Pilgrim Witnesses
The Wildfire Network thanks Robert Welch, leader of The Vintage Barn, for his submission of this edition of FUEL…
“Blessed is the man who strength is in You, Whose heart is set on pilgrimage.” - Psalms 84:5
Is your heart set on pilgrimage?
In Mark 16:15 Jesus says, “Go into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.” Sometimes when the Lord tells us to go, we may not even know where we are going. Abraham left with a command from the Lord to leave his people and seek a ‘Promised Land’, not even knowing where that land would be.
In her book, Chasing The Dragon, Jackie Pullinger describes how she bought a ticket from her home in England in 1966 to go as far as she could afford. She then waited on the Holy Spirit to show her where to get off the train. She ended up in Hong Kong and worked with the drug addicts and prostitutes in the infamous “Walled City” where few white women dared to tread. Many young men and women were set free from addiction and came to love Jesus as a result of her going into the darkness of that horrible place. As followers of Jesus we have a duty to share Christ with those to whom God sends us. Instead of chasing the American dream to have financial prosperity so that we can retire with a comfortable home and spend our days perfecting our golf game, we should be pouring out our lives until the day we go to meet Jesus. The only question that remains for those who have surrendered to Jesus as Lord is this:
“Lord, where do you want me to go?”
He might lead you to the slums in your city, or the Afghan refugee children that are in the apartments near your home, or to the people in Turkey and Syria reeling from devastating earthquakes. Regardless of the specific place, our hearts must be set on the great pilgrimage of taking the love of Christ to our fellow men and women. If this is not the main focus of our lives, then we have simply missed the seriousness of the Great Commission. In Matthew 25 Jesus tells the parable of those who were given resources (talents) from their master. When we stand before Christ one day, He will ask us what we did with the resources that He gave us - including the resource of time.
Amy Carmichael recalls as a young girl how her heart was “set on pilgrimage.” She was with her mother and brothers as they left a church service one day. An old woman came out of the side alley with muddy, torn clothes and rags covering her feet. Amy stopped to help the lady walk down the alley. When she saw the other church members staring at her, she hid her face in embarrassment to be seen with such a woman. As she reached a fountain in the middle of the road, she heard a voice speak to her, “Gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, and straw - the fire will test what sort of work each has done. If the foundation survives he will receive the reward” (1 Corinthians 3:12-13). From that day forward Amy began to look at people differently, and she spent her life as a vessel to reach the poor and hurting for Christ. She started to spend time with the Shawlies, a group of girls in her hometown in Ireland who were very poor and worked long hours at the warehouse. She invested much time with these girls, and eventually started a church for them. For Amy, her pilgrimage led her to Japan, and eventually to India. There she opened up a home named Dohnavur Fellowship for girls who were being taken at a young age into prostitution at the Hindu temples. Amy gave the rest of her life to these girls until she went to be with Jesus at the age of 84. She wrote many books through the suffering of being an invalid after a fall left her bedridden for many years. These books have been a great source of help to Christians on how to respond to suffering when it comes. So what is your heart set on? What do you think about through your days and dream of and give your time to? Does it involve helping people come to Christ. If not, we had better repent and seek to obey our Lord’s command in the Great Commission.
Since this encouragement from the Wildfire Network is called Fuel, I want conclude this letter with a poem written by Amy Carmichael with that word in the title:
Make Me Thy Fuel
From prayer that asks that I may be
Sheltered from winds that beat on Thee,
From fearing when I should aspire,
From faltering when I should climb higher,
From silken self, O Captain, free
Thy soldier who would follow Thee.
From subtle love of softening things,
From easy choices, weakenings,
Not thus are spirits fortified,
Not this way went the Crucified;
From all that dims Thy Calvary,
O Lamb of God, deliver me.
Give me the love that leads the way,
The faith that nothing can dismay,
The hope no disappointments tire,
The passion that will burn like fire;
Let me not sink to be a clod;
Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God.
- - Amy Carmichael
Book Resource for further study and encouragement:
Chasing the Dragon, Jackie Pullinger