OMS Canada is a faith-based missionary sending organization. Our primary purpose is to recruit and mobilize missionaries who will take the gospel to the nations according to the command of Jesus Christ in the gospels and in the book of Acts. Matthew 28 contains what is known as the Great Commission.

18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in2 the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (ESV)

One of the most frequent comments heard at a missions event or missions conference is ‘I’m not sure I’m called to be a missionary. This misunderstood idea of a call to missionary service is perhaps the single issue that prevents people from even considering missions as a vocation. Over the next six weeks, we will consider this idea of the missionary call in four blog posts and perhaps bring some clarity to the idea of the missionary call and the process of receiving the call.

Before we do that, though, we need to be clear on what missions is. This week we will talk about what missions is and is not.

What Missions Is and Is Not.

“Missions exists because worship doesn’t.” (John Piper)
​
God is a missionary God. He is passionately committed to spreading His fame and His glory to all nations.

So how should we define “missions?”

First, we must start with what missions is not. God commands His people serve the poor and hungry, but mercy ministry and social justice are not missions. If we reduce missions to providing relief, education, or compassion—in other words, if everything is missions—then nothing is.

Similarly, missions is more than sharing the gospel. If missions simply meant evangelism, then we could all do that in our hometown without crossing cultures.

To define missions, we must begin with the gospel, then work out to consider what God is doing in history.

The gospel is the good news of Jesus Christ’s death, resurrection, and reign to save sinners. This was necessary because, although all human cultures have knowledge of God through creation (Romans 1:19-20), every people group has rejected God (1:21-23) and is born in sin, trapped under God’s wrath (Ephesians 2:1-3). Since God’s standards of good and evil are written on every heart, all are accountable for their sin—even if they’ve never heard of Jesus or read the Bible (Romans 2:14-15). Humans in all cultures are equally lost, in need of rescue from an eternity in Hell.

The good news is that “God so loved the world, that He gave His Only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). Jesus Christ—the ultimate missionary—left the comforts of heaven, crossed into our world, died in our place, and rose in victory. Now all who repent and trust in Christ are made right with God and given eternal life.

What is God doing in history? At the onset of God’s redemptive plan, he promised that through Abraham “all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 17:3). Jesus, the promised offspring from Abraham’s line, purchased “people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation” on the cross (Revelation 5:9). Right now, God is making a people for Himself—bought by Jesus—from among the nations. We call that people the church.

Christ told His followers, “As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you” (John 20:21). We are commanded to disciple all the nations (Matthew 28:18-20) until the earth is “full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea” (Isaiah 11:9). God’s work in history will be finished when all His people from every tribe and language are worshiping Christ in heaven (Revelation 5:9).

The gospel is the message God is using in history to save and set apart a people for himself in the church from every nationality, language, and ethnicity. Missions, then, is what carries this gospel to all the nations. It’s the job of the church that’s between Christ’s first coming and His return.

So what is missions? Missions is the task of proclaiming the gospel to every people group that has not yet heard it, in order to establish churches—churches that will carry on mission by reaching their culture, teaching others, and sending missionaries out.

For more information about people, tongues, tribes, and nations, read this post about Unreached People Groups.
​
Next week we will ask the question “Is everyone called to be a missionary?”
 
 

 In this dark, fearful and confusing time for Haiti, God continues to do that which only He can do:
win the battles. 

​For hundreds of years, hundreds of thousands of people in Haiti have gone to the witchdoctor, looking for help, looking for answers, looking for something better. On Friday, one of these witchdoctors came to Emmaus instead, looking for the same thing. 

Praise the Lord, something better is not far off, His hand is not too short to save. Be encouraged by this quick testimony from President Matt Ayars, bringing light to things that cannot be changed...CHANGING.
 
“Hi everyone. Matt Ayars here, President of Emmaus University in Haiti, and I wanted to share a quick story. With so many people who have been praying and fasting for so long for Haiti’s release and Haiti's redemption, and God buying back Haiti so these manifestations and political instability, all this stuff going on is just a result of, I believe, God bringing Haiti back to Himself and I had an experience today that I think is illustrative of that and that really confirmed that conviction in my heart.
 
