Coconut Apostles: Principle #2
Updated: Jan 14, 2022
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We cannot see around the next corner but God does.
The Holy Spirit is always one step ahead of us and God prepares good works for us to do. Our responsibility is to pray, listen, obey as we seek to keep in step with the Spirit. Prayer and discernment are therefore essential to mission work because it is God who leads God’s mission. We participate in what God is doing in the world to proclaim the good news and draw people into his family. Some view mission differently, as I did for many years, and see prayer as enlisting God’s help with what we are planning to do and see the Holy Spirit as one who enables us to do what we intend to do. Some of that is true but a better way is to let God take the lead, to strengthen ourselves by meditating on the New Testament, to make space to be still, and invite God to direct us in every way.
Photography courtesy of Greg Rakozy on Unsplash
“Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path." Psalm 119:105 — The New International Version (NIV)
As we pray and take baby steps we increasingly find our hearts aligned with God’s heart and our actions more in step with his purposes in the world and in our local context. Prayer and discernment are essential to evangelism and mission work and no one should be sent out into God’s field until he or she knows the gardener and is responding to their leadership.
