I assume you are like me. I know (in my head) that my joy enlarges with significant engagement in world missions. But I drift away from this engagement and this joy. It takes a biography or a message or a video or an article or a conference to wake me up to the drift.

One of the reasons the universe is as large as it is, is not that humans need that much room, but that God wants a suitable demonstration of his majesty. Accordingly he gave humans hearts and minds with huge capacities of vision and amazement.

One of the terrible effects of the Fall is that our souls have shrunk. We are content with very small vision. And our ability to be amazed is often exhausted by artificial worlds in movies. This is tragic.

The real world is a stunning place. World population is an astounding size. Complexities of languages and cultures are mind-boggling. The universality of sin is manifest and terrible. The misery of suffering is appalling. The prospect of eternal suffering is the most sobering truth in the world. The coming of Jesus to save repentant people from every culture is the greatest news in the world. The hope of the end of sin the arrival of a new world of righteousness and joy in the presence of God is worth everything. And God’s granting us to be essential in this global redemption is astounding.

These are the greatest realities we were made to live for and think about and pray over and dream toward and throw ourselves into.

And my point here is that God has made our hearts capable of great joy in these things. Joy that can be had no other way. Not all are to be missionaries. But all are to tap into the joy of this great global cause of Christ.