Editor’s Note: The AMI QT devotionals from Jan. 18-22 are provided by Pastor Ryun Chang (Ph.D.) who is the AMI Teaching Pastor. He and Insil have been married for 28+ years and they have three children: Christy (teacher), Joshua (grad student) and Justin (college freshman). They live in Philadelphia.
Devotional Thoughts for Today
Acts 2:7-12
Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? 9 Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome 11 (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!” 12 Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, “What does this mean?”
Genesis 11:7-9
Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”
8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.
Whenever the late evangelist Chun Suk Lee, a physically imposing man, spoke, people listened; I certainly did in 1982 when he said to me, “God gave you the gift of language.” I had no clue as to what he meant.
We love Acts 2 because the 120 people “were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues” (v. 4). But what we often ignore is connecting this event with the entirety of what Jesus said ten days earlier. Of course, it’s easy to see why we become enamored with the first part of Acts 1:8: “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you.” But some quickly associate this power with the ability to claim health and wealth from God. Had they read the rest, they would’ve realized that the power was given so that we can testify of Christ “to the ends of the earth” (i.e., all nations).
Nations or tribes (etnos) were birthed on the day when God confused the language of men. What was a common speech up to that point, which unified men in defiance against God (the Tower of Babel), became so diverse that men, now unable to understand each other, “scattered over all the earth.”
However, at Pentecost, God, after gathering all nations (symbolically) scattered in confusion, began implementing the long awaited program of making them one again, not through a common speech but through the Holy Spirit, as Paul says, “We were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks” (1 Cor. 12:13). Understanding and wonder replaced confusion and bewilderment as if God were saying, “I’ll redeem the nations that bear my curse.”
While I was becoming fluent in Spanish in Mexico where I served as a missionary, I wondered whether this was what Evangelist Lee meant. Perhaps. But the language that we need to gain fluency is the gospel that bears witness of Christ who was “slain, and with [his] blood . . . purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation” (Rev. 5:9), so that they may be one worshiping body before God (7:9). That is why we do missions. Now, let’s get busy!
Prayer
Lord, You are the God of redemption, and for that I am infinitely grateful. Like useless and rusty junk, we could’ve easily been discarded for our sins, but You saw fit to send your Son to take our place to redeem us. Now that I realize that You want to redeem the nations, may I become a mission-minded Christian. Amen.
Bible Reading for Today: Genesis 17
Lunch Break Study
Read Jonah 4:5-11
Jonah had gone out and sat down at a place east of the city. There he made himself a shelter, sat in its shade and waited to see what would happen to the city. 6 Then the Lord God provided a leafy plant and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head to ease his discomfort, and Jonah was very happy about the plant. 7 But at dawn the next day God provided a worm, which chewed the plant so that it withered. 8 When the sun rose, God provided a scorching east wind, and the sun blazed on Jonah’s head so that he grew faint. He wanted to die, and said, “It would be better for me to die than to live.”
9 But God said to Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?” “It is,” he said. “And I’m so angry I wish I were dead.” 10 But the Lord said, “You have been concerned about this plant, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. 11 And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?”
Question to Consider
- In what sense does this dialogue between God and Jonah reveal God’s heart? Keep in mind that these Ninevites (i.e., Assyrians) were cruel and ruthless people.
- What did God want to show Jonah through the object lesson of a leafy plant that died over night?
- There is no question that AMI takes missions seriously. In light of the morning QT and the Jonah narrative, what should be our motive for doing missions?
Notes
- Jonah hated these Ninevites for what they had done against Israel—and they no doubt deserved it. However, here we see an amazing concern God has for these pagan Gentiles: “Should I not have concern for . . . more than a 120,000 people” who are spiritually blind? Those who say that God championed only the Jews in the Old Testament obviously have never read Jonah.
- God pointed out three things about Jonah: first, he cared more for silly plants than people; two, he cared more for his own comfort than eternal damnation that the Ninevites were about to suffer; third, God was using Jonah in spite of his immaturity and selfishness, not because of his greatness.
- We do missions to redeem the nations. To accomplish this, we are to make disciples of all nations (Matt. 28:19), i.e., people who don’t look like us. Our purpose for reaching to these nations is so that all nations are represented when the redeemed are gathered to worship God at the “wedding supper of the Lamb” (Rev. 7:9; 19:9).
Evening Reflection
Before wrapping up this day, let’s pray for the missionaries. Of course, AMI has its own missionaries: Kate, Paul, Nate, John, Esther, Kelly, Billy, Sung, Christina and Eun Mi in E. Asia. Also, don’t forget our interns sent from respective AMI churches. I am sure you know other, non-AMI missionaries. I do too and I pray for them regularly just as I pray for ours. Pray for open doors, wisdom, health and protection.
I wonder how Jerry Rankin, then-President of the International Mission Board, felt as the vote was being counted. In 2005, the board members of this Southern Baptist Convention organization voted on whether to accept anyone who speaks in tongues as its missionary candidates. The board overwhelmingly decided against it. Rankin, who had been speaking in tongues for 30 years, couldn’t have felt too comfortable.
