Seeking approval

"You may brag about yourself, but the only approval that counts is the Lord's approval."

2 Corinthians 10:18 CEVDCUS06

Atta boy! Well done! Good job! We long for approval. I want to hear "well done".  Some days I feel like that is already an impossibility - that I've messed up so badly that there is no way the Lord will say those words to me. I feel like a runner who stumbles badly in the middle of a race and falls to the ground. The rest of the field finishes and I am still rounding the last turn, bloody, painfully slow, and obviously limping.  The TV crew is interviewing the winner,  draped in his national flag, and I am that out of focus last runner in the background finally crossing the line. No reporters or fans are waiting to congratulate me, no one holds out a bottle of water or even a paper flag to wave. No one says "nice race". It wasn't nice, it was ugly, brutal, embarrassing. There are only two things to say about it : I ran, and I finished.

Will I hear "well done"? If it were my child in the race coming in last would I say  "Good job, I am proud of you. You didn't quit."? I would.

" if you, being evil, give good things to your children, how much more the Father... "

I will one day cross the finish line and I hope, I expect that my Father will say "you did good. I love you and I'm proud of you." And so, I run...

The process of missions

"But I hope as you become stronger in your faith, we will be able to reach many more of the people around you. That has always been our goal. Then we will be able to preach the good news in other lands where we cannot take credit for work someone else has already done."

2 Corinthians 10:15b-16 CEVDCUS06

Here is a great summary of the hope and goal of missions :

• To reach many people in any one locale 
• To train up & strengthen the new believers so that they will become partners in outreach and discipling. 
• As local believers become active in outreach then the missionaries/apostles can go to another place and start again.

Notice the two pronouns Paul uses: "as YOU become stronger in your faith, WE will be able to reach many more of the people around YOU." (emphasis mine: why do people always say that? Does anyone really think Paul used all caps in the original Greek?) I think the YOU is the Corinthians and the WE is the Corinthians + the Apostles. When the Corinthians grow to the point where they become active partners in outreach then MANY MORE people in the area can be reached. Multiplication occurs, and the Apostles can go to another land where people haven't yet heard about the gospel.