Where the Story Is Going
The last book of the Bible lets us hear the end of the story. Before the throne of God a new song is sung to the Lamb: thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation (Revelation 5:9).
God has been heading toward that song since Genesis. Missions did not begin with a modern movement, or with the apostles, or even with the Great Commission. It began in the heart of God. He made every people, He loves every person, and all through history He has been working to gather worshipers from every tribe and tongue.
Many Christians think of missions as an extra, a calling for a few unusually brave people. Read the Bible from front to back and you find the opposite. Once you see God's love for the nations, your coworker, your neighbor, and the family who just moved here from overseas all look different.
We believe God loves the whole world, that Christ died for every person, and that God wants all to be saved. We also believe there is one way of salvation for every nation: by grace, through faith in Jesus Christ alone. The need is the same in every language, so the Gospel is the same in every language.
The peoples of the world: families, tribes, and language groups, and not only modern countries. The Old Testament's usual word is the Hebrew goyim, and the New Testament's is the Greek ethnē, a word related to our word ethnic. Both often mean the Gentiles, the peoples outside Israel.
God has never saved anyone so that the story could stop with him. He blesses His people so that His name will be known by those who do not know it yet.
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For Deeper Study
- Let the Nations Be Glad!: The Supremacy of God in MissionsAmazon John PiperA stirring case that the glory of God is the goal of missions, from a Reformed Baptist. We differ on election.
- A Biblical Theology of MissionsAmazon George W. PetersA thorough survey of missions from Genesis to Revelation (Moody, 1972) by a Mennonite Brethren missiologist who taught world missions for many years at Dallas Theological Seminary. It stresses proclamation and the local church.
- From Jerusalem to Irian Jaya: A Biographical History of Christian MissionsAmazon Ruth A. TuckerThe story of missions told through the lives of those who went. Broadly evangelical.
- Whosoever Will: A Biblical-Theological Critique of Five-Point CalvinismAmazon David L. Allen and Steve W. Lemke, eds.Non-Calvinistic Southern Baptist scholars on grace, the atonement, and the Gospel call to all.
- Foxe's Book of MartyrsAmazon John FoxeThe classic Protestant record of those who died for the faith, from the early church to the English Reformation.
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The Great Commission
Before He ascended, the risen Christ commanded His church to take the Gospel to every person: go, win them to Him, baptize them, and teach them to obey. He gave it to the church, every believer shares it, and it stands until He comes.
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