I grew up on the mission field in Cameroon, Africa, and missionary biographies were a staple in my home. I remember sitting on the edge of my seat as I read Rosalind Goforth’s account of escaping China during the Boxer rebellion, shedding tears with Anne Judson as she buried her first child in Burma, cheering Mary Slessor on as she pounded a hippopotamus with her frying pan in Africa, and praising God with Darlene Rose in a prison in Japan. So, I guess it’s no surprise that I’ve wanted to do missions ever since junior high. When I went to Bob Jones University, I chose to major in elementary education, because I knew that would be something I could use on the mission field. While I was there, I was heavily involved in Missions Advance. I loved learning about missions all around the world; I remember hearing missionaries speak from India, Philippines, Yemen, South Africa, and France, to name a few! When we didn’t have a speaker, we would have prayer requests listed for different missionaries and parts of the world. After the presentations were done, we would all scoot our chairs in little groups and pray. Sitting in those plastic chairs, listening to the murmurs of people praying all around me, and lifting my own heart up in prayer gave me a taste of true gospel advance. I knew God was working even as we prayed.  Even though there were so many other things I could be doing (and yes, there were times I skipped and did those other things!), I never regretted it when I went.
 
Fast forward a couple years to about three weeks ago when I took a survey type trip to a restricted access country with my one year old and husband (Yeah, a lot can change in a couple of years… let’s just say Missions Advance is a good place not only to pray, but also get to know your future special someone!). My husband and I are interested in missions to a restricted access country, so we spent about two and a half weeks visiting “workers” in a predominantly Muslim country. We rented a car so we could travel to several different cities and get a feel for the whole country. During one of these trips to a nearby city, as I watched the countryside fly by my window, I started to reflect (as somehow long car rides tend to make you do) on what we had been able to do and see so far. I was struck by how hard it would be to do missions here in this country; the people did not seem open to the gospel. Even after years of service, missionaries there only met with two or three believers. I wondered, “Would it be better to go to a place where people were more open to the gospel, where they wanted to hear about Jesus? The people here just seem so anti-Christian and…. closed. Islam is everything.” These thoughts troubled me and made me wonder if we were right for this country.
 
The next day, I read Matthew 8-9 for my devotions. As I read, I noticed a theme unfolding:

But the centurion replied, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant will be healed… When Jesus heard this, he marveled and said to those who followed him, “Truly, I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such faith…” And to the centurion Jesus said, “Go; let it be done for you as you have believed.” And the servant was healed at that very moment. (Matt. 8: 8,10,13)

 And they went and woke him, saying, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing.” And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. (Matt. 8:25-26)

And behold, some people brought to him a paralytic, lying on a bed. And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven. (Matt. 9:2)

And as Jesus passed on from there, two blind men followed him, crying aloud, “Have mercy on us, Son of David.” When he entered the house, the blind men came to him, and Jesus said to them, “Do you believe that I am able to do this?” They said to him, “Yes, Lord.” Then he touched their eyes, saying, “According to your faith be it done to you.” (Matt. 9:27-29)

As I read, I thought about my troubled questions from the day before. I pondered, where was my faith? Do I, like the blind men, believe that He is able to do this? How can I do anything but to echo their response of “Yes Lord”? Without faith, it is impossible to please Him (Heb. 11:6). Jesus said, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matt. 16:18). Jesus was pleased by the faith of people on earth. He is pleased by my faith that He really can draw people to himself and save them in a closed, Muslim country.

Since we have gotten back to States, I’ve continued to reflect on how God uses faith to reach closed countries and how prayer is inseparably linked with that faith. In 1887, the Goforths, missionaries to China, were appointed the task of reaching a new province in China with the gospel. It was one of the most anti-foreign provinces in all of China. When Hudson Taylor heard of their new mission field, he wrote to Mr. Goforth, “Brother, if you would enter that province, you must go forward on your knees" (Rosalind Goforth, How I Know God Answers Prayer).
 
If I want to go to a restricted access country, or do any type of missions, it must be preceded by and saturated with faith-filled prayer. Now that I’ve graduated from BJU, and missions advance, prayer group, society prayer meetings, etc. are gone, I pray a lot less for missions. I’ve had to ask myself, am I praying for the lost? More than that, am I praying with faith? Not only for missions but what about for unsaved family members? For some reason, it seems like it takes more faith to pray for the salvation of an unsaved family member or friend than for hundreds of Muslims across the world! Am I praying for the lost and acting on that faith?
 
