“And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.” - Revelation 5:9-10
This text is held up often for reflection upon the missionary nature of God and it is no wonder why. No longer would only those who went to the Levitical priests in accordance with the law for the forgiveness of sin and restoration of purity be the worshipers who are accepted, but now the work of Christ on the cross opened the way for any who would come to him. With this work in mind, Jesus then commanded his disciples to go out and proclaim this great news. Indeed Paul says this concerning the message: …how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. (Col 1:27-28) Therefore, we see the beauty of this passage because it provides for us a glimpse of the full realization of this work, the multitudinous, multinational, multicultural, multi-a-lot-of-things church. People from all eras and from all sorts of cultural and linguistical backgrounds coming together to praise the one who ransomed them with his own life and blood.
What sparked this post was the reading of TORTURED FOR CHRIST by Richard Wurmbrand. It is his detailed coverage of workings of the Underground Church in the Soviet Union and the treatment that believers endured for their faith. Ironically, I often think of the billions of unbelievers living their lives without Christ and facing eternity with no hope and then how encouraged I feel when I remember this passage and the reality that one day many of these people will be together with the rest of the body of Christ worshiping him in eternity. I had never really let it set in that there are Christians like those mentioned in the book, who are all around the world and have become believers and now suffer for the fact that they confess that Jesus is Lord.
So my warning to you tonight is not to think only about the wonder of the end product of God’s work to redeem a people for himself when you read this passage. I also want you to pray for and seek to support through various means the living-right-now-day-to-day people of God who are dealing with intense suffering and persecution in places all around the world.
Two quotes to ponder concerning the Western Church:
“When I was beaten on the bottom of my feet, my tongue cried. Why did my tongue cry? It was not beaten. It cried because the tongue and the feet are both part of the same body. And you free Christians are part of the same Body of Christ that is now beaten in prisons in restricted nations, that even now gives martyrs for Christ. Can you not feel our pain?”
There are endless discussions about theological matters, about rituals, about nonessentials. At a party in a lounge, someone asked: “If you were on a ship that sank and you could escape to an isolated island, having the chance to take with you only one book from the ship’s library, which one would you choose? One answered, “The Bible,” another, “Shakespeare.” But a writer had the correct answer, “I would choose a book that could teach me how to make a boat and to arrive at the shore. There I would be free to read whatever I wished.” To keep liberty for all denominations and all theologies and to regain it where it has been lost due to widespread religious persecution, is more important than to insist upon one certain theological opinion. “The truth shall set you free,” said Jesus (John 8:32). But, the same freedom, only freedom, can give the truth. And, instead of quarreling about the nonessentials, we should unite in this fight for freedom against the tyrannies in this world.
NM from the Missions Team