Surely, no likes to wait in line—especially for a long time. However, if we want something bad enough, we’re willing to put up with a sleepless night, shiver in the cold, and wait in order to get that thing—in my case (1980), it was to purchase a ticket to the Bruce Springsteen concert. But it was pure elation once I had the ticket in my pocket, even though it cost me a night’s sleep.
What’s harder than replacing Tom Brady as the quarterback for New England Patriots? Try replacing the father of a teenager girl. That’s the predicament an old friend faced when he married a woman with a daughter in the middle school. Unfortunately, to the daughter he was never more than an unworthy replacement—it didn’t end well.
Ironically, the Civil Rights Movement, led by Baptist minister Martin Luther King, wasn’t the most popular movement then, even among African-Americans. That honor was shared by the militant Black Panther Party that launched violence against the white power structure, and the Nation of Islam that aimed, not for racial desegregation, but a complete separation from whites. Its leader Malcolm X even called King a “‘chump’ and other civil rights leaders ‘stooges’ of the white establishment.’”
Over the holidays, I spent time with my extended family that included a little boy who is about to turn two. One activity he enjoyed was building with magnetic tiles. He made a tower taller than himself, but it was top-heavy and started swaying. We expected him to delight with glee when it fell over with a big crash; possibly tears when it fell over because his creation was no more. What we didn’t expect was for him to hang on to the tower, standing on his tiptoes to support it. He whimpered, on the verge of tears, because he clearly did not want the tower to fall and was holding it up with his own strength.
Over the holiday break, my husband and I visited Los Angeles with my parents. Our only non-food related destination was the Getty Villa, along the Pacific coast. It is a museum established by the late oil tycoon J. Paul Getty that showcases ancient artifacts from Greece and Rome. Among the many artifacts, we saw statues of household gods found in Roman empire from the first century. It was amazing to see what we had read in the Bible come to life before our eyes.
Seeing statues of golden calves, sacrificial altars and tangible likenesses of deities at the museum made me think of the things we bow down to in our modern day that may not be made of gold or wood. In our day, we can worship our careers, relationships, success in the eyes of the world as defined by money or approval, or even righteousness through religious duties. This happens when we let good things become the ultimate thing. It can happen when hard times that we don’t understand come our way and we decide God doesn’t know best, but we do. The Israelites struggled with this too, when they complained about their time in the desert and made the golden calf. Maybe we aren’t so different after all. Let us come to the Lord with humble hearts, asking Him to reveal our idols and the help of the Holy Spirit to return to our first love (Rev. 2:4)
Moody Bible Institute and Wheaton College are leading institutions of higher learning for evangelicals. So, upon noting that the New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman studied there, we would expect to learn a great deal from him. That, unfortunately, is not what you will get from Ehrman, who heads the religious-studies department at the University of North Carolina.
This isn’t a forum for an in-depth discussion, but many Christians have erroneous notions about the inspiration of the Scripture. While no one is certain about what inspiration exactly entails, it doesn’t mean superseding differences in each writer’s observation, depending on the perspective taken and culture. It is quite plausible that “Judas hanged himself and that the rope broke, causing him to fall” (Baker). Regarding the field, Judas, in effect, bought it since the chief priest purchased it with his money. Evidently, Matthew accentuated the tragic end of the betrayer (suicide) while Luke focused on its irony: Judas was the first to be buried in the accursed field. Had Ehrman been taught right, perhaps he wouldn’t have taken that fatal road.
The TV show 48 Hours deals with murders involving middle-class Americans who have good jobs and live in nice houses. Viewing just a few episodes is all it would take to notice two repetitive themes regarding whodunit and why. As to who, likely your spouse; as to why, money! In one episode, a young professional with an M.B.A. kills his beautiful wife, even shooting himself 4 times to make the police believe that it was a robbery gone bad. But once the police discovered the $2 million life insurance on the wife, they had the motive to go with his inconsistent testimony.
The Bible, however, gives a simpler reason why Judas “served as guide for those who arrested Jesus”: greed. After all, Judas said to Jesus’ enemy, “What are you willing to give me if I deliver him over to you.” By all account, “thirty pieces of silver” was a large sum of money then (as much as $15,000 today). An older John, recalling the events that occurred some 50 years earlier, wrote, “. . . [Judas] was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it” (Jn. 12:6). In other words, betraying Jesus for a small fortune was too good of an opportunity for this small-time thief to pass up.
When I told my father, who was not even a churchgoer at the time, of my desire to enter the ministry, he was relieved, hoping that perhaps my partying days were over. On the other hand, the parents of my seminary roommate “Daniel,” who were good Christians by all accounts, weren’t happy when their MIT-attending son, whom they hoped would become a physician, told them the same. So to calm their displeasure, Daniel applied to several medical schools and prayed that none would accept him; God obliged, and that’s how he ended up in seminary.