One more for Jesus,

"Got to save one more for Jesus! Got to save one more for Jesus!"

My father was a minister for over fifty years, serving mostly in small, rural churches. He was a simple preacher, but he was a man with a mission. His favorite activity was taking teams of volunteers overseas to build church buildings for small congregations. In his lifetime, Dad built over 150 churches around the world.

In 1999, my father died of cancer. In the final week of his life the disease kept him awake in a semi-conscious state nearly twenty-four hours a day. As he dream, he'd talk out loud about what he was dreaming. Sitting by his bedside, I learned a lot about my dad by just listening to his dreams. He relived one church building project after another.

One night near the end, while my wife, my niece, and I were by his side, Dad suddenly became very active and tried to get out of bed. Of course, he was too weak, and my wife insisted he lay back down.

But he persisted in trying to get out of bed, so my wife finally asked, "Jimmy, what are you trying to do?" He replied, "Got to save one more for Jesus! Got to save one more for Jesus!" He began to repeat that phrase over and over.

During the next hour, he said the phrase probably a hundred times. "Got to save one more for Jesus!" As I sat by his bed with tears flowing down my cheeks, I bowed my head to thank God for my dad's faith. At moment Dad reached out and placed his frail hand on my head and said, as if commissioning me, "Save one more soul for Jesus! Save one more for Jesus!"

I intend for that to be the theme of the rest of my life. I invite you to consider it as a focus for your life, too, because nothing will make a greater difference for eternity. If you want to be used by God, you must care about what God cares about; what he cares about most is the redemption of the people he made. He wants his lost children found! Nothing matters more to God; the Cross proves that. I pray that you will always be on the lookout to reach "one more for Jesus" so that when you stand before God one day you can say, "Mission accomplished!"

Rick Warren.
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Everybody needs Jesus.

The Importance of Your Mission. Fulfilling your life mission on earth is an essential part of living for God’s glory. The Bible gives several reasons why your mission is so important.

• Your mission is a continuation of Jesus’ mission on earth

As his followers, we are to continue what Jesus started. Jesus calls us not only to come to him, but to go for him. Your mission is significant that Jesus repeated it five times, in five different ways, in five different books of the Bible. It is as if he was saying, “I really want you to really get this!” Study these five commissions of Jesus & you will learn the details of your mission on earth the when, where, why & how.

In the Great Commission Jesus said, “Go and make disciple of all nations and make them my disciples. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teach them to do everything I have told you.” This commission was given to every follower of Jesus, not to pastors and missionaries alone. This is your commission from Jesus, and it is not optional. These words of Jesus are not the Great suggestions. If you are not a part of God’s family, your mission is mandatory.

To ignore it would be disobedience. You may have been unaware that God holds you responsible for the unbelievers who live around you. The Bible says, “You must warn them so they may live. If you don’t speak out to warn the wicked to stop their evil ways, they will die in their sin. But I will hold you responsible for their death.” You are the only Christian some people will ever know, and your mission is to share Jesus with them.

• Your mission is a wonderful privilege.

Although it is a big responsibility, it is also an incredible honor to be used by God. Paul said, “God has given us the privilege of urging everyone to come into his favor and be reconciled to him.” Your mission involves two great privileges: working with God and representing him. We get to partner with God in building of his kingdom. Paul calls us “co-laborers” and says, “We are workers together with God.”

Jesus has secured our salvation, put us in his family, given us his Spirit, and then made us his agent in the world. What a privilege! The Bible says, “We are Christ’s representatives. God uses us to persuade men and woman to drop their differences and enter into God’s work of making things right between them. We’re speaking for Christ himself now: Become friends with God”

• Telling others how they can have eternal life is the greatest thing you can do for them.

If your neighbor had cancer or AIDS and you knew the cure, it would be criminal to withhold that lifesaving information. Even worse is to keep secret the way to forgiveness, purpose, peace, and eternal life. We have the greatest news in the world, and sharing it is the greatest kindness you can show to anyone.

One problem long-term Christians have is that they forget how hopeless it felt to be without Christ . We must remember that no matter how contented or successful people appear to be, without Christ they are hopelessly lost and headed for eternal separation from God. The Bible says, “Jesus is the only One who can save people.”

Everybody needs Jesus.
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Transformed by trouble.

"It is the fire of suffering that brings forth the gold of godliness."
Madame Guyon.
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God has a purpose behind every problem. He uses circumstances to develop our character. In fact, he depends more on circumstances to make us like Jesus than he depends on our reading the Bible. The reason is obvious: You face circumstances twenty-four hours a day.

Jesus warned us that we would have problems in the word. No one is immune to pain or insulated from suffering, and no one gets to skate through life problem-free. Life is a series of problems. Every time you solve one, another is waiting to take its growth process for you.

God uses problems to draw you closer to himself. The Bible says, "The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; he rescues those who are crushed in spirit." Your most profound and intimate experiences of worship will likely be in your darkest days - when your heart is broken, when you feel abandoned, when you're out of options, when the pain is great - and you turn to God alone. It is during suffering that we learn to pray our most authentic, heartfelt, honest-to-God prayers. When we're in pain, we don't have the energy for superficial prayers.

Joni Eareckson Tada notes, " When life is rosy, we may slide by knowing about Jesus, with imitating him and quoting him and speaking of Him. But only in suffering that we can't learn any other way. Everything that happens to you has spiritual significance.

One step at a time.

"We're not meant to remain as children."
Ephesian 4:14
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God wants you to grow up. Your heavenly Fathers goal is for you to mature and develop the characteristics of Jesus Christ. Sadly, millions of Christians grow older but never grow up. They are stuck in perpetual spiritual infancy, remaining in diapers and booties. The reason is that they never intended to grow.

Spiritual growth is not automatic. It takes an intentional commitment. You must want to grow, decide to grow, make an effort to grow, and persist in growing. Discipleship - the process of becoming like Christ - always begins with a decision. Jesus call us, and we respond: "' Come, be my disciple,' Jesus said to him. So Matthew got up and followed him."

I was created to become like Christ.

God is far more interested in what are than what you do. We are human beings, not human doings. God is much more concerned about your character than your career, because you will take your character into eternity, but not your career.

Jesus did not die on the cross just so we could live comfortable, well-adjusted lives. His purpose is far deeper: He wants to make us like himself before he takes us to heaven. This is our greatest privilege, our immediate responsibility, and our ultimate destiny.

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