One thing about me is I hate gatekeeping. Gatekeeping is when you have access to certain information but refuse to share it. When someone asks me where I got a particular shirt, or about a recipe or who they can contact for cheap but efficient car service, I am always quick to share as much as I can with them. If something has a significant impact on my life or has benefited me in some way, why would I want to keep it to myself?

Well, a week ago I realised how much I have been gatekeeping information that has changed my life forever. It was after my 2 week mission trip to India and I was back home reminiscing, when I had a random thought in my mind, which I know was from God, and He was asking me, “If you knew a certain store, like IKEA, had a 100% sale on all items. Everything was free. How many people would you tell?” And I answered so quickly, “I would tell everyone”. “Well” God said “you know that I offer 100% forgiveness of sins. Eternal life is free once anyone believes in me. Why are you not telling everyone about it?”

Don’t you just love it when God calls you out?

About 7 months ago, I was sitting in church as I do every Sunday and it was time for announcements. An announcement came up about 2025 Short-term mission trips that the church would be engaged in and I quickly thought to myself – It’s so good that the church is sending out missionaries. I will pray for those who will go to those mission trips and I might support them financially if I am able. I was ready to move on to the next thought when I felt the tagging of the Holy Spirit and a thought rushed into my mind – Why don’t you go for a mission trip? Before then, I had never considered myself “mission trip material” so this thought was foreign to me. I assumed the thought came into my mind because I was hungry or sleepy or distracted. I mean, surely God can’t be calling me to a mission trip, can He?

After the church service, I interacted with some of my friends and the Missions Pastor, and she threw out a wild thought. “Maybe Victor you could go to India”. Twice in less than an hour? This is so weird. So I made the resolve to go home, pray about it and hear what God said. Now, let me make it clear – when I said I’d pray about it, what I meant is I am sure I heard God wrong so I am going to talk to Him and He will confirm that He hasn’t called me to a mission trip. Well, the more I prayed, the clearer the instruction got. I laid down all the excuses known to man – I don’t speak the languages of the people in India, I am an introvert, this is out of my comfort zone, there are so many other better people to choose from, can I afford it? What if I say the wrong thing? Don’t I need to have a theology degree?

Thank God for His grace and patience. Despite my very many questions and wrestles, He chose to confirm it to me not once but twice. First time was while I was reading the Bible and I landed on Romans 10:14 – 15 and let me tell you, it felt like those words jumped out of the page and slapped me in the face. This is what it says:

How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”

As soon as I finished reading these verses, I heard God saying “I am sending you.” Okay Lord, I know that you want me to do a mission trip but where Lord? If I could please give you a suggestion, I would prefer going to Kenya. You know, because of my comfort zone? I am from there, I speak the language, they are my people, I might get a chance to see people I know. In the midst of my confusion, God gave me another confirmation. I had taken the day off from work because I was sick and was laying in bed all day. Isn’t it so like God to speak so clearly in the times where we are least distracted? I had a dream where I had gone to a Mother Teresa Orphanage in India. Just like that it was clear that God was not only calling me to do any random mission trip, but the India one.

One thing I know for sure:

This trip changed my life. It was only two weeks, but it felt like 2 years. In those 2 weeks, we were able to minister to, share the gospel with, pray for, care for, encourage, listen to, dance and eat with, smile on almost 700 people. These 700 people ranged from children, families, widows, recovering drug addicts, women in the red-light district, people living in slums, missionaries, medical patients and so many more people. Words cannot even describe the emotions I felt interacting with the people and living in India, albeit for such a short time.

Being in India truly highlighted the idea of idolatry. Our ideas of idolatry in the West mainly revolve around the social media, our phones, our jobs etc. But for them, their idols are small or big images of different animals that sit in their temples, cars and houses. They are idols that they pray to daily and perform rituals to. I was confronted with the Christian privilege that I have carried for so long. That I have always known that the God of the Bible is the only one true living God but this has not been the reality for so many people in the world who are born into polytheistic and syncretistic cultures. The idea of trusting in only one God is so foreign to them, not because they just refuse to believe it, but there are strongholds that tie them to their belief of many gods. For many of them, believing Jesus means wrestling with their identities, cultures and for some, it means opening themselves up for persecution and being disowned by their families.

Despite the spiritual darkness that was so evident. I saw and interacted with men and women who have decided to surrender all and obey the call to share the gospel. Ordinary people who had thriving careers and comfortable lives until one day God disrupted their comfort zones and gave them hearts to see the plight of His people. Seeing the level of full and sometimes immediate obedience that these people had really challenged me.

I was in so much awe of the God who loves all of us so much that He gives us the privilege of knowing Him, despite what our backgrounds have been. Listening to people who came to faith not because someone preached to them but because God performed a miracle in their life that was so grand that they couldn’t attribute it to anything or anyone else. Like one family, who through tears shared with us the story of how God had healed them and how God raised a husband to life through his wife’s prayers, when he was pronounced dead in a hospital. Now this family knows without a shadow of doubt that Jesus is the only true God. Praise God!! Oh what a mighty and loving God we serve.

If I described everything I experienced and learnt, the internet wouldn’t have enough space to contain it 😊. Here are a few things that God highlighted, challenged and convicted me on and I pray He does the same to you:

Go and make disciples

These are the first few words of Matthew 28:19, what is referred to as the Great Commission.

