to associate missions
with those outermost circles. That is
where missionaries go to do what they do.
The truth is that we are all
called to be witnesses … to go … maybe only as far as our living room …
but maybe to a grass hut. Each of us
must listen to and obey the voice of God in this matter.
Unfortunately, many
times we think of the work of missions as something for the “hired guns”. People who will do our work for us, so then all
we have to do is pray and give money to be obedient to the Lord’s command. There was a television show on many years ago
called “Paladin”, he had business cards that said “Have gun – will travel”. For the right cause and for the right money,
Paladin would go to right wrongs. For
the missionaries their cards might say “Have Bible – Will travel” with the
difference is that they go for the cause of Christ – the Gospel and not for the
money. But, helping others fulfill their
call to go and serve in the uttermost parts does not absolve us of our to
missions to serve closer to or at home. Each
of us has a responsibility to be witnesses wherever the Lord might call us
to. Think about it. ELGIN
Charley Elgin
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