To the Ends of the Earth… or Bust!!!

            One of the hardest parts of ministry is waiting on the harvest.

            You go into a new country and begin to live with the people. You learn their ways, attempt their language, and love them with all that you have. You lay awake at night, praying for those who God’s given you to pour into. You listen to their stories and see their lives; you give everything for the sake that they will know Christ and follow him for the rest of their days. And you do it all while hoping to see a harvest. You want to see the seeds take root and grow. You want to see the fruit.

            But we don’t always get to see it.

            Sometimes, the ones who plant the seeds aren’t the ones who get to reap the harvest. Thought we weep, sweat, and toil, we have no way to know when those seeds will burst forth. It’s definitely an exercise in faith, for all too often on trips such as these we have to leave before we see fruit. We go home and trust God, that he is still at work even though we are not there to witness it.

            Or help, for that matter.

            It really isn’t about us at all. We might sow the seed, but we do not possess the power of life. We can’t make anything grow at all. It’s all about Christ, about his timing and his power at work.

            But sometimes, we get to witness a harvest. It’s the greatest thing in the world.

            I am rejoicing today. On my first trip as a leader, I found myself in the Amazon jungle. I fell in love with the land and the people, even as my heart longed for Africa. On my first day there, my co-leader, Ed, stood in front of my team and told us our mission: we were another wave in a series of teams to come and minister in the jungle. Just the year before, the RL team traveled throughout the jungle and saw incredible fruit, coming home with awesome stories of people coming to Christ. Our job was to go back, to still preach the gospel, and to disciple those young believers. Then, after we left, Ed and a small team would go back to those villages. They would call the young men out, invite them in a 6 month seminary, and take them on a missions trip. The vision was that hopefully these young men would return home, reach their villages, and then go into the interior of the jungle to the villages and tribes that are still unreached. “This,” Ed said, pointing at the map, “Is the ‘ends of the earth,’ as far as South America goes. We are going here,” he pointed at an area just south of his first mark, “and our fruit will go to the parts that have never heard of Christ.” Our job was to be faithful and plant seeds, trusting that God would do everything else.

            Daily, we prayed for the people in the jungle. In every new village, I saw people who desperately needed him, young disciples who wanted to know more, and a church that needed encouragement. Every day our team cried out, sometimes for hours, pleading for this forgotten region of the world. One of the biggest requests was that those who were Christians would really begin to understand and live it, instead of partaking in the superficiality that besieged many churches. We prayed for roots grounded deep into the earth. We ministered. We planted seeds. Then we left.

            On Monday, I got an email from Ed. The seminary is over, and those young men are on fire for Christ! They understand, finally, what it means to be men of God. They are choosing to live in the Kingdom of God instead of the confines of this world. Now, they are back in their own villages, preaching the Word and most importantly, living it, for all to see. The jungle is on fire for Christ in a way that it hasn’t been before. And y’all, the next step, is the interior of the jungle.

            The ends of the earth.

            My prayer is that the entire region will come to Christ, that the land will ring with praise to our Almighty God. That the church in the jungle will grow solidly, soundly, with Christ alone at its head. That we’ll be able to cross South America off the list of the unreached altogether, for the Good News will spread throughout the land, reaching to very shores of the Continent.

            Brothers and sisters in the Lord, he is at work all over the world! He is being glorified! His command—to go and make disciples—is being realized and lived out. As we walk in it here, I just wanted to testify about his work on the other side of the world. Come, rejoice with me, for the jungle is on fire for Christ!!!!