Sounds great - but is it really needed?

In the last post I talked in general about the vision.  This time around I want to share a little bit about our rationale for doing this.

Though I don’t know for sure, I doubt too many missionaries are familiar with the lyrics from an old Def Leppard song (I probably shouldn’t be familiar with them either, but I wasn’t always a missionary, you know…), but many of them are ministering like they have heard them – “Better to burn out, than to fade away”.  It is almost like it is expected that you go to the mission field and burn yourself out for God, going out like Elijah in a blaze of glory.  The problem with that is that it was Elijah’s chariot that was on fire, not Elijah!  In fact, when I look at Elijah’s life I see a different story that serves as a bit of a basis for some of what we want to do.

In 1 Kings 18 you have that awesome story of Elijah’s “showdown” with the prophets of Baal up on Mt Carmel.  I have always loved that story!!  Then in chapter 19 you have this incredible man of God running for his life because of Jezebel’s threats.  He literally runs out in to the middle of the desert, sits down under a tree and asks God to kill him. Isn’t it great that James tells us that Elijah was a man with a nature like us (James 5:17) - not some Biblical superhero, just a man like us that God used in a mighty way?  But I digress…

In chapter 19, when Elijah goes and lays down under a tree asking God to kill him (suicide by Deity?) what is God’s response?  Does He send Gabriel with a flaming sword to carry out Elijah’s wishes?  Not quite.  He sends an angel alright, but that angel wakes Elijah from his sleep and gives him some fresh baked bread (can you smell it?) and a jug of water, then lets Elijah sleep some more before doing it all over again.  Two hot meals, something refreshing to drink, and an encouragement that God is not done with Elijah (by telling him he needed to eat again or the journey would be too much for him, it is implied that God still had work for Elijah to do).  This is how God responds to His tired, dejected, depressed servant.  Not judgment.  Not punishment.  A hot meal.  A good night’s rest.  Encouragement.  Then, in the mouth of an isolated cave, in another desolate place – new instructions for ministry.  Wow.  Who’d a thunk it?                                                

We have met so many missionaries who are tired, worn out, dejected, and depressed.  They don’t need to be judged – they need a rest and a reassignment.  We have been there ourselves! We want our “place” to be a place of refuge.  A place where some good sleep and some good hot meals can lead to a refocusing and reassignment and refreshing which in turn will lead into a new period of successful ministry for those who come.  We want to be those ministering angels who are able to come alongside workers who are weary and pray with them.  We want to see them revitalized and redeployed by God, instead of burned out and cast aside.  I have a feeling that this is what God wants too.  God met Elijah in a deserted place – just not in the way Elijah expected.  But when Elijah got away from the “noise” and the threats and then stopped looking for God to speak through bigger means (the wind, the fire and the earthquake) he heard God’s gentle whisper telling him what the next phase of ministry would hold.

We toyed with the idea of calling our new ministry “The Broom Tree” or “The Juniper Tree” in reference to this story, but there are other ministries who have already used those names.  Instead we have decided on a name that comes from another great Biblical passage showing the need for God’s disciples to take a break.   More on that in the next post…