Your Mission Field Isn’t Too Small

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. ” (Matt. 28:19-20 NIV)

Do you ever worry that your mission field is too small? I do. When I get letters from missionary friends, many of whom live abroad as full-time missionaries with their families, that demon named Comparison jabs me and whispers, “Are you really fulfilling the Great Commission? You, in your comfortable life? What are you possibly doing to further the kingdom of God?”

My husband spent his formative years as an MK (missionaries’ kid) in East Africa. Even now, my in-laws are part-time missionaries who spend a portion of each year in the Congo, doing on-the-ground work to alleviate the distress of the people living in the same town where my husband spent his childhood.

Now, I work for a Christian publishing house, so one could argue that in a roundabout way, my Monday-to-Friday working life is all part of the Great Commission. But I do not personally, daily, take the gospel to people who have never heard it before.

Unless you count my children.

And mamas, we must. We must count our children as our foremost mission field.

In Deuteronomy 11, the people are commanded,

Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. (Deut. 11: 18-19 NIV)

Jesus himself pointed out the importance of children to the faith. In Matthew 19, when parents brought their children to him, asking if he would lay his hands on them and pray for him, the disciples tried to turn them away. But Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these” (v. 14 NIV).

I worry sometimes that I am too surrounded by people who already know Jesus. As Madeleine L’Engle writes in Walking on Water, “If I understand the gospel, it tells us that we are to spread the Good News to all four corners of the world, not limiting the giving of light to people who have already seen the light.” These are tough words for a mama at home. How do I reach the four corners of the world from my house in the middle of America?

Maybe I don’t need to go to all four corners. Maybe I just need to be a light in the corner where I find myself, the corner God clearly prepared for me.

Sally Clarkson writes, in Mom Heart Moments,

We are called to give up our lives, as Jesus gave up his life for us, for the purpose of training, loving, and preparing our children for life–eternal life . . . It is our responsibility to care for our children’s souls, presenting Jesus to them in hopes that they will choose to follow Him.

She goes on to say that mothers must recognize that we are raising the next generation of Christians. The future of the church is being brought up, right this minute, in our homes.

Our mission field may feel small, but it isn’t. It has the weight of eternity wrapped up in it.

To read on, join me over at The Glorious Table.