Why in the world the World Race?
I started writing this as a narrative about how God has been moving me towards the direction of missions, but I quickly realized that no one would want to read a blog that long. So instead… I’ve decided to leave out the grim details of me wrestling God over this question and just write out a summary of what He has been putting on my heart through this crazy journey.
Mercy *****Love*****Hope
1.Mercy
Passion 2012 was a big event for me this year. God moved in my heart so much during these three days that I literally can’t explain it all in words. So I won’t. The main lesson I left with is that we are meant to take the word of God literally; “do what it says” – James 1:22.
One of the speakers, Chris Caine, really showed me a new definition of compassion. She asked whether compassion was really compassion if there was no action tied to it. This hit me hard because I have always wondered how people could not have compassion for others in need, but the ‘compassion’ I felt I had really wasn’t worth anything. My feelings of sorrow for a homeless man in the street doesn’t help him anymore than someone just walking by, unless I actually stop to help him.
This realization was really pressed into my heart when we went to the story of the Samaritan man in Luke 10. A man was laying in the street after being robbed and beaten almost to the point of death. After the two men had seen him and just walked by, a third man saw him and took pity on him. The very next line says that this Good Samaritan “went to him and bandaged his wounds” (Luke 10:34). He felt mercy for the man, and he acted on it.
I have become aware of so many social injustice issues that have fired me up this year and I’m sure there will be more to come. I have always had a heart for people living in poverty. But God grew my heart for them so much more after learning about all the horrible circumstances that they are more vulnerable to fall into.
Awareness might provoke compassion, but mercy requires action. True compassion made this man interrupt his life and help the wounded man in the road.
"Go and do likewise." -Jesus, Luke 10:37
2.Love
My favorite verse, 1 Corinthians 13: 4-8, is all about love.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails…”
It describes the kind of love that Jesus Christ has for us. The kind that we should strive to have for others. There are two laws that Jesus preached above all else: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind; and love your neighbor as yourself” (Luke 10:27, Deuteronomy 6:5, Leviticus 19:18).
I believe that true love is never easy. Because true love is self-less, it requires work and it requires being intentional. Love requires action. Even from the One who perfected it.
“This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?” -1 John 3: 16-17
3.Hope
Luke 10:3 was a scary verse for me to read after asking God if He really wanted me to go on the World Race… “Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves.” My initial reaction was similar to one I’ve been encountering a lot lately, “Yikes!”
Instead of just leaving it at that and glazing over the realities of the dangers of mission work, I read the passage over and over again. I thought about why Jesus would use the picture of wolves and lambs, knowing that we would automatically think of wolves devouring lambs. So ranther than being stuck on the idea of being a sacrificial lamb, I focused on the wolves. Wolves would devour lambs because they are hungry. Well, why would Jesus refer to people in the world as hungry wolves? What would they be hungry for?
Then I remembered all of the horrible stories I heard this year about people in slavery around the world. Children soldiers being enslaved by fear. Women (and children) being enslaved by sex-traffickers. Men being enslaved by debts that are meant to never be paid off. I can think of a lot of things that these people would be hungry for, but I think Jesus was thinking of one thing that can sustain all: Hope.
Hope can be found in a lot of things, but only hope in Christ can set us free. Our hope in Him is the basis of our faith in Him. This faith can not only free us from an eternal slavery, but it frees us from anything we might be enslaved to in this life as well. Because we realize our hope in him is greater than any hope of things in this life, we have freedom from all of our earthly circumstances and struggles.
It enables us to be strong, because He is strong for us. “The Lord is a refuge for the oppressed; a stronghold in times of trouble. Those who know your name will trust in you, for you, Lord, have never forsaken those who seek you.” -Psalm 9: 9-10
It also enables those who have this hope to go out and share it; as lambs among wolves that are hungry for hope. Hope fuels action.
“Sing praises to the Lord, enthroned in Zion; proclaim among the nations what he has done…he does not ignore the cry of the afflicted…the needy will not always be forgotten, nor the hope of the afflicted ever perish.” –Psalm 9: 11,12,18
My ordinary life was interrupted when I found hope because Jesus showed me active mercy and self-less love. Because of this, I am willing to let my life be interrupted by others who need His mercy, love, and hope.
“The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love…let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth…” (Galatians 5:6 and 1 John 3:18).