So a few weeks ago, I visited a witchdoctor to share with him the gospel, and he's a guy that I know and I have met before. No other witchdoctor kind of gave us a tour of the voodoo temple and explain to us, you know, kind of, the talismans, and how it works, and the pantheon of deities, showed us, you know, with his mystic snake that sits up in the ceiling and explain to us how the sacrifices work and explained all the different demons and spirits that he served. At the end of our time together, you know, I very clearly shared the gospel with him, and he seemed open to me but not ready to make a decision. It's not the first time I've shared the gospel with him and not the first time that I've even prayed with him. He seemed closer this time than ever before.
 
And then just today, less than an hour ago, he came with his assistant who was with him at the temple. He came to tell me that he had stopped all of his activities as a witch doctor. He was no longer living there on the site where the temple was. He had moved and had found a truck and try to pick up the truck, trying to get back to work and doing some side jobs in the meantime.
 
So it was, there was nothing but wonderful news for me to be at a church. A graduate is the pastor of this church. And so I asked if I could pray with them. I prayed with them. And a lot of you know that every Monday night I do a Bible study with welcome from Haiti that's just about a mile down the road. A lot of young men, similar to these guys to the witchdoctor and his partner who I met today, met with today, and I invited them to Bible study Monday nights, which they were enthused about. And so I too am really excited to have them doing that Bible Study Group, progressing, I think, closer towards making a decision and growing and maturity and hopefully you know discipleship being the main goal there.
 
And then I also sent them away with a couple brand new Creole Bibles and a book on spiritual warfare, a book on the Holy Spirit, and that book on the Holy Spirit talks about how the Holy Spirit's uniquely different from spirits of animism which he'd be very familiar with. And also a book on the life of radical discipleship, a book by John Stott. So they left happy, enthused, encouraged, excited about joining Bible study and studying the literature I had given them. But to me it was a wonderful illustration of the power of Satan and darkness, being lifted from Haiti. Pray for revival, pray for repentance. We pray that people who have been held captive by the darkness and the lies that the devil would come to the light, and they would come to Christ, the one in whom all truth is found, and in whom all liberty is found, for the forgiveness of sins, life everlasting and for eternal, satisfying joy and peace.
 
So, again, thank you. I hope you find this story encouraging, as I did. Thank you.”
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=rlodCMUyQSM&feature=emb_logo
 
Stay up to date here where we have updates about what is happening in Haiti. 

Canadians recognize Remembrance Day, originally called Armistice Day, every 11 November at 11 a.m.
It marks the end of hostilities during the First World War and an opportunity to recall all those who
have served in the nation’s defence.

On this day of remembrance, I would like to challenge you to remember something else as well.
​It is the Gospel, and it is not just for the new birth; it is for your new life as well.

I love to find and share practical methods or techniques for living the Christian life—ways other Christians live out their Christian faith day-by-day. As I speak with people, as I read books, as I listen to sermons, I am always looking for these tips that might be called “faith hacks.” I am going to share one with you today. It comes from Jerry Bridges and deals with the importance of preaching the Gospel to yourself everyday.

Bridges has written in several of his books about the importance of the daily practice of preaching the Gospel to yourself. In “The Discipline of Grace” he writes, “When you set yourself to seriously pursue holiness, you will begin to realize what an awful sinner you are. And if you are not firmly rooted in the Gospel and have not learned to preach it to yourself every day, you will soon become discouraged and will slack off in your pursuit of holiness.” He also gives an overview of the practice: “To preach the Gospel to yourself, then, means that you continually face up to your own sinfulness and then flee to Jesus through faith in His shed blood and righteous life. It means that you appropriate, again by faith, the fact that Jesus fully satisfied the law of God, that He is your propitiation, and that God’s holy wrath is no longer directed toward you.”

But it is in “Respectable Sins” that he gives the practical example from his own life. Here is how he preaches the Gospel to himself every day:

Since the Gospel is only for sinners, I begin each day with the realization that despite my being a saint, I still sin every day in thought, word, deed, and motive. If I am aware of any subtle, or not so subtle, sins in my life, I acknowledge those to God. Even if my conscience is not indicting me for conscious sins, I still acknowledge to God that I have not even come close to loving Him with all my being or loving my neighbor as myself. I repent of those sins, and then I apply specific Scriptures that assure me of God’s forgiveness to those sins I have just confessed.

