Forget the Checklist

Awhile back a good friend of mine asked me why Patrick and I would want to move to the other side of the world to do missions.  This is a question we need to think about and be able to articulate, so I appreciated my friend asking.  After all, if we can't answer the question of "why" then we probably shouldn't be going in the first place.

My friend aptly pointed out that the people living in our country of interest already have a religion, so why would we want to introduce something different?  Let me be clear that missions has nothing to do with us wanting to go overseas to proclaim that we're right and they're all wrong.  This is about loving people enough to want to share the truth with them.  Yes, the world is filled with religions that are all striving for the Truth and seeking a way to get to God.  But that's just it: all religions are focused on what we do that makes us worthy of God.  Religions are works-driven, and while many people find some sense of fulfillment in doing things to please God, God is not interested in a checklist.  We can't pray, fast, do enough good works, or even love enough to make us worthy of God's grace. We simply can't earn a right standing before God.  It just isn't possible.  I know that sounds depressing, but keep reading.

On the other hand, following Jesus is entirely about what God has done for us and the fact that everything God requires of us (basically perfection) has been accomplished by Jesus.  When we recognize that we can't earn God's love and finally submit our lives to Christ, all his righteousness is transferred to us.  This is the beauty of grace.  We have a right standing before God not because of anything we do but what God did for us out of love.  Romans 5:8 says, "But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."  People who sin (which is everyone including you and me by the way) don't deserve God's love, nor could we ever in a thousand lifetimes do enough good things to earn it.  God's grace is simply that: grace -- something we don't deserve but are given freely anyway because God loves us.

So we want to do missions because there are millions of people around the world who have never heard the Truth of God's grace.  They are constantly toiling under religious systems that demand the impossible, and they are daily crushed under the reality that they can't earn their way to God.  What we want to do is simply point them to the awesome truth of God's grace.  We want to see people set free from the oppression of religion and help them begin a real relationship with God.  The way I see it, that's not a bad thing to commit our lives to!