Commissioned by Grace: You have purpose

Seven billion people spread across seven continents. Sure, it’s a small world – but almost 60 million square miles of land is still plenty to get lost in. And a population of billions that’s still rising? That’s easy to get lost in, too. Check the statistics: every single second, four babies are birthed into this world. Every half second, a fellow human being dies. The numbers are easy to understand; it’s when I try to imagine the reality behind the numbers that my mind begins to spin. I look around at the world and feel very, very small.

I am just one girl in the middle of an ocean of humanity. I’m just one face, one voice, lost in the blur. It’s easy to feel dwarfed by the immensity of the universe, to feel like I’m drifting, meaningless and insignificant.
Take God out of the picture, and it’s true. If there is no God, then I’m essentially a mistake, straying my way through a nightmare world of coincidences. My only purpose is to try to be happy and then to die. The first is impossible, the second is inevitable, and all of it means nothing in the end.
But the reality is so different. I may be weak, but I am not worthless. It means something that I am alive. That’s because I’ve been been given a work to do here – a mission. Impossible for man. Possible in God.

I am commissioned by grace.
Commissioned to help spread the fame of God to every corner of the world. Commissioned to love the unlovely, to defend truth to the last, and to warn stubborn wanderers. Each child of God is part of a great and beautiful operation to preach the gospel, a project that stretches through history and across continents.
Only grace could choose a person like me for this job. I am flawed, finite, and often afraid. But I’ve been set apart for this, along with men and women from past and present, from every portion of the world. It’s not me fighting – it’s us, and we’ve been formed into the most powerful and the most unlikely army history has ever seen. We aren’t perfect, but we’re redeemed. We aren’t strong, but we’re empowered. Some of us have so little in common, but what we do have in common is enough. Yes, we look different, speak different languages, and come from different cultures. But our aim is unified, and our God is the same.
If you’re familiar with the Lord of the Rings, you’ll remember the symbolism in the formation of the Fellowship. There is a wizard, a dwarf, two men, an elf, and four hobbits. These groups didn’t typically get along, yet they undertook the most urgent of journeys, the most epic of adventures, side by side. They stuck by each other, put aside their differences, and sacrificed for each other to the last. All because of a common cause that held them together. Some of the members of the fellowship were wise and capable, some only naive, but they all had their unique strengths that proved to be crucial in the end. This is the kind of commission that we have been given: a commission that brings people together from the farthest reaches of the globe and unifies their hearts and purposes when nothing else could.
There’s another similarity between Tolkien’s epic and the very real task that we have been given. Both of them are of the highest stakes and the greatest importance. How can I feel aimless when I have been given a part such a great endeavor? Ours is the highest of all callings; we are the hands and feet and mouth of Christ as He draws sinners to Himself, speaking truths of eternity to dying sinners. This is a task more immense, difficult and exhilarating than anything in legend or human history. It is not a game – it’s a matter of human souls.
Seven billion people, seven continents. Every second that passes, four babies are born. Every half second, a death occurs. This is a world full of precious lives that need to be reached for Christ, and we have been commissioned to do just that. God’s love compels us and gives us purpose. We are a people on a mission. A mission destined for victory.

What are we waiting for?