Our Greatest Mission Field

If you are going into mission work, one of the most important things you will want to know about the people in the country you will work is, "How receptive are the people to the gospel?" Some areas of the world are not very receptive. In those places it might take months just to find a handful of people who would be willing to study the Bible with you.

In Tennessee, people are very receptive. So receptive that nearly any form of religion will do. There is not a single day that goes by that I am not trying to get somebody to come to worship with us, or to study, and so this counts for a lot of spiritual conversations. I am finding more and more that people do not know very much about the Bible, even though they would consider themselves to be religious. I am also finding that most people are interested in Bible study, but a large number of those people have already formed their denominational or philiosphical conclusions about what the Bible teaches.

Sunday evening, as I was working with my kids for Lads to Leaders, it dawned on me that the most receptive people to the gospel I want so desperately to spread are my own children. They are like sponges, soaking up Bible verses and historical accounts of events and places and people. They have no preconceived notions. They have no filter. They just want to learn and their hearts are pure and they are willing to be shaped by the will of God.

This being the case, I said a prayer of repentance for all the times I may have neglected to teach my own children, because I was trying to teach somebody else. I am going to rededicate myself to them. Since children are so innocent and receptive, what a great responsibility we have to teach them what the Bible says! I don't want my kids to be shaped by modern philosophy and theology and the current world view. They deserve to know what is in the mind of God. They deserve to have an understadning of the only book that will bring them joy, peace, comfort, hope, and eternal life.

Here I am, wanting to go to all the world, just as Jesus instructed...and yet my greatest mission field is right in my own home.

"And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up." ~ Deuteronomy 6:6-7