Mission Trip Prayer & Devotional Planနမူနာ

“God and His People”

God chose the most curious way to go about setting his creation right. He might have put on a power display, destroying whatever had warped it, and starting over with instant new creation wherever it was needed. Instead, he invited Abraham and Sarah, who were unknown and insignificant, to start a family that would transform the world. These verses from Genesis 18 reflect God’s perspective on how this would happen. Abraham and Sarah remained nobodies. Yet God sees a great future for them.

God says he has chosen Abraham, the head of the family, to train his children and his household in doing “what is right and just.” Remember that they had no Bible and no book of laws to follow. But all people know a great deal of what “right and just” means. Abraham was to lead a family and a household — which would be something like the family business, with employees included. As he followed “right and just,” and taught his family, God says he will “bring about for Abraham what he has promised him.”

What has he promised? A big family, settled in Palestine, owning the land. (They were a small family and landless nomads, when God made this prediction.) Even more significantly, God promised Abraham that through him he would bless the whole world.

Here we see a fundamental biblical pattern. God calls people to be his followers, and he asks them to learn justice and teach it to those around them — their family, pre-eminently. It is through such people that God will bring his justice to the whole world.

What does this mean for you on your mission trip? It means that God has called you to represent his justice. The kind of person you are, the relationships you have with your mission team, are tremendously important to the work that you do. They are the key to whether God’s purposes will be fulfilled.

Prayer: Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where I see injustice, enable me to live a renewed life.