Journal: Reformation and Revival
Volume: RAR 02:3 (Summer 1993)
Article: Global Evangelization and God’s Sovereignty
Author: Jim Elliff

RAR 2:3 (Summer 1993) p. 59

Global Evangelization and God’s Sovereignty

Jim Elliff

When I mention the term “evangelizing,” I know what comes to your mind. It is the same sort of thing that comes to my mind: first is the word guilt, and second is the word fear. If I enlarge that a bit and say you are not only responsible to evangelize but you are responsible for evangelizing all nations (Jesus did tell us in Matthew 28 to make disciples of all of the nations) we have even more guilt and even more fear. There is a great weight of responsibility put on top of us. We know that we are inadequate and we know every time we speak of Jesus Christ we flounder for words and cannot seem to get our thoughts together. We don’t seem to have a feel for what it means to share the gospel effectively. Yet God has said that He has given us this message and He has given us this responsibility.

There is a fabricated story I heard years ago about the life of Jesus. He had lived, died, and returned to heaven. An angel came to Him and said, “What did You do?” He answered, “Well, I lived a perfect life on the earth. I obeyed everything that the Father told Me to do. I did it up to the very last moment. As the perfect Lamb, I sacrificed my life on the cross so that men’s sins could be atoned for, satisfying My Father’s wrath. I was buried, was raised, and ascended to be here. I have charged eleven men to carry the message of salvation through My name throughout the known world in such a way that it will continue to reproduce itself throughout all generations until I finally come back and the work is finished.” The angel looked at Him with incredulity and said, “What if Your plan fails?” Jesus replied, “I have no other plan.”

Starting from those original eleven men, God gave the responsibility to you and to me—He lays it on top of us. We have a tendency to feel very much under the pile about that sort of thing. But He has no other plan.

Missiologists tell us that the idea of “all nations” in the Scripture is synonymous with today’s term “people groups.”

RAR 2:3 (Summer 1993) p. 60

People groups are groups of individuals who are in some sense unified culturally. For instance, in India there are many people groups isolated by their language. They need their own particular witness indigenously—through their own people and to their own people. When Christ and writers of the Bible spoke of evangelizing the world, they were talking about evangelizing people groups. God’s intention is that people like you and me take on the responsibility of reaching every individual people group in all the world.

Though I am not always enamored by statistic...