Every Day Missionaries
Ever wished you could be a missionary but never felt like you had the opportunity? Opportunities are everywhere! Just ask Jesus. He has a place for everyone to do missionary work. He uses everyday people like you and me in everyday life.
GoodSalt.com-rhpas1141
A few years ago, one morning I was checking in on an elderly, physically handi-capped man who is housebound. As always we had prayer before I left. In his prayer the man asked for God to lead us to people who we could share our faith with that day. I mused to myself, why did he say “we’? I’m the only one of us who will have an opportunity to meet people today. He will be bound to his chair at home all day. He won’t be meeting anyone.
Later that evening, after my last Bible study, I checked my voice mail messages, and there was a message from my elderly friend whom I had visited that morning. I called him back and he told me some exciting news. He told me that the cable repairman had come by to fix the TV and saw some Sabbath tracts on the end table by the door. He picked them up and told my friend that He was searching for a church. My friend invited him to church and gave him an enrollment card for Bible studies!
It wasn’t till after I hung up the phone (If you can even hang up a cell phone!) that I remembered what my friend prayed that morning. I thought it was a futile prayer, given my friend’s condition, but God answered His prayer! Even though my friend could not get out of his chair in his home, God sent someone for him to minister to.
I have learned to never underestimate the opportunities God can provide for all of us to be missionaries.
After serving as a full time Bible Worker for 11 years at one church, I have recently become a part time Bible Worker for the Plant City Florida Seventh-day Adventist Church. It is only part time so I have picked up another job working part time, two days a week in a sandwich shop at an Adventist Hospital. Last Monday the full-time sandwich shop worker was on vacation so I had to fill in for her. Sure I would rather have been doing my Bible Worker job that day, but I prayed and decided to make the best of it.
A lady came in and ordered a breakfast sandwich and sat down to eat. While I continued waiting on customers I noticed her watching me. After the line went away, she came up to me and asked, “Why are you so happy and cheerful? You are beaming.” I told her I am just a happy person. She looked at me like she expected more, so I said a little prayer, not wanting to sound preachy, and told her my relationship with Jesus makes me very happy. Her eyes lit up. “That’s what I thought!” She exclaimed. She said that she used to be very happy walking with Jesus, but after a while, Satan started attacking her more the closer she got to God, and it discouraged her away from God. I told her that if her relationship with God was making Satan upset that was a good thing and she should not relent. God was blessing her and it was making Satan mad. She told me she lives in Chicago and was here to help a friend having surgery. Since she was out of town I followed up by giving her the address to my In Light of the Cross Website and told her there were some articles and studies that may encourage her. I then went to wait on another customer.
After waiting on the customer I returned to the lady’s table and found she was already reading one of the studies on her phone. Then something interesting happened. Around 10:30 every morning that I work, the hospital cafeteria sends someone to cover for me so I can take a short break. Well, it was only 9:30 when someone happened to come to give me a break. This freed me up to talk more with the lady without being interrupted by customers. I shared with her how Jesus tells the church of Philadelphia that He opens a door that no one can shut, but yet He tells the church of Laodicea that He knocks at their heart’s door. Heaven’s doors are always open. Its only our doors that close. I invited her to ask Jesus in her heart again. We prayed together right there in the sandwich shop. When we finished praying I still had some time left on my break, but I quickly and politely excused myself so I could go get some supplies from the store room. By quickly disappearing after our prayer, it left our prayer and her decision resonating in her mind instead of some idle chit chat killing time.
On my way to the store room I realized that filling in at my temporal job that day did not prevent me from also doing my job as a Bible Worker missionary. Just like being bound to a chair in his house did not keep my elderly friend from being a missionary.
(47)