Jesus talking to the twelve here.
Luke 9
“Take nothing for the journey — no staff, no bag, no bread, no money, no extra tunic. Whatever house you enter, stay there until you leave that town. If people do not welcome you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave the town, as a testimony against them.�
This is right after He just gave them all power and authority to kick demon (censored word), heal diseases, and raise some dead people. Jesus gave them His same authority and just told them to go out to the lost. No real game plan given here. Just go. One stipulation: don’t bring stuff.
Another verse expands upon what this looked like for the apostles after a few attempts.
1 Corinthians 4:11-13
“To this very hour we go hungry and thirsty, we are in rags, we are brutally treated, we are homeless. We work hard with our own hands. When we are cursed, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure it; when we are slandered, we answer kindly. Up to this moment we have become the scum of the earth, the refuse of the world.�
Why do it that way? Why leave all your resources behind like that? Why endure the cursing, persecution, and slander to become “scum of the earth?� Why walk around homeless in rags? Answer: a need for total dependence. We often look at resources for ministry in terms of our assets or what we can do for “them� and forget that Jesus is our biggest resource and ministry to the poor is reciprocal ministry.
Fast forward a couple thousand years to Cambodia before our ATL (ask the Lord) month.
I’ll give you the cliff notes for this scene:
My team members prayed separately for where to go.
Came back together and everyone answered Vietnam.
Jonathan specifically heard Dong Tau.
Turns out there is a Dong Tau in Vietnam.
We head into Vietnam with no game plan, little resources, and big dreams.
Maps show Dong Tau roughly a couple hours from where we decide to stay up north.
Scene Two. Act One.
Jonathan and Tracy impromptu try out one of these Luke 9 things. They get on a bus and take it toward where they thought Dong Tau might be. They had little money for bus fares. No one here speaks English. No bags with them. No food. No extra anything. They just went. The night before I prayed the Lord would make our team uncomfortable with being comfortable. Their trip was full of un-comfort: alcoholic possessed man on the bus, brothel type houses in the middle of nowhere, scamming motor-bikes drivers offering not so free rides. But I’ll let those two blog about that day. They needed providence though, and the Lord was faithful. He found them rides, supplied food & water, and brought them home safely.
Scene Two. Act Two.
We each decide to ditch one of our bags to leave at the wine hotel and venture out for the next three days in search of Dong Tau as a team. Ok, it’s not a complete Luke 9 trip. I brought an extra tunic, and I have my bag with a few ramen packs and some oranges in it, but you’ve got to start somewhere. No plan here folks, just trusting the Lord will provide and bring us to where we need to be.
So we get on a bus…and go…
