This past weekend, Susan and I attended a mission conference in Asheville, North Carolina. Mission India is one of many Christian organizations who long for all of the 1.2 billion citizens of India to hear the Good News of Jesus Christ. The only strategy that seems feasible in a land of 1200 languages and dialects is for local Christians to become missionaries to their own people. As the fire of God spreads from village to village, Mission India celebrates that 10,000,000 people have become disciples of Christ during the past five years.
Chano only had a 7th grade education, but when he gave his life to Christ at the age of nineteen, he knew God had created him for a purpose. Beginning as a helper in an afternoon Children’s Bible Club, Chano discovered he had a gift of teaching. God has used Chano mightily not only to impact children, but to train other believers to be leaders. Over 73 churches have been planted through the work of a young man the world would have called hopeless.
At age fourteen, Renu sustained a terrible brain injury from falling off a roof. Doctors said she would never be normal again because the damage was permanent. A local pastor heard of the accident and went and prayed for the young girl. God healed her; Renu became a Christian; and now at age twenty she is a teacher in an adult literacy program that teaches women about Jesus as they learn to read. She expresses a great desire for the poor of her land to become literate and for her nation to shine for Jesus.
The emphasis of the conference was: ‘Look at what God is doing!’ We were encouraged to pray for his Word to spread and to seize opportunities to support our brothers and sisters. Many Christians endure severe persecution as they leave other religions to follow Jesus. They have counted the cost and decided it is better to keep eyes on a heavenly home. We have much to learn from their example.
“Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of the world and the despised things — and the things that are not — to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.” I Corinthians 1:26-29
“They admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country — a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.” Hebrews 11:13-16