Thots On My Romania Mission Trip

I just can’t believe the support I’m getting toward my mission trip to Romania in April!  I praise the Lord, and I thank my friends and brothers and sisters in Christ.  It’s just amazing!  I’ve nearly reached my goal already, and still have two weeks to go before it’s due (I’ve only known it was possible for less than two weeks!).  The support yet to come will provide for any extra unforeseen expenses (which I’m sure there will be some).  The speedy responses of everyone, the enthusiasm of the church (First Baptist Church of Bakersfield), and the prayers of all who are interested has made this, my first mission trip, a reality.  

Now, I’ve been given chances to go on other mission trips before.  The responses were nothing like this one.  My wife told me the other day that this is clearly God’s will.  The previous opportunities were merely tests – proving that God was not in them.  She’s right.  The support I’ve gotten this time comes from folks who are able this time.  What a wonderful thing – watching the Lord organize support for such a trip as this one by surrounding me with folks who CAN support this trip, then moving their hearts simultaneously so they WOULD support this trip!  It is a divine thing, indeed!

So I take this opportunity to give the Lord the glory and my friends and brothers and sisters in Christ (even those who could not give financially) a special thank you and bless you.  

Now on the other side of this – to those who prayed and/or gave – I want to encourage you in Christ to remember that your partnership with me is a partnership in heaven, seeking to further the church in God’s Kingdom on earth, and to strengthen what exists in Romania.  Such a partnership will be credited to your account in Heaven – provided that your partnership is done with the motive of doing the will of God rather than the will of Greg (I’m not insinuating anything about anyone, simply stating the obvious on the off-chance that someone might read this and get the wrong idea).  

I count myself privileged, honored, humbled and now commissioned with a weighty responsibility to fulfill my obligations on this mission trip with the utmost of dignity, diligence, and duty.  I am honored to represent not only the United States, the Southern Baptists of Missouri, Howell Baptist Association, and First Baptist Church of Bakersfield, but I am privileged especially to represent the Great “I Am.”  For a little over a week in Romania, I will be part of a team of God’s servants chosen to do a work with consequences that I may only see and appreciate in eternity.  I am humbled by the fact that my educational experience is probably less than that of most of the others – I’m not yet through seminary – yet I’ve been called to preach by the King of Kings.  I truly will do everything within my power, to yield to the Lord, to be dignified, diligent and dutiful in fulfilling my responsibilities.

It is for this reason that I covet your prayers – your sincere and earnest pleadings of the Most High God – that I be, like the apostle Peter immediately following Pentecost, bold and powerful in my preaching, clear and articulate in my explanation of the gospel, and that I, like the apostle Paul, would not go with flowery speech, but in the power of the Holy Spirit so that He will get all the glory for what is done and I will hinder it not with my flesh.