Noël and I are reading together in the evening Ruth Tucker’s book, From Jerusalem to Irian Jaya, A Biographical History of Christian Missions (Zondervan, 1983). Then we pray together.

Last Saturday while my sermon on Priority Three was boiling in me, we got a new idea to keep the fire glowing at BBC. We said to ourselves: We are in a war—a war of liberation. 2 Timothy 2:26 says that Satan has taken unbelievers captive to do his will. The goal of missions is to blow the gates off the hell-hole of unbelief, and bring out the prisoners into the light of life (Luke 4:18). Nobody fights a war without tactics and strategies. So what should our strategy be as pastor and wife?

High on our priority list, we concluded, is giving encouragement to the many people at BBC who are being tugged by God into vocational ministry at home and missions abroad. So we came up with the idea of a meeting called Missions at the Manse.

Here’s what it is. Noël and I would like to invite to our home everyone at Bethlehem who is seriously considering frontier or domestic missions as a vocation. (This includes people aiming toward the pastorate, Bible teaching, tent-making ministries, church planting, aviation or technical support, writing, etc.) Our hope is that there would be at least sixty people (spouses are welcome). We will get rid of the chairs and all sit on the floor.

The reason is for Noël and I 1) to find out who you are; 2) to say we are for you and behind you all the way; 3) to feed you; 4) to stir you up with God’s word; 5) to sing and pray with you; 6) to dream with you; and 7) to promise to pray for you by name every day through 1984. Please put this on your calendar and spread the word. It is for old and young, men and women who are committed to the body at Bethlehem. Here’s the summary:

What: Missions at the Manse
Where: The Manse
When: 7:30 pm, Friday, March 9, 1984
Who: Young and old and in-between, men and women considering or committed to vocational (or tent-making) missions or other ministries at home which could support missions.
Why: See seven reasons above.

Hooked by a High Cause,

Pastor John