A Change of Perspective

It’s been about 3 weeks since I last wrote. Since that time, The Perspectives Course (over world missions) has both started and ended--A semester course all crammed into 15 days!! I feel like someone pushed the fast forward button and forgot to stop it til just now. 

To give you a picture of the typical day... there would be a lecture from a missionary instructor in the morning from 8:30-12. Then after lunch we would each go off and read for 6 hours straight every day. I think I’ve read more in these past few weeks than I have in my entire life. Although, most of the articles I read were extremely interesting and insightful, especially the missionary bios. The readings were over a vast array of materials--all dealing with the Biblical, Historical, Cultural, and Strategical basis of missions. I soaked it up like a sponge!

The biggest thing, besides all the millions of other things, that I’m taking away from the Perspectives course is that there’s something bigger going on in the world than what we know or will ever know. God really is all about His global agenda. His heart is for the nations, every people group! It’s seen all throughout Bible history starting with the Abrahamic promise,

 “I will make you into a great nation,

    and I will bless you;

I will make your name great,

    and you will be a blessing.

I will bless those who bless you,

    and whoever curses you I will curse;

and all peoples on earth

    will be blessed through you. ” –Gen 12:1-3.

We are blessed to be a blessing! Such amazing truth! But I’ve learned that this is not just a blanketed statement or something to make us feel good. It’s a mandate. A mandate that is reiterated several thousands of years later in Matthew 28: 18-20. Jesus stands on a mountain in Galilee and tells his disciples...

 “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

This is the last thing Jesus tells us before He ascends in to heaven and the first thing before He sends His Spirit to dwell in us – empowering us to fulfill this mandate.

I’ve been able to do a lot of reflecting while I’ve been here. I’ve claimed to be a “Christian” my whole life, but only in that past few years have I realized that I wasn’t a Christ follower. I wasn’t following Him with everything I am. I was more of a fan of Jesus, than I was a follower. If I truly loved Him, I would have been obeying His command to go and make disciples. But I was selfish, thinking only of what I would get out of the deal, and doing the right things just so I could check them off my list and fulfill my “spiritual duty” for the day.

However, now I have tasted and seen that the Lord is good. And I can’t go back. Now I am responsible for that knowledge. “…from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” Luke 12:48b

My eyes have been opened as I have been blown away by the immense vastness of God’s heart and glory. My perspective has been flipped upside down, and turned inside out. To give you just a glimpse of that, I’ll share how God gave me a whole new perspective of the following things...

THE BIBLE: I’ve read the Bible all my life and after taking Perspectives, I feel as though I’m reading my Bible for the very first time! It’s amazing to see the Truth in a different light. I shared a little of that earlier where God’s purpose for the world and for us was brought about through the Abrahamic covenant.

WORSHIP: “missions exist because worship doesn’t.” A great John Piper quote. One that radical changed the way I now see missions. WORSHIP is the key to effective missions. How beautiful a thing…to bring His people into a mutual proclamation of His greatness and glory, rather than simply preaching to them. Worship is a lifestyle. We were made to worship!  It says in Revelation that in heaven, people from every tongue, tribe, and nation will be worshipping the Lord together with a new song! But God is telling us this so that we may bring into existence and start experience glimpses of it now. “…Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks...” John 4:23-24

MISSIONS: I used to think that in order to be a missionary, I had to have a heart for the people overseas. I didn’t understand, then, why God called me to be a missionary if I didn’t even have a heart for people here in the U.S. at times. But then I realized… That I don’t need to love people or have a heart for nations. God doesn't expect me to! On my own strength, I am completely incapable of this.  All He asks of me is to love Him-To love Him with all that I am and that in this, He will give me a heart for the things He has a heart for. I will begin to love the things He loves. The fact that I love people has nothing to do with me, but everything to do with the Him. And the fact that I love Him is where the outpouring of that love for the nations stems from.

MISSIONARIES:  I used to think being a missionary was a life of routine and hardship. And in some respects it is. But reading numerous Biographies of people like D.L. Moody, Luther Wishard, Hudson Taylor, Robert and Grace Wilder drastically changed my view. These pioneers of the faith are some of the coolest people I’ve every read about. They lived radical lives for the sake of the Gospel and endured many hardships. Something that impressed me the most was that they knew what they were going up against, and yet they still went. Missions is not safe. Living for God is not safe! They knew this. And even though they may never be recognized in Hollywood, their lives will be marked by greatness in the Kingdom of God.

And that’s only a picture of What God’s revealed. More to come!! --Ellane