MEDIOCRE NO MORE

Tanzania Update: I leave in 5 days. The pressure is on and we are all feeling it. Please pray. We had a team meeting yesterday afternoon via internet. One teacher is on the verge of strep throat and our team leader was flat on his back all day with back problems. I am feeling the anxiety of leaving my family behind and the burdens that go with it. Please pray. Mark (he is the one with the sore throat) has only one hour in Amsterdam to change to his plane to Nairobi. All of us are looking for good weather for plane travel and making our connections and getting luggage to our destination. Please pray. We are all thankful for the school and the opportunity to bless the school and the students. Mark works for Baker Books and they have donated books for the College library and others are bringing books as well. These books will be a great blessing so pray that this luggage will get arrive safely for the graduation ceremony on Saturday night. Please intercede for East Africa Christian College, Tanzania and our service there. This would be a good time to look up Tanzania in Operation World and pray for that country. I praise God for your fellowship in the Gospel.

For the last couple of weeks I have been pondering my mediocrity. Whenever ministry opportunities present themselves, such as this mission trip, I question my capacities and abilities. As I get older, and weaker, and too often search for simple words that I know that I know but in frustration cannot grasp, and misname people and places sometimes without even noticing, and misspell words and even find upon rereading what I have written that I have used a different word than what I meant to use, and when I fumble with the simplest tasks, I see myself slowly slipping into mediocrity. Mediocrity is described as a quality of moderate ability or value. As ability declines I also feel that my value is declining with it.
Looking backwards I must confess that in the past I thought of myself above mediocrity. I saw myself for the most part as able, useful, valuable, a leader, a risk taker, a better example than most. Now I realize that I was mediocre then as I am now and compensated with natural strength and natural energy, and a loud personality. I thank God that in spite of myself, God has been gracious in my service to Him.
We read in 1 Corinthians 1.26-31, "For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, 'Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.'"
From this passage I learn some important lessons of which I need to constantly remind myself. 1) According to God, value is not related to ability. In Christ I have value before God. End of discussion. This I must accept without dispute. 2) It is not my ability and capacity that gets the work done but God's ability to work through a surrendered individual. God chose the what was foolish and weak and low and despised by the world, not what was wise and powerful, and noble and strong. My mediocrity doesn't matter. Who God IS matters. (Moses: Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt? God: I will be with you. Jesus to Peter after Peter betrayed Jesus: Feed my sheep). The end result, as it should be, God is glorified in all that is accomplished by His people. 3) I must put one foot in front of the other today and in my future, even I as see the growing deterioration of my capacities, trusting in God's valuation of me in Christ, depending on His ability working in me and through me, walking in faith and not by worldly evaluations or unbelieving personal evaluations, with a growing hope that in my future are unimaginable capacities which I will lay at the feet of Jesus in eternal worship. May God grant us to grow old in faith, and joy, and peace, with a warm sense of our Father's near presence often moving us to tears.

INTERCONNECTED FOR MUTUAL GROWTH

Tanzania Update: It is just over a week before my trip begins. Preparations are going well. I will be spending extra time on my lessons next week. Please pray that other immediate needs do not interfere with this preparation time. My primary concerns at this time are the preparation of my lessons and teaching them through a translator; the extra burdens that will be upon Gloria and Michelle while I am away; maintaining good health and stamina before and during my time away; and my flight connections. If you could especially hold up these concerns I would much appreciate it. Please pray that God will teach and show Himself to the students both in the formal setting of the classroom and in the time we spend with them in the college compound. I thank God for your fellowship in the Gospel.

