Everyday Thankfulness
During my most recent trip to Colorado, my 8-year old niece gave me one of her “treasures” — a small wooden trinket stamped with 1 Thessalonians 5:18, “Give thanks in all circumstances.” The rest of the verse, of course, is “for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”
I often wonder (tongue-in-cheek) if when Jesus said, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few,” it was actually a warning about how busy
the work could be! I find that serving in this day of harvest is often energizing and wearisome, engaging and overwhelming. Yet I realize that this is the everyday circumstance where I need to be thankful — above all to give God glory, but also for my own sake.
My natural tendency is to focus on problems — which I think I can do something about — more so than blessings, which are manifestations of God’s grace. But “blessing” is the only way I can describe the dual privilege of being on a leading edge of the Great Commission and serving with an incredible team of co-workers and ministry partners.
It’s funny how easily “the amazing” can turn into “the routine.” This occurred to me a while back as I strolled through the GMO office in Orlando. Large LCD monitors show real-time statistics of how God is touching lives around the world through our ministry — numbers so large that I still have a hard time wrapping my mind around them.
Our team is often abuzz with global activity — I can simultaneously observe one co-worker developing a web site in Arabic, overhear someone on the phone in Spanish, and see that yet another is on a Skype video call to a different hemisphere. A couple of our staff might be processing applications from volunteer online missionaries, while another works to program a new feature for our email response system. Even opening my own email inbox can be an adventure in global partnership.
Recently at GMO’s new Silicon Valley studio (which I helped build-out this summer), I recorded our basic evangelism and discipleship videos in Korean. I’m currently working on plans to do this same set, and perhaps even more content, in five or six other languages. It’s truly exciting to be creating content that God can use to change lives. I also receive the joyful blessing of partnering with mission-minded Believers from other cultures and language groups.
When I joined Campus Crusade for Christ nine years ago (as of this summer), part of my call was to engage others in the Great Commission. As I’ve recorded interviews with our online missionaries, I get to see first-hand how our ministry is fostering a passion for global evangelism and discipleship in other Believers.
Finally, I’m thankful for the partners that God uses to financially support my ministry. Ever week or so, I will download a list of recent gifts — tangible reminders of the vision and mission I share with committed individuals and churches. It is truly an honor to be involved, and to involve others, in a movement that I see God using in a significant way to complete the Great Commission.
Radical Faith
What does it mean to have “radical faith?” I’ve been thinking about this question for a few months since I was was challenged by these words in Crazy Love by Francis Chan: “God wants us to trust Him with abandon. He wants to show us how He works and cares for us. He wants to be our refuge. …God doesn’t call us to be comfortable. He calls us to trust Him so completely that we are unafraid to put ourselves in situations where we will be in trouble if He doesn’t come through.”
“Faith” is simple word that is difficult to adequately define. It describes the beliefs and convictions that guide our attitude and actions; what I do says more about my faith than what I say. And Biblical truths of what it means to have and apply faith are often repeated as well-meant but shallow, inept clichés. Encouraging someone they need to have “faith the size of a mustard seed” is easy; living it out is a whole different matter.
The familiar words of Hebrews 11:1 define faith as “being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. ” Like the faith heroes of the Bible, we look with hope towards a God who has both kept His promises and still has promises to keep. As followers of Christ, we can understand every problem, every circumstance, and every decision as part of the story unfolding between two bookend events: Christ’s resurrection and Christ’s triumph as King. We live as aliens and strangers in this world, knowing that what we cannot yet see — the Kingdom of God — is far more real than anything we do see.
I am increasingly convinced of the connection between faith, joy, and glory. Faith is simply taking God at His word, trusting in His nature and promises, and turning that truth into actions. Radical faith comes when we take this to the extreme, laying aside sin, doubt, worldly perspectives, and whatever else gets in our way. Faith is how God has chosen to reveal His glory in and through us. Our true and lasting joy comes when God shows up, when He comes through for us. Why should we not want anything less radical quantities of faith, joy, and glory? A faith that is not radical is a faith with unrealized potential.
I doubt that anyone just wakes up one morning and decides “I’m going to become a radical.” Rather, it’s a series of steps, big and small, that lead to radicalism (whether for good or for evil). By any definition, Jesus was a radical; he defied the norms of his contemporaries. So if we are called to follow Jesus’ example of total dependance on God, then we to are called to be radical. Yet if anything is clear from scripture, is that God doesn’t just “zap” us with radical faith; rather, He develops it through a messy, difficult, and often confusing process.
I’ve found myself wondering how many aspects of my life are defined by “radical faith.” It seems like there should be some — after all, I am a missionary! God has shown me that, by His grace, He’s already covered the landscape of my life with situations where I’m going to be in deep trouble apart from Him. Yet I find myself both yearning and somewhat nervous to have God develop in me an ever more radical faith.
Kingdom Pieces
Sometimes the realities of God’s Kingdom are easy to spot, like when God does something big. But other times, the Kingdom is more subtle — at least until God opens your eyes to realize how He is masterfully bringing many small pieces together for a larger purpose. I realized this truth a few days ago during the largest video production I’ve ever done with GMO.
Steve Douglass, the president of Campus Crusade for Christ, worked with Crusade staff and students at a local university to develop a Bible study series called Essentials of Spiritual Growth and Multiplication. The basic idea is to help believers understand, apply, and then share core spiritual principles. A while back, my co-worker Mike and I took on the task of turning this material into online courses (“e-learning”) to disciple new believers.
