I am famous. They are hungry.

I am famous.  

Stirred. Moved. Unsettled. Passionate.

These words point to what is happening in my soul.  It all started when…. just over a year ago I had the opportunity to translate Romans and then the Pastoral Epistles into English as an exercise in my Greek studies.  I have read those books several times throughout the course of 32 years of living, but never like this.  In addition to being able to intimidate people with a 1% knowledge of the greek language I have found it most useful because it causes me to slow down, really slow down in reading the Bible.  In the process it seems that the truth of those words seeps deeper into my soul; specifically, truths about the gospel.  Or, from the Pastoral Epistles I discovered truths about how the church is to fiercely defend, promote, and defend the true gospel.  And, if I wasn’t being wrecked enough by those truths I endeavored to teach Luke’s gospel to those in Awaken.  With the truths of the gospel, I looked in on the centerpiece of the gospel – Jesus Christ.  His message of the Kingdom of God was (and is) breathtaking.  This kingdom message so wonderfully describes the way in which God calls the poor, the prostitute, the leper, and the religious leaders to himself.  Even before Paul wrote about the gospel, Jesus lived the gospel by dining with sinners, rebuking the pious religious people, and by touching the untouchable. 

So many times I have prayed, thought, cried, “Thank you Jesus that your kingdom welcomes the sinner, because I am one.”  The bigger God gets and the more impressive the gospel becomes to me, the more I believe that the gospel as mere words is no gospel at all.  It is, instead, a combination of truths about Holy God, Sinful Men, and Hero Jesus together with a care for those who Jesus cared about in the way that he cared for them.  What a tragedy to claim to believe the gospel while at the same being ignorant of one’s place in God’s plan to invite others to worship the King. 

I am more recently struck by my own calling to use the influence (albeit little) I have to lead the believers to see, feel, care for those who will never hear of God’s grace because they were born in a country where they will die of hunger before they are introduced to Jesus Christ. 

Maybe it is my frustration with how much church time we spend on worthless things, about how we have so many bible studies and so few missionaries, about how I am quickly becoming an alpha male in a church world that worships the alpha male preachers. 

What do we do?  Everyone can do something.  My contribution is to continue caring for Philemoni, a boy that Jeanie and I began supporting 8 years ago with Compassion International.  But, that is not enough.  I know it.  I know it.  The bigger God gets and the more impressive the gospel becomes to me, the more I believe that the gospel as mere words is no gospel at all.  So, Jeanie, Koby, Keaton, Pryce and I will do something more….