August | 2012 | seasoned with salt

Statistically, the church planters in Portland know it looks like God’s not there. While the city has as many old church buildings as a small town on the East Coast, many of them are empty. Or house movie theaters. Or restaurants.It is one of the least-churched cities in the country, and in my experience, a hostile place for a Christian.

As we drove out to visit a church near Multnomah Bible College last weekend, it sure looked like we were the only ones going to church.

But we know He’s there:

He revealed Himself when we were welcomed so enthusiastically at Wood Village Baptist Church.
He is at work in the life of my friend studying counseling at Multnomah who desires to allow God to use her circumstances to help others
His love is on display, especially for the loveless in Portland, through an amazing organization called Cupcake Girls, which I learned about from my former college roommate and our newest partner, Amy.
Speaking of Amy (and her boyfriend), His grace is sufficient for the wounded but surrendered souls in Portland, and I am humbled by their story.
He gives courage to my friends who are speaking out about abuse in Portland.
He is the Great Provider to some of the most amazing and talented teachers of my generation, who have been unable to find permanent positions (pray for Oregon’s education system!)
Finally, He blessed Portland with wonderful, generous and fun friends who should have stayed in Washington when they had their chance (just kidding, guys!), and we wish we could spend more time doing life with them.

God blessed us greatly by reminding us how He is working in the lives of our friends, by allowing us to speak into their lives and challenge them to engage in His work in Spain, and by showing us how He works in places the world calls hard to reach.

Rejection is a part of our lives these days. An inevitable fact of prefield. Truly, it is also an inevitable part of working on the mission field and being obedient to the Great Commission in general.

As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
(1 Peter 2:4-5 ESV)

This verse follows one I think of often for our ministry in Spain. It is our desire to see Spaniards taste the goodness of the Lord and His word. But the next part, quoted above, applies more to our life right now. God always uses rejection to make us more like Him. Persecution is endurable because we are chosen and precious in His sight and He endured it so that we might be acceptable to Him. Rejection on prefield (which I know is not real persecution) also makes us more like Him. We learn patience, how to wait on the Lord, how to trust in His timing, or to humble ourselves before Him when we have needs that only He can meet, and endurance for the long haul. All characteristics of Jesus, all doubly needed on the mission field compared to prefield.

But we are “being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy preisthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”

I think what Peter refers to here is much bigger than good deeds on the mission field.

Before Jesus came along, God had strict rules regarding His spiritual house, the tabernacle. Once, someone unauthorized by God to touch the tabernacle died because he tried to stop it from toppling over (see 2 Samuel 6). Following through on a consequence He warned about in Numbers 4:15, God also used the incident to remind King David of the importance of worshiping on God’s terms – bringing an acceptable sacrifice, acting like the chosen and precious treasure God called them.

I see in this passage that because of Jesus, I am not rejected. I am a living stone, a chosen and precious gem to God. Because of Jesus, when I come to God, I am acceptable; I am accepted.

The old way was to worship according to God’s revealed instruction. Under the New Covenant, we worship according to our faith in God’s revealed Son because of His death and resurrection.

Photo source: Creative Commons