Jim Elliot
The life and death of Jim Elliot was a testimony of a man committed to the will of God. He sought God's will, pleaded for it, waited for it, and—most importantly—obeyed it.
He martyrdom at age twenty-eight and subsequent books on his life by his former wife, Elisabeth Elliot, have been the catalyst for sending thousands into the mission fields and stoking the fires of a heart for God. He was an intense Christian, bent on pleasing God alone and not man.
"[He makes] His ministers a flame of fire," Elliot wrote while a student at Wheaton College. "Am I ignitable? God deliver me from the dread asbestos of 'other things.' Saturate me with the oil of the Spirit that I may be aflame. But flame is transient, often short-lived. Canst thou bear this my soul—short life? In me there dwells the spirit of the Great Short-Lived, whose zeal for God's house consumed Him."
Elliot was a gifted writer, speaker, and teacher. He had a commanding presence while a student at Wheaton, even starring on the wrestling mat where he became a champion.
Many of his friends were convinced Elliot's spiritual giftedness should be concentrated on building up the church in America. Elliot, however, wanted God's will, not man's. After many protracted and solitary prayer sessions, Elliot sensed God's call to a foreign field, specifically South America. "Why should some hear twice," he said, "when others have not heard [the gospel] once?"
Correspondence with a former missionary to Ecuador and hearing of a tribe—the Aucas—that was never reached with the news of Christ's redemption set his course.
In the winter of 1952, Elliot and a friend who shared his vision set sail on a freighter, the Santa Juana, for the jungles of South America.
Elliot's focus on obedience to God's will led to a disciplined and slightly unorthodox courtship of Betty Howard, whom he met at Wheaton. They longed to be husband and wife, but Elliot would not agree to the marriage yoke until he was certain of God's plan.
Elisabeth and Jim both were called to Ecuador as missionaries. Almost one year after arriving, they were finally engaged. On October 8, 1953, they were married in a civil ceremony in Quito, Ecuador.
After their wedding, Elliot continued his work among the Quichua Indians and formulated plans to reach the Aucas.
In the Autumn of 1955, missionary pilot Nate Saint spotted an Auca village. During the ensuing months, Elliot and several fellow missionaries dropped gifts from a plane, attempting to befriend the hostile tribe.
In January of 1956, Elliot and four companions landed on a beach of the Curaray River in eastern Ecuador. They had several friendly contacts with the fierce tribe that had previously killed several Shell Oil company employees. Two days later, on January 8, 1956, all five men were speared and hacked to death by warriors from the Auca tribe.
Elliot wanted God's will. It ended in his death, but it was a death whose seed still brings forth fruit for the gospel's sake. Elliot said: "Our orders are: the Gospel to every creature."
Many Aucas eventually came to accept Christ as Savior when Elisabeth Elliot bravely returned to share Christ with those who killed her husband. Her books, Shadow of the Almighty and Through Gates of Splendor, speak passionately of the power, majesty, and sovereignty of God while chronicling the life of her husband.
You may or may not be called to the mission field, but each Christian is called to the delightful adventure of knowing and doing the will of God. This is the thrill of the Christian life - to experience God at the center of all you do, think, and say.
The process of seeking God's will for your life is not always easy, but God is willing to reveal His plan to those men and women who desire Him above all else and delight in Him. It means setting aside your agenda and asking God to "will and to work for His good pleasure" (Philippians 2:13).
There is usually a season of sifting, of waiting on God for His timing. The Elliots waited five years before sensing God's time was ripe for a marital union.
Wherever you are, be all there. Live to the hilt every situation you believe to be the will of God. You can live "to the hilt" as you seek and obey the good and acceptable will of God.
Amy Carmichael
Amy Carmichael's life is a model of selfless dedication to God. She lived a life of discipleship and abandonment. She lived for one reason, and that was to make God's love known to those trapped in utter darkness.
Born in northern Ireland in 1867, she was the oldest of seven children. Her father's early death when she was eighteen had a profound effect on her, leading her to think seriously about her future and God's plan for her life.
Years before she became a missionary, God gave her a glimpse of the work she would one day do. His first prompting came on a wintry Sunday morning as the family returned home from church. Amy and her brothers spotted an old woman carrying a huge bundle. She writes that they felt an overwhelming urge to help but also a feeling of embarrassment. "This meant facing all the respectable people who were, like ourselves, on their way home. It was a horrid moment. We were only two boys and a girl, and not at all exalted Christians. We hated doing it. Crimson all over (at least we felt crimson, soul and body of us) we plodded on, a wet wind blows in about us, and blowing, too, the rags of that poor old woman, till she seemed like a bundle of feathers and we unhappily mixed up with them."
As they passed a beautiful Victorian fountain, she heard the words of 1 Corinthians 3:12-14 in her spirit: "Gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble—every man's work shall be made manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be declared by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide."
She turned to see who was there, but there was no one—just the sound of the fountain's water and the laughter of a few passers-by.
