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7 Bible Verses To Encourage Missionaries

7 Bible Verses To Encourage Missionaries

Last updated on: April 8, 2016 at 9:45 am by Jack Wellman

7 Bible Verses To Encourage Missionaries 2016-04-08T09:45:14-05:00 Jack Wellman

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Here are seven Bible verses that should encourage any missionary.

Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

When missionaries or when any of us share the gospel, we have the same promise that Jesus gave His disciples and that was the Holy Spirit would be with us and that we would be His witnesses throughout all the world. This power doesn’t come from within but from the Holy Spirit and does not depend on the will of man or the strength of the flesh but upon God alone, thankfully (John 1:12-13). Today the gospel has reached every continent and nearly every people group in the world but we can’t forget about our neighbors who live right next door.

Romans 1:16 “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”

This verse is a great memory verse for any Christian but particularly to encourage missionaries because the gospel doesn’t depend upon human power but the gospel comes with its own power; the very power of God. If it did, then many of the things that Jesus said wouldn’t make sense like in John 6:44 where He said “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day.” Trust the Lord of the harvest.

Read 10 more encouraging Bible quotes

First Corinthians 9:16 “For if I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting. For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!”

This verse has the Apostle Paul referring to his overwhelming call of God to preach the gospel. He is so compelled to preach that he feels a woe or judgment of God would be upon Him. He doesn’t just desire to be a missionary; he was called directly by Jesus to be one. He had no other choice much like Jonah but the difference was Paul ran toward his calling while Jonah ran away.

Luke 10:16 “The one who hears you hears me, and the one who rejects you rejects me, and the one who rejects me rejects him who sent me.”

We’re told to go into all the world but for most of us, that’s not possible. That’s where the missionaries come in. They can go for us or in place of us since the vast majority of us can’t go but we can support them with our prayers and with our financial offerings. We might not be called to go into all the world but we’re without excuse if we don’t start with our own neighbor. Every believer is called to that.

Second Timothy 1:7 “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”

As Paul was mentoring Timothy, both in person and in his letters to Timothy (1st and 2nd Timothy), he reminded Timothy that God has not given us a spirit of fear but one that has the power of love and that of a sound mind. He is trying to encourage Timothy, the young evangelist, to keep on preaching the gospel despite the intense persecution going on around him. Perhaps Timothy backed off some because Paul had been imprisoned for the sake of the gospel and maybe Paul know that and so reminded Timothy that the power is not in us but in the gospel.

Acts 20:24 “But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.”

Paul, in his missionary work, had been beaten, stones, whipped, starved, deprived of comfort in the elements and also imprisoned. Paul looked at it in the way that a business owner might look at like; much like the accountant would their debits and their credits. He took an account of the stock of all of his life and then to that of reaching the finishing line in the kingdom and he considered it not worth comparing with the glory that’s coming (Rom 8:18). That’s what missionaries focus on in many cases.

First Corinthians 1:18 “For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

This verse comes very close to Paul’s statement in Romans 1:16 where he wrote that the gospel has its own power but here he admits that it will be foolishness to those who are perishing because the foolish person says there is no God (Psalm 14:1) but that’s no surprise. For those who are being saved, it’s the power of God to save but anyone who’s witnessed for Christ before already knows that we are “to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life” (2nd Cor 2:16a) so “Who is sufficient for these things” (2nd Cor 2:16b)? None are sufficient for this and they don’t need to be; the power belongs to God and it is He Who calls and saves.

Conclusion

If God has placed a burden on your heart to reach the lost in other parts of the world then “go into all the world” (Matt 28:19) with this thought in mind; “Cast your burden on the Lord, And He shall sustain you; He shall never permit the righteous to be moved” (Psalm 55:22) because “God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus” (Phil 4:19). Missionaries operate on a lot of faith in their ministry but missionaries have learned from experience that they can trust God and know that He comes through when the time comes.

Article by Jack Wellman

Jack Wellman is Pastor of the Mulvane Brethren Church in Mulvane Kansas. Jack is also the Senior Writer at What Christians Want To Know whose mission is to equip, encourage, and energize Christians and to address questions about the believer’s daily walk with God and the Bible. You can follow Jack on Google Plus or check out his book Teaching Children the Gospel available on Amazon.

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