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

I have read these words before but for some reason, it didn’t click in my mind that they applied to me. I always thought they apply to my pastor or that man or woman who God called to leave everything and become a full-time missionary. Surely not for little, ordinary me. Theologians believe that the word ‘Go’ can be best translated in the English language to mean ‘As you go’. This means that the call/instruction to go and make disciples is one that should be part of our everyday life. Making disciples is something a believer does while ‘going’ about the business of the day. The call is to all of us, in whatever spheres God has placed us. That doesn’t give us any excuses, does it?

In Acts 1:8, Jesus said:

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

The call to be His witnesses was to the areas in close proximity to the disciples (Jerusalem) all the way to the ends of the earth. In our walk with God, He may give us opportunities to go to far away places to share the gospel. If He calls us to that then we should definitely obey and go. But some people might never leave their hometown until they die. The instruction to be God’s witnesses applies to these people as well. Our job is to make disciples. Jesus said to his disciples then and he is saying to us disciples now “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few” – Matthew 9:37. It’s not a matter of if we are called to it, it’s a matter of where are we called to. At our homes, at our jobs, schools or in other states, towns, countries or continents. The Great Commission is for every single person who has believed and professes Jesus as their Lord and Saviour.

This sounds easy in writing but harder to do in person. Instead of immediately dismissing this as too hard, how about you start praying to God to give you organic opportunities to talk about Him with the people you live, love and laugh with. Conversations that may start with sharing hobbies about basketball or running that God turns them into opportunities to talk about Him. It may not be an hour long conversation but it might be a few minutes of telling someone about what you did on Sunday, or praying for them when they are sick, or including a verse when you send them a birthday card, or sharing why a certain Christian movie is your favourite. The opportunities are endless if we acknowledge and act on the small prompts God gives us in our everyday lives.

“We are called to be the salt of the earth not just the salt of the salt shaker”

Priscilla Shirer

Unreached versus Reached

This is a concept that truly hit me hard before I went to India and in the 2 weeks I was there. That there are places in the world where people have never even heard the name ‘Jesus’. Jossy Chacko, in his book titled ‘Madness: One man’s crazy dream to transform Asia and beyond’ shares a story where He went to a small community in India and asked people randomly if they knew about Jesus and the responses were bewildering – some asked if that is the name of a place, others asked if that is something you buy at a shop.

The Joshua Project describes unreached or least-reached people as “a people group among which there is no indigenous community of believing Christians with adequate numbers and resources to evangelize this people group without outside assistance.” Most of these groups have no Bible in their language, no church presence in their communities and some face intense persecution if they believe in or speak about Jesus. India is an example of an unreached nation. God’s heart is for these people and they are in dire need of people to not only evangelise to them but also disciple them. These people are also plagued with so many social injustices. In as much as we should never ignore these social injustices, we should be as concerned with where someone will spend eternity as much as we are about where they are going to lay their heads at night. It is not an ‘either-or’ approach but a ‘both-and’ one.

“The greatest injustice in the world is that you and I can choose to hear about Jesus anytime we want to while others don’t have that option even if they do want to”

Jossy Chacko

On the flip side, there are reached nations. Kenya, where I am from and Australia where I live, are two examples of them. Where we have the privilege of having Bibles at every corner we turn. In Kenya particularly, private and public schools have Christian Religious Education taught as a subject in school and the National anthem acknowledges God as the God of all creation. O the privilege we take for granted that we can openly and freely express our faith. While most people from reached nations have been evangelised to, most are not disciples. We can’t go and make disciples if we are not committed to being disciples ourselves.

Are we just fans of Jesus or are we followers of Him?

The two previous points have been all about our outward expression of our faith. This one is about our inner conviction and dedication.

Most us know the stuff. We can retell Bible stories in our sleep. We have different versions of the Bible sitting in our houses and maybe one or two Bible apps in our phones. But the question that God posed to me and which I now pose to you, “What are you doing with what you know?” Whether you accepted Jesus 20 years ago or 2 days ago, the challenge is for all of us to not just be fans of Jesus but followers of Him.

Luke 9:23 says:

Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.

Becoming a disciples is moving from head knowledge to heart knowledge. From taking what you know and applying it to our everyday lives. Or as John Mark Comer puts it –  to Be with Jesus, to become like Him and to do as He did. I am not telling you this as someone who has mastered being a disciple but rather as someone who struggles with it but is committed to the daily journey it takes. Salvation is instant, sanctification is a process.

This also requires us to move from being Sunday Christians only or as my Pastor calls it, CEOs – Christmas Easter only Christians. I saw a post by Pastor Stephanie Ike Okafor where she gave very interesting statistics. The average church service is 1 and a half hours. Which is 6 hours a month and 78 hours a year. One day has 24 hours so 78 hours equals 3.25 days. If you only attend church and have no other interaction with God during the rest of the week, then you only have 3.25 days of the year spent with God! That’s less than the time we spend at work, at the gym, sleeping, eating, and so many other things. This makes the call to be a disciple even more real. It is not just meant to be something we do but someone we become.

A lot of hard truths, right? Thank God we don’t have to do it on our own. We have the Holy Spirit inside of us, God’s Word with us and communities around us to help us in this journey. As you reflect on the points above, could I please ask you to pray for the people of India and other unreached nations? Pray for the missionaries who have dedicated their lives to sharing the gospel, the many people who don’t yet know Jesus, pray that God would water and grow the seeds that have been planted thus far and that the political leadership of the country will have changed hearts to legislate policies that create peaceful environments for the word of God to be spread.

I would love to hear from you – Have you ever done a mission trip? Is it something you would like to do? What are the exciting and challenging thoughts that came to your mind as you were reading the post?

Wishing you all the best,

Victor