By Shane Bennett<\/p>\n\n\n\n
[You can also read or share the email edition<\/a> of this article.]<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the past week, I\u2019ve been privileged to watch two women I know do remarkable things. One bought a one-way ticket and hopped on a plane to Faroffistan. She\u2019s going to live there, learn the language, and love and help the people. She raised support and launched during a pandemic. I\u2019m impressed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another friend prayed, cried, schemed, called, cajoled, pressured and otherwise worked her tail off to get her Muslim-background-believer friends and a bunch of others out of Afghanistan. She has a way to go to reach her goal, but several people are breathing the air of freedom and security because of her efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Do you want to have an impact like that? I do. I want to do every good deed<\/a> God has laid out for me. I want to accomplish great things for a great God. I don\u2019t want to miss the full impact God has in mind for my life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But there are traps. There are distractions. There are things that look good, but only give the illusion of life, like what songwriter T Bone Burnett called \u201ca travel poster in a prison cell.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me be clear: I don\u2019t know what \u201cfull impact\u201d means for you. I don\u2019t really know what it means for me. But I believe we want to pursue it and I know there are traps and pitfalls between here and there. Join me in asking which ones you\u2019re prone to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s never a totally good time to move to Pakistan! Some times are slightly worse (eight months pregnant) or slightly better (marriage is solid and you\u2019re independently wealthy), but no time\u2019s perfect. I wonder if it\u2019s possible that we fib to ourselves by saying, \u201cWe\u2019ll seriously consider going when whatever happens.\u201d Could it be this is an application point for the Proverb<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, It\u2019s cool when global impact is on our bucket list, but we miss our best impact when having done something, we put a big fat checkmark by it! I wonder how much more effective Mormon missionaries would be if 20-30% of them went back for a second pair of years. (Let\u2019s keep this idea to ourselves, eh?)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Like many things, we can expect our involvement in missions to compound in effectiveness over time. Your best contribution might be 25 years down the road.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My friend who\u2019s getting people out of Afghanistan was in a position to make a difference because she\u2019d been discipling Afghans for a while via Facebook. She was able to do that because she had taken the trouble to go out and meet Afghans in her city. Going to a public event with the hope (and prayer) to meet and make friends with Muslims is a relatively small step. Taking that step, however, can lead to amazing possibilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I hope God has huge things in store for you and for me. Maybe you\u2019re up to your ears in one right now! If you\u2019re not, trust God for the results of the small steps you\u2019re taking and continue to exercise the faithfulness<\/a> in little that qualifies you for big.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I want to soft-pedal this in some way, but I\u2019m just going to ask: Is it possible you\u2019re not having the full impact God has for you because you\u2019ve boarded a boat to Tarshish<\/a>? Would you be fish bait right now, were not God demonstrating his amazing patience? Maybe you found a good thing to do in order to avoid the scary thing Jesus was asking of you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I certainly don\u2019t know this about you. But I do know this: It\u2019s never too early to get off the wrong road.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The depth to which this notion has been pressed into our psyches is matched by its absurdity. The most cursory look at the Bible will show God specializes in partnering with buffoons! An equally cursory look at the humans around you (and perhaps your own heart) will show that most of us assume we are the sole exception to this rule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n God can use you. In fact, he probably already is. And it\u2019s scary cool what he might do through you as you turn your face to the wind and begin to walk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All cultures are broken, right? They\u2019re packed full of presents for God waiting to be opened, but yeah, they\u2019re broken. In America, it may be the dream of owning more and better and bigger stuff. Maybe, where you\u2019re from, it\u2019s honoring your family or community above all, submitting to its every direction for your life. I don\u2019t know, but I bet there are aspects of your culture that effectively raise up mindsets and pressure against giving your life to God\u2019s global purposes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I like a lot of things about my culture, and I don\u2019t like the feeling of bucking it (usually), but I really don\u2019t want to meet Jesus and have him say, \u201cHigh five, Buddy, you pretty much nailed the American Dream. You could have 10x\u2019d your impact on the world, but, hey, you got to drive a Tesla.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I feel like such an old man saying this, but watch out! Entangling alliances can cause you to miss your full impact! A wife or husband is such a gift. The Bible says so<\/a>. But with four feet instead of two, it\u2019s harder to jump into something new! Add a baby and you square the challenge. Buy a puppy and you might as well forget it! None of those things are bad. You may even want to get a mortgage and buy a house. But do the calculus. Consider the ramifications. Don\u2019t let the vines of normal life keep you from the radical impact God wants to give you and give the world through you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Have you ever tried to plan a trip and been paralyzed by the options? A gazillion flights at different times and prices and do you have to pay for bags? Forty different rental car companies plus secret ones you won\u2019t know until you commit. Hotels with high prices and bad reviews, low prices and mostly good reviews except for the one just three days ago that says this place has gone to the dogs! Ack! So it can be with a world in need. With so many options, how do you know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n For starters, at least, go where the glow is low. Point yourself toward the places or peoples where the least amount of Jesus seems present. There are around 422 Muslim peoples where no one has yet shown up and said, \u201cWanna hear a story Jesus told?\u201d Give yourself to one of them!\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ask God for the grace and strength to run all the way to the tape. I know people whose gospel effectiveness is stunning, even though they\u2019ve more than earned a rocking chair and an afternoon of watching baseball. To be sure, \u201cfull impact\u201d looks different when you\u2019re 25 than it will (does?) when you\u2019re 75. But may God make us all like scrappy old Caleb<\/a>, \u201cI am still as strong today as the day Moses sent me out; I\u2019m just as vigorous to go out to battle now as I was then. Now give me this hill country that the Lord promised me that day.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n True confession: I\u2019ve been a mission mobilizer for 35 years and for most of them I\u2019ve wanted to be a universalist. I just don\u2019t think the Bible allows it. Tolerant pluralism may be the current zeitgeist, but God says he\u2019s bringing his kingdom to bear on the earth and Jesus is the king. I want to die inviting people to their rightful place in that kingdom. Join me?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Globe image by Prawny<\/a> from Pixabay<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 10 Traps & Distractions that Keep Us from Full Impact in God\u2019s Global Purposes By Shane Bennett [You can also read or share the email edition of this article.] In the past week, I\u2019ve been privileged to watch two women I know do remarkable things. One bought a one-way ticket and hopped on a plane … Continue reading Travel Posters in a Prison Cell<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":10444,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-practical-mobilization"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10443"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10449,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10443\/revisions\/10449"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}1. Sometime\u2019s gonna be the right time.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
when it is in your power to act.
Do not say to your neighbor,
\u201cCome back tomorrow and I\u2019ll give it to you\u201d\u2014
when you already have it with you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n2. I\u2019ve been there, done that, got the fridge magnet.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
3. I\u2019m waiting for the big assignment.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
4. I\u2019m truckin\u2019 to Tarshish.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
5. God doesn\u2019t (or maybe can\u2019t) use people like me.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
6. I\u2019m living the American\/Dutch\/Kiwi\/Indian dream.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
7. Blessed be the ties that bind (well, not all of them).<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
8. I don\u2019t know which way to walk.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
9. Say no to plateau.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
10. We\u2019re all going to be OK, aren\u2019t we?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n