Once, I was preaching at a church camp, where I struck up a conversation about hymns with the worship music leader. He believed that the lyrics of hymns written by the Chinese versus the Koreans were vastly different. Between the two, he preferred hymns written by Koreans. Why was that? Because their hymns often speak of a fearlessness towards death and a willingness to give up their own lives like Jesus did. In this Korean song, “Mission”, the first verse and chorus are about complete dedication, roughly translated below:
The road of the cross that Jesus walked, I will follow
The sacrificial road that bleeds his blood, I will follow to the end
No matter the dangerous mountains, I will follow to the ends of the earth
To save the lost souls, I will throw away my own life
Father, please send me! I want to walk the road of the cross
I would sacrifice my own life, please send me
Does missions in our church need more dedication? What is dedication?
Dedication can also mean “to offer up”. In a dictionary, the word “offer” is defined as “present”, or “give”. Christians use the terms “offer up” or “dedicate”, to mean “present to God”, or “present oneself before God and allow Him to use us”.
Missions.
What is missions?
Missions, in this article, refers to overseas and cross-cultural evangelistic and pastoral work.
In the past 20 years, our church has sent over 50 long-term missionaries (almost 90 short-term missionaries) to 11 overseas missions fields. To the outsider it may seem that our church is indeed very dedicated. We may also consider ourselves quite dedicated. Do we need even more dedication? In what areas? How? Allow me to suggest three areas of dedication:
1. Dedication in numbers:
Even though we have sent out 54 missionaries in the past 20 years, we are still a long way off from our 2020 target of 100 missionaries. We need to be even more dedicated in the number of missionaries. Let us cry out in faith to the Lord of the harvest that he may send more workers, because as Jesus said,
“The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” (Mat 9:37b-38)
2. Dedication in prayer:
In the past, our church had spent 10 years in prayer before starting missions work. Currently we also intercede for missions work through prayer chains, but our missionaries, pastors, and church members need to be even more dedicated in prayer for missions. How? To be more willing to wake up early to pray, to wait upon the Lord and pray for longer periods of time, to resolve to fast and pray at least once a week and join in the weekly church-wide fast between Thursday after dinner until 3 pm Friday. We need to be united, just as the Antioch church had decided to send missionaries after fasting and prayer, and then continued to support them through fasting and prayer:
“While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’ So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off.” (Act 13:2-3)
Besides dedication of numbers, dedication of prayer, the most important is the dedication of our lives.
3. Dedication of Lives:
Jesus Christ is the greatest missionary. He came from the riches of heaven to be born in a most humble manger, to live among the poor. He did not have a pillow to rest his head on, except for the final pillow called the cross. For love of us sinners, he shed his blood and offered up his life completely. He did not merely speak of the gospel, but his own life (death and resurrection for mankind) became the gospel and fulfilled missions.
Those of us that have put our faith in Jesus Christ ought to respond to His great love and grace, to follow in his footsteps, and spread the gospel through our words and actions. As the apostle Peter said,
“But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.” (1 Pet 2:21-22)
Many missionaries have followed in Jesus’ footsteps. The apostle Paul called himself “prisoner of the Lord” (Eph 4:1). Jesus’ own disciples were martyred. Tens of thousands of missionaries in the past 2000 years have given up their lives for God, becoming our examples for greater dedication.
A few years ago, the Methodist Theological School lecturers and students went on a prayer trip to South Korea. There we visited a missions museum, and saw many names of Korean Christian martyrs from the past 100 years. In class, the Korean pastor teaching us asked, “Has anyone in the Malaysian church ever shed blood for Christ? Has anyone been martyred?” In that moment, we had no response. We could not think of anyone who had shed blood for God! I only thought of maybe falling in a basketball game and bleeding. But today, if the Korean pastor asked this question again, I can answer him, “Yes, there have been people who shed their blood for Christ…”
Brothers and sisters, the time is here to be even more dedicated in missions. We need more college students to offer themselves to God, we need more parents to offer their children to God, we need more fully dedicated pastors, missionaries, and church members.