Rivers Baptist Church - Christ alone - and Him crucified

Winston's summary of his 2007 Missions trip to Sri-Lanka:

The church services there goes on for about 2 hours (minimum) and the fellowship thereafter lasts two to three hours after the service. The day at the church is treated like a day out for the believers. I was reminded that in a world that is getting busier by the day, the church should be one place where we can simply stop “racing” and pause to share our love with one another as God wants us to, and not treat the day as just another ritual. There are some churches in the capital of Colombo that are open 24 hours! They feed & offer a sleeping place for the poor wanderers. At times I was overwhelmed at the extremes of the lack of basic needs of the some of the believers, but they were always joyful in their outlook. How did these people live with so little? Because their “wants” are less versus our “wants” It was not about what we have, but how content we are with them. What stood out for me was the fact that I was too busy to be fruitful for God.

Only when I completed the journey did I reflect on what I learned from the journey. In Missions, I learned that the learning is more for me than anyone else. It teaches you that God’s word is not effective unless you practice it. When you see the many people you come across, no matter how different they are you begin to understand that God loves because of who He is, and not because of who we are. I saw many defaced people living in places that not many would want to visit. They stayed indoors because they were embarrassed to show their faces to the outside world. I looked at an old lady and was disturbed to see the shape of her face & teeth, But then I saw her made in the image of God, no matter how defaced that image had become. I was reminded that we must never lose the sight of the depths from which we have been lifted. Then we see the purpose of God’s creation. We were born broken, and the only glue we were mended by was His grace, through Jesus. Jesus poured out his love for humanity through grace. Every act of his life was marked by it.

Before I embarked on this journey, I spent a lot of time speaking to a dear friend of mine to purchase as many Bibles as our funds could afford(cost Rs:400-500 or A$5.00 each). The Bibles were so scarce that he had to visit the bookshop 20 days consecutively as the shop only sold a maximum of 10 Bibles per person per day. It was important that I distributed God’s word along with the gifts because I had learned how more valuable the word of God was to a person than giving of things only. The most harmful thing you can do is to give such things without the word of God, because unknowingly, you shift the focus from God to yourself. Otherwise we focus on the physical need of man rather than the spiritual need. When I was an unsaved person, I used to enjoy feeding poor people and giving gifts and so on. I used to think that I was “earning” my merits. Unfortunately, what happened was that I was making the people “dependent” on me, and without realizing, I was then becoming their “god” and I would be honored and treated like a VIP. I remember that trap very clearly. Jesus said, “The spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life” (John 7:63).

The great thing about giving to a believer was twofold. One (and the most important one) is that they praise God first and ALL glory goes to God, and two is that they also pray for you and give thanks for you to God. I believe that the main theme in missions is to touch the lives of other people. A Christian walk is not only a private devotional time in prayer but also to seek to enhance someone else’s life. The Christian knows to serve the weak not because they deserve it, but because God extended his love to us when we deserved the opposite. I was based in an orphanage during my entire mission, from where I traveled to all the destinations this time. After every trip I would return to this place and hear the voices of the children. There was not one night when I thought about my wife & children back in Australia and at the same time looked at what they consumed for EVERY meal-rice! (I found that bread was too expensive to feed all of them-close to 80 plus their caretakers-about another 20) With the blessing of God I was able to treat them all to special meals once a week. One evening they gathered around me like my own children. The number who could get close to me was about 10 and the rest just tried to push their way in for cuddles. That was the only time I was sad, because I could not hold them all. Then I remembered that God’s arms were larger than any of us. The strength of God is in his love. Romans 8:38-39 says “ For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” That is an awesome gift of love. God climbed down in a ladder full of grace. But we try to reach up the ladder of power. Think of how Jesus changed the world’s way of thinking. His words alone did, what the world with all its provisions could not. It is clear that Jesus “fed” our spirit rather than our bodies, because He knew that humanity was lost without it. Once saved in Christ, it is the spirit that lives forever, not our physical bodies.

Jesus said “I tell you the truth, No one who has left home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God, will fail to receive many times as much in this age and in the age to come, eternal life” Luke 18:29-30 and again “Whoever does not take up his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple” Luke 14:27.

To our humanistic way of thinking, this is a very tall ask. My home is so comfortable and is a place I long to return to, all the time. To hug my wife and my kids, and share our love. It also becomes a place that you do not wish to step out of. It is a case of if you want to walk on water-you have to get off the boat first. Sometimes it is also like not wanting to step outside of the Heavenly Father’s love. But really, once you place Jesus first in your life, it is amazing what transpires thereafter.