The Sovereign God Does Involve You

The sovereignty of God is often misunderstood. Many are not involved in the Great Commission because they believe that if God wants to save the whole world He can do it without their help.

William Carey, the Father of Modern Missions, met with such response when, in a meeting of pastors in 1787, he raised the question of whether all Christians should spread the Gospel throughout the world.

An elderly pastor told him off, saying,"Young man, sit down; when God pleases to convert the heathen, He will do it without your aid and mine."

Many do not realise that the dominion of this world is given to Man. God, of course, can operate without us but since He has assigned this "first heaven" to us, He must involve us.

Even God could not save us by remaining as "God" in heaven. He had to become a Man to die on the cross for our sins. The wages of sin is death and only a righteous man can pay that price.

Man lost it and so Man must gain it back.

Today, the victory over the evil one has been won at the Calvary and we are now the occupying force.

We have to spread the Good News that the victory has been won and our people have no need to live under the slavery of the enemy.


We have to do the task of evangelism and not God..


Albert Kang

10 Ways to Determine God's Calling in Your Life

By John Piper

God's calling to missions is not authoritative the way the Scriptures are. Your calling is never beyond question. You can't claim it to others the way you quote Scripture to them.

Nevertheless our calling can be profoundly and durably sure in our own heart. It is the work of God to bring our heart to a point of conviction that, all things considered-including Scripture-this path is the path of obedience. The conviction is not infallible. But when it is of God, it brings peace.

How does God waken such a calling? I will suggest ten means that he uses. Only one of these is infallible-the Bible. All the others are relative. They are not absolutely decisive in your leading. They are important. But any of them can be overridden by the others. Various combinations of these are the fuel God uses to drive the engine of his calling in your life.

1. Above all, know your Bible and saturate your mind with it.

The Bible shapes our minds for mission durability (Psalm 1:1-3), and makes us burn for Christ (Luke 24:32).

2. Know your gifts and know yourself.

Every Christian has gifts (1 Peter 4:10-11). Knowing them shapes your convictions about your calling. And knowing yourself (as Paul exemplifies in Romans 7:15-24) deepens your sense of fitness for various ministries. (Keep in mind that this can be overridden by other facts!)

3. Ponder the need of the world.

The Christian heart of love is drawn by perceived needs, whether near or far. Therefore God uses what we know to awaken the measure of our desire that pushes us over the edge of commitment (Matthew 9:36-38).

4. Read missionary biography and missionary frontline stories.

Clearly the Bible treats heroes of the faith as divinely appointed inspirations for the awakening of vision and ministry (Hebrews 13:7). "Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us" (Hebrews 12:1).

5. Inquire of your soul, "Where are you burdened for others?"

God sends and seeks the burden for lost people. Jesus carried such a burden: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem! . . . How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings" (Luke 13:33-34). This burden was essential to his calling. What is your burden?

6. Know your circumstances.

Parents, health, houses, lands, children, age, etc. All of them matter in our calling, but none of them is decisive. They can all be overridden. "Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life" (Mark 10:29-30).

7. Pray for God to throw you where you can be best used for his glory.

I say "throw" because in Matthew 9:38 that is the literal meaning: "Pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to throw out laborers into his harvest." The point is pray! Ask God to use you to the fullest for his glory. "If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him" (James 1:5).

8. Do not neglect passionate, Christ-exalting, corporate worship.

The most important missionary calling that ever happened took place in corporate worship: "While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, 'Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them'" (Acts 13:2).

9. Listen humbly to the spiritual people in your life.

They not only confirm your gifts. They are the instruments of God to awaken in you possibilities and joys of missionary service that you never dreamed (2 Timothy 1:5-7).

10. Cultivate absolute surrender of all you are and have to Christ.

This is the person that God leads to the greatest fruitfulness of life. Woe to the person who tries to be a half-Christian and never says from the heart: "I renounce everything for you, Lord Jesus. I am willing to go anywhere and do anything at any cost, if you will go with me be my everlasting joy."

This is why Jesus said, "If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. . . . Therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26-27, 33).

John Piper has been the Pastor for Preaching at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota, since 1980. He has authored numerous best-selling books, including The Passion of Jesus Christ, Don't Waste Your Life and Desiring God. You will find 25 years of online sermons, articles, and other God-centered resources from the ministry of John Piper at www.desiringGod.org. He also has a daily radio program, called "Desiring God," which can be accessed online at www.desiringGod.org/radio.

History Lesson From Kerteh

Talking to Bro Leong (center) with my father-in-law, Bro Ong

Talking to Brother Leong, a 75-year-old brother from Kerteh, was quite enlightening. His father had come from China to Kerteh before the Japanese invasion in 1941. As Kerteh is situated in North East of Peninsula Malaysia, it was among the first places to be occupied by the Japanese. According to the elderly brother, he and his family fled to the jungle. His father was on the black list of the Japanese as some people had pointed him out to be the sympathizer of the Communist fighters. .The Japanese had suffered quite a few casualties from the Communist resistance fighters and they were not too happy with Communist sympathizers.To be captured meant death.

Brother Leong said that day after day, the Japanese took helpless victims to be shot in very remote areas. One of them was the grandmother of Brother Kui Jee, one of the elders of the Church in Kerteh. When the Japanese fired their machine guns, the grandmother put her hand to her eyes and was shot only in the arm. The blood that covered her arm and face saved her life. She remained very still until the murdering team of Japanese executioners departed. She then got up and made her way to her village. Along the way, she was met by some villagers who helped her. She did survive her injury.

After the war, Brother Leong had to collect coconut husks to be burned as fuels. One day, he wandered deeper into the jungle and met with a gruesome sight. There were skulls and human bones every where. He had stumbled upon an execution site.It was recorded that more than 100,000 civilians were killed in all of Malaya during the war.

Another exciting episode of Brother Leong's life was during the Malayan Emergency. From 1948, the Communists of Malaya were waging a guerrilla warfare against the British rulers of Malaya. Many of these Communists were Chinese even though there were some Indians and Malays in their midst. At that time, Brother Leong was still a boy and he actually witnessed an execution conducted by the Communists. Apparently, in his area, there were two police detectives who were bullies. According to Brother Leong, these were the bad people. They made the lives of the people there very miserable.

The Communists captured these two 'bad' people and tied them up. One of the captured detectives was a Chinese while the other was a Malay. The villagers were invited to pass judgment on these police officers. When asked whether they should die, everybody just raised their hands and voice in agreement of the harsh sentence. Immediately, after that, the two condemned men were dragged to a open space and shot.

Throughout the emergency period which lasted up to 1960, Brother Leong and his family were not interned in any 'New Village". Millions of Chinese who lived near the forests were deported and interned in guarded camps known as "New Villages". This move by the British authority was very effective because it dried up the food supplies to the Communist fighters in the deep jungles. To prevent raw rice from being smuggled out of these camps, the British instituted communal kitchens in all these 'New Villagers. No villager was allowed to cook his or her own rice, Everybody had to receive their cooked rice rations from the communal kitchens. That new move literally helped win the war because the Communists in the jungle were being starved to death.

Bro Leong healed

Brother Leong had complained about his legs. They were weak and he had to hobble slowly with a bow-legged gait.On the Friday's night of 13th August 2010, he was divinely healed of his leg condition.During our healing evangelistic meeting, he was touched not only spiritually but physically. As a couple of brothers from the church laid their hands on him and commanded his legs to be healed, the miracle happened. The next thing was amazing. The elderly brother began to jump - that was something that he could not do before. Wow, what a wonderful God that we have. He touched this elderly brother and many others on that night. Praise the Lord.