Pray For Boldness

Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly _ Acts 4:29-31

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere--in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." _ Acts 1:8

I have been wondering a lot lately about something...Are we truly bold enough to be witnesses for the Lord and share the testimony of Gods grace to those around us in our everyday lives. AND even more, Are we bold enough and brave enough, passionate and fanatical enough to think that making disciples and sharing the testimony of God's grace can be done through us even on an international level? 

One thing I have noticed lately is a vibrant and exciting trend for social justice, and my generation especially are catalysts for this. To stand up against human trafficking, against world hunger, against inequality and abuse and terrorism and child soldiers, and the list can go on. I'm proud of this trend...but I have a slight concern for one thing... Is it possible that all this wonderful hype -to be change in the world- can possibly shift our focus from the glory of God to the the glory of humanity? What I mean is this (and I'm confident that it is assumed, but I really actually am a little concerned it gets forgotten, even by me) 

Our primary purpose in life is to Glorify God; and since not everyone on earth is doing that, God decided to use his church, to testify about Him to those who are not glorifying Him, so that they might know and glorify Him too. 

Missions Exists Because Worship Doesn't- John Piper

Social justice fits in this (it truly cannot be separated from the gospel) but our primary goal is still to testify of the grace of God for his Glory to win souls for him for hope of their eternity. There are a vast number of organizations that do not know the Lord who also do great social justice things. We as the church need to be careful that we seek to be a testimony and light in WORD, as much as in DEED, it's what will set us apart from the world so that nations can know God. How else will they see the deeds we do and attribute it to God if we are simply doing what every other humanitarian organization is doing?

I tried figuring out why I have heard such a passion for social justice more then I have heard a passion for evangelism and proclaiming the gospel, especially when considering attaining such a goal on an international level. 

If one of the greatest barriers in going global with the gospel is the spiritual depravity in our own backyard that compels us to witness here first, then could it not be equally argued that we have social needs in our own back yard as well? We recognize that social justice is necessary across the globe even though there are deep social needs to also be met here as well... BUT Maybe you argue there are many places in the world where their social needs are so much greater then ours...but isn't this also the case for spiritual depravity? 

In North America, we practically have access to a church in every community, and at best most everyone here is in contact with at least one Christian that can witness to them; where as according to www.joshuaproject.net., 41% of the worlds population is unreached, without the Gospel or any testimony of a believing Christian near them to share the grace and love of Christ.

Do we share the same passion for such a spiritual depravity in our world? Social justice is biblical and necessary; it's meeting a great and essential need. But what then? We can go to the nations and help provide even-distribution, create a more universal middle class, promote equality and freedom and human rights...but then what? Without Jesus, people will still go to hell.

My greatest fear is that we might without realizing it be creating a mantra for Humanism and such love for people that it trumps our love for God. I am NOT saying that we should ONLY evangelize, NOR am I saying to stop being so zealous for social justice, both are necessary and they essentially cannot be separated...but my point is that I fear that often the two ARE separated and the proclamation and testimony of Christ is most often what can be diminished to the sidelines. 

Spiritual depravity is everywhere, but as an example, it is greatly forgotten about in affluent countries that already have their social needs met. These are some of the most challenging countries and people groups to minister to, primarily among people groups in Western Europe where there is a drastic falling away from God. I heard a wise man once share an analogy of these countries in how they are often reluctant to receive the gospel. He shared:

In the perspective of famine and someone who has not eaten for a very long time, it has been said that they somewhat lose their feeling of hunger over time. The same can be attributed to someone who experiences Spiritual Famine, they don't even realize how severely malnourished they are.

And even though this might be true, it doesn't relinquish our responsibility to go. Ezekiel's call was not dependent on his success of converting the people he was going to, but rather his call was dependent on his obedience to be a mouthpiece and witness for God, for the glory of God. (Ezek. 2:3-5) 

But the reality is, we can never actually know which of the seeds of truth that we sow will grow and which will die, only God can know that because it is only God who can change peoples hearts, BUT its is our job to SOW. Bill Hybles shared at this years Global Leadership Summit, that the Parable of the Sower had only a 25% ratio of a good crop, despite the other 75% of seeds that were sown and died. His conclusion: If you want to see more transformed lives, you simply have to sow more seed! (Matt 13:3-8)

So I continued to try to figure out why there is so much more zeal today for social justice, then there is for evangelism and the proclamation of the gospel on a global level. This was my conclusion...

We live in a time when our realization of world disaster is more common then we ever knew before. We see the brokenness of our earth and the brokenness of humanity and it stirs something within us; causes us to act. We as humans empathize with brokenness; we all do, even if we have never gone through it in the same way nor the same capacity. But we realize the frailty of life and recognize injustice and desire to stand united for change. But how much of our hearts are drawn more to meet their needs then to meet their greater depravity, their hearts. Where is God in all this? Especially we should ask ourselves, where is God in our motives as we reach in our pockets and share our years for what we are capable of giving, but neglect to draw from HIM what we cannot give... What can we not give?... Salvation. Truth is they may live longer and better quality of lives when we help meet needs of social justice, but they will still go to hell if they do not know Jesus.

I don't want to simply promote missions or evangelism. I rather would rather promote Christ. To be passionate about him and the glory of his name and the responsibility that our adoption must also compel us to act as it is our responsibility as co-heirs with Christ in God's Mission (Rom 8:17, Rom 10:13-15)

I would love to challenge people to do that with so much heart and passion that they radically believe that they can even make a difference to the ends of the earth by doing so, because Christ transforms people and gives eternal life. My desire is that people would get so revved up on the zeal for the Lord that they will be compelled to run to the nations to transform nations through Him. What in us gives us such passion to see change that causes us to run to the nations to promote global change for humanity?... It is zeal for the Glory of God and Glory of His Name, that will cause us to run to the nations to promote hope and eternal life and boldly proclaim the Word of God and of the God if grace because he transformed even us! When we really grasp this, we cannot help but testify. Consider every testimony of everyone who had a personal encounter with Christ in the New Testament; their immediate response was that they told somebody! They simply could not keep quiet.

So just as the early church did, so is my prayer -with assurance not in myself but in Christ in me- to pray that the Lord would give me boldness to preach the word of God, even as far as the ends of the earth. And if he doesn't bring me to the ends of the earth... then I will make it my mission to join in His mission to see that someone does bring it there, for this is His greatest burden, and the proclamation of His Word and His Name to all people, is what we were created for. I pray he helps me to maintain His focus.