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. . . they went forth for His name’s sake . . . —3 John 7 Agape love, the unselfish love which expects nothing in return, wants the best for others, and places self last, is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. It is not natural. It is supernatural. It is exhibited by a desire to respond to Our Lord’s inquiry, “Do you love Me?” (John 21:17) with “Feed My sheep.” In effect, He said, “Identify yourself with My interests in other people,” not, “Identify Me with your interests in other people.” It seems that we have a world that knows neither how to love nor how to be loved. We have young men who show no respect for women. We have young women  “looking for love in all the wrong places. Love is not something we can demand or a feeling we can self-generate. It is a fruit of the life of God inside us: “the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit . . .” (Romans 5:5). Our Savior teaches us how to love, provides us the ultimate example of what it means to love, but most of all indwells […]

. . I say to you, he who believes in Me, . . . greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father —John 14:12 Prayer does not equip us for greater works— prayer is the greater work.  We must go to God as His child, because only a child gets his prayers answered; a “wise” man does not (see Matthew 11:25). Prayer is the battle, and it makes no difference where you are. Wherever God has placed you and whatever your circumstances, you should pray, continually offering up prayers to Him. We must learn to work according to God’s direction, and He says to pray. “Pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest” (Matthew 9:38). Pray and be blessed. Nick

Pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest —Matthew 9:38 Anyone who has ever had the honor to be used by the Lord is well aware of the necessity of prayer. For our Kairos weekends, we arrange to have someone praying 24/7 from the beginning of the weekend through the end. Read any history of great moves of God and you will find they were birthed and maintained by prayer. From prayer the worker gets his direction, confidence and strength. Through prayer he lays all credit for the result at the feet of the Master.  Prayer moves us from the ordinary, common sense, and a trust in medicine, civilization, education, or even evangelization. The key is in following the Master’s orders— the key is prayer. “Pray the Lord of the harvest . . . .” In the natural realm, prayer is not practical but absurd. We have to realize that prayer is foolish from the commonsense point of view. No Christian has a special work to do. A Christian is called to be Jesus Christ’s own, “a servant [who] is not greater than his master” (John 13:16), and someone who does not dictate to […]

He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the whole world —1 John 2:2 Propitiation is God’s Wrath Appeased and it’s the key to the missionary’s message: His sacrifice for us that completely satisfied the wrath of God. That’s why it’s so important that we don’t shortcut the gospel message. It begins with God’s justifiable wrath for our SIN. Starting with anything else: His love or His “plan for our life” undermines the message. Christ’s work is multifaceted:  healing, saving, and sanctifying. But— “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”— that is limitless (John 1:29). The missionary’s message is the limitless importance of Jesus Christ as the propitiation for our sins, and a missionary is someone who is immersed in the truth of that revelation. A missionary is someone who is bound by marriage to the stated mission and purpose of his Lord and Master. Paul did not say, “Woe is me if I do not preach what Christ has done for me,” but, “. . . woe is me if I do not preach the gospel!” (1 Corinthians 9:16). And this is the gospel— “the […]

Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, ’All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations . . .’ —Matthew 28:18-19   Interesting that the reason we should “go” is because of Jesus, His authority and not because of the need. He doesn’t say “The world is lost. Go and give them the good news.” The focus should always be on Jesus. When we look to Him we seek the solutions, not the problems. We know what can be and not what has been. We see the power and not the powerlessness. It is so easy to give too much focus to the lost or to ourselves. Salvation is in neither place. It is in Him.  Notice what He does say to the needy and the missionary, “all you who labor and are heavy laden . . .”: “Come to Me . . .”— that is the place to meet Jesus— (Matthew 11:28). We first come to Jesus. “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you . . .” (John 15:7) We abide in Him but we don’t stay, while abiding, we go. “Go […]

. . . when Moses was grown . . . he went out to his brethren and looked at their burdens —Exodus 2:11 Is it time to go to our brothers and look at their burdens. When we first come to Christ we may feel that call to spread the joy we have found to those we love; but it doesn’t work out. We fail to convey the joy and our enthusiasm is met with skepticism. We are considered “odd” or “fanatic” and a slow separation begins as we live our lives with our new Christian family. A period of discouragement in the desert begins. That call doesn’t die. Maybe it’s time to move on it again. Moses saw the oppression of his people and felt certain that he was the one to deliver them, and in the righteous indignation of his own spirit he started to right their wrongs. But it didn’t work out. He was sent into the  the desert to feed sheep for forty years. He was not the person for the work until he had learned true fellowship and oneness with God. Have we grown to the point that we are into God’s stride. Check […]

Enoch walked with God . . . —Genesis 5:24 One of my first memories is of walking with my dad. I don’t remember where we were walking. I just remember trying furiously to keep up with his long strides. I had to take at least three steps for each of his. I remember he would stop or slow down or look in a shop window to give me a chance to catch up. That’s a little like walking with God.  It is painful work to get in step with God and to keep pace with Him— it means getting your second wind spiritually. In learning to walk with God, there is always the difficulty of getting into His stride, but once we have done so, the only characteristic that exhibits itself is the very life of God Himself. The individual person is merged into a personal oneness with God, and God’s stride and His power alone are exhibited. It is difficult to get into stride with God, because as soon as we start walking with Him we find that His pace has surpassed us before we have even taken three steps. He has different ways of doing things, and […]

Those of us in the West are uncomfortable with silence. In the East it is not unusual for long periods of silence to be honored during meetings and discussions. With us, silence is a potent tool to force the other person to talk. We abhor silence so we speak to fill it. Police Interrogators make good use of this method. Silence has long been practiced as a spiritual exercise. For years I enjoyed an annual silent men’s retreat. One year we had a particularly popular speaker and decided to invite the women. There went the silence and eventually the annual retreat. Silence is part of our communication with God. If we ask for something and hear nothing, we assume He has not answered. There could be other explanations. For one, we may not be hearing the answer. For another, silence may be the answer. In our close personal relationships, we learn to interpret silence in the other. My wife and I know very well what the other’s silence means, depending on the circumstances. In an intimate relationship, speech is not always necessary. In fact, comfort with silence is a sign of the intimacy of the relationship and the level […]