What about you? Are you praying for the lost? Are you praying with faith? Are you willing to act on that faith and share the gospel—across the world, on an extension, to your unsaved friend or family member? Maybe you, like me, feel inadequate. Maybe you believe that God could save people in some missionary presentation, but not your unsaved grandfather. Maybe you believe God could use Hudson Taylor or some brave missionaries from the past in the dark jungles of Africa, but you wonder, “Can he really use me today? No cannibals, prisons, frying pans, boxer rebellions, but just ordinary me in ordinary Greenville, SC?” When God asked Gideon to save Israel from Midian, Gideon responded:

“How can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.”

God’s response?

The Lord answered, “I will be with you.” (Jud. 6:15-16)

What more could we ask for? The Lord will be with us! With God all things are possible. Where is our faith?

This month, we are featuring some of BJU's CGO-affiliated organizations. Missions Advance, which was previously known as Mission Prayer Band, is a student organization that exists to cultivate in the student body a passion for God’s glory resulting in greater participation in world missions through learning, praying, and mobilizing.
__________
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Bob Jones University has a long history of involvement with Christian missions. For ninety-three years it has been giving future missionaries and their supporters a vision of the needs of the world—and then sending them out to serve.
 
As I write, I have before me two pieces of evidence from the early days of Bob Jones College. One is a copy of Robert Moffat’s Missionary Labours and Scenes in Southern Africa, which was given to the college library by missions professor Grace W. Haight (1863-1955), herself a former missionary. On the title page Dr. Haight has written her name and the words, “A very valuable book.”
 
The other is an autographed copy of Japan Needs Jesus, a record of a 1937 missionary tour by Clifford Lewis (1909-85). A member of the first BJC class, the author was a secretary of the Young People’s Fellowship Clubs, an ancestor organization of today’s GFA Missions.
 
I found the missions focus very much alive when I came to BJU many years later. The annual Missions Emphasis Week (since retitled Global Opportunities Week) was a highlight of every fall. In addition, with local extension ministries and mission teams, students and staff were regularly mobilized for missionary work in Greenville and around the world; I twice served in Europe with BJU’s Musical Mission Team.
 
Most memorable and most valuable in influencing my own appreciation of missions was the student organization founded in the late 1930s and known for most of its existence as Mission Prayer Band (called Missions Advance since 2011). My sister, who was a year ahead of me in university, invited me to Mission Prayer Band when I was a new student, and I never voluntarily missed a meeting.
 
We used to meet in the large science lecture room for a half hour just after supper four days every week. There were sometimes missionary or student speakers, but mostly we read missionary letters and spent the majority of our time praying for the needs missionaries wrote about.
 
Neither prayer nor missions was new to me. My parents, who themselves had moved halfway across a continent to help my missionary uncle and aunt, raised their children on missionary biographies. However, reading those letters and praying with my fellow students showed me how I can be an active participant in missions work. Missions is my own responsibility.
 
Mission Prayer Band taught me about the world. I learned about men and women who were living without hope—about the forces that keep them from the truth and about the willing servants who have gone to help them.
 
Mission Prayer Band taught me about the church. I saw the Lord’s people working together in the gospel. I heard how His kingdom was growing in many lands. I found encouragement in praying with other believers. To me, Mission Prayer Band was the heart of my university as prayer is the life of a local church.
 
Mission Prayer Band taught me about God. We took our inspiration from Jesus’ words: “The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest” (Luke 10:2). This command comes from the One who was in the very act of sending out His messengers. Almost in the same breath, He tells us to pray, and he answers the prayers. He has a plan, and He is using His people to accomplish it.
 
As we met in Mission Prayer Band, we were obeying our Lord’s orders. More than that, we were participating with Him in His mission. Mission Prayer Band was both training and active service for the Lord.
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Brendon Johnson, administrative assistant in the School of Religion at Bob Jones University since 2018, began attending Mission Prayer Band in 2009 and was the secretary of Missions Advance from 2011 to 2013

​I recently spoke to a couple thousand college students about the hope we have in Jesus. I emphasized that the hope we have is one that is alive, and its life is found in the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the grave. I also encouraged the oft forgotten reality of our inheritance as saints. To those who are alive in Christ, there is an inheritance kept for us that can't fade, refuses to decay, and does not perish—its eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. 
 
