SAVING THE REFUGEES

“’Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you…’”
Matthew 28:19-20a

Recently I watched the movie “Tears of the Sun”, starring Bruce Willis. In the movie he plays a Special-Ops commander who leads a team into the jungle area of Nigeria to rescue a doctor. His mission was to get only the doctor, but the doctor refused to go without the deliverance of the seventy refugees as well. As Bruce’s character is arguing this point with his Commander, he makes a statement that I find bold. “My team will complete this mission.” He went in for one mission, to save the doctor, and yet when faced with the possibility to leave helpless more to suffer the fate of death, he changed the rules by changing the goal of his mission.
I think what I find so bold about this comment is not that he stood up to his Commander, but that he saw the bigger picture. It would have been enough to obey his orders and get the doctor. It would have been commendable even. But seeing that all these innocent people were in the line of soon coming fire and disaster, he made the choice to extend his mission to include them.
This reminds me of our mission. However, I think it is safe to look at our mission in two ways. First, our mission is to get to heaven. How do we do that? We do that by accepting Christ as our Savior. In Romans 10:9-10 we read that, “If [we] confess with [our] mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in [our] heart that God raised him from the dead, [we] will be saved. For it is with [our] heart that [we] believe and are justified, and it is with [our] mouth that [we] confess and are saved.” This action and confession of Christ as our Lord brings us into a relationship with Him. Still this is only a portion of our mission. Should our mission stop here, however, it is still commendable. In essence we saved the doctor.
But the second part of our mission, and perhaps the part that many do not complete, is the making of disciples. In the final words of Matthew’s gospel, Jesus gives these words. “’Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.’” This is the saving of the refugees. Are we completing this order given by our Commander? Granted some are. Yet not all people are Billy Graham. Because I am not, does that mean I should not even try to complete my mission? By no means. Keep in mind that not each person is given the same drop off location in the military. Does that make one unit better than another? It should not, for we are all on the same team.
So what is it I am trying to suggest in this devotional today? I am trying to get us to answer honestly the question of if we are saving the refugees. A few days back I posed on On The Vanguard’s facebook page this question, “If we are soldiers in God’s army, and the mission is clear, then are we fulfilling our mission?” Can I just be honest with you? I cannot say I have been fully fulfilling my mission. Some days I try, other days I leave it to the others in my unit. But those orders were given by Jesus to us, both individually and as a unit. Following this, I was placed here, at this drop off location in time and space, to work to save the number of God-less refugees that I can touch. It may be commendable that I am saved and my rescue is coming, but there are many more who need to be saved still. What am I doing to save them?

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