For all Your goodness

I will keep on singing

Ten thousand reasons

For my heart to find

-song lyrics from 10,000 Reasons by Matt Redman

Once in a while, we all forget something. Car keys, an appointment, or perhaps where we parked our car. With all of our ‘To-Do” lists, schedules and deadlines, it’s bound to happen. Hopefully, most of those mental mishaps are not debilitating or can eventually be resolved or revised. Some things however, are more critical to remember. Like turning off the stovetop, your child’s first day of school, or keeping a baby away from the edge of a pool of water.

It’s often that way with missions. We forget just why we still need to go. We may even wonder – do we need to go? The answer is the same as it has always been. The need is there. It is critical. And we have been called to go. Jesus said it this way: “The harvest is great, but the workers are few.” (Matthew 9:37)

The need. What is it now? Must we remind ourselves? We only need to look at the verses preceeding Jesus’ statement above to remember why:  “Jesus traveled through all the towns and villages … teaching in the synagogues and announcing the Good News about the Kingdom… When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were confused and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” (Matthew 9:35-36)

Sheep without a shepherd. As spoken by The Shepherd himself. These were the ones Jesus came to rescue. The ones he died for. Lost sheep, wandering, broken, confused. In need of a Shepherd, a Savior, and desperate for love and forgiveness. Desperate to be redeemed and restored to relationship with the Father, the God they did not know.

So it is today. The world is full of lost people who have yet to hear the Good News of salvation through Jesus, have yet to receive his love and forgiveness, have yet to be restored to his family. More than 2 billion still have not heard the gospel.  That is why we still must go.  But there’s more. In case any of us need any more convincing why missions work is needed, there is no shortage of good reasons.

4 Good Reasons Why We Need to Go

 1.     It is God’s Plan

Lest we forget, it was a direct command from Jesus to the early church to take the good news to other places. To GO, to MAKE DISCIPLES, to BAPTIZE and to TEACH. (Matthew 28:19-20) Nothing to argue there. Clear as day! We are told to go to the nations and be the body of Christ.

 2.      It Can’t be Done Alone

It’s been said, “The Great Commission is too big for anyone to accomplish alone, and too important not to try to do together.” (author unknown) That was true for Peter and the first disciples, and it’s true for us today. God did not leave us alone in this commission. He promised to go/be with us. We have been given the Holy Spirit to empower us to go, together.

3.      The Task is Unfinished

The vision of John  in Revelation still stands before us unfulfilled.  As John described in Revelation 7:9-10, “I saw a huge crowd, too huge to count… all nations and tribes, all races and languages… standing before the Throne and the Lamb and heartily singing: Salvation to our God on his Throne! Salvation to the Lamb!” That’s all nations, all tribes, all races, all languages. That task has not been finished. Nor has Jesus’ command to go into all the world been withdrawn. There are still thousands of ‘tribes’ and people groups that don’t have an indigenous church strong enough to reach their own. There are over 600 ethnic groups without a church, a Bible, or any known Gospel witness at all. There are plenty of unreached yet to be reached.

4.     There Are Tangible Needs to Be Met

Jesus didn’t just show up to those around him and say ‘I’m here. All your troubles are over. Be saved.’ He fed the hungry with real food. He healed the sick. He told parables that described tangible ways of loving your enemy (Luke 10:25-37). Today throughout the world there are still masses of people with physical unmet needs, many merely surviving. 663 million people in the world live without clean water – a majority of those in Africa; without access to medical care and health education, thousands could die in remote areas of Latin America and other regions. We can be the Voice and Hands of Jesus to the unreached and meet real tangible needs that exist for them.

If we yet want more reasons for missions, there are plenty of testimonies of the fruit being reaped from present-day work and outreach of missionaries. Take Ama  for instance, in Ghana; or the people in Sierra Leone who lived through the trauma of civil war. Listen to and watch the story of a woman named Noi in the Asia Pacific region who wanted to commit suicide. God is reaching and rescuing all of these and more through the missionaries and mission work of Reach Beyond and our partners.

We don’t need one more reason to go to the unreached. We don’t need one more excuse to stay. The call has been made. The fields are “ripe for harvest” (John 4:35 NLT). We have been empowered.

We may have 10,000 reasons for singing our praises to God; we have even more for continuing the work of missions. The only thing missing is – YOU! What are you waiting for?


Sources: Reach Beyond

 WhyWeGo: Reach Beyond Global Ends Document