The sermon I preached was based off the first chapter of Peter's first letter to the exiles of the Dispersion. It is in this section that Peter reminds these believers to remember their hope and their inheritance, and to join him in exuberant praise to God. Truly, the entire passage echoes back to the third verse: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! 
 
Peter suggests that it is God's mercy, full and powerful, that has caused us to be born again to a living hope and to an eternal inheritance. He says that it is in these we rejoice (v. 6), even though we are being grieved by various, tenacious, and ferocious trials. Peter, like many other writers of Scripture, says that we are to rejoice even when life gets hard. He says that our faith is not yet complete, or genuine. The purpose of these trials, struggles, and pressures in our lives is to make us nothing less than praising, glorifying, and honoring to Jesus. 
 
He does not shy away from the struggles of our lives with pithy words of endearment. He does not tell these exiles that they must toughen out their Christian lives and be stronger than the persecution of their day. Peter insisted, rather, that they must rejoice! I insist today that we as God's people must rejoice. We must see the mercy of God in Jesus, we must enjoy the hope of life we hold, and anticipate the joys of eternal life we will have. And we must rejoice in the tough stuff. It is the same God that is sovereign over our salvation that is sovereign over suffering. 
 
By this I mean that the trials in our lives are designed to make us genuine, and that God is sovereign over trials that stretch and transform us to be more like Christ. This sunk into my heart deeply when I contracted strep throat the week after preaching. I had tonsils the size of golf balls and blisters to boot. My entire week was described by attempting to swallow air, food, drink, and meds without excruciating pain accompanying it. 
 
It was last week (and not two weeks ago when I was preaching) when I realized what it actually means to thank God for all things. I had to take to heart the truths I had expounded for many others to hear. I realized at heart level that we truly do have every reason to give thanks in Christ Jesus. 
 
There are many aspects to prayer. It is when we sin and are convicted, we know we must confess. It is when we see the struggle and hurt of others, we choose to intercede. When the Word dwells in us richly and we understand the presence of God through faith, we commune with Him. The aspect of prayer that I am attempting to highlight with this post is adoration and thanksgiving towards God. 
 
Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. (1 Thes. 5:16-18)
 
And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. (Col. 3: 17)
 
Addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord in your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. (Eph 5:19-20)
 
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places! (Eph 1:3)
 
These verses are not mere Christian literature designed to give us proper distinction as a religion and add to our tenets of religious practice. These verses are aimed and charged directly at the people of God, so they might rejoice, thank, and praise God for all their spiritual blessings! This is the God of all our words and deeds. The God of all our circumstances. The God of our songs and melodies. The God of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The God of heaven and blessing.  
 
You cannot truly teach someone to be thankful. You cannot tell them to say "thank you" and it be adequate gratitude. Words are not enough to show reality, for they are temporary and often masqueraded. True thankfulness arises from a heart that has tasted and seen that the Lord is good. It is the heart that has been washed with the blood of Calvary that sings to the Savior. It is the heart that has seen the glory of God that is transformed and overflowed. 
 
It is also only in thanksgiving and adoration that that the heart realizes how great God is. Have you ever gone up to a speaker, performer, chef, or teacher and thanked them for what they had done? It is in the act of showing gratitude that you truly realize how overwhelmed your heart is. It’s when you go out of your way to thank someone that heart has gone full circle on the roundabout of gratitude. It is the same with God. 
 
This is why Peter would invite the exiles to rejoice in the God whose mercy has given salvation. Paul knows that for the heart to be fully blessed, it must bless the One who has blessed it! Thanksgiving is the natural response of someone who has been touched by the grace of God. The sad part is that many have become too accustomed to grace and its flavors, colors, and marvel. Many forget the depths of Jesus' service to us. Many cloud the grace of God with classes, meetings, agendas, and people. 
 
May we be the people of God that are truly and exuberantly thankful to our God, because such is the joy of living. We taste the joy of eternity when we rejoice in God and his gifts today. I find 1 Peter 1:8-9 a tremendous chorus and conclusion to the song of praise we started with at the beginning of the chapter. 
 
Though you have not seen Jesus, you love him. Though you do not now see Jesus, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.