This is a journal entry for my Composition and Rhetoric class. The prompt is "What I'm learning," and it can be either based on classroom experiences or personal wanderings of the mind. I will probably post all of my entries over the next few months. You will know them by their label Journal #__.
Journal #1
I have heard a lot about
worldview lately. Over the summer, I read the book Freshman 15 by Travis
Agnew. By clearly and thoroughly explaining what a worldview truly is, Agnew
challenges Christians to truly live out what they say they believe by viewing
the world through a biblical perspective. Viewing the world as God does will
lead to changes in our lives, Agnew explains, and those changes are a step
towards becoming the people God would have us to be. For me, the challenge to
become more grounded in a Christian worldview was exactly the push I needed at
this time in my life. As I am preparing to answer God’s call to the mission
field, I must first strive to see people, situations, or ideas as God does, or I
will utterly waste the educational opportunity that God has provided me.
Intellectual growth is great. As a missionary, it will be helpful to understand
complex theological concepts. Being able to linguistically analyze a language
will be useful, and I may even find myself in a situation where an
understanding of chemistry could allow me to avoid great harm. If I do not view
the lost with the love of God, though, it will all be in vain. Christians are,
as our name implies, followers of Christ, seeking to point everyone in our
paths to salvation through Jesus Christ. How can I do that if I do not see them
as God does? It can’t be done. Thus, to think, feel, and act like Christ is to be
primary goal of my time here at North Greenville University, and I have been
learning that sometimes that means changing my initial perspectives about
certain situations.
Take,
for example, the news about Iran I recently heard. Apparently, they had an
“earthquake” (or perhaps a failed nuclear test) in a remote region of the nation.
Immediately, I humanly associated Iranians with the human rights atrocities
that I so often hear of. I thought of the impending nuclear crisis that seems to
be looming on the horizon, and I thought of the extreme hatred and persecution
of Christian men, women, and children that I have read about in recent days. It
was hard to feel sympathy at that moment. However, God has a habit of piercing
the callous of my soul right when I think I can’t be moved, and from that wound
poured the warm compassion of the Holy Spirit. God is a gracious God, always
changing His children and revealing the true way of the cross. I glanced over
the pictures, and my heart broke for those grieving, devastated, and misled
people. I saw the photos of the lifeless loved. I saw the man hold his child
for the last time. I saw the woman screaming at the heavens, devastated at the
loss of a precious person in her life. I saw the brutal, sickening effects of a
fallen world, and I hated it. The villagers were not who I hated. I hated the
forces of darkness that were holding them captive, and I longed for them to be
set free. Jesus overcame the forces of evil, and He conquered sin and death.
Seeing those people lost and without hope, I pleaded with God to use me-to use
all of His children- to reach the world with the good news of Jesus Christ.
That natural disaster reminded me that the sin of the world, the sin of
Christians, and my own personal sin has devastating consequences, consequences
that I sometimes forget. Sin can only be beaten by God. Suddenly, I had an even
deeper desire for God to give me more a compassionate heart, and to see the
lost not as people I have to reach but as people that I want to reach. Jesus
isn’t just for the lost that do not hate or the lost that do not harm. Jesus is
for all the lost. He saved me, He saved every Christian, and He will save
whoever has faith in Him. Praise God that Jesus saves!
No comments:
Post a Comment