GET OUT AND REACH OUT

 

Matthew 9:35-10:8

Jesus tell us to “go,” to get out of the confines of our church and into our communities.  The nurturing ministries tend to focus us on our inward needs, and that's okay because those kinds of ministries are needed for the care and feeding of growing disciples.   However, the fruit of outreach and missions lead us to focus outwardly, to reach out.  Outreach and missions call us to be field hands in God’s harvest of salvation.

After living for 15 years in Des Moines, Iowa, my husband and I moved to Cedar Rapids, Iowa.   In seeking direction for this new stage in my life, God revealed this to me:

As a Christian, I had been playing it too safe.  I had gotten too comfortable “volunteering” rather than serving, to comfortable with being involved in programs and projects rather than ministries and missions.  God opened my eyes to what was happening around me -- people were dejected and rejected, harrassed and helpless like sheep with out a shepherd.  They were dying physically, emotionally, and spiritually for the want of Christ in their lives. 

After World War II with the beginning of the baby boom, it seemed that all churches had to do was open the church doors, and people showed up to fill the pews.  Those were the days, and maybe because of such easy success, we got too comfortable and complacent and focused more on ourselves than on God's mission.  As church was replaced with other activities in people's lives and post-modern culture devalued Christianity, we found we forgot how to reach out to our communities and proclaim the good news in ways that resulted in changed lives.

Perhaps, in a time COVID-19 and social distancing, we have been given the opportunity reset our mission priorities and to prepare for work in God’s harvest of salvation.

At least we don't have to go far to reclaim the mission field.  It's right outside our doors in our own communities.  

John 1:14 says that “the Word became flesh and lived among us …”  Out of unconditional love and compassion, Jesus put on our humanity to walk with us and share our troubles and pains.  If we're suppose to love others as Christ loves us, we have some hard questions to consider.

Do we truly live among our own neighbors?  Do we really know them and understand their challenges and need? 

Do we embody Christ’s compassion to walk with them and minister to their physical, emotional and spiritual needs? 

Do we proclaim the good news, that the kingdom of heaven has come, through unconditional love and service that does not expect anything in return?

It doesn’t matter how many other churches are in our community, how large or small our church is or even how much technology we use in worship.  It makes no difference that cultural values and attitudes have changed or that we’re in the middle of a pandemic, because the sense of urgency is still there as people are perishing physically, emotionally and spiritually for the want of Christ in their lives.

The fields are still ripe, the harvest is bountiful and the Lord of the harvest has put out the call for field hands.  These are times when we will be required to be creative and adaptive, to do ministry in new and different ways to proclaim the good news that is just as relevant today as it was the day Jesus sent out his disciples. 

We are created to do more than just survive in these challenging times.  God means us to thrive and be fruitful, and as we take those steps into God’s future to get out in those fields and reach out with Christ’s love and compassion, we can do so with the confidence of Jesus’ promise to be with us until the work is done.