I then generalize the Scripture’s promises of God’s forgiveness to all my life and say to God words to the effect that my only hope of a right standing with Him that day is Jesus’ blood shed for my sins, and His righteous life lived on my behalf. This reliance on the twofold work of Christ for me is beautifully captured by Edward Mote in his hymn “The Solid Rock” with his words, “My hope is built on nothing less, than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.” Almost every day, I find myself going to those words in addition to reflecting on the promises of forgiveness in the Bible.

What Scriptures do I use to preach the Gospel to myself? Here are just a few I choose from each day:
As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. (Psalm 103:12)
“I, I am He who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.”
(Isaiah 43:25)

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone one to his own way; and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:6)

Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin. (Romans 4:7-8)

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. (Romans 8:1)

There are many others, including Psalm 130:3-4; Isaiah 1:18; Isaiah 38:17; Micah 7:19; Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 2:13-14; Hebrews 8:12; and 10:17-18.

Whatever Scriptures we use to assure us of God’s forgiveness, we must realize that, whether the passage explicitly states it or not, the only basis for God’s forgiveness is the blood of Christ shed on the cross for us. As the writer of Hebrews said, “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins” (9:22), and the context makes it clear that it is Christ’s blood that provides the objective basis on which God forgives our sins.

That has been his daily practice for many years. Why don’t you make it part of your practice, and see the difference it makes to begin each day reminding yourself of who you were, and who you now are in Christ?

Milton Vincent has written a little book called, “A Gospel Primer for Christians” that could be very helpful in preaching the Gospel to yourself daily. It includes hundreds of Scripture references to reinforce the truth of the Gospel.

Do you make it your practice to preach the Gospel to yourself? If so, what have you learned?
How do you go about it?   Please leave a comment below to share your experiences.

You can also check out our blog page here where you can find updates from our missionaries around the world and various blogs for your own growth!

Change is something that comes as a result of something new happening; an alteration, shift, transition, or transformation. The result can be a positive thing or even a challenge for us because it may be unusual or unfamiliar at first.
 
“See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”
Isaiah 43:19
 
God allows us to experience new things so that we can grow and depend more on Him, so it is important that we remain focused on God during times of change and remember that He is the One
​who is in control.

In Ontario, we experience four different weather seasons throughout the year:
​spring, summer, fall, and winter.
 
These seasons vary and as a result they impact our daily living. What activities to do and not do outdoors, what to wear, what to cook/eat, etc. These seasons can even impact our moods and how we feel.
 
Spiritual seasons are also very significant and things we all go through.

Let’s do a comparison with weather and spiritual seasons and see how they can relate:
 
Spring

• Rain, water, plants, grass, and flowers starting to grow.
• Most of us don’t like rainy weather, but it’s necessary for growth.
• Spiritually, this can be a season of growth in our walk with God. We may not enjoy being stretched but we need to remember that these situations will cause us to grow.

 
Summer

• Flowers bloom, the grass is green, and the weather is nice and hot outside.
• We do sometimes complain when it gets too humid, but it is a wonderful thing to go camping outdoors and enjoy some fresh BBQ    on a summer day.
• Spiritually, this can be a season of blessing where we simply enjoy the good things that God has blessed us with.

 
Fall

• Leaves change colors and fall, a season of winter preparation.
• Seeing the leaves change color and peak is a beautiful sight. When they fall, the trees are bare and this doesn’t look so beautiful for us.
• Spiritually, this can be a season of change and newness. This is not always easy at first, but we need to remember that God is in control of the change. He directs our steps.

 
Winter

• Cold weather, snow, nothing growing outside.
• We get to enjoy outdoor winter activities and sports, we dress in layers to keep warm, and drink hot chocolate while watching a Christmas movie.
• Spiritually, this can be a season of dryness. We can feel like nothing is happening and that we are not growing. Let’s be encouraged that God is always working, even when we don’t see any fruit or results.

 
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Jeremiah 29:11
 
Let’s be encouraged to trust God in all seasons. We can be assured that we will not walk through any season alone. God is with us and as we trust and serve Him, He will make all things work for good in our lives.
 
What season are you currently in? How have seasons of change in your life allowed you to deepen your faith and get closer to God?
 
Please leave a comment below to share your experiences with others as we all continue to grow in this journey together by God’s grace.   It would also be great connect with you. Simply click here   to  do that.
 
To Him be all glory.