Joh_18:37 Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a
king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for
this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth.
Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.
The coming of Christ to earth is good news! It is the
truth of the incarnation (God with us), the life, the teachings of Christ, His
death for us and His resurrection. It is a story that needs to be told over and
over again, not just by gifted “gospel sales people” but by you and me!
Isa 52:7 How beautiful upon the mountains are the
feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth
good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion, Thy God
reigneth!
Go, tell it on the mountain,
Over the hills and everywhere
Go, tell it on the mountain,
That Jesus Christ is born.
While shepherds kept their watching
o’er silent flocks by night,
Behold, throughout the heavens
There shone a holy light
The shepherds feared and trembled,
When lo! above the earth,
Rang out the angel’s chorus
That hailed our Savior's birth.
Down in a lowly manger
The humble Christ was born
And God sent us salvation
That blessed Christmas morn.
Go, tell it on the mountain,
Over the hills and everywhere
Go, tell it on the mountain,
That Jesus Christ is born.
Our job, our responsibility, our commission and mandate is to
spread the word that Jesus has come, He is the answer, That His birth, death
and resurrection are the gospel, the good news. And this world is in need of some
good news about now!!!
Tears streaking her
cheeks, Evie Brand pleaded with her mission board. Rules were rules, they
answered. She was too old to go back to India. She must retire.
Evie had sacrificed her comforts, her tiny income, her family for the work.
With her husband, Jesse, she had pioneered on the Mountains of Death until he died of fever. Year
after year, she lived entirely on a small inheritance and set aside her
official salary to buy parcels of land for the mission. But the board said it
made no sense to appoint a sixty-eight year old woman to another five year
term.
Evie did not see it that way. Years ago, she and her husband Jesse had
vowed to reach five mountain ranges with the gospel. Four still had to be
reached. Evie felt that God intended for her to fulfill that vow. She saw one
last chance. "Please just send me back for one year," she pleaded.
"I promise not to make any more trouble. At the end of one year I will
retire."
Reluctantly the board agreed. Had they known Evie's secret plan, they
would surely have refused. When her year with the mission ended, fellow
missionaries gathered to wish her goodbye. Then came the shocker. Evie
gleefully informed them that she was retiring from the mission-- retiring to
take up independent work in the mountains. She would fulfill the promise that
she and Jesse had undertaken years before. Protests and warnings fell on deaf
ears.
Rejoicing, seventy-year-old
Evie began to fulfill Jesse's dream. Everyone called her "Granny,"
now, but she felt young. She traveled from village to village, riding a hill
pony, camping, teaching, and dispensing medicine. She rescued abandoned
children. The work was hard because her body was thin now. Life became even
more difficult when she was dropped by her carriers and whacked her head on a
rock. She never completely recovered her balance after that.
She took to walking with bamboo canes in her hands. Yet the face that she
turned upon the world was full of joy and laughter. "Praise God!" she
exclaimed continually.
Despite broken bones and fevers, she labored on. In fifteen years, she
almost eradicated Guinea worm from the Kalryan range. (Guinea worms grow
several feet long under a person's skin.)
Through her efforts, the five ranges were evangelized, and a mission work
planted on each. She added two more ranges. "Extraordinary," said
people. Granny insisted it was all God's doing.
Whether on her mountains or off, she proclaimed Christ. In a hospital
with a broken hip, she scooted on a carpet from room to room and talked to the
other patients. She painted landscapes for them. Her bones knit in record time
and back she went to the mountains to fight marijuana growers. Her son Paul visited
her and found her looking not older but younger. "This is how to grow
old," he wrote. "Allow everything else to fall away, until those
around you see just love."
Granny tore some ligaments and had to go to the plains for treatment.
Before she could return to her beloved mountains, her speech became jumbled and
her memory failed. Seven days later, on this week, December 18th, 1974, she died. The next day
her body was taken back to the hills and laid beside Jesse's while a multitude
wept. The woman who was considered too old for missions had carried on for twenty-four more years.
QUESTION: Are there any places in
your world that need to be reached? Are there any people that need to hear the
good Word? What is your excuse, what is my excuse?
There are mountains yet needing to hear the gospel. But what are
we doing with our lives? What are we doing with the story that needs to be
told? The story of God, in love, sending His only begotten Son, so that whoever
believes on Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life!
Have you come today, needing to hear about Jesus, the answer to
your every need? He told Pilate, just before His death, that He came to bear
witness to the truth.
The truth is that we are all sinners in need of a Savior.
That He gave His life for us, to pay sin’s penalty.
That He lives again to save you.
What are you going to do with that truth? Ignore it? Put it off
until a more convenient time? Are you going to out and out reject it? Or are
you going to just go ahead and accept it?
