Being a fifth grader in Vacation Bible School, I remember my teacher telling me the four rules of being a missionary:
1. Always pay attention.
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2. Shut up and go or stop complaining and do what God wants you to do.
3. Always be respectful of the culture.
4. Always remember God brings the growth.
Those four rules sparked something in my heart. I will surely say that my desires now are not the same as fifth grade me, but it's not because of me. It is because God has changed my heart.
So the question is, what does the Great Commission mean to my generation? Matthew 28:19-20 says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
I go to a church where we take that command seriously. My pastor is always telling the congregation, “We've taken the call and we've answered God's call.” At my church we have flags of every place someone in our church has been. The total of that is twenty-six different states and countries. One little church in Magalia, of all places, going to twenty-six different states and countries for mission. Why, you ask? Because, as a church, we take the Great Commission seriously.
Isaiah 6:8 says, “Then I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, 'Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?' Then I said, 'Here am I. Send me!'" That verse speaks to my heart because that is the call of my heart: Here am I, Send me Lord. We have to have an open heart and be willing to take God's call for our lives.
My pastor is always telling me that I am not a typical teenager and I am okay with that. I am not the typical teenager, especially in the town I live in, because I am doing what God wants me to do with my life. I am studying and growing and listening to God's call for me and I take the Great Commission seriously. I have a hurting heart for lost and hurting people and I want to show them the love of Jesus.
Steve Green sings in his song The Mission, “To love the Lord our God is the heartbeat of our mission, the spring from which our service overflows, across the street or around the world the mission's still the same, to proclaim and live the truth in Jesus' name.” No matter where we are or what we are doing, we are to follow the Great Commission and love the Lord our God.
While my church does take the Great Commission all over the world, we also know the importance of following the great commission in our own neighborhoods. We realize that we have to love the unlovable, seek the lost and help the hurting in our own town. We know that we have to go outside of our church doors and go to the people where they are at because they will not come to us.
At the end of the day we must remember the heart of the Great Commission and to me this quote gets to the heart of it: "Missions is not something we do, it is something we are."
Missions is not an act it is a lifestyle.
Missions is not for us; it's for others.
Missions is not supposed to be comfortable (because growth happens outside the comfort zone).
Missions is about serving other and serving Jesus.
