Jesus couldn't have been any more plain; five times and five books. Gospel of Matthew: go and make disciples of all nations. Gospel of Mark: sow the seed. The sower sows the seed; can't control the kind of soil that receives it. He sows the seed. Sow the seed. Gospel of Luke: repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached to all nations. Gospel of John: as the father has sent me, I send you. Book of Acts: you will be my witnesses to the ends of the earth. Get it? Our mission is clear. Share the good news: wildly, indiscriminately, generously, just like a sower cast seed across the land.
Jesus has given us the greatest news in the world. Christmas: God is with you and loves you. Good Friday: Jesus forgives you, and makes you right with God. Easter: Jesus was raised, and he will raise us too. And now he's sending you and me into the world to share that good news. That's the mission God has for his people. The mission God has for you. In fact, that's why you were made; to share the best news the world has ever received. Think about it. If I had the cure for cancer, I'd want to share it. If I had the vaccine to prevent AIDS, I would want to share it. Those cures pale in comparison to this. We have the greatest news in the world. God loves us, and we, too, will be raised. God made us to share that with the people around us with our families, our colleagues, our neighbors.
So my question is, will you take a step forward today to begin fulfilling the mission God made you for? To step from being a worldly Christian, a believer who thinks mostly about yourself, your own spiritual needs, your own wants, who prays mainly for you and just kind of lives life, to being a world-class Christian: one who spends your life as a college student, as a real estate broker, as a stay-at-home mom, thinking about the spiritual needs of other people, and sticking to offer them the greatest news in the world. Because God made you to be a world-class Christian.
I invite you to take three simple steps. First, step from self-centered thinking to other-centered thinking. This is the step that's probably the toughest one of all; to start thinking about the spiritual needs of other people as much or more as you think about your own spiritual needs. You have the best news in the world. Do you consider whether the people around you know that good news? God invites us to think of the spiritual needs of the people around us; to pray silent little breath prayers when we're with them. Asking God to show us their needs and how we can be of service. How he can use us to offer them hope and grace and love and life. To think less about ourselves and more about other people.
The second step would then go from being a here-and-now thinker to an eternal thinker. So much of what we spend our time on energy on, is stuff that's just going to fade away; it's temporary. Houses are temporary. Hairlines, waistlines, wrinkles, all temporary; beach strips, temporary. Focus on what's eternal; what doesn't fade away. Don't settle for temporary things.
I learned that very, very, very, very plainly when my dad died. We spent time finishing up all the will and estate stuff and all the legalities that go with death; settling all the loose ends of dad's estate. And then we set aside time on one Saturday to clean out dad's closet; a lifetime of clothes and papers and stuff. Mom had a good laugh. Some of my dad's taste in clothing hadn't changed since George Washington. Most of the stuff went to one of two places. Some of it got stacked up on the street to be picked up by trashmen and carried to a landfill. The rest got loaded up and taken to the Salvation Army. When we arrived there, the Salvation Army was so overwhelmed by people dropping off stuff that hundreds, maybe thousands of boxes of clothes were sitting out in the parking lot as far as the eye could see. It began to rain. And the temporary things that people had worked so hard to accumulate over the years sat there getting saturated in the rain and boxes in a parking lot. Don't waste your life seeking things that are temporary. Things that will end up in a landfill or in a pile in a parking lot because nobody else wants it. Become a world-class Christian whose life is focused solely on the eternal.
The third step would be shifting from excuses to finding your own way to fulfill your mission. Every person I ever met has a good excuse. Some of us have lots of them. Sarah was too old. Martha was worried too much. Moses stuttered. David was an adulterer. Lydia had business concerns. Peter was a hothead. Samson was codependent. Naomi was a widow. Leah was unattractive. Jeremiah was too young. Gideon was too small. Rahab was immoral. But God uses all his people. And he always provides a way. It's God's mission and God provides. When you step out to fulfill your mission, God will provide the way. But you must step out. Moses raised his arms and God parted the Red Sea. A little boy offered 5 loaves and 2 fish and God fed 5,000 people with 12 baskets left over. God has made you for a higher purpose. He has a mission for your life. You were made to share life-changing news. But I do need to warn you, it will cost you. You're going to stop doing some things that you're doing because they're just good, but they're not great. You'll use your time and your thoughts differently than you presently do. You'll be focused on God and the eternal. You'll manage your money differently because you'll use your resources to fulfill the mission of sharing the good news. And you'll think about other people around you in a whole new loving way. But best of all, you will experience the blessing of God in ways you can not even begin to imagine right now. You will experience the blessing of God in ways that few people ever will and holy moments will overflow out of your cup. Because you have stepped forward to fulfill the mission. For which God made you.