Before this time Carmichael admitted to a preoccupation with her social life. However, now it appeared that God was calling her to "settle some things with Him."
In September 1886, when the Carmichael family attended a conference in Keswick, in England's Lake District. It was there that Carmichael felt God's hand on her life. The purpose for the conference was the promotion of holiness or the "higher Christian life."
Carmichael writes: "The hall was full of a sort of gray mist, very dull and chilly. I came to that meeting half hoping, half fearing. Would there be anything for me? . . . The fog in the Hall seemed to soak into me. My soul was in a fog. Then the chairman rose for the last prayer . . . 'O Lord, we know Thou art able to keep us from falling.' Those words found me. It was as if they were alight. And they shone for me."
Amy Carmichael realized nothing could be more important than living her life for Jesus Christ who, with nothing of worldly possessions, had given His very life for her. She knew He was calling her to do the same and give all of herself to Him. This meant she must become "dead to the world and its applause, to all its customs, fashions, and laws."
In 1895, she was commissioned by the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society to go to Dohnavur, India, where she served fifty-six years as God's devoted servant without a furlough. A major part of her work there was devoted to rescuing children who had been dedicated by their families to be temple prostitutes.
Amy Carmichael often recalled the image of the old woman carrying her heavy bundle alone. She realized God had given her a love for those in the world deemed unlovely. The overflow of this love God used to start the Dohnavur Fellowship in India that became a place of safety and refuge for temple children.
More than a thousand children were rescued from neglect and abuse during Amy's lifetime. To them she was known as "Amma," which means mother in the Tamil language. The world often was dangerous and stressful. Yet she never forgot God's promise to "keep them in all things."
"There were days when the sky turned black for me because of what I heard and knew was true . . . Sometimes it was as if I saw the Lord Jesus Christ kneeling alone, as He knelt long ago under the olive trees . . . And the only thing that one who cared could do, was to go softly and kneel down beside Him, so that He would not be alone in His sorrow over the little children."
She was a prolific writer with thirty-five books published to her credit. Even as a young girl, Carmichael had showed talent as a writer. However, after a tragic accident in 1931, much of her time was spent in confinement in the Dohnavur Fellowship's compound.
Obedience, total commitment, and selflessness were the marks of Amy Carmichael's life. In a world where the thought of living one's life for Jesus Christ above all else is rapidly fading, she remains a bright and ever burning example of one whose sole existence was devoted to her beloved Lord and Savior.
God may or may not take you, as He did Amy Carmichael, to some far away land. However, He does have a plan for your life—to use you as His light of eternal hope and forgiveness to others. Ask Him to make His will perfectly clear. The rewards of God are not based on human achievements or financial success. They are given, instead, to those who "settle some things with Him" and commit themselves to Christ through a life of obedience and selfless devotion.
Karen Watson
Karen Watson, a missionary, wrote the following :-
"When God calls there are no regrets. I tried to share my heart with you as much as possible, my heart for the nations. I wasn't called to a place; I was called to Him. To obey was my objective, to suffer was expected, His glory my reward, His glory my reward . .
The missionary heart :
Cares more than some think is wise
Risks more that some think is safe
Dreams more than some think is practical
Expects more than some think is possible
I was called not to comfort or to success but to obedience. . . .
There is no joy outside of knowing Jesus and serving Him"
Karen was a Southern Baptist missionary to Iraq and was killed by
unknown assailants March 15, 2004.
God is glorified precisely when we are satisfied in him
when we delight in his presence,
when we like to be around him,
when we treasure his fellowship.
This is an utterly life-changing discovery.
It frees us to pursue our joy in God
and God to pursue his glory in us.
Because they are not two different pursuits.
God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.
[Let the Nations Be Glad]
"Go", my friend....
We want the sadness of our absence healed,
but workers in the world are few,
and each the Master of the harvest may beseech
to go again into the mission field.
If this is what the Spirit has revealed,
that He wants you again to preach and teach
and reach lost peoples whom He wants to reach,
despite the sadness that our friendship has yielded.
If God has opened up a different door
that leads into another place than here,
then go into that nation, to that shore,
to preach the Gospel everyone must hear.
The time we cannot have,
God will restore eternally,
and wipe away each tear.
what's next?
as the missions class come to an end in 3 weeks' time, i am still seeking for the answers to questions inside me. the same questions that surface everytime i drive home after attending a lesson.
where do i go from here? what should i do next?
one area of my life is yet resolved - my personal life. i have become a single parent and i have one person to care for, at least for the next 8 years or so. how can i commit myself to missions at this moment?
mind boggling.
there are several solutions that i can think of
1. shelf the idea for a few more years
2. go ahead (but what happens to my family?)
3. while waiting to fully make a commitment, get involved in some peripheral missions tasks together with my family
hmm....
impassioned pilgrims,
walking hand in hand
along the way to whom their lives are bound,
shall reach a stretch of consecrated ground
which,
bordered narrowly with sinking sand,
they know they cannot travel hand in hand.
yet
to this narrow pathway are they bound.
