November 01, 1996 by

What Is Our Place in History?

As we look back over the thousands of years of recorded human history, we often think of all the empires, dictators and saints as just a random series of people and events without much direction or purpose. If we believe the Bible, we know that God is sovereign, but we have a hard time figuring out how a Hitler or an Ayatollah Khomeini fits into what God is doing.

In this issue we answer the question; what is God's overall plan for mankind and how can we fit into it. It really is no big secret, it has been in the Bible for everyone to read for thousands of years, not to mention the Perspectives course. But it hasn't often fit with our desires for comfort, pleasure and the association of people who are like us.

As John Piper has said, "All of history is moving toward one great goal, the white-hot worship of God and His Son among all the peoples of the earth." From Scripture and from history we can clearly see that God's plan for all of history is to bring all the peoples of the earth into the joyful worship and enjoyment of Himself. God is determined to use His people to accomplish this plan even when we do not want to cooperate.

When God's people are unwilling to go to the unreached peoples, God brings the unreached peoples to His people. Often times in history this has been a very unpleasant experience, to say the least, as was the case when the barbarian Vikings invaded Christian lands in the ninth century with horrible atrocities. But eventually the Gospel was victorious and the Vikings became believers.

Even in our own day, we have been largely unwilling to go to the unreached peoples, so God has brought them to us with mosques and temples popping up across the fruited plain. We can either see this as a God-given opportunity to reach these peoples for Christ or we can retreat into the comfort of our fortress churches while the Judeo- Christian foundations of our society are washed away.

We must recognize the fact that God's highest priority is not our comfort and pleasure, but rather that all the peoples of the earth would come to worship before Him. If this is a priority for Him, then we must make it a priority for us as well. If we do not, we may suffer the loss of the very things we seek to make a higher priority in our lives.

The choice is ours, but the most foolish thing we can do is to oppose God. Disobedience to God in this area is to invitate the very disasters that God has used before to make His light shine among the nations. Read the articles starting on page 9 and don't miss John Piper's article on page 14 where he describes God's eternal plan for the nations. It's an eye-opener!

Urbana '96 To Focus on Unreached Peoples

This year the Urbana '96 missions convention, sponsored by Inter- Varsity Christian Fellowship, will feature an exciting new focus on unreached peoples. Beginning Dec. 27th, around 17,000 students will be learning about and praying for Joshua Project 2000 and the efforts to reach the 1,700 unreached peoples with over 10,000 population. These Urbana students will be divided into 1,700 groups of ten-- one group for each of the peoples listed on the Joshua Project 2000 list. Each prayer group will have a simple profile for specifics on how to pray for their people. Pray that God will touch the hearts of these students and lead many into frontier missions on behalf of the unreached peoples.