One Small Step

I'm just returning from a summit of sorts in Dallas, where a number of ministry leaders from the Mideast met together. We came to discuss ways we can partner to impact regions like Lebanon and beyond for the cause of Christ. It is both impressive and encouraging to see the caliber of men and women God is bringing together.

We came to dream large and pray big and strategize powerfully—but we realized it all begins with small steps, little decisions to do the will of God. The good news is that in a region that seems so desperate and chaotic and easy to write off, there is this growing conviction that after years of praying and seeing little fruit, God is beginning to move throughout the place, from Algeria to Iran. Shiites and Sunnis and Druze are finding dead ends in their own faiths, and finding the grace and hope they have been looking for in Jesus. God is revealing Himself in amazing dreams to unbelievers, creating events that are giving the church the opportunity to show the compassion of Christ. Hence, it is imperative the church of Jesus is mobilized to minister to responsive hearts. 

 

Still, it seems pretty overwhelming. There are huge obstacles—threats of terror, instability, seething hatreds, desperate people, religions that give legitimacy to acts of great evil. But in these days, there are a couple of things that urge us forward. First is the knowledge that we serve a God who has put all things under His feet (I Cor 15). He has both conquered death and raised us to new life. We have been given His power to stand in this tension of the already and not yet, the Kingdom of God that is present, and yet future. And hence, there is something of God’s future reign that steps into the present when we call on Him. For this is the essence of prayer—prayer that cries out—Thy kingdom come! It is prayer that is unwilling to accept the world as it is. Prayer that is so formidable that there is an in-breaking of God’s future rule into the present, such that we who bear His name become “advance signs” of God’s eventual new world in the here and now. This is what is happening—and must happen in the Mideast.

 
The second thing that encourages our hearts are the stories of consummate risk-takers, those that have gone before us. In a book I just finished, Water from a Deep Well by Gerald Sittser (well worth spending a lot of time in), the author has a compelling chapter about risk-takers. One of my favorite stories is one told of David Brainard, a man who risked everything (“I want to wear out my life in his service”), and devoted his life to praying for the nations. Jonathan Edwards was to be his future father in law, but Brainard died before the marriage could take place. Nonetheless, Brainard lived on, for Edwards was so moved by this young man’s example, that he wrote a brief biography of his life. And these words moved across the ocean, setting in motion the modern missionary movement and inspiring the likes of William Carey. They moved a Jim Elliot to go out and risk his life and impact his world, facing obstacles every bit as big as ones today.

 

Still, is seems so overwhelming. But Sittser’s closing words help a lot—“They each lived the story, day after day, year after year, not knowing how it would all turn out. Their work progressed slowly and unpredictably and mysteriously. They made little decisions every day to do the will of God as they knew it; they took little risks—as well as a few big ones—that set them on a course leading to adventure, achievement, and influence; they chose to devote their time, talent and energy to God, refusing to put limits on what God would do with them.” It all begins with one small step.