Go Where He Leads - Some Thoughts on "Missions" Pt. 1

I was thinking just a few minutes ago about how we, perhaps moreso in American Christian culture (though I am no expert), view God's call on us to "do missions."

There's a lot of talk in Christian bubbles today about missions. Most of the time the people that are super fired up about missions we regard as some sort of higher breed of Christian, people that are willing to be poor and live off of a steady diet of baloney and/or vienna sausage (that stuff rules by the way) while living amongst natives of far-off "unreached" and primitive civilizations. Oftentimes, from my experience in dealing with and knowing a lot of peers that wish to be missionaries in distant lands, we get this somewhat unrealistic view, maybe not overtly sometimes, that if we don't make this huge move somewhere overseas or in the most remote village in Zbembezedjfd or wherever, that we are somehow not "responding to the call of God." Now I am quick to agree that Jesus commanded to preach the gospel in all nations and to make disciples of all people, but I think it's easy sometimes to just reduce the Commission to the people that do go to other countries and to so-called unreached people groups that haven't heard the name of Jesus.

Or perhaps we can even reduce "the call" to people that decide to go to seminary and be religious "professionals." The problem with such thinking is that it creates this hierarchy of spirituality where we can agree that we are all Christians, but sometimes we who just stay at home and work a mundane job can feel the temptation to exalt these "missionaries" and "seminarians" to a higher status in God's spiritual pyramid scheme where Jesus sits at the top and we can become like him by making the right decisions, gritting our teeth, being moral, and depending on our own will to attain the righteousness of Christ. We view them as spiritual super heroes that somehow never struggle, never miss reading their Bible, never cease praying, and are even never suffering from sin in their lives, both those they have committed and those that have been committed against them. I believe we must resist the temptation to do this because we are focusing so much on other people and our failures to live up to them instead of focusing on Jesus and the righteousness he imparts to us by his death and resurrection achieved according to his own grace and love.

If we get stuck on this type of man-centered thinking, it can distort where we think our righteousness is obtained. This can also happen to the person who is "called" to go overseas or to seminary. We have a strange view of God's "call" I think. We are raised by the institutional American church (usually the mainstream denominations) to try real hard to "hear the call of God," so we say. Granted, this is true, but we must be careful in how we understand this. We must ask ourselves: what is the call of God? Is it different to each person? Should I wait for God to speak audibly to me or give me a vision? In thinking about these questions, we must not overlook some of the clearest commands of God and how we are to respond to His call to us. Primarily, we must not overlook the inspiration of Scripture, and also the speaking of the Holy Spirit to our hearts. Furthermore, it must be understood that the Holy Spirit will never call us to do something contrary to Scripture, for He Himself "inspired" it ('breathed life into it') (2 Tim. 3:16), and for Him to do so it would seem He was either a horrible communicator because He couldn't get the message right the first time, or that He was some sort of whimsical schizophrenic who gives commands based on some ridiculous capricious nature that change from moment to moment. No, we must refuse this heretical teaching.

Secondly, we can have a confused outlook on God's call to us. We can take one aspect of the Gospel call and run with it, while ignoring the remaining crucial parts, for the entire Gospel is to be regarded when obeying Jesus' Commission. We cannot say "we must all be overseas missionaries," or "we must all go to seminary," or "we must leave our homes and spread the Gospel to the unreached peoples because how can anyone know Jesus unless it is us who tells them?" Let me just say, a lot of this kind of talk is nonsensical. Who are we to say what we should be? Who are we to prescribe what the call of God is to us, or more broadly what the will of God is for the nations of the Earth? And how do we know that those "primitive" civilizations don't know Jesus? Can we claim that Jesus can't show up to them and reveal himself? I want to be clear here. God does not need us. He is all-powerful, omnipotent, the Almighty God, however you want to put it. The point is He can get things done without us, but the amazing thing is He chooses to use us and include us in His purposes. Therefore we must approach the "call of God" or the "will of God" humbly and ask God to glorify His name by using us however He sees fit. We must remember who is in charge here. It's not us. We must remember that God will get what He wants done, done. We must remember that God is on a mission also, a much bigger one, and unlike us, He never fails. Jesus was the ultimate missionary. He came to a foreign land for one reason: to save sinners, and he completed his mission to the nth degree. He shouted "it is finished!" from the cross, and indeed it is. He has completed his mission on the cross and from His perspective outside of time, He has already won the battle for our souls. We must recognize by the grace given to us that we must repent from our sin and turn to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. Ephesians 2 tells us that we are saved by grace through faith, and both of these are gifts He gives according to the purpose He set out before the foundations of the Earth to glorify Himself, the source of all righteousness.

I think the main point I am trying to make is that we must not get too caught up in "trying to hear the call of God", wondering which country to go to, and being really good at guessing the secret will of God. All people need Jesus, and God will "have mercy on whomever He wills" (Rom. 9:15), so we must rest our hope on Him who is faithful that He will accomplish His purposes and He can use us in any circumstance, in any country, in every moment of time if it be His desire. We must hold fast to the truth, worship God in all circumstances, and preach the Gospel whether in season or out of season. So I say, do whatever you like, go wherever you want, marry whomever you want, work wherever you want, but preach the Gospel, love your neighbor, love your wife, submit to your husband, pray, take up your cross, glorify His purpose, love your enemies, do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God--in your words and how you live, and know that our only source of righteousness does not come from what country we're in or where we work, but from the crimson flow of Christ, Hallowed be Thy Name. Amen.