we be church

Continuing on the Treasure Trail

It looks like the Treasure Trail Healing Stories I blogged about in my last post, “Treasure Hunting Leads to Seven Youth Heald!“, are inspired by a Book by Kevin Dedmon called “The Ultimate Treasure Hunt“. I have added it to the Library section on this website, man I really want to read it! If you want to have an advanced read before you get your mits on it can do that on the US Amazon site. Thanks to Nat Carey for pointing the book out to me.

We as Christians seem to either go jelly at the knees or “wowzer!” when we hear of stories of people getting healed today. I was suddenly struck that actually we have a whole Bible crammed with awesome stories and practical examples where people have been healed by God’s power. These are reasons enough to get out there and begin praying for people, but Jesus says something that I feel gives us total permission and freedom in the knowledge that we too can do this work and heal people in John 14:12-14. Thank you Jesus!

I know I need to stop looking at the tails where Jesus healed as a surface stories but dive deep in to the relevancy they have for us today and to not only think about it but get practical about it because they are strong exhortations to GET CRACKING for HIS KINGDOM!

Be like a Zealous Child: Attain and Retain God’s Kingdom

Been reading a book called Surprised by the Voice of God by a dude called Jack Deere which is all about prophesy.

The author demonstrates that we need to learn the Holy Spirit’s language (how he speaks to us) and provides the example of his small children when they lived in Germany for a year. In learning the lingo his children played with the local German children and made headway with the language. Being tiny their motivation was playing with people their own age and they were not shy to try new things, they knew it was available to them. In comparison their father had dug into text books and was a little too proud to make language mistakes in front of people so refrained from giving the language practice.

Reading this I was reminded of the verse in Matthew where Jesus says that the kingdom of heaven belongs to those who are like Children.

“but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 19:14)

It struck me that we always give this verse in relation to a Child’s belief, but thinking about it seems to relate more to a Child’s zealous attitude to a task. They play with passion and spare no thought to what they look like or the way they do things. This is the way they learn and progress. I can remember when I was a kid all a wanted to do was have fun and play but I enjoyed learning too, I was always asking questions even if they sounded silly.

However I can remember the point I stopped trying to look silly. I was with my family at an airport and upon seeing a group of nuns asked my dad why their attire was so odd. He said “why don’t you ask them?” I was eight and was becoming more aware of what people thought of me and so didn’t approach them. I wish I had.

If we want to attain and retain God’s Kingdom (his amazing and tangible rule) at work today we need to be like children, being passionate to learn the language of God. It means actively removing any proud thought that stops giving glory to him. God can use people who put aside worrying thoughts and who understand that their lives are crucified and resurrected in Jesus. Church home groups are a wonderful place to learn how to listen to what God is saying. He is always saying something. Give his language a shot, be open and listening.

I’ll do a proper review of the book in coming weeks when I have finished reading it. So far so good though.

Over 4,100 languages needing Bible translation

Jesus is pretty clear that all nations will hear the gospel of the Kingdom before the end of the world.

And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. (Matthew 24:14)

So what are the stats? How many languages still need the Gospel translated? Here are a few figures from Wycliffe Bible Translators.

How many languages have Scripture?

2,454. Of these, 438 have a complete Bible, another 1,168 have the New Testament. 848 others have at least one book of the Bible.

How many languages still need translation?

In addition to more than 1,900 active projects, work needs to begin in over 2,200 languages.

How many people have no Scripture?

196 million speak these languages where translation still needs to begin.

How many languages is Wycliffe currently involved in?

About 1,415 languages (around 73% of all translation work currently being done)

In how many languages have Wycliffe been involved in the completion of a New Testament?

721. Over 80 million people speak these languages.

Wycliffe do an amazing work coordinating an effort to reach nations with the gospel. I would really recommend reading a book called Unafraid of the Sacred Forest: The Birth of a Church in an African Tribe to see how their work can practically be done alongside planting churches. I will do a proper book review in the weeks to come.