October 19 Daily Devotional

Bible Reading

Devotional

The word mission means sending forth. A missionary is one who has been sent to do the will of the sender. Jesus was on a mission for the Father. And Jesus has sent us into the world. So we too are on a mission.

A mother sends her son to a nearby store for a loaf of bread. She tells him to come back right away. But on his way to the store, he meets a friend with a new bike and forgets about his mother who sent him to the store. He forgets that he is on a mission.

Christians resemble that boy. We have been sent by the Master. We are on a mission. But on our way there are so many things that detain us. These things are not necessarily evil, but they become evil to us because they rob us of our sense of mission.

Having a sense of mission does not only mean that we are interested in bringing the gospel to those who do not know Jesus Christ. It also means that others can tell from our way of living that we are under orders by the One who sent us.

We are not at home here. We keep ourselves in readiness to meet someone else. Then we will get to our destination. We are not "of" the world; we have been sent "into" the world to fulfill a mission.

But we are very easily sidetracked. Little things soon become big things, and the really important things are almost forgotten. Like the boy who forgot his errand while he was talking about bikes with his friend, we can forget our mission while we are talking about cars, houses, gas prices, or baseball. Maybe these things are all good and honorable, but somehow the urgency of our mission slips into the background. We forget that we have to report to the One who will ask, "Mission accomplished?"

Only one person could say, "Finished!" And he said it on Golgotha. Since he died, we have peace. Since he lives, he instructs us about our mission.

REFLECTIONS

What is your mission? What kinds of things distract you from it?

Andrew Kuyvenhoven's Daylight, a modern devotional classic, was originally published by Paideia Press in 1977. This updated edition is copyright 2009 by Faith Alive Christian Resources. You can order a copy of this revised version of the book directly from the publisher.

A man of many accomplishments, Andrew Kuyvenhoven is probably best known for his contributions to Today (formerly The Family Altar), a widely-used monthly devotional booklet associated with the Back to God Hour. Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations for this updated edition of Daylight are from the Holy Bible: Today's New International Version copyright 2001, 2005 by the International Bible Society.