Featured Article: Witnesses!

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“Ye are my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. . . . But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” (Isaiah 43:10, Acts 1:8)

How beautifully the Holy Spirit weaves His themes in and out of Scripture, causing them to emerge in different centuries of the sacred story, each time according to His wise purpose.
The wording of Isaiah’s verse is so close to that of Acts 1:8 that there can be little question about their being close spiritual cousins. The exact details are different but the living thrust of both passages is a divine mission for every true believer in God.

We are to be His witnesses. For the people listening to the prophet, the message was to boldly display the solid case for His eternal Being. They were to show off the perfect trail of prophecy. Since forming the nation, Jehovah had sent Israel a continuous stream of fulfilled prophecies, spanning everything from international politics to personal blessings. The evidence was irrefutable.

In comparison, the argument for any idol of any nation of the world was ludicrous. Various times throughout the book, Isaiah pokes fun at the whole idea of manmade images and the utter absurdity of them being able to foretell anything.

Centuries later Doctor Luke recorded the precise last words of Christ before His ascension. Surely he knew that anyone familiar with Isaiah’s writings would quickly make the connection. The charge was pretty much the same, only here in the New Testament the grace of Jesus and the goal of worldwide evangelism were more clearly seen.

All of the redeemed were now officially called to join the witness stand. The followers of Jesus were to share the overwhelming testimony of His life and identity as Savior of the world.
However, the courtroom was not a specific building or place. It was much larger than that. It was the entire earth! Christians were to scatter to every corner of the globe to witness of the greatest truth mankind could ever know.

As back in Isaiah’s time, these godly people had a thick dossier of proofs. Miracle after miracle, fulfillment after fulfillment, many visual confirmations of His resurrection . . . all stacked up to certify Him as the One and only Messiah.

Perhaps the astonishing question for all of us should be: Why does God even stoop to give us this honor? I really don’t think we could understand the full answer.

We have no inherent right to be such royal ambassadors. We are mere clay, completely unworthy of having the divine image imprinted on our souls or being selected to represent the invisible Lord before a lost world.

But in His amazing grace, the King has chosen us to tell each generation that He was, and is, and always will be. We are living monuments of His love, and are expected to share with any soul who will listen, that He is God.

Dear Father, very often I have been silent about You, both in actions and speech. For many around me, I may be the closest one in Your family they will ever meet. Please help me hold the banner high and boldly show them that You are the true God, and that You came to die for their redemption. Amen.

Prayer & Dates – August 2014

Click the link above to download a PDF of prayer requests and praises as well as the birthdays and anniversaries for August. Note: You will need to login to SecureCloud in order to view this document.  Once you have logged in, click on Files Shared, then Headquarter Happenings, then scroll to the month you would like to view. This step protects people with WWNTBM in restricted access fields.

From the Memo Board: August 2014

 New Missionaries

Please be in prayer for these new additions to the World Wide family, as they complete survey trips in the near future and then make plans to begin their deputation ministries.

The DeatricksMichael & Honorah Deatrick have recently joined the World Wide family.  The Deatricks are both graduates of Ambassador Baptist College and are from the First Baptist Church of Wayland, MO, where his father, Dan Deatrick, is the pastor.  They are planning to go to the Solomon Islands.

 

The Sinskies

John & Sarah Sinskie have also joined the World Wide family.  The Sinskies are both graduates of Pensacola Christian College.  They are from the Trinity Baptist Church in Warrenton, VA, with Pastor Vinton Williams.  Their plan is to be involved in education ministries in the Far East.

 

SecureCloud Account Settings

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Receiving Donations

We recommend that missionaries request that all donors make checks payable to WWNTBM, instead of making checks payable to you as an individual.  This can help to alleviate certain tax complexities which may result if churches make checks payable to the individual.  In addition, please make donors aware of your account number so they can designate your funds appropriately.  If you have questions about this please contact our office.

From Our President: August 2014

Danny WhetstoneDo you have an electronic device or kitchen appliance that has a reset button?  Many times you can use one of these and not even know it has one simply because there is not a need for it.  However, when the day does come that it is needed it is the first thing to look for.  Perhaps there is an electrical surge that would have destroyed the device or appliance, but it was saved by a small circuit breaker that kept the power from torching it.  When that happens you can just press the reset button and you are back in business.

So many things clamor for our attention these days.  We have often heard someone say, “information overload!”  There was a day when things were not so complicated.  You would know the people that lived right around you, and probably every intimate detail of their lives, but apart from them you only knew what the evening news would tell you in half an hour.  Today, twenty four hours a day we are bombarded with information every waking hour.  It is so easy to lose sight of the important things in the midst of all of the “information overload.”

Is it time to pause and look for the reset button.  We know that we need to pray, read our Bibles, study the Word, witness to others of the saving grace of God, and teach others how to live out their faith.  Have you noticed how easily the world can overrun these very important things in our lives.  It seems obvious that we have many responsibilities because we are saved by the mercy of God, but because of our calling these duties are even more obvious.  We have been specifically called of our Lord to go into the world to witness, baptize and teach.  How can we justifiably permit the world to so intrude into our lives to the degree that these things are put on the back shelf and gotten to only when time permits?

Press the reset button on your life today if the circuit has indeed been broken.  Let’s focus on the things that not only matter for time, but for eternity as well.  Let’s move on from the survival mode the the service mode.  We are servants of the living God, and we have been sent out to serve among a very specific people.  That isn’t to say that our burden isn’t for the entire world, but by virtue of our call of God He has gotten very specific with our location.  Look around today and see the faces of the souls that the Lord has put you in the midst of, then ask yourself if you are truly focused on completing the task given you by God.

It is good to understand the unfolding of events surrounding us today, but not to the exclusion of our duty before God.  Paul fought a good fight.  Paul finished his course.  Paul kept the faith.  Are we?

In His Service,
Danny A. Whetstone
President