Thursday, June 2, 2011

For such a time as this...

"Why should a sinner be saved?"

Gulu responding to the Gospel :)

This is an age old question that I have heard discussed, and that I have pondered myself.  There are two sides to the argument-  1. God deserves the worship that he has refused to give him. 2. The sinner has value and needs to be saved.  I feel like people have felt the need to hang on to one side of the pendulum... And I honestly feel like they aren't mutually exclusive.  If a sinner is only saved simply to "fulfill a requirement", then it leaves out the part of God's heart that desires to see His children walk in Life, and Life in abundance.  God has created us to be in relationship with Him, because He loves us, not because he "needs" us.  But if we only look at the sinner and we get stuck in "deeds" then we lose sight of the One that we are actually trying to reach them with, and we will get burned out, dissapointed, and let down.  So what if the answer was so much easier than we made it.  What if a sinner is meant to be saved simply because God has commanded us to go to the ends of the earth and make disciples of all nations.  God knows the reason, He knows the purpose, and He knows the goal.  When God asks, who are we to think that we can "reason" why He is asking us to go?  When we try to reason, most of the time, if it is not done in the fear of the Lord, it steals the glory away from the Lord in simple obedience.  The times in my life I have seen God come through in the biggest ways, and the times I have been so blessed by His provision and guidance are the times I followed Him in blind faith.  Yet I always seem to forget that fact and think that I have to "figure everything out" before I actually step into doing it.  But this time I choose to say no to my pride and ignorance.


My team coming to Uganda with me!
 This time I choose to walk in obedience to God, even if I don't understand His reasoning.  All I know is all I need to know, and all I know is right in front of me.  I know that God has called me to Uganda for such a time as this.  And this time I want to go focusing on the Lord... but I also want to go with a focus on His people.  That is why I believe the greatest command that Jesus gave was two- fold; He told us to love God and to love our neighbor.  Sometimes I think we have a misunderstanding in thinking that compassion is "humanism"  But I am challenged to think different. I am challenged to see the Lord through my personal times with Him, as well as to see Him through the people that He has created in His image to worship Him and to spend eternity with him.  And I am so encouraged and blessed by the people that are walking by my side to see this happen :) God has called us to Uganda for such a time as this, and we may never know all that He is up to...but one thing we can say is that we have responded "send us, we'll go."  Please pray for our team and all of our workers at Soldiers of Christ in Northern Uganda this summer! Pray that we can walk in the obedience and the love of the Lord and in His strength and bring his joy to the people of Gulu, Uganda!