"Missions is not the ultimate goal of the church. Worship is. Missions exist because worship doesn't. Worship is ultimate, not missions, because God is ultimate, not man. When this age is over, and the countless millions of the redeemed fall on their faces before the throne of God, missions will be no more. It is a temporary necessity. But worship abides forever. Worship, therefore, is the fuel and goal of missions. It's the goal of missions because in missions we simply aim to bring the nations into the white-hot enjoyment of God's glory...But worship is also the fuel of missions. Passion for God in worship precedes the offer of God in preaching. You can't commend what you don't cherish...Where passion for God is weak, zeal for missions will be weak. Even outsiders feel the disparity between the boldness of our claim upon the nations and the blandness of our engagement with God."
John Piper, Let The Nations Be Glad
The above quote from John Piper turns several questions in my mind. Have we made it possible for some churches to worship in "blandness" because the missing zeal is hidden by aggressive missionary endeavors? Are those endeavors really Christ-honoring if they are not driven by our passionate desire for God himself? Why have we allowed our churches, those particularly here in America, to often distance missions, both foreign and domestic, from the Gospel? If we tire of missions, do we realize that we are in essence tiring of worship? How are we motivating people to participate in missions? By guilt or grace? Can we honestly say that we are participants in genuine worship if we are not driven to show the glory of Jesus to all people, in all places?
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