Luke 10: 17, Mt 28: 19, Isa 6: 8

Carl Belcher

Well, at the risk of getting a right cyber stoning from you all, greetings from Malaga on the south coast of Spain! Now before you all reach for the rocks, let me remind you that resting is God's idea and boy, what an idea!

If it's any consolation just a few days ago we were right in the thick of a huge youth mission we had been organising for the last 12 months as part of the Grapevine international celebration. Those of you who have taken part in Soul in the City or Festival Manchester will be familiar with what we embarked upon. Not content with hiding away in the corner of some field in Lincolnshire to get blessed up, we heard the cry of many young people wanting to get their hands dirty and make an impact in the world. So we teamed up with some like minded churches around the city and over the course of the festival carried out 21 practical projects in 9 locations which served the local communities through family fun days, sports activities and practical projects which made an environmental impact in the communities.

We then hired a whole fleet of double decker busses to transport the folks we met in these communities back to our festival site to take part in full on celebrations and get the chance to discover the life changing power of Jesus for themselves.

There are already so many amazing stories of what took place during this time that they could quite easily fill a book! Maybe one day that's what we should do.

I think one of the highlights for me though was seeing how God transformed this mass of young people getting ready to embark upon this rather daunting mission, full of a mixture of excitement and fear, into a small army of expectant and confident witnesses. It reminded me of when the original disciples returned after Jesus had sent them out: [Luke 10: 17] The seventy-two returned with joy and said, "Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name."

An even bigger joy for me was to hear so many young people saying that they now realised how simple it can be to demonstrate and explain the truth of God's love. Not only that, but nearly every single person said that they wanted to take what they had experienced and let God use them to make a difference in their communities back home. How cool is that?

With the very last words that Jesus spoke to his disciples he said [Mt 28: 19] "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations." The people living down your street need the life giving truth of Jesus just as much as someone living on the other side of the globe. What part of "Go" are you struggling with today, is it the G or the O?! My prayer today is that of Isaiah [Isa 6: 8] Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?"

And I said, "Here am I. Send me!"

Will you go?