Getting There Before It's Too Late: (essentials for everyone)
This update, i want to say some things that are essential. No quick overview this time.
We're staying a couple days in a mission guesthouse that had a sign on the kitchen wall with the following inscription:
"The Gospel is only good news if it arrives in time!" -Carl Henry
Those words have been quite sobering. Only a few days ago the 15-year-old daughter of one of our national friends got sick and died. We were able to help the family transport the body back to her family in their village. There are two graveyards in this village --one for so-called "Mohammed followers" and the other for "Jesus followers." The latter was the resting place for only one person. The former held too many to count. When the Usus bury their dead they lay them prostrate in the ground and line sticks across the mouth of the hole. They cover that with leaves and then a mound of the dirt. Within a short amount of time the wood rots and the dirt falls in. I looked around me as they laid her body with those of her ancestors. Within that wooded area i counted seven fresh graves of people that had only passed away within the last couple months or so.
What i'm about to write here will be a hard pill for some of you to swallow, but i ask that you let me know so that we can talk about it in private.
She is in hell now. All those fresh graves and the several in between hold the remains of people who are all in hell. Most of them had never heard the Gospel. Why? And how can we as Christ's Church change that?
Those were not rhetorical questions. Leave a comment.
'til the whole world hears,
corey reid pendergrass
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5 comments:
Prayer my friends, prayer...and broken hearts. Both of which we know you have and are doing. All in His timing. I read about Isaac today...it was 20 years before his wife had a baby. And last Sunday we stufy Joseph...it was 13 years of wait time for him, although he was busy during those years...being steadfast in his faith....13years before he become 2nd in command of Eygpt. Our timing is not His. We love you all! N and J
I think Piper says Go, Send or Disobey. Our church (Harvest Bible Chapel) says that the mission of the church is missions and the mission of missions is the church. Every Christian is to be directly involved in missions either by giving directly or by going, or by praying. Praying God blesses your relationships and time there with eternal, soul saving fruit.
http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/conference-messages/doing-missions-when-dying-is-gain
That sermon is worth listening to.
In my opinion the reason is a number of things.
In the last year, i've spent a good amount of time curious about one in particular.
We are a Church greatly composed of mules. Mules are born. They eat grass. They poop. And they never reproduce.
I know math usually only works on paper, but consider this. If a Jesus follower disciples one lost person a year and then that disciple does the same and their spiritual "grandchildren" do the same... can you guess how long it would take for every man, woman, and child on planet earth to hear the Good News? 33 years. I'm not kidding. Do the math.
So why after 2000 years is over half of planet earth have still not reach with the Gospel?
Mules. It's not the "layman's" job to minister to the lost. That's what we pay the pastor for.
1 Peter 1:5&9 declares us all as priests. According to Peter, there was no such thing as laymen.
Marinate on it.
we the church ought to be relentless towards growing in the incredible intimacy of experiencing GOD in our lives! JESUS prayed that we would become ONE with the Father just as He is ONE with the Father (John 17). It will be then that our hearts break for what break's the Father's heart! It will be then that an overwelming desire to share the Gospel and make disciples will become a nonnegotiable in our lives and CHRIST in us will reach the entire world for His Glory! Halaluyer! love yall!!!!!!!
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