"We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings (weaknesses) of the weak, and not to please ourselves". (Romans 15.1) This verse is part of a larger section of teaching (Romans 14.1 to 15.7) on not allowing personal convictions and practices about food and drink and special days to bring disunity and destruction to the body of Christ. Some believers were still influenced by their Jewish rituals and beliefs, and some by their Gentile practices. Paul calls the believers who have carried some of these influences and convictions into their new Christian life, "weak in faith". They did not yet understand and practice their full freedom in Christ.
To some degree we can apply "weak in faith" to Christians in our churches today who still believe and live from their unchristian, worldly upbringing. In the scriptures above we are told that the convictions of these weak believers were to honor the Lord. This is not the case with these new recently-delivered-from-the-world believers but they are still "weak in faith". The church has many such people and should expect many more to come to faith in Christ. They become believers with little biblical background and often with distorted beliefs and practices. They will carry into their Christian life convictions and practices with no biblical basis or from a misunderstanding of the Bible's teachings.
Paul has some clear instruction on how the "strong" in the faith are to respond to those "weak in faith". First we are to welcome them (14.1). Paul's idea of welcome is not that of a man wearing a big grin, rubbing his hands together, ready after greeting the weak believer to pounce on him with a rebuke from the Bible, an itemized list of new behaviors and ideas, with a fierce determination to make him into his envisioned christian icon. No! Paul says in the same breath as welcome them, "but not to quarrel over opinions". We are not to despise them or pass judgement on them (14.3).
In 15.1 Paul says we have an "obligation to bear with the weaknesses of the weak and not to please ourselves". The strong are not to ignore the weak and hang only with the strong, nor are they to rule over the weak with an attitude of pride and disdain, but they are to bear with the weak in an unselfish way. This is more than pity and tolerance.

Paul does not say we are obligated to bear with the weak in their weaknesses but with the weaknesses of the weak. This is unusual wording and deserves some meditation. Paul is not asking the strong to approve of the weaknesses of the week but for the strong to accept the consequences that their weakness will have on the christian community as a whole, and to identify with those weaknesses and how they effect one another in the community in the day-to-day experience of life. In love and in Christ, this will promote hope and unity, opportunity for growth in love, in patience, in truth and in character both for the weak and the strong. God is strong in our weaknesses, and brings much fruit through weakness. The principle at work in these verses is more than toleration for the weak and putting up with the weak because we have to while living our own life in spite of the weak. This will only lead to a marginalization of the weak by the strong. No! God has a fuller plan to use the weaknesses of the weak to bring godly fruit, character, deeper love, sensitivity, mercy, compassion, dependence on Him, and a Spirit filled life to the whole community. Praise God for giving the community weak believers for as we respond to them God's way we will know God's growth as a body of believers.
Paul gives the example of Christ who was willing to identify with sinners to save sinners, and was willing to accept the reproach of others in this seeming unholy behavior (15.3). The end result will be the glory of God (15.6-7). "Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God".
Tell me, how did Christ welcome you? Did Christ tell you to become perfect and then to come to Him? NO! Come as a sinner and I will forgive you, come and I will fully accept you and love you, come as your are and I will teach you, and I will identify with you even though the world despises you, to the glory of God.
A lot more could be said about these verses but I leave off for now.

LOVE, HONOR

Tanzania Update: The East Africa Christian College website is <http://maxpoint.org/eastafricacc>. Pray for the conversion of the Muslim people of Tanzania, especially from the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba. Conversion among Muslims has increased but pray for more. There is a spiritual battle between Muslim fundamentalism and Christianity for the souls of these Muslim people. Pray for the work that is being done in Tanzania by a number of different Christian groups. Pray for ongoing Bible translations. 51 languages have no Scripture at all and 32 only have portions of the Bible. Pray as the nation increases in literacy that Christian tracts and books and digital resources will increase. Pray for the ministries of Christian radio, the Jesus film and Gospel Recordings, which has recorded gospel messages in 88 languages and dialects. God is working in Tanzania but the need is great. Especially pray for the church and the Pastors of the nation.

Romans 12.10 says, "Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor." As followers of Christ we are called to glorify God by loving and honoring others. Loving others as we read in 1 Corinthians 13 is selfless and sacrificial. We are to give to others and treat others in a way that helps them not so much to get what they want, but to discover what they need and have in the fullness of Jesus Christ. Sometimes an act of benevolent love is a voice of support for the Gospel that someone else will preach at a later date. At other times the action of love is in the form of a rebuke or even a withholding of support that God may have room to work in the life.

