People are sure friendly here. If you have been following our tour, we have spent a good part of October in Ohio and Pennsylvania visiting partnering churches and individuals. These churches, part of our Converge MidAtlantic network, are like the others we have visited in Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Wyoming are very committed to missions across the street and around the world. We wrote about this early in our tour (http://www.gospelrest.com/churches-on-mission/ ). This can be easily seen from the words of a layperson who in the worship service introduced us and other missionaries.
“If we are disciples of Christ, and we want to both follow His commands as well as teach them, then our lives are to be impactful and reach out with that same mission [as the early disciples] without avoiding any area of this earth. We are called to be determined local ministers breaking out of the walls of this church to bring the lost to not only know Christ, but follow Him. But our hearts must burn with equal passion for our country. And we shall never set our eyes on anything less than the entire world, for it says that, ‘God so loved the world…’ He gave His only Son for the world, so why would we have any lower standard than the world knowing about Christ? …
If you are a disciple, you will see the people and the message that they bring not as an afterthought, not as something “nice.” But rather, of the utmost importance, because the true disciple looks at these people and says, ‘They are my partners, they are my brothers and sisters, because we are doing the same work! We are accomplishing the Great Commission together, you half way around the globe and myself right here in northeast Ohio.’
So, when we hear their stories and their lives and work, we don’t dismiss it as something foreign and unrelated to our own work. Rather, we join with them saying that we share in the same vision, mission, and work: to see Christ glorified and lifted up. We pray fervently for them, make their concerns our concerns, support them financially and with our resources, and share in our joys and sorrows together.”