Imagine you are unreached. You have never heard the everlasting Gospel, and you will likely never hear of Jesus and His gift of salvation unless someone crosses oceans and cultures to share their merciful Creator God with you.
Picture yourself sitting in a high-rise apartment in the concrete jungle of Kuala Lumpur trying to make sense of Allah. Your religious instructors tell you that the scriptures can only truly be understood in Arabic, a language completely foreign to you. Although they have memorized the text of the sacred book, they themselves barely understand the language. You wonder: Can God hear the heart cries of someone who longs to know Him? Can He hear me as I plead for His presence?
Picture yourself in Nepal on a Buddhist pilgrimage. You have traveled many days to reach Lumbini, the birthplace of Buddha, hoping to discover peace and hope. Instead you are met by voracious priests eager to separate you from your offerings, hawkers urging you to buy their carvings for your home shrine, and beggars and thieves who prey on the pious. Does God inhabit a stone, or silver, or gold? You wonder. Surely the Creator of all cannot be created by His creatures. Who can tell you of the true, living God?
Picture yourself in India in a Hindu temple by the Ganges River. A beloved family member has died, and you watch as flames consume their funeral pyre. What remains will be cast into the sacred waters. As you listen to the drone of the priest’s words, you are struck by the terrifying thought: Maybe the stories and rituals I have been taught since birth are as empty and meaningless as this priest’s chanting. Is there a God of ultimate truth—a God who can conquer death?
But you are not one of the unreached. You are a converted, committed Christian who loves Jesus with all your heart, and you want others to know Him so they can experience the joy of having their prayers answered by the One who hears their supplications. You have experienced death in baptism and the thrill of new birth, and you can confidently proclaim that your Savior has conquered sin and the grave.
Go to the unreached. Go to the poor and desperate, the tired and confused. Go and bring them light and truth, peace and hope, victory and joy. Go, tell them of Jesus!
