Living the Adventure Ministries guides the way to a growing relationship with Jesus through mission experiences.
Jesus invited his disciples to travel with him and to live in community together. During their shared times of walking, sitting at meals, and engaging in ministry, they were able to learn from Jesus. There is so much we see in Scripture where Jesus spoke to his disciples, and I wonder how many more amazing conversations happened while Jesus and the disciples were moving about the highways and byways of life together.
God has called Living the Adventure Ministries to engage in this style of ministry through mission experiences. We believe mission experiences are incubators for discipleship, growth, and calling in the lives of those who follow Jesus. We are called to put our faith into action, and as we put our faith into action, we find the Holy Spirit walking with us as we face new struggles, adversities, and experiences. We are called to offer mission experiences as a way of helping people grow in their relationship with Jesus.
In James 2, the author challenges the reader to consider how our faith is lived out in mission. He writes, “But someone will say, ‘You have faith and I have works.’ Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith” (18). He later writes, “You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was brought to completion by the works” (22). He wraps up this section when he writes, “For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead” (26).
Our faith grows as we put it into action. In our mission experiences, we have witnessed people being called into full-time ministry, called to be foster parents, and to make radical changes in their daily lives because they were struggling with bad habits. The Holy Spirit has spoken to people in new ways as we leave the comforts of our daily routine to live in community with people in the villages, communities, and churches where we work. It is amazing to witness the growth in each person who is on the mission team, while we witness growth in the community where we are partnering.
We are called to be active in our faith. This pushes against the blessing mentality of what do I get from God to a place of being a conduit of blessing from God to other people. Audio Adrenaline, a Contemporary Christian Band, shared the song Hands and Feet in the late 1990s. In the lyrics, they sing:
I’ll abandon every selfish thought
I’ll surrender every thing I’ve got
You can have everything I am
And perfect everything I’m not
I am willing, I’m not afraid
You give me strength, when I say
I wanna be your hands
I wanna be your feet
I’ll go where you send me
As we continue to live into our new mission statement, we will be putting a greater emphasis on domestic and international mission experiences. We want to invite people to be active in their faith meeting the needs of people in their own community, while providing opportunities for people to leave the comfort of their homes to be in mission in other parts of the United States and around the world.
How is God calling you to live an active faith of being in mission in your community? How is God calling you to be in mission outside of your community? How is God calling you to support people called to be in mission around the world?
Let’s be the hands and feet of Jesus as we seek to grow in our relationship with Jesus.
Prayer: Lord, thank you for calling us into mission in our community, in our nation, and around the world. Give us strength to serve and witness your power at work in and through us. Give us clear vision of where you want us to serve. In Jesus’ name. Amen.