MISSIONARY FEATURE
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by Dr. J. Arthur Mouw
P resenting a significant missionary challenge is a portion of Scripture from I Kings 17:8-16. “And the word of the Lord came unto him, (that is Elijah the Tishbite), saying, Arise, get thee to Zarephath, which belongeth to Zidon, and dwell there: behold, I have commanded a widow woman there to sustain thee. So he arose and went to Zare phath. And when he came to the gate of the city, behold, the widow woman was there gathering of sticks: he called to her, and said, Fetch me l pray thee, a little water in a vessel, that I may drink. And as she was going to fetch it, he called to her, and said, ‘Bring me, I pray thee, a morsel of food in thine hand.’ And she said, As the LORD thy God liveth, I have not a cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse: and, behold, I am gathering two sticks, that 1 may go in and dress it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die. And Elijah said unto her, Fear not; go and do as thou hast said: but make me thereof a little cake first, and bring it unto me, and after make for thee and for thy son. For thus saith the LORD God of Israel. The barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the LORD sendeth rain upon the earth. And she went and did accord ing to the saying of Elijah: and she, and he, and her house, did eat many days. And the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of-oil fail, accord ing to the Word of the LORD, which he spake by Elijah.” If one wears rose-colored glasses, everything will ap pear rosy to him. If he wears green glasses, everything will turn green. Likewise, if you put on “missionary glasses,” you will see everything through the eyes of a foreign ambassador. This is the kind of glasses I wear
all the time! I hope you will do this, too. Some years ago, I learned that a prayer meeting for revival in Chicago was to be held. Since I was in the area, I decided to attend. When I arrived, about thirty- six ministers were gathered together in a room, asking God to send a revival to that hardened city. They felt if revival could come to the middle west, it would spread throughout the United States. That was a wonderful thought and a worthy motive. Yet somehow I couldn’t join in that prayer as I felt I should. For the first two days, everyone had prayed except myself. Have you ever been to a prayer meeting where everyone else has prayed but you? Finally, I felt I had to say something. While on my knees, it came to me that the same God who was looking down upon these thirty-six ministers was also beholding the lands of China, India, South America, West Irian, and the Island of the Sea. A ll God had to do was to turn His eyes one centimeter from America to look upon millions o f people who had never even heard the Word of God for the first time. Here were Christians asking God to revive them again (maybe for the fifth, sixth, or even tenth time) when others had never even had the message once. Sobs welled up from my inner most being. Go back to the story of Elijah, walking down a dusty road in a land where there was a famine. God told him to go to a certain widow woman. He found her busy gathering sticks, so that she might cook her last cake for herself and her son. But Elijah said to her, “ Go and do as thou hast said: but make me thereof a little cake first and bring it unto me, and after make for thee and thy son.” If that widow woman had not obeyed Elijah, she and her son would have died of starvation. Elijah would not have perished, however, because God kept him alive
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THE KING'S BUSINESS
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