Missionary Partners

“Love is a verb.”  -John Mayer

As I am writing this, Long Hollow has two mission teams in the air.  One is in Haiti, and the other is in Uganda.  Both will be the hands and feet of Jesus, loving on our beautiful children in the orphanages.

They won’t be building impressive buildings or feeding thousands, not that those are unimportant things.  But, they will be spending time and loving precious children.  Soaking children in their smiles and kind touches.  Letting them smell their shirts and rub their faces on them tenderly.  Joking with them and being a “bright spot” in an otherwise ordinary day as an orphan.  Do you sometimes wonder what memories our children of the nations will have as adults—will they think back on when “those people” came and treated them kindly and told them over and over that Jesus saves and God loves them?

Oh, Lord, I pray that they will!  I pray that these efforts will deposit in their emotional “banks” so the spiritual deposits can fall on good soil as they mature and grow!  I pray that they will be manifested in life-change and nation-change for the purposes of His plan!

Also, Long Hollow’s leadership is listening to God’s calling concerning an unreached people group in North Africa.  Unreached.  People. Group.  Let that sink in—UNREACHED.  Where tribal languages and Muslim culture are obstacles.

I was telling our eight-year-old about UNREACHED groups, and she was surprised.  She is a relatively new Christian, and watching her makes me realize how “churched” we can become, where we hear and intellectually know things without allowing them to influence our hearts with a holy burden for the lost and dying world.  Seeing her face as she pondered a life without hearing the name Jesus and understanding what that means, I could see that she was truly, authentically touched.  It was convicting.

So, today, let’s all partner with the Long Hollow mission projects.  Let our hearts be united in prayer for our church’s teams who are going to the nations.  If you don’t know what to pray, consider these verses:

• Colossians 4:3, 5– Pray “that God will open to [them] a door for the word, that [they] may declare the mystery of Christ…” and that they will “conduct [themselves] wisely toward outsiders, making the most of the time.”

• Psalms 46:1-2– Pray that every team member will recognize and call upon God as their “refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble” so that they will not fear, regardless of the circumstances.

• 1 Thessalonians 5:8– Pray that each team member will “put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.”

• Hebrews 13:1-2– Pray for mutual love to continue, and that they will “not neglect to show hospitality to strangers.”

• Psalm 139:5– Pray that God will “hem [them] in, behind and before, and lay [his] hand upon [them].”

• Romans 12:3-8– Pray that the team members will not think of themselves “more highly than [they] ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.”  Pray that they will be members of one body, that they will embrace their different roles for the team yet “have the same function.”  Pray that they will use their differing gifts while on mission.

• Hebrews 13:17– Pray that the team members will “[o]bey [their] leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over [their] souls and will give an account.  Let them do this with joy and not with sighing—for that would be harmful to [them].”

• Philippians 2:2-8– Pray that the teams will “be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord or of one mind.”  That they will “[d]o nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than [themselves].”  Pray that they will “look not to [their] own interests, but to the interests of others.”  Pray that they will “Let the same mind be in [them] that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness, and being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.”

• Psalm 67:1-2– Pray that God will be gracious to them and bless them and make his face shine upon them, “that [God’s] way may be known upon earth, [his] saving power among all nations.”

• Romans 10:15-17– Pray that the teams will not grow discouraged or impatient.  For this is God’s ministry first and foremost:  “And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent?  As it is written, ‘how beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!’”  Yet, “not all have obeyed the good news.”  God is sovereign!

What other power verses have you discovered to pray for our missionary efforts, whether in our backyard or in Haiti, Uganda, or North Africa? 

Marisa