St Barnabas Church Website

A wise lady once said someone who reads the bible and doesn’t follow it is like a person who looks in the mirror and can’t see their reflection. You may follow in the way of youth ministry, community ministry or even be a missionary. As long as you do something, I am being careful with my words here as I have had no discerning call to be a missionary. So why am I going you might think, this was answered while I was away at missionary orientation up in Hamilton last month.

One missionary who had spent years out in the field said they also had no calling from God, they just read the bible and followed. Why do I need a booming voice and crashing thunder when I already have the bible, all I need to do is follow. This following has led me to go on a short term mission trip with Worldwide Evangelisation for Christ or WEC as it is known.

This Friday I am heading off to South Africa for 8 weeks to a WEC centre about a hour out, on the east side of Johannesburg in a place called Brakpan. It is a gold and uranium mining town with about 350,000 inhabitants. It is a very flat place and according to Wikipedia, the name Brakpan comes from a small pan on a farm which was filled with very brackish or salty water and was probably referred to as the "Brakpan" and it was near this pan that the first settlement started.

I will join a team already there who are helping out the local community by setting up or helping with gardening, bakery, crèche and many more projects already under way. I will probably spend the first week taking everything in before helping out where needed. This trip will give me a better idea if mission work is for me, test the water so to speak. This is the idea behind WEC sending people on short term mission or ‘WEC treks’ as they call it. Even if I find out mission work is not for me, the experience will surely open my eyes and change my perspective on life.

I realise I will need to rely on God a lot on this mission trip and beyond and I hope that he will guide me at this crossroads I am facing at the moment. I pray that He will be with me as I throw myself in the deep end Boys Brigade has been doing this to me long before I realised it was a blessing wrapped in a challenge not a curse.

I ask that you pray for me over this time, for courage as I take the 14 hour flight over, which is a lot of time to think. Also that I do not go into my shell while I am there, instead be open to new opportunities, experiences and seize the God given moments. I will keep you posted by setting up an e-mail list, if you e-mail mum and dad, I will add you to the list, its in the church directory.

Finally I could talk about bible verses on mission, there are quiet a few like the great commission in Matthew 28:19, “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” but the best piece I found was from a speaker at Parachute, he said that the first two thirds of the word God spell Go and the last third is duh!