If you want to read some thriller stories, pick up a biography about Hudson Taylor, David Livingstone, or William Carey.

If you want to be stirred by heroic endurance and courage, read about Adoniram Judson, Mary Slessor, or Amy Carmichael.

These Christians—and a host of others—saw God do the impossible in foreign fields. They took seriously Christ’s command to give the entire world the Gospel, and they acted. And because they acted, to this day there remains fruit to their efforts.

But God’s power and our obedience are not limited to yesteryear. I hunger to see God’s work flourish today.

When all we do is talk about works of God in the past and don’t care to dream for the future, we are in a state of decay.

There are more people without Christ today than there ever were. There is a greater need for missionaries and church planters today than ever before.

When we view the overwhelming need of the present through the lens of past miracles, we see incredible potential for God to work mightily through us today.

I thank God for missionaries and church planters who are right now on the front lines of spiritual warfare—daring to claim cities, villages, towns, and even jungles for the Lord. I thank God for those who are sowing and reaping the seed of the Gospel in places where I will never go—saturating communities with God’s Word.

If we want to see the miracles of the past repeated today, we must do today what the heroes of the past did.

We must surrender to the Holy Spirit’s work in us. We must sacrifice. We must give. We must go. We must pray. And we must rely on the power of God alone.

Note: These next few days our church is involved in our annual missions conference. Feel free to join us for the conference via live stream. Find a schedule of the services at lancasterbaptist.org/missions-conference.