Wayumi Day 1

Why did Jesus have to die? Why can't I merit goodness? What does God require as a payment for sin? Does God require a payment for ALL sin? Why are we on earth? What purpose were we created for? How can one man's death pay for ALL man's sins? Why can't my good and bad works even out? Is God more pleased with me when I go to church?

Imagine going into a group of people who have no clue who Jesus is, no clue who the true God is, no clue that there is a heaven and a hell. Where would you start? How would you answer the above questions? This week I am studying at Wayumi, which is a program here in Jersey Shore, PA put on by New Tribes Mission. The staff here are all missionaries who have spent time on the field and are here to give people a taste of what cross-cultural missions looks like. Their goal is for us to leave here with a better understanding of what some of us will be doing. Today we talked about language and culture and how important they both are. We also talked about what God is doing on earth. And what is He doing? He's calling out a people for His name. Hey, that's us. That's the church. How cool is that? :) And He has specified previously that it will be from every ethnic-linguistic group. We're not there yet, but we will be. Why? Cuz God said so. Awesome stuff. :)

So what's with the questions I started out with? Well, our textbook for our time here is on how to plant a cross-cultural church and it was telling stories about how many countries (and honestly, we could probably say this about some American churches as well) have churches established and when people (missionaries) go in and talk to them about what they believe, they find that the people professing faith in Christ are confused about what actually gets them saved! Many people in so-called "reached" areas are not reached at all...they didn't understand the Gospel message. And so the missionaries had to ask questions and figure out where their understanding was at. Over time they realized that the foundation for the Gospel had not been properly built. The people didn't understand God's character and based it on what they knew of their previous gods, but not the one TRUE God. And so this caused false facts and ideas to be mixed into their ideas of God. They couldn't answer the questions written above according to Biblical truth. They simply believed the "white man" and trusted his friendship. So the missionaries started at the beginning. They began with Genesis 1:1 and taught about God's character and His goals for creation from the beginning on. They showed the people WHY blood was required and WHY no one can merit goodness so that by the time they presented Christ, they understood WHY He had to die and why it was the only way to take care of their sin. They knew that they were sinners from Genesis and that they needed a Savior from that. They saw their need all through the Old Testament and understood the Law for what it really was. With the proper foundations laid, they were able to understand the Gospel message as truth. And the missionaries were able to see how important foundations from the Old Testament were. So now New Tribes presents the Gospel from Genesis to Revelation and that is how we have learned at school. I've seen the benefit of that style of teaching in my own life and I'm so excited as I hear stories of my brothers and sisters in Christ from tribes as they learn the truth that God laid out for us to hear! What a great God we serve!!