The End?
“Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.” (2 Tim 4:2). There is the command. So we go: at home and abroad. We go quietly, with a word spoken in due season to the tired. We go with the timeless trumpet, “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” The fresh young face goes with the energy of youth, the seasoned veteran with the wisdom of experience. We go alone, in pairs or groups. We meet others along the way; some stay for a moment, some for a while. Their memories remain with us when they leave, and we are not the same.
Preaching is not easy. Bro. John Carter wrote:
“The conditions in the world‐apathy, pleasure seeking, etc. ‐ may make the task of those who bear the message, whether at a door or on a platform, not an easy one. But whether people hear or forbear, to us who have heard is the injunction given‐Let him that heareth say, Come. It is in the context of the prophecy of the last days’ perilous times that the command is found: Preach the Word.” Preach the word: pg. iii
Words fail me to express what a blessing it has been to spend the last nine months or so in South America. I have traveled to the ‘middle of the world’ in Quito, Ecuador. I have visited the ‘southernmost city of the world’ in Ushuaia, Argentina. I have seen the technology of Chile, the labour of Bolivia, the beaches of Brazil and have tasted the amazing seafood of Peru. More important still, I have seen your brethren. I can’t count the number of times that I have laughed…and cried. And now, the time has come to leave. In every place I’ve passed, the brethren plead, “Please. Please tell them to send someone to help us. Can you stay longer? There is much work to be done.” This is very true.
The lack of laborers is not only an issue of today. Two thousand years ago the Lord Jesus Christ commanded his disciples to ask that Lord of the harvest send laborers, because there was more work than workers.
It is easy and natural to make excuses: Didn’t even Moses ask the Lord five times, directly or indirectly, to not send him? Yet God was with him, and did not leave him in the forty years during which he traveled.
As we go about our comfortable lives and the business of the day, it is easy to forget about those labourers at home and abroad. How can I help them? How can I join them? Will I truly be a light in the world, shining forth the word of life? As I leave South America, these are the questions I take with me. They are the questions I ask you. The answers are intensely personal, but the response has the ability to touch many.
Would you like to help with the vital work in the Americas? Visit CBMA.net to find out more.
Written by Sis. Colleen Uiga