As Christians we are especially called to love and honor fellow believers in Jesus. We are commanded to show them genuine appreciation, affection and admiration and to put them first as we are told in Philippians 2.3-11 and shown in the example of Christ. Of course other believers are people and that is the problem. We know that we are easy to love, but them, well that is another situation!!! God enables the Christian to embrace the porcupine in love and honor as well as the teddy bear.
We are to outdo one another in showing honor. What a loud message to a back biting, self-centered, proud world. As smiling, humble, serving, honoring, loving Christians we may be mocked for our beliefs and marginalized in our social circles, but let us make sure we are never accused of hypocrisy, and partiality. Let's at least be attractive to the world and not give any valid reason for their rejection of Jesus. "Let your light shine before others, so they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven". (Matthew 5.16). "Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation". (1 Peter 2.12).
Grab a coffee or tea or juice or water. It is time to take 1/2 hour to quietly meditate on 1 Peter 2. God has given us much and also calls us to much as we live in Christ.

SET APART TO SERVE GOD

Tanzania Update: Christopher John and Peter Andrew (pray for them) started East Africa Christian College two years ago. Training Leaders International (TLI) shares a large portion of the teaching responsibilities and also does training seminars for area Pastors. This is a small school with four living-room sized classrooms, with chalkboards and small desks. Desks and chairs need to be replaced with more durable ones and a TLI team member is seeking to raise the funds for this. TLI is also providing funds to build a second overhang where teaching can be done outside. The TLI team (5 of us) will be staying at the school. Water is intermittent and the city dump next door produces acrid smoke which irritates the eyes but otherwise the conditions are clean and safe. We will be teaching 5 hours a day for 5 days. The EACC is seeking to expand its 100 book library so a number of us will be bringing reference books and commentaries as a gift to the school. We will be flying through Amsterdam to Nairobi and the whole trip with layovers is 42 hours long. I will be leaving February 1st and returning late on the 13th. The Saturday before we fly back we will spend the day in the Serengeti National Park which will be a treat after a long week.
Here are some statistics and prayers for Tanzania. I would encourage you to read about and pray for Tanzania from Operation World until February 13th. Let me know if you are committing to this prayer time. That would be so encouraging to me. Tanzania is 54% Christian (all denominations) and 31% Muslim. The evangelical population is about 18% of the 54%. From 1990 to 2010 the evangelical population grew from 9.2% to 17.9%. Conversion growth continues. The country is very poor, life expectancy is 55 years, witchcraft and occult practices are rampant, aids afflicts almost 9% of the population, many children are orphans because of aids, and Islamic fundamentalism is seeking inroads. In spite of all this the church is growing and evangelizing. The greatest need in the church is for leadership development. There is a critical lack of trained, mature leaders, and many pastors must care for 10 or more congregations, often miles apart. 45% of Tanzania's population is under 15 years of age so the future of Tanzania is in the hands of the youth who need Jesus. Many students are being converted including Muslims and training them is essential. There are many other needs to pray for. Please join me in praying for Tanzania.

The Bible is filled with rich diamonds. Here is a diamond for you. "And for their sake I consecrate myself,^[a] that they also may be sanctified^[b] in truth." (John 17.19) In this verse Jesus is letting us listen as he prays to his Father about how he has fulfilled his mission on earth in obedience to the Father. Jesus says that for the sake of the disciples that have believed in him he has consecrated himself. The footnote to this verse [a] says, Or I sanctify myself; or I set myself apart (for holy service to God). That sums up the whole purpose of Jesus to God his Father. Jesus has set himself apart for God's holy service and the cross is the culmination act in this service, and he does this for the disciples. Why? So that the disciples may also be sanctified. This word is the same verb as consecrate but a different tense which looks to a future possibility. Footnote [b] says, Greek may be set apart (for holy service to God). Jesus set himself apart for God's service so that we might be set apart for God's service in truth. We can go so far as to say that the abandoned life of service that Jesus lived unto the Father was so that we might live the same abandoned life of service unto the Father in truth, so that others may be able to live the abandoned life of service to the Father in truth and so on... Here is how the Expanded Bible translates this verse, "For their sake, I am making myself ready to serve [sanctifying/consecrating myself] so that they can be ready for their service of [sanctified/consecrated by] the truth." What a radical thought. What a radical privilege. And what a radical responsibility.