Thank you so much for
your prayers and support over the past month.
I have been so blessed by your encouragement and excitement about these
next six months in the Dominican Republic and in Peru. As I prepare to go, I have been reading and
studying about missions. I would love
to share with you some of the things that I have learned.
What is missions?
“Missions exists because
worship doesn’t” (John Piper).
Missions is not the goal of the Gospels, worshipping God is. Missions is a temporary necessity. Worship will exist forever, but missions
will only be needed for a time.
Missions strives to gain more worshippers for Christ. Worship “is the goal of missions because in
missions we simply aim to bring the nations into the white-hot enjoyment of
God’s glory” (Piper). Reaching people
through medicine allows an opportunity to share the Gospel with those who may
have never heard of Christ. Through the
work of the Holy Spirit in sharing the Gospel, more people come to worship
Christ. Missions is done for the glory
of God, that He may be given the honor due to His name. (Learned from Let the Nations Be Glad
by John Piper)
Prayer is vital in
missions and vital to life. It is a
wartime walkie-talkie to the general (God).
Through prayer God provides what we need to accomplish the mission. Prayer is our greatest weapon in
missions. “With all prayer and
petition, pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the
alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints, and pray on my
behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth to make
known with boldness the mystery of the gospel” (Ephesians 6:18-19). Please join me in prayer as I prepare to go
and while I am in the foreign mission field.
Please pray that hearts be prepared for the Gospel. Please pray that my Spanish would improve
greatly in a short period of time. And
above all, please pray that God would be glorified through this work and that
we would gain more worshippers of Christ.
As Christians we are
called to suffer for Christ. “If anyone
wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily and
follow Me” (Luke 9:23). Through our suffering,
taking up our cross and following Him, God is glorified. Not only does it aim for deeper faith and
deeper holiness in each one of us, but it also shows the world the supremacy of
God in a way that nothing else can. Through
persecution, the Gospel was spread from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria to the
world. “It is not the missionary
mobilization that any of us would choose.
But it is God’s way” (John Piper).
We would all choose not to suffer, but God can even use our suffering to
draw others to Him. “Unless a grain of
wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears
much fruit” (John 12:24). We all must
be prepared to suffer, so that God may be glorified through us. (Learned from Tortured
for Christ by Richard Wurmbrand)
As a support-raising
missionary, I have to trust God for my finances. I have to trust that the right amount of money will come in
through the Body of Christ to cover ministry expenses. As Christians we are called to a life of
interdependence. Each part depending
upon each other to function together. I
depend on you for support through finances,
through prayer, through encouragement and so much more. I will be sending out monthly letters while
I am in the Dominican Republic and Peru to share with you the blessings of OUR
ministry. Before I leave on May 30, I
need to raise $6527.00 for air travel and the medical trips in the DR. I also need to have $1420.00 pledged to come
in monthly before I leave. So far, I
have been blessed with donations of $5900 for the up front amount and have $330
pledged to come in monthly. Please pray
about how you can be involved in this.
The outskirts of Lima, Peru
“Now to Him who is able to do exceeding abundantly beyond all that we ask or imagine, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.” Ephesians 3:20-21
The
outskirts of Lima, Peru. The Mission
Hospital in the DR.
Brianna Esswein, RN, BSN