|
Book Notes by |
|
|
|
CatThro
05-11-175 THROUGH GOD’S EYES A Bible Study of God’s Motivations for Missions Patrick O. Cate |
|
Dr.
Pat Cate is the President of Christar, www.christar.org,
(formerly International Missions, Inc.) a mission sending organization that
plants churches among the least reached of the world. This Bible study is designed to “help the
next generation catch a glimpse of God’s passion for all peoples and to
better help them understand God’s direction for their lives.” It
is a major in-depth study for the serious inquirer about missions. This would be a good study prior to
embarking on a mission trip. It can
be used in a small group or on your own.
Because of the postmodern bent of the younger generation, some may
want to begin with chapter 9, “What About Those Who are Not Reached with the
Gospel?” A
number of maps and charts show where the needs are the greatest. Each chapter concludes with reflection
questions. There are several pages of
biographical sketches and an excellent annotated bibliography at the end. The
study begins with chapters on the Old Testament (He draws principles from the
call of Moses, Joshua, and Isaiah.), Christ’s perspective, and the early
Church. It then goes into a number of
specific theological issues (The Second Coming, The Gospel) and practical
issues (Who Must be Reached, What is Required, etc.). God
has a passion for this world. He
gives us a variety of motivations for missions in Scripture. Through this Bible study you may gain a
better sense of His direction for your own life. (ix) “Missions
begins with God Himself. God has a
passion that He be glorified and honored by all people groups on earth. But Satan and his forces have stolen some
of the glory which belongs to God alone.
God wants to restore His creation to His original purposes.” (1) “A
dictionary may use ‘radiant splendor’ as a definition of glory. The root meaning comes from ‘weight’ or
the weight of importance. It clearly
includes ‘reputation.’ Part of
glorifying God is to lift up His reputation.” (4) “God
is a God of missions. He wills
missions. He commands missions. He demands missions. He made missions possible through His
Son. He made missions actual in
sending the Holy Spirit. Biblical
Christianity and missions are organically interrelated.” (7, quoting George
W. Peters, A Biblical Theology of Missions, p. 346) “Missions
did not begin after the resurrection through the Great Commission.” “The Great Commission began in the heart
of God in eternity past.” (11, 12) On
page 30, Cate lists 25 categories of people groups and asks which ones Christ
wants us to reach “exclusively or primarily.” They range from one’s home country to secure nations to kind,
nice peoples. Then he asks which ones
the church has excelled in reaching.
The obvious point is that we have done pretty well with the easy ones
and he presses us to consider going as a missionary to the difficult ones. “When
Christ said to go to all people groups and make disciples of all peoples,
were there still major needs and problems at the home base in Jerusalem?”
(31) “The
early church, recorded in Acts and the Epistles, is saturated with motivation
and life style examples of missions.” (37) “The
second coming of Christ is one of the strongest motivations for sharing the
good news.” (45) “The
world to come at the end of history will be a world without the national
barriers that divide people today, a glorious and rich mosaic of peoples,
languages, and cultures around the Lamb of God. Missionary internationalization is a clear step in that
direction.” (47, quoting Samuel Escobar) “Matthew
5:15 tells us clearly that we must demonstrate some of the love of God or our
word will lose power. Evangelism
cannot be separated from the need to demonstrate God’s glory. Christ clearly merged the two. But the good can become the enemy of the
best if it squeezes out our motivation, resources, time and energy. We do not have the energy, finances, time,
creativity and resources to do every good thing. If we do things in the order of their importance, we can avoid
ending up accomplishing just good things at the expense of the best.” (51) “If
the church waited until all in Jerusalem were saved and all its social
problems were solved before it moved out with the gospel, the church would
still exist only in Jerusalem.” (59) About
80% of Christian workers minister to the 7.6% of the world population who
speak English. Yet many people groups
and areas have no workers.” (60) “The
least-reached are people who do not have access to a church where the gospel
is preached in their own language and culture.” (60) “To
know the will of God we need an open Bible and n open map.” (60, attributed
to William Carey) “More
than 95% of the graduates of most U.S. and Canadian colleges and seminaries
minister to the 5% of the world who live in the U.S. and Canada.” (61) What
about those who are not reached with the Gospel? “If we believe in heaven because the Bible and Christ taught
it, then we have to accept the existence of hell for the same reason.” (73) The
politically-correct value of “tolerance” in the West teaches us to be
tolerant even of evil, sin and things repulsive to God. (79) What
is absolutely required to bring the Gospel to all of the world? (chap.
10) The
sine qua non include prayer, mobilizing new missionaries, and giving and
receiving. (85-89) “The history of missions is the history of
answered prayer. ... It is the key to
the whole mission problem. All human
means are secondary.” (86, attributed to Samuel Zwemer) Chap
12. Yes, But... Issues and struggles which can side track
us from missions. Chap
13. Here Am I. What part should I play? “A
driving purpose of all of the Word of God is that He be glorified by all
peoples.” (115) “Every
man gives his life for what he believes: every woman gives her life for what
she believes. Sometimes people
believe in little or nothing. One
life is all we have, and we live it, and thus it’s gone.” “What specifically do you want to try to
become and to get done?” (118) “One
hundred years after you die, what difference do you hope your life will have
made?” (119) “Three
things are eternal: God, the Word of God, and the souls of men.” (119) “What
primary values and passions for your life do you believe God wants you to
have?” (120) “It
is to be kept in mind that the ‘generations of men do not wait for the
convenience of the church in respect to their evangelization.’ Men are born and die whether or not
Christians are ready to give them the gospel. And hence, if the church of any generation does not evangelize
the heathen of that generation, those heathen will never be evangelized at
all.” (120, quoting J. Oswald Sanders) “The
one aim of us all in doing our particular job for the Lord must be the
evangelization of the whole world.” (121, attributed to G. Allen Fleece) Good
wrap up questions on p. 145 ff. *
* * * * |
|
