Tonight’s meeting focussed on the forthcoming mission trip to India (9-23 April). Eight of us are going out to Bangalore to visit Fredrick and Reeba whose ministries we support.
This does not simply affect the eight of us, however, for all of us are involved in this trip through giving and prayer. Paul urged the Ephesians to ‘pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel.’ (Eph 6:18-19) This kind of prayer encompasses all of us, at all times of day and night, and helps us to understand that the main purpose of the trip is to be Christ’s ambassadors as though God were making His appeal through us (see 2 Cor 5:14-21).
An ambassador is a representative for a country, ‘an accredited diplomat sent by a state as its permanent representative in a foreign country.’ We go to India as representatives of GPCC, but we also need to understand that this calling applies to all of us at all times. Whatever we do in India, whether it’s in a gospel meeting, meeting with the ladies on the tailoring programme, talking with children on the streets, praying with people in their homes, teaching the children in Sunday School, or anything else which may come up during these two weeks, we believe it will be as though God is making His appeal through us. Everything we do, as Paul tells the Colossians, is done in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, with thanksgiving to God. (Col 3:17) – and this applies to each of us in our ordinary, everyday lives, whether we are at home in Goldthorpe, at work, living in our neighbourhoods or on the trip to India.