HomeARC ML 1668
EASTWARD HO!--Why God's Moving East!--After Studying the Latest WS Finance Report! DFO 1668 11/83
1. IT JUST SHOWS YOU HOW THE LORD BLESSES THE EASTERN MISSIONARIES, THEIR GIVING IS MORE THAN ANYBODY ELSE'S! In the poorest countries in the World the giving is the highest, in the East, in the neediest countries in the World & the ones that need the Gospel the most, our missionaries' giving is highest!
2. OF COURSE YOU'D EXPECT LATIN AMERICA'S GIVING TO BE LOW because they're having a lot of financial troubles down there & their economy is really in a nosedive, but the richest country in the World, the U.S.A., & Europe the next richest area, imagine, the ones you'd expect to be able to give the most, they give much much less than the ones in the East!
3. THE AVERAGE EASTERN HOME OF VIRTUALLY ALL MISSIONARIES GIVES TWICE AS MUCH TO WORLD SERVICES AS THE AVERAGE LATIN AMERICAN HOME, & 50% MORE THAN THE AVERAGE NORTH AMERICAN OR EUROPEAN HOME! Does this say something?--That the richest countries of the World are giving 50% less to World Services than the poorer countries of the East! As my Mother so often said, "It is truly the poor who really support the Work of God because they give sacrificially."
4. AND SURELY THAT'S THE REASON GOD IS BLESSING THE EAST NOW MORE THAN THE WEST in every way despite our great Southern migration, so that approximately two/thirds of our Family are now in the South. Still only half of our Family are in the East, so that there is still one of us to approximately every 100,000 Westerners whereas there are only one of us to every 600,000 Easterners.
5. SO OUR EASTERN FAMILY ARE EACH HAVING TO TRY TO PREACH THE GOSPEL TO SIX TIMES AS MANY PEOPLE AS OUR WESTERN FAMILY!--Which means that while our Western Family are using six times as many people to preach the Gospel in the already Christianised West, our Eastern Family are struggling along with one/sixth as much personnel per capita trying to preach the Gospel to the mostly non-Christian Orient!
6. DOES THAT TELL YOU ANYTHING ABOUT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE NEED OF THE EAST & THE WEST & the far greater need of missionaries in the non-Christian East than the Christianised West?
7. HOW ARE YOU WESTERNERS GOING TO LIVE WITH THESE STATS ON YOUR CONSCIENCES, that you're doing one/sixth the job that our Eastern Family are doing, & in Christian countries at that, while our poor Eastern Family are labouring away against tremendous odds in mostly non-Christian countries with six times the population of yours! How do you expect to enjoy Heaven with that on your conscience? No wonder some are going to be raised to everlasting shame & contempt!
8. HOW CAN SOME OF YOU STAND TO STAY IN THE WEST preaching the Gospel over & over again to the same people we've preached it to for years & years in Christian countries where surely they've all heard the Gospel by this time after nearly 15 years of us & nearly 400 years of Christian missionaries by the thousands while there are still billions here in the East who have never heard the Gospel nor ever seen a Christian missionary! No wonder God is going to hold some of you responsible for not coming East who can & should!
9. WE CERTAINLY CANNOT DESERT THE WEST NOR ALL COME EAST, BUT CERTAINLY ALL OF YOU WHO CAN SHOULD COME, AS WE HAVE SIX TIMES AS BIG A JOB TO DO HERE AS YOU HAVE THERE!--Six times as big a job here in the non-Christian East as you have there in the Christianised West! What do you think of that for comparison?--Between the monumental need of the East compared to the far lesser need of the West! If you could come but won't, how are you going to live with that on your conscience & how are you going to face the Lord with that guilt on your heart in the Heavenly City?
10. GIVE ME A GOOD REASON WHY YOU CAN'T COME EAST WHERE MILLIONS ARE DYING WITHOUT CHRIST & THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD'S LOVE & THE JOY & HAPPINESS OF HIS SALVATION! Give me a good reason why you have to stay in the West, or I'll tell you you have to go East! Why do you have to keep giving the Gospel over & over again to the Christian West when there are billions in the East who have never even heard it once? Now can you understand why I am angry & God is angry that so many of you are staying in the West when you're so sorely needed in the East?
11. OF COURSE, IT IS FURTHER & COSTS MORE TO GET THERE & IS HARDER in some ways, but even so, the rewards are also greater & the thrill of giving the Gospel to so many who have never heard it is far more exciting & satisfying & the spiritual compensations far more fulfilling, & surely your final rewards in Heaven will be far greater & your crown brighter, shining brilliantly with Eastern stars of multitudes of Easterners whom you have won to Jesus!--That's the pay off of being a Christian missionary in the East compared to one in the West!
12. DO YOU WANT TO COME WHERE THE CHALLENGE IS GREATER, the work harder & the sacrifices more difficult & the people, languages, customs, religions & countries far stranger & worlds apart?--But where their spiritual hunger is even greater than their physical hunger & their eager receptiveness far more responsive than that of the West, & where the eternal dividends of the many more millions to be won to Jesus far outrank those few who are still left to be gleaned in the overly-evangelised West!
13. GO EAST, YOUNG FOLKS, GO EAST!--And grow up with the new youthful population of the Orient, over half of whom are younger than you & still waiting for the Gospel! No wonder God called these the Lands of the Rising Sun & the New World of today, full of new people, new generations, new golden opportunities & unlimited fields ripe unto harvest compared to the old worn out over-reaped limited fields of the West! The West is dying! God is almost through with it. A new World is being born in the East, a World that will outlast the West when the judgements of God begin to fall!
14. SO WHY ARE YOU CLINGING TO THOSE OLD FAMILIAR EASY HAUNTS & HABITATS OF THE CHRISTIAN WEST, & old worn out fields with an aging dilapidated past when you could be working fulltime with an abundant, bountiful, ripened harvest of unlimited fields in the far safer & more productive East? Why will ye die in the West?--When you could live & love & labour in the East till Jesus comes! Amen? If you want to know what I'm talking about, ask any Eastern missionary & I'm sure they'll be glad to tell you the far greater advantages of being a missionary in the East over that of the West. So what's keeping you?
15. WHAT'S KEEPING YOU IN THE WEST?--Away from these vast, rich, ripe harvest fields of the Golden East! Come on! It's far past time for you who can go East! Why can't you? Don't give me your excuses! Let me see you try to give them to God some day face-to-face to Jesus! What will your answer be then & what will you say? What reason will you give Jesus? What reason can you give Him now that He will believe that you cannot possibly go East, when with God nothing shall be impossible & all things are possible to him that believeth! (Mat.19:26; Mark 9:23)
16. THERE MUST BE SOME REASON WHY HE IS SUPPORTING THE EASTERN MISSIONARIES TWICE AS WELL AS THOSE OF THE WEST!--And even half again as well as those of you who have stayed behind in System jobs in the richest countries on Earth! God doesn't neglect His Own, especially when they obey Him & lift up their eyes from the sparse little over-gleaned corners of worn-out Western fields to the vast unlimited rich ripe Eastern fields already white unto harvest! "For the harvest truly is plenteous but the labourers are so few! Pray ye therefore that the Lord of the harvest shall send forth labourers into His harvest." (Mat.9:37-38) How about you? (Just don't forget to raise that Home Support before you come!)
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family
