RICHMOND, Va. (BP)–Lost souls are searching desperately for meaning and purpose in life — and though reaching out to them is exhausting, being part of God’s mission in the world is worth it, Beth Moore told employees of the International Mission Board Oct. 23.
Moore, a noted speaker and Bible study author, told the mission workers they are pouring out their lives for the most important cause in the world.
“I cannot think of anybody doing anything on the face of this earth … that matters more than what you pour your lifeblood into,” she said. “We may be tired at times. It almost seems unbearable, but we have what the world is looking for.
“They feel purposeless. They don’t have anything that would be worth dying for — and therefore worth living for,” she said. “That we would pour our lives out for somebody else to know Him and to love Him, that is everything.
‘IN THE THICK OF IT’
“I would rather be right here in the heat of battle and live the great adventure than be out there in the safety zone of mediocrity,” she said. “I want to be in the thick of it.”
A member of First Baptist Church in Houston, Texas, and founder of Living Proof Ministries, Moore’s personal mission includes ministering to missionary women overseas and challenging young people to give their lives to reach a lost world.
And when Southern Baptist missionary work is at a critical point — with more qualified missionary candidates than funds available to send them — Moore said God had given her a special word to share with IMB staff members.
“It’s going better than you think. It’s going well. The Spirit is doing what He came to do,” she said. “And praise God that all our problems, all our shortcomings, all our lack of resources are not holding Him up. He just wants us to have the joy of being in on it.”
‘PRACTICE BIBLICAL FAITH’
She challenged the mission workers — and all Southern Baptists — to take hold of biblical faith.
“Missionaries practice more faith [than most evangelicals] because they have to,” she said. “They don’t get to think the safest thoughts because they can’t afford to. They are desperate for God to work.”
Evangelicals in the United States, however, have allowed others to keep them from practicing biblical faith, Moore said.
“As evangelicals, we are in a crisis of unbelief. We need a revival of biblical faith,” she said. “We’ve got to be people of God’s Word. Believe what He says. Stop arguing [about] things of faith and just believe.”
And that, Moore said, sometimes means believing God for what seems impossible — like a 33 percent increase in this year’s Lottie Moon Christmas Offering so the board can send all the missionaries God is calling out.
‘CAUGHT IN THE ACT’
When Scripture says “everything is possible for him who believes,” it uses a verb tense meaning “caught in the present act of believing God,” Moore noted. “You’ve got an unreasonable goal for the offering this Christmas, but we believe Him for the unreasonable.”
God has given each believer a race to run, and the question is whether each one keeps running until it is finished, Moore said.
She recalled a story in the Houston Chronicle about a 101-year-old woman who died when she fell off her horse.
“If I live until 101, I want to die falling off the horse I’ve been riding,” Moore said. “I want to run the race out. There is no quitting. There is no retiring. Let’s do this thing to the death.”
‘PLEDGE OF FAITH’
When the devil tries to discourage Christians off the path of faith, they must be people of God’s Word who believe what He says and practice it, Moore declared.
Toward that end, she encouraged the mission workers to recite a “pledge of faith” she uses daily, counting each point off on the fingers of her right hand:
“God is who He says He is. God can do what He says He can do. I am who God says I am. I can do all things through Christ. God’s Word is alive and active in me.”
“I want to go out believing God,” she said. “At any point in my life, caught in the act of believing Him.”
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(BP) photo posted in the BP Photo Library at http://www.bpnews.net. Photo title:
WORTH IT.
Audio excerpts from Beth Moore’s message to IMB staffers:
— ‘Just an overgrown GA’:
Low-speed connection
http://rodan.implex.net/alliedvaughn/IMB/bethmoore/GA_low.wma
High-speed connection
http://rodan.implex.net/alliedvaughn/IMB/bethmoore/GA_high.wma
— ‘It is worth it all’:
Low-speed connection
http://rodan.implex.net/alliedvaughn/IMB/bethmoore/poured_out_low.wma
High-speed connection
http://rodan.implex.net/alliedvaughn/IMB/bethmoore/poured_out_high.wma
— ‘We have a decision to make’:
Low-speed connection
http://rodan.implex.net/alliedvaughn/IMB/bethmoore/ime_low.wma
High-speed connection
http://rodan.implex.net/alliedvaughn/IMB/bethmoore/ime_high.wma
For Beth Moore’s Living Proof Ministries, go to www.lproof.org.
