Ross Paterson

“Missionaries are needed on the front line, where the Gospel has not yet reached, because there is something in the name of “Emmanuel” (God with us). God through us comes to these unreached people. They will touch God, see God, hear God – trough us. These people have not touched God in a specific way, only in God`s general revelation of Himself through His creation. How will they hear? How can they hear unless someone goes to them? (Romans 10:15). During my last trip to visit the x people, I had the powerful sense that our presence meant that God was in their midst. They needed to touch God trough human arms, human smiles, human interaction. We gave them that as we worked amongst them, as strangers who battled to make their lives better in a practical ways. In a sense, as they saw us helping them in that battle, they could say: “this is what God looks like... “ ”

“The work cannot be done without those who are willing to go out.”

“Greatness is obedience to what Jesus said, to the commission to go to the ends of the earth. It means setting out to make some difference somewhere to someone, in the Name of Jesus Christ.”

“Ordinary people who walk with an extraordinary God of grace and power, really can make a difference in other as yet unreached lives.”

“God uses one whom others would have passed over without a second glance. The history of obedience to the Great Commission is full of such examples. Behind this reality is a truth that God will use any who will submit to and obey His purpose for mission in their generation.”

“For now, it is enough to face the reality that it is possible, as individual Christians and also in our churches, to be doing well in many areas, and yet still miss what is perhaps the most urgent matter on the agenda of God in our generation, the task of reaching men and women everywhere with the knowledge of salvation in Jesus Christ.”

“It was that simple. God spoke to Carey about the needs of the lost in other lands. And Carey wished to respond. After all, was that not what the Bible told him to do?”

“On a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occur, there was once a crude little life-saving station. The building was just a hut, and there was only one boat. But the few devoted members kept a constant watch over the sea, and with no thought for themselves went out day and night tirelessly searching for the lost. Some of those who were saved, and various others in the surrounding area, wanted to become associated with the station and give their time and money and effort for the support of its work. New boats were bought and new crews trained. The little life-saving station grew. Some of the members of the life-saving were unhappy that the building was so crude and poorly equipped. They felt that a more comfortable place should be provided as the first refuge of those saved from the sea. They replaced the emergency cots with beds and put better furniture in the enlarged building. Now the life-saving station became a popular gathering place for its members, and they decorated it as sort of a club. Fewer members were now interested in going to sea on life-saving missions, so they hired lifeboat crews to do this work. The life-saving motif still prevailed in this club`s decoration, and there was a liturgical lifeboat in the room where the club initiations were held.About this time a large ship was wrecked off the coast, and the hired crews brought in boatloads of cold, wet and half-drowned people. They were dirty and sick and some had black skin and some had yellow skin. The beautiful new club was in chaos. So the property committee immediately had a shower house built outside the club where victims of shipwrecks could be cleaned up before coming inside. At the next meeting, there was a split in the club membership. Most of the members wanted to stop the club`s life-saving activities as being unpleasant and a hindrance to the normal social life of the club. Some members insisted upon life-saving as their primary purpose and pointed out that they were still called a life-saving station. But they were finally voted down and told that if they wanted to save lives of all the various kinds of people who were shipwrecked in those waters, they could begin their own life-saving station down the coast. So they did just that. As the years went by, the new station experienced the same changes that had occurred in the old. It evolved into a club, and yet another `spin-off` life saving station was founded. History continued to repeat itself, and if you visit the sea coast today, you will find a number of exclusive clubs along the shore. Shipwrecks are frequent in those waters, but most of the people drown.”