Dear Father God
Thank You for Your holy grace, your gracious holiness, your merciful sovereignty, your sovereign mercy. Arriving safely at st. Louis we entered the the registration area. I noticed how organized the lineups were as they split the lines alphabetically. As I approached towards to the V-Z line, it reminded me of that scene in the Christmas story—You know the one where Ralphie stands at (what he thinks) is the end of the Santa line, only to realize the line extends beyond he can see. Well yeah that happened to me—the line extended even beyond the A-B line! So standing in line I started up a conversation with the person in front of me. Turns out she (Christie) was actually from the Graduate Institute of Applied Linguistics who will be setting up a booth in the exhibit section. One fact she mentioned was that there were yet over 2000 languages that still need a bible translation. Christie witnessed how one woman who read a translated Bible for the first time, and her facial expression was full of joy and tears—priceless. Amazing God, Your word is so precious; Your Word never returns void. How may I help spread Your Word for Your glory, and for Your people's joy?
After registering, we were waiting for the bus to our hotel. Urbana was having a little trouble with the buses (ie: they weren't making their roundtrips to/from the hotels fast enough) so they sent a bunch of mini-vans. Our driver's name was Ben, who is on the prayer team at Urbana. He mentioned how there is this one room of 70 Urbana staff who are there to pray for you—he also mentioned that if he knew that existed the first time he went to Urbana as a student, he definitely would have used it. I think I'll have to check that out.
Checking into our hotel was great. The best thing is—our hotel had a popcorn machine, with free complementary popcorn! Praise God!
At 7pm all Urbana participants gathered in Edwards Dome. One of the speakers asked us to imagine a scenario where a missionary couple wanted to demonstrate their love and reach a people who lived in a place known as 'garbage village'. Imagine all their efforts to reach them were not working—the people were afraid. Now imagine that the missionary wife (who was pregnant), decided to show their love by giving birth in 'garbage village'. What would that say to the people living there? Yet that is exactly what Jesus did who came in the flesh and dwelt among us, born in a dirty manger, because God loves us that much and wants to reach out to us. This is known as the incarnational model.
The speaker then talked about how the model that Father God uses to reach to us, is the same model we ought to use for others. As missionaries, the incarnational model means not so much that we invite people to where we live, but rather we visit them where they are at. God wants us to go in their context. The potential danger in the “business model” of missions (ie: strategic planning, projected numbers) while good, ought not be the primary means since it lacks the vulnerability, meekness and other attitudes that the incarnational model adheres to.
A short video clip was played of a man named Father Simon who worked in garbage village and tried to reach out to the kids with the Gospel but they were too afraid. So the Holy Spirit said to him, “use a torch to find your way among the darkness”--so he used a torch but the kids would still hide. Then the Holy Spirit said “kiss their hand”--so he did that, then the Holy Spirit said “put shoes on their feet” and he did that which “freaked them out.” Yet You O God Most High, have sent Your Son as a light among the darkness, to wash us away of our sins, to clean our feet, to die on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins—You “freaked us out”; May we as a body of Christ demonstrate Your love to others with a heart full of gratitude.
Then at night we were encourged to have a short bible study/reflection of Urbana. One of my roommates said that he realized his attitude toward Urbana was skeptical (due to so many people saying how great it was from years past), he realized it was pride that made him say that. Kill our pride LORD, and renew a right spirit within us, in Jesus Name Amen.
