Warwick CU's mission week starts bright and early tomorrow at 8am with prayer. It'll be an entire week of extra events aiming to bring the gospel to every student on campus, whether through apologetics over lunch, evening talks on Luke's gospel, text-a-toastie to halls of residence, or Globe café for internationals.
At church today, the question I was most frequently asked was, 'so, are you ready for mission week?' To which I confidently replied, 'er... well, yes... I think so.'
Ready? Probably not. If 'ready' means confident in my ability to share the gospel with other students, then I'm the most unprepared of the lot. If 'ready' means I have no fear, then I may as well just hide myself in the library and try to forget that mission week is going on.
I'm not ready, neither confident in my ability, nor fearless. But that actually doesn't matter. Most of the messengers and prophets sent by God in the OT were quaking in their boots as they spoke and the disciples were intent on hiding from the world like trembling doormice before Pentecost.
But I, like they did, have a mighty God. He supplies the strength and the courage.
Most of the CU members have had their pictures taken with a board saying, 'Ask me what I'm living for', the aim being to upload them onto Facebook as profile pictures. Funny then that just the other day I should read in 1 Peter 3 this gem of a passage:
'But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear; having a good conscience, that when they defame you as evildoers, those who revile your good conduct in Christ may be ashamed.' (vv.15-16)
My prayer for the CU this week is that we would fulfill this verse, speaking humbly and lovingly with students of their need of Jesus. Interestingly, this verse quite naturally couples telling others about Jesus with persecution. That's something I haven't heard much of in CU, and which may shock some when it happens. So please pray with us that this hope would be uncontainable, but also that when some do 'suffer for doing good', (for what's better than sharing the truth in love?) that they wouldn't be discouraged, but instead again look at Christ as their example in all things.
Embarrassing...! Here's how the FB pictures look, so check it out!
'For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit' (1 Peter 3:18)
No comments:
Post a Comment