Acts 1:8 Model for Missions
Jerusalem
When Jesus told his disciples that they would be witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea & Samaria and unto the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8), He was speaking of a pattern in which God's people can evangelize the world. The important thing is to remember that the whole world needs to hear the gospel!
Jerusalem was an obvious starting place for the disciples. It was their neighbourhood. It was right where they were. And that's where we begin too. What's our task? Our village, hometown or city. Our neighbours, friends, colleagues and our families desperately need to hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The shop assistants, bus drivers, mothers and elderly people you see every day are within reach of us.
Whether you give a tract, debate the things of God or simply stand for honesty and integrity, you are called to be a witness. It may be sharing your testimony or it could be something much more active. Just take a few examples. The love and justice of Christ might burden you for the plight of the homeless, or the victims and perpetrators of crime, or the unemployed and hard-to-employ. Jesus might stir you to engage yourself in the issues of poverty, medical care, hunger, abortion, unwed mothers, run-away kids, pornography, family disintegration, child abuse, divorce, hygiene, education at all different levels, drug abuse and alcoholism, environmental concerns, terrorism, prison reform, moral abuses in the media and business and politics.
Pray for opportunities to share the gospel with people immediately around you. The Truth can transform the culture we live in. The Holy Spirit will guide you and speak through you as you witness. Just as God promised Moses that He would teach him what to say to Pharaoh, so He promises to give you the words, as you begin to evangelize your 'Jerusalem'.
A great way of moving on from sharing with just your friends and family is to pray and ask God for the people in your church or youth group to start an evangelism team. Maybe your church has outreach ministries, perhaps open-air events. Get involved - make yourself available to the leadership of your church. After you have a team (even two will do) - pray together and ask God to reveal a place for you to go and witness in. It could be anywhere! Take tracts with you or even make your own. People may have a lot of questions and arguments! They may be atheist, Muslim, they may even be angry at God for something they have seen or that has happened in their life.
Most importantly, remember that the disciples in the bible weren't 'old guys' with long beards, balding and a walking staff. They were young, enthusiastic, passionate, full of zeal for God and would stop at nothing to share the gospel with the 'lost' of the world. They pointed people to Jesus. Nor did they go in their own strength. They went in the power of the Lord, full of faith and the Spirit. It's not by might or strength that we witness - but by the Holy Spirit. This is God's work; you're just a vessel for Him.
All around us there are opportunities. On the streets, where we live and where we study, certainly where we work. This is our Jerusalem, a generation in the west that knows nothing of the love and mercy of God. You're the historymaker he wants to use to shine His love into those hearts.
Judea & Samaria
But remember that's not all. Jesus' point is that it's simply not enough to look to those immediately around us. The second part of the pattern of witnessing to the world is the wider area we live in, perhaps somewhere in our own nation or continent. This was the Judea and Samaria of the early church.
These kinds of opportunities usually take more planning, training and a lot of prayer. It could be a beach mission, organising games for children or maybe its working in a deprived council estate or another city entirely. God calls us to reach these places and it often means leaving our comfort zones. Life will be disrupted. The cosy routines are broken as we travel out to different cities and the nations around us to be His witnesses. There is always work to do and that is why Jesus told his disciples: The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. (Luke 10:2)
It's a strange thing: people get very emotional and excited about their own Christian work all around them but can be utterly blind to the wider world. Yet the task of missions involves enabling indigenous ministries to happen right across the world. The task is to see a church functioning and serving in its own community in Tibet or maybe Hanoi. This means that the people who ought to have the greatest burden for overseas missions are the very people who have the biggest heart for domestic ministries. The same love of Christ and sense of justice that burdens a person for housing and unemployment and hunger and health care in London, say, will also burden a person for these very same needs in people groups where no Christian impulse for transformation exists at all.
Lots of churches and missions focus on areas within their own countries. Could you go and serve in a team in your 'Judea and Samaria'? Perhaps you have time in your summer holidays to spend a few days out of the comfort zone of your home town. Maybe you're in a gap year and stuck for somewhere to go? Witnessing isn't always about front line evangelism. The Bible teaches us to serve one another first and foremost and that may mean background tasks like cooking or cleaning - often we must be faithful in the little things before being used in the big things. Explore the gifts that God has given you & make them completely available to Him. Are you concerned about paying for it? God's commission always comes with His provision.
The Ends of the Earth
If you have look a part 1 and 2 of the Great Commission pattern, you will gather that the 3rd part is basically the rest of the world. The US Centre for World Missions isolates over 16,000 unreached people groups around the world yet we don't feel the dreadful force of this state of affairs because we don't look beyond the UK or USA. Here, there are lots of resources. Here, there are lots of workers, pastors and evangelists. In Bhutan, for example, there are huge people groups with no knowledge at all of the Gospel. In Vietnam, many hill tribes are still without the Scriptures.
The goal is huge: to penetrate an unreached people with the gospel and establish there an ongoing, indigenous church which will apply the love and justice of Christ to that culture. That's the task overseas.
Oswald Smith used to ask, "What would you do if you saw ten men lifting a log; and if nine were on one end and one on the other?" There are 190 countries in the world with proportionately fewer Christian workers than we have. Of these, 45 have fewer than one-tenth as many Christian workers in relation to their population as we have. Yet year in and year out, we send men and women to the wrong end of the log. The simple fact is that the deployment of Christian troops in the world is proof that the church in the UK does not yet have a wartime mentality. It is as though during World War Two we conscripted one million men and then sent just 600 to go and fight Hitler and kept 999,400 to be based in Liverpool. What we are doing just doesn't make sense. God isn't just interested in the UK or even the USA, he is interested in the whole world. Every nation, tribe and tongue needs to be evangelized. Remember, His passion is His own glory, that the nations be glad in Him!
The early church got as far as Europe, Africa and parts of Asia, but still to this day there are around 2 billion people who have never heard the gospel. The task is huge but the workers are few. There are only three kinds of Christians: zealous goers, zealous senders, and disobedient. Which will you be?* *John Piper
How to get involved
Firstly, pray. Pray for more workers and pray for the nations of the world. Get hold of good prayer material for places around the world. Books like 'Operation World' are fantastic. Places like North Korea where Christians are persecuted more than any other place on the planet. Laos, Vietnam and China are Communist and punish converts to Christianity. Bhutan is a Buddhist kingdom, the Maldives is 100% Islamic with no bible and just a handful of believers. India has over 2000 languages. Tribes in Borneo are hidden in dense jungle. Japan, Iran, Afghanistan... the list goes on. All these countries and many, many more are un-reached or least-reached and need the serious prayers of believers in the west.
Secondly, do something. You can support the work of missions by contributing financially (see donate). You can also go short-term. Short-term mission will change your life for ever. One mission agency suggests that 80% of its short-termers became full time missionaries! It's amazing when you work for God and see Him at work. Simply being present in these nations - increases faith, broadens awareness and raises burden. We work with indigenous Christians across Asia but we do take teams every year into Asia to help with vital ministry such as delivering Bibles or distribution. The pursuit of global evangelism should be on the heart of every believer. Understand the world you live in, look at its cultures and beliefs. What better way to do this than on a short-term mission?
One day you may become a full-time Christian worker in an un-reached people group. If you go, you will make history. You will be a part of shaping the future. ...after this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands (Revelation 7:9)
