One of my favorite books of all time is Discipling Nations: The Power of Truth To Transform Cultures, by Darrow Miller with Stan Guthrie. Today I was able to re-read a couple chapters on the plane. I found the passage below on page 225, and there in the margin I have a note in bold yellow highlighter: “I LOVE THIS!” …
As we have seen in previous chapters, we are not to be God’s mindless lackeys, although that in itself would be more than we deserve. No, God has given us the unfathomable privilege of being co-creators with Him. Man, made in God’s image, is given the awesome task of bringing forth all the potential of creation. Man is the source of earth’s bounty as well as its poverty. As the sovereign God’s vice-regents, we are stewards for His household, coworkers in His kingdom, caretakers of His garden, builders of His city, and actors in His story. In some ways, like our Master, we transcend nature. Of course, He is completely above the natural order, while we live in it and in some sense are bound by the universe’s physical processes. Yet the minds God has given us allow us to move ahead, to leap over barriers, to devise new ways, to solve problems. As Novak has said, “Creation is full of secrets waiting to be discovered, riddles which human intelligence is expected by the creator to unlock.” Created “a little lower than the angels,” we have a task to perform, a purpose to fulfill.
While our creatureliness binds us to nature, God’s image stamped on us allows us to move beyond the physical reality we see daily. We can dream of a better world and then begin to make it happen. Where there is darkness we can create a lightbulb, where there is desert drill a well, where mountains are barren plant a forest, where people are forgotten and ignored set them free through the power of the gospel, where people are ignorant build them schools and libraries, where the land is wasted plant a garden, where people are sick develop a cure, where there is silence hear the music and play it. Man is the discoverer, explorer, innovator, creator, and composer.
Don’t you love this sacred, exalted view of man created in the image of God? I love this because it explains the entrepreneurial nature of humankind. It explains my nature and desire to create!
With the Mission ONE Ambassador Program, I am looking for entrepreneurial leaders who are willing to be trained to be a successful advocates for a cross-cultural partnership ministry—who want to partner with outstanding indigenous Christian leaders to bring blessing to the hopeless, who want to change the world for the glory of God, through the glory of the Gospel. You’ll be trained through The Beauty of Partnership learning journey. It costs a lot. It is tremendously challenging, adventurous work. Are you a Christian entrepreneur or entrepreneurial leader looking to get into God’s Story in a fresh and effective way? Write me at werner@mission1.org.
A reading from this book—Discipling Nations: The Power of Truth To Transform Cultures—
is part of the learning lessons for “Week 4: Identity” in
The Beauty of Partnership learning journey.
Download the Mission ONE Ambassadors brochure here.