Since this is a discussion-based study, we decided that the best way to adapt it for online use would be to film a “scripted Bible study.” The person taking the course becomes a “virtual” member of the group, answering questions and responding to the discussion. But we had a big problem: we didn’t have the resources or people needed to make this idea possible.
After joining our team last Fall, Kristina began looking at options and found a studio that we could rent at a reasonable rate. And last January, she ?organized GMO’s first-ever “casting call,” asking local Christian actors to come and audition. Mike finalized the scripts he had written, and I began looking for equipment we could borrow. 
Driving home weary after the first of our two production days, it struck me how this was an ?incredible example of God’s Kingdom in action. Our five actors and four additional crew members gladly gave of their time and energy to be part of this effort. The studio time and equipment was paid for by the gifts of many donors to GMO and the other ministries that loaned equipment. And, of course, I was there because of the commitment of my ministry partners. God masterfully coordinated the gifts and talents of many believers so that we might impact others — many of whom we will never meet this side of heaven.
There is still work to do to for the four lessons we’re creating, and if this pilot is successful there are 20 additional segments of the Essentials series that can be developed. If if so, it will be awesome to see how God will bring all the pieces together again.
Commanded Reality
I recently read Psalm 119:1-2: “Joyful are the people of integrity, who follow the instructions of the Lord. Joyful are those who obey his laws, and search for him with all their hearts.” Here and in other Psalms, words like “joy,” “happiness,” and “delight” (depending on translation) are correlated with obedience to God’s commandments. I began thinking about this in the context of Jesus’ final words in the Gospel of Matthew, a.k.a. the Great Commission: “Go and make disciples… teaching them to obey everything I’ve commanded you.”
The Psalms, of course, are referring to the commands and laws God gave to Abraham and Moses. This is the foundation upon which Jesus gives His own commands; He said, “I did not come to abolish the law of Moses or the writings of the prophets. No, I came to accomplish their purpose.” [Matt. 5:17] Jesus’ death and resurrection fulfilled, once and for all time, the requirements of the Law. But while the Old Testament laws are the “do’s and don’ts” of pleasing God, Jesus’ commands pointed to something even greater. In word and deed, Jesus’ commands reveal His worldview or paradigm — the reality of heaven itself. In Jesus this reality becomes accessible to mankind: “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” [John 14:6]
Jesus’ reality stands in sharp contrast to the reality of earth. “Love the Lord your God … Love your neighbor as yourself.” “If you cling to your life, you will lose it; but if you give up your life for me, you will find it.” “Whoever wants to be first must take last place and be the servant of everyone else.” If I wanted to list all of Jesus’ commands, I could simply copy and paste large chunks of the Gospels into this letter. But the point is, Jesus isn’t talking about “doing things better” — He’s talking about doing things completely differently, old nature replaced by new nature. It’s an existence so different that it can only come when one reality gives way to another.
The foundation of Jesus’ reality is His relationship with the Father. The reality of His followers is established by relationship with Jesus and, through Him, the Father. John 15:1-17 is the familiar “vine and the branches” passage where Jesus tells His followers to “abide” or “remain” in Him, in His love, just as He does with the Father. Without this connection, none of Jesus’ commands make any sense, do any good, or are even worth attempting. “Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.” [15:5] How do we do this? Jesus says in verse 10, “When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love.” It’s a cycle: we remain in relationship with Jesus by following His commands, which we can only do… if we remain in Him.
Jesus’ commands are not a new 10-point moral code tacked onto the old one. Nor did Jesus give us a formula for following Him and getting God’s blessing. His commands describe the reality God originally intended for us that was then marred by sin. Commands that are not designed to restrict us, but to free us — and bring us the joy for which we were created. Jesus said, “I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow!” [John 15:11] Right back to what it says in Psalms — and so much more.
Let’s be honest: there’s something about “obedience” that doesn’t sound like fun — nor does it seem like “good marketing” for our cause. At least on the surface. We are called to live and proclaim God’s reality — an eternal kingdom of joyful relationship — which is far better and desirable than the sin-warped reality into which we’re born. The invitation to follow Jesus is an invitation to enter into His reality. The Great Commission mandate of “teaching them to obey everything I’ve commanded” is about helping others enter and mature in Jesus’ reality; His priorities, perceptions, power, and practices becoming those of His followers.
As I journey with God, He is continually changing the way I think so that in my heart and mind the world’s reality is ever more replaced with Jesus’ reality. In the face of any circumstance or difficulty — from economic jitters to literal earthquakes, personal challenges to future worries — I can choose to define things in terms of Jesus’ reality instead of mine or anyone else’s. In Jesus’ reality, I can say confidently, “With God, all things are possible.” I can regard “the least of these” as truly worthy and valuable. I can trust “that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God.” And I can celebrate that “nothing can ever separate us from God’s love” — nothing can ever cut me off from Jesus’ reality. [Rom. 12:12; Matt. 19:26, 25:40-45; Rom. 8:28, 8:38]
People worldwide are searching for hope, for meaning… for a different reality. Last year, the Lord allowed Global Media Outreach to tell 67 million people how to enter His reality through faith in Jesus Christ. And 10,502,641people indicated their decision to trust Christ for the first time or renew their commitment. We don’t know what kind of “soil” all these people are — only that they were searching and responding. Yet many of the 1,943,585 people who contacted us by email certainly need to learn the joy and fulfillment of obeying all that Christ commanded.
I can only be truly passionate about that which I’ve truly experienced. The more I know and experience Jesus’ reality, the greater my motivation to tell others about it as well. I trust the same is true for you. Thanks for being part of my mission to help others discover and grow in Jesus’ reality.
