March 15, 2010
After thinking about the things that our Iraqi guest told us Sunday, I feel compelled to write about what I believe is our “Macedonian Call.” It is a call to evangelize Muslim nations. More than a third of the WEI students who use the teaching website specify Islam as their faith.
I know that many have your sights set on Romania, Albania, Slovenia, India, Mexico, Brazil, etc., but you know that the Spirit did not allow Paul and his companions to turn northward. Instead, the Spirit pointed them toward the west. It wasn’t until they reached the sea that the Spirit showed them where they were to go—across the Aegean Sea to Macedonia. Could it be that the low number of registrants and students we are getting from certain nations is the Spirit’s way of directing us elsewhere?
Read the last section of Joel Rosenburg’s book, Inside the Revolution, and see if the Spirit does not set your hearts on fire with a desire to evangelize the Muslim world. The Spirit directed Paul to go to a land filled with idols, temples, and so many religions that, in Athens, there was an altar dedicated to “The Unknown God.” We know that radical Islamists will kill anyone who leaves Islam and anyone who teaches people to leave Islam. But Rosenburg tells about the tens of thousands who are leaving Islam for Christ each year. We feel compelled to use WEI’s lessons to teach them the way “more perfectly.”
What do we need to do? We hope, because the Spirit dwells in the hearts of those who read this newsletter, that more people will pick up their mouse and put their fingers to their keyboards and join this missionary journey into the lands where Satan dwells.
Suppose Paul had not gone to Philippi because he was too busy with something else? Would Lydia and her household have found Christ? Would the jailer and his family have found Christ? Will Muslims find Christ because we answer the call? Or will we have to tell God, “Well, I was busy with. . .”? Who else will not have an opportunity to find Christ?
In March 2010, WEI’s teaching website had its biggest month since we began registering and teaching students. Five thousand, nine hundred and three people registered and had the opportunity to study WEI’s Introductory Lesson. Of these, 997 submitted their answers and were assigned to teachers. Thanks to all who participated in this growth—to those who recruited teachers; to teachers who continue to take new students, to those who keep the website operating, and to those who contribute to WEI’s Google advertising budget.
—Bob and Jan Towell
