Beyond Borders!

At our church, we are currently in the midst of our annual missions convention. Our theme this year, as handed down to us through the Assemblies of God is, “Beyond Borders.”  Throughout this past week we have heard of God taking men and women and their families far beyond the borders of their lives here in the U.S.—taking them to the far reaches of our world; to places that I can sometimes hardly find on a map. It’s incredible to hear where they are living, what they have faced, and most of all the walls that God has broken down for them to preach the gospel.  

Now, I am not trying to get political in any way, but considering the rhetoric in our nation in recent months, I find the theme that has been handed down to us to be a bit ironic.  After all, it was probably at least two to three years ago, long before the current rhetoric, that the Assemblies of God leadership in our missions department chose the theme for this year and began producing the banners, videos, music, and other items we use in our churches for our missions conventions.  When the writers of the theme song wrote the words: “We built our walls around ourselves, drew lines around our nations; There’s us and everybody else, dividing up creation….” they had no idea that across our own nation there would be renewed talk about building a wall on our southern border, a stronger emphasis on the deportation of illegal immigrants, and putting into place a ban on immigration from certain parts of the world.  All I can say is, I find it to be very ironic to the point that I fear someone in the church may think that our missions theme this year was meant to be a political statement of some sort!  That, it is not!

 

The message of this year’s missions theme, however, is as pertinent as ever to the church of Jesus Christ.  Through it, I am reminded that, although there will always be a need for national security and the well-being of one’s own nation (whatever nation that may be), the ultimate call for the Church all around the world is to reach out to the peoples of our world with compassion and the preaching of the gospel.  Sometimes that means going to them. And, sometimes God may bring them to us.  Either way, we are challenged to go beyond borders—the borders of governments, culture, language, fear, and prejudice—to reach people of all nations with the incredible grace and love our Lord Jesus Christ.

The Bible speaks of, “…Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.” (Philippians 2:5-7 – NIV)  That is, Jesus Christ has set for us the perfect example of what it means to go beyond borders as he crossed from heaven to earth and became one of us—humbling himself to become not just a man, but a servant to all men. 

I pray that God would use each of us to reach people around us and around our world with the incredible good news of Jesus!  Let’s be people who know what it means to go “Beyond Borders!”

Have a great day!

Pastor Tim Harris