…To Have Eyes for the World
By Julie Hawkins
Director of Missions
Be sure to save the date—the evening of March 12—for a special all-church missions event called On Earth As It Is in Heaven! Read more about it below and watch for additional details coming soon.
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In the Missions Department, we sometimes refer to part of our job as “setting the table.” A large part of what we do is preparation work, and invitation work. Inviting this congregation to go out into the world, whether that’s across the street or on the other side of the globe. As we engage with partners and projects, prepare different classes and kit builds, train teams, plan all of the details for Go teams; there is a sense that we get to participate in teeing it up for the Lord to do amazing things through (and in Chapel Hill). After all, one of our main priorities is to educate, equip, empower, and engage Chapel Hill to have eyes for the world.
This January Chapel Hill sent out three Go Teams. And as our groups returned from Cambodia, Thailand, and Arizona State, we relished the joy of hearing story after story of seeing the Lord at work to the ends of the earth and back again. We heard stories of encouraging the Cambodian church through a series of teachings on prayer. And of Karen voices and American voices praising God together at a chapel on a hill in Laytongku, Thailand. And of watching medics at the Laytongku health clinic use an ultrasound machine for the first time. And of a woman committing her life to Jesus for the first time through a conversation with one of our own. We heard stories about tired eyeballs, spiritual warfare, long journeys, difficult days that ultimately ended in thanking the Lord for sustaining and empowering. We heard stories of people feeling called to continue to serve the Lord in a new or different way when they came back home. And we heard stories from our partners of being encouraged by the fellowship and work of our teams. We feel like we got to see a little bit of heaven on earth as God moved and worked through these teams.
But it seems unfair to keep all these stories to ourselves here in Missions. We want to give the congregation a chance to hear too. I know you have been hearing snippets of PASTOR Ellis sharing about ASU last week, or Pastor Megan praying for the church at Laytongku. I hope you are hearing stories from team members. But we in the Missions love to set the table, so we are going to set the table again and invite all of you to join us and hear reports from our winter Go Teams. We are going throwback Missions Sunday style with a celebration night. Mark your calendars for 6:00pm on March 12 in the Gathering Place and come and hear how our teams saw the kingdom of God come On Earth As It Is in Heaven.
With a heart full of joy,
Julie