Thinking in the light

"The truly powerful ideas are precisely the ones that never have to justify themselves." - Dallas Willard

Nowhere is the truth of this statement more evident than when I try to build a case that world missions is a worthy endeavor to invest one’s life in. I’ve often been struck by how hard aspiring young missionaries have to “prove” their call, while no one ever has to justify why they are staying at home.

Without fail, people who dream of going to the nations are asked, “Are you sure God has really called you to go?” But we never ask people who remain in a well-paying job, in the comfort of the First World, “Are you sure God has called you to stay here?”

I know this to be true from personal experience. Before becoming a missionary, I worked six years in what many would consider a prestigious job with good career prospects. Throughout those six years, no one ever questioned if God had truly called me to serve my company. Neither did I ever have to justify why I continued working for the same company year after year.

But since embarking on a missionary career – and especially as a missions mobiliser – I’ve had to defend the missionary enterprise time and again, from every front.

There’s the classic “Am I really called?” question that leads nowhere in my opinion, because it places my finite, limited self in the centre, as though the entire world revolves around me. Plus, why isn’t anyone asking if they are really called to remain at home? Honestly, what concrete evidence do you have that God’s will is really for you to be home in light of the lostness of the world?

Related to this point is our need for multiple confirmations before stepping out to the nations. I think God understands our need to be certain and He does confirm His call in very special ways because He loves us. But again, I often wonder why no one needs any confirmation, let alone multiple ones, to accept a promotion, a pay raise or go for a holiday.

“Why go overseas when there are so many needs back home?” Now, I don’t make light of the needs back home, but I do think we need a sense of perspective to properly weigh the magnitude and urgency of the needs locally versus globally. And if we are talking about staying behind to serve a group of people who are already saved, or have access to many types of Christian ministries, then I am tempted to say as God did to the rich man who died and pleaded for Lazarus to be sent to warn his brothers, “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.” (Luke 16:29)

As Willard’s quote above shows, the truly powerful ideas never have to justify themselves. They are accepted and subscribed to with no questions raised. Ideas like:

Of course CPF is important – how will you ever own a home or retire without it?

Of course you deserve a prestigious job with advancement prospects – isn’t that the whole reason for getting a good education?

Of course you have the right to get married – everyone does!

What ideas about life have you accepted unthinkingly? To what extent are they in line with biblical truth? Often it’s not easy to recognize them simply because they have been so deeply held for so long, and by just about everyone we know. And swapping these seemingly universally held ideas about life for God’s ideas can be a painful process because it will expose many of our insecurities, fears and prejudices that we don’t want to face up to.

So, a willingness to bring these ideas into God’s light is the crucial first step. Without that, the renewing of the mind cannot take place. Large chambers of our mind will remain in darkness, like fertile places where worldly ideas grow like mould, sending their spores into different areas of our lives, propelling us to make decisions that effectively keep God out of our lives despite what we may profess…

Personally, I’ve come to realize that it’s not helpful to try and suppress or deny thoughts that are not biblical. What I have found helpful is to think these thoughts with God’s light shining on me. As I linger in God’s presence and love, outright lies are vaporized in the disinfecting power of God’s light. Other thoughts that proceed out of fear and insecurities weaken their hold on me as I hand them over to a God who loves me. We will all struggle with different issues, but let’s do so in His light and presence. That is the only safe place to be.