Day Twenty seven  -  Read a Missionary story

Hebrews 12:1   Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

                  Hebrews chapter twelve pictures a race with a  grand stand.  There are witnesses all around us watching the race.  In context it appears that the witnesses are the ones who have gone before and showed a way to victory through faith.  Hebrews eleven is a chapter that it filled with illustrations of faith that pleased God.  

                   There are people who have lived in your lifetime and have also been men and women of faith.  These have run the race and have shown us a way to victory through faith.  Some of these have served in your own hometown,  others have served Christ halfway across the world.  Some have been missionaries who devoted their life to seeing people come to Christ and grow to become testimonies and servants of God. These saints are not different than we are.  They have the same passions and the same pursuits.  The Bible talks about Elijah,  a man who was subject to the same passions that we have.  The difference,  he prayed.

James 5:17  Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months.

                  The implication is “since Elijah was a man of like passions,   we can be men and women of like prayer.”  The great heroes were ordinary people who did extraordinary things through faith.  When we read about them, it is as if they are watching us and cheering us along.  We get strength from their journey to complete our own race. 

An Exercise to increase my Faith  -  pick up a book and read about a missionary who served Christ and accomplished a work for Him.  Think,  “If he can,  then I can.”  He is a man of like passions,  and we can be men and women of like purpose. Read a portion of that book every day for a week and ask God to use that example to help you run your race.