Weakness

I found it fascinating to visit with church planters, pastors and missionaries in the field.

I think it therapeutic to talk through failures and victories. Not everything in the mission field is glorious. There are huge obstacles in adapting to a new way of life and a new culture. There are real advantages to building up a team of national workers. But the work has to start with a spark. It will take a missionary to first reach them. The Gospel commission says "Go".

Last night we were visiting with a missionary in Thailand. She made a comment that I had not really thought of before:

"God not only calls us because of our strengths, but also because of our weaknesses." She explained that ability and God's calling are important for a missionary but also that the power of the Gospel is demonstrated by a missionary leaning on God to strengthen their weakness.

The Gospel is not only a set of doctrines and intellectual teachings. The Gospel has to be lived. We have to experience God being real in our lives. A real God that answers prayer. A real God that heals illness. A real God that solves the humanly unsolvable. This daily relationship-- this in filling with God's abiding presence, is what is the power of God unto Salvation.

As I thought about it, this need is not only in SE Asia. This is our need everywhere. This showing that God is real in our lives is what our young people in America need to see and then experience for themselves. We don't need more fun to hold the youth in Christianity. We need God to be real. They need God to make a difference in their life and through them in the lives of others.

So perhaps we need Spirit filled Christians everywhere. Then God will be ready to do something miraculous and will finish the work.

How can God be real to you today? How can you say yes to each prompting of His Spirit, "Yes Lord- I am ready for service or sacrifice."

I am thinking of the image of an Ox standing between an alter and a plow. The inscription reads "Ready for either!"

May this be the prayer of our hearts. And let there be a spark.