The Mission
It’s difficult for men to decide what they really want. What’s your passion in life? What makes it worthwhile to jump out of bed each morning? When your prayer is, “God, give me the passion to do your will,” God will break your heart for what breaks his. When you ask God for a passion, then he will work with you and in you to will and to do of His good pleasure.
According to Romans 1, Paul knew his mission and his one purpose in life. He began this book by calling himself a “bondservant” of his Lord Jesus Christ. Paul had a dramatic “conversion experience” on the road to Damascus while he was traveling to persecute Christians. He was a devout Pharisee who wanted to stamp out Christianity. Jesus said of the Pharisee’s that they were “whitewashed sepulchers,” tombstones that look pretty on the outside but have dead bones on the inside. Jesus reserved his harshest criticism for the Pharisees. On the road to Damascus he heard a voice from heaven that said, “Saul, Saul why are you persecuting me?” He was called by the Lord Jesus to serve a new master.
A bond servant serves his master voluntarily from a heart of love. Most slaves serve because the “have to” not because they “want to.” In biblical times, slaves were required by law to serve their masters because of a legal obligation for a certain period of time. Most slaves couldn’t wait to be freed from the bondage of their hard task masters. However, a bond slave is one who had paid his debt of service to his master. He returned to his master to plead for his master to allow him to continue to serve, not because of obligation but voluntarily from a heart of love. To mark his bondservant, the master put black ink on his servant’s ear and pierced his ear to the doorpost. This indelible mark told the world that the bondservant was bound by love to voluntarily serve his master from a heart of love for life.
Before Jesus ascended into heaven, he told his disciples, “go into all the world and make disciples of all nations. And I will be with you even unto the end the world.” This “great commission” is the calling of men of God. We are called to deliver the message of the good news of God’s salvation.
The call of God to the Apostle Paul was to preach the gospel. The gospel consists of bad news and good news. The bad news is that “there is none righteous, no not one.” For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. According to Hebrews, It is appointed once for all men to die and then comes the judgement. Most men will reject the message that “sin” is the nature of all men. However, the massage of salvation is not whether we sin, but whether we accept the savior from sin. Those who are committed to share the gospel know that they are not perfect, just forgiven. Not because of our own righteousness but because of His righteousness. For he who was without sin became the perfect sin sacrifice on our behalf that we may be made the righteousness of God in him. Because we’ve been saved by grace, we have been set apart to deliver the good news of the gospel of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. Our calling is to preach the gospel of redemption for he has called us as “living epistles”… God’s love letters known and read of all men. Our mission is to demonstrate the good news of God’s salvation.
Sanctification is growing to become more like Christ. It means “separated according to the purpose for which the Designer designed us.” The purpose of our testimony is that we show forth the glory of the one who has called us to his grace, mercy and love. Our purpose is to lift up our Lord Jesus Christ. Our life’s mission is to bless others by demonstrating the love of God.
Most Americans think that the purpose of life is the “pursuit of happiness.” They think that the “good things in life” will make us happy. However, blessings according to God’s standard are different from the world’s definition of happiness. The devil’s original lie was that “man is the center of the universe, not God.” He said “God’s not God…you are. Ye shall be like God knowing good from evil.” However, blessing is not in being served but in serving to the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. A bond servant says, “thy wish is my command.” My pleasure is the good pleasure of your will. For it is God who works in you to will and to do of His good pleasure.
God will teach us to love others when we love Him above all. He will use trials, tribulations, heartbreak and pain so that we can know that he is the one who is our comfort and strength…that we must decrease so that he may increase. He teaches to run to him for refuge…casting all your cares upon him for he cares for you. He has called us to preach the gospel and to use words only when necessary….to proclaim the glory of the one who has called us from the darkness of this world and into the glorious light of the gospel of truth.
May God richly bless you!
Your brother in Christ,
Michael