Team Prayer Night

Contrary to everyone’s belief missionaries are far from perfect. For those who used to think that, they now have concrete evidence in me that their former hunch is true. I know it is easier to imagine that missionaries are perfect with Alicia, she is about as perfect as it gets. So you would think that a group of people who gave up all dreams that they had for their lives in the culture that they grew up in, to go around for 2 years begging people to give them money and pay for their salary, who move to a new culture and learn a new language, all to teach people about Christ and bring them into a relationship with God, would have learned by now that they have undertaken a task that cannot be completed through human power. There is simply not enough hours in the day, enough brain cells that can’t wait to learn to speak a foreign language as an adult, or enough resources to wow people with fancy church buildings, to complete our mission of seeing that every person in Salvador comes to know the blessing of living in an abundantly rich relationship with their Creator. We have been sent here by countless numbers of families, individuals and churches who have ordained us to complete this mission, that left to our own power would be doomed to fail. Yes we are only human, and just as faithful people of God in the past have done, so we too forget God and try to do it on our own. However on the mission field, missionaries learn quickly (probably by God’s design) that they cannot do it on their own. I think of Moses leading the Israelites, who just got burned out, or Nehemiah trying to rebuild the temple. It only happens when the person led by God to do a God sized task, turns his heart and completely trusts in God. Our team is learning this. For a while now I realized that our team was falling into similar partners that I see at times in churches back home due to our humanity. We begin to meet regularly to do churchy stuff, have some traditional prayers, and good church-like activities and fellowship, that talks about God being in our midst, but lacks that focus, vibrancy, and freedom of knowing that we have come together as believers in a God who rules the universe, loves beyond imagine, and is intensely passionate that we love Him with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. I think the Evil One loves to tell us that if we are busy we are living God’s desire for our lives. I have found that already a mission team can be busy doing great things in the name of God but not in a serious pursuit of the God they desire to share with others so intensely. God wants us to share our love for Him with others out of our intense desire to know Him, so that we are speaking out of our daily experiences with Him, and out of our current walk with Him. I believe this would help a lost world see how we truly believe in a God that is the greatest reality in this world and that life without Him is just a waste. So to that end Alicia and I have offered our team another opportunity to join together in a serious pursuit of God, by meeting together weekly outside of regularly scheduled churchy activities to come to the feet of our ruler and get the inside scoop from Him. Be praying for our team and our spiritual dynamic and growth, that we will learn that without God being glorified and at the helm of this work it will end up being a human sized work.