The Ultimate Sacrifice

Sandra Chowns

Accountant for World Radio

Have you ever gone to church, sat in your favorite pew, and heard this announcement, “Today family, we have a guest speaker. He is a visiting missionary so let’s give him our full attention”? I wonder how many of us have rolled our eyes and thought to ourselves, “Oh no, not again. If I had known a missionary was speaking I would have just stayed home. How many times must we hear about people so far away in places we can’t even pronounce?” All the while we are forgetting about the passage in Mark 16:15 that states, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation.” I, like many of you, find myself convicted with guilt and shame about those feelings. Complacency is just what Satan wants us to feel concerning the lost. And friends, you and I must change. It truly is our responsibility to do all we can to help spread the word of salvation to as many people as possible, and to hopefully help others do the same.

 Recently, some friends and I went to see the release of the movie “The End of the Spear”. This movie was based on the true story of five young men and their families who chose to become missionaries in Ecuador. We watched the many compelling acts of unselfishness, calm bravery, and ultimately the laying down of these young men’s lives at the hands of the ones they were desperately trying to teach. Their remarkable faith in our God moved my friends and me to tears. One scene stands out when Nate, the missionary pilot, was getting ready to leave camp to make his first personal contact with the tribe. Nate’s son looked his father straight in the eyes and asked, “If you are attacked are you going to fight back with your gun?” That daddy looked his young son square in the eyes and said, “No son, you see they are not ready for heaven, but we are.” Those men could have fought to save their own lives, but they chose not to do so. They knew the people weren’t ready to meet Jesus. It was the sacrifice of their lives that ultimately allowed other family members to return to this tribe and teach them of the love of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Most of us have heard stories about missionaries on foreign soil, but this story brings to life everything that we have heard. It caused all of us to reflect on our own lives and compelled us to ask ourselves the hard question, “How have I sacrificed in order to help spread the Word of God to those who have never heard the name Jesus?”

These missionary families are really not that different from you and me. Just like you, they had a love for people they never met. They had hopes and dreams of sharing a gift that only our Father in heaven could provide. And thankfully, these families were willing to leave the comforts of home in order to share this wonderful gift with one of the most savage and vicious tribes in Ecuador. Most of us wouldn’t be willing to sell everything we had and move to a foreign land, risking life and limb in order to spread the Word of Jesus. God gave each of us talents and abilities to help accomplish our Lord’s commands. Partnering with World Radio is one of those ways.

World Radio broadcasts allow each of us to personally participate in spreading the Word through the airwaves. We are so blessed to have the availability of radios. They are fairly inexpensive to own and are capable of picking up signals from far off. There are no televisions or any other type of modern communications in some of the areas that we are targeting. So it is imperative that we continue airing Christian broadcasts through World Radio. World Radio is also blessed to work with national Christians in many countries, enabling the masses to better hear and understand the Word in their own language as it fits their culture.

We give praise to God that there are brethren with a passion for lost souls who are willing to become missionaries in very far-off places. And we also praise God for your support of World Radio, a support that allows the Word to be aired to distant places with hard to pronounce names for us North Americans.

If you find that you are already doing all that you can do to further the spreading of the Gospel, we at World Radio want to thank you from the bottom of my hearts. But, if you like me find yourself challenged to do more, will you prayerfully consider financially supporting World Radio’s wonderful ministry? Please continue to pray that God’s Word will touch the hearts and souls of those who have no hope, and that the light of His goodness and mercy will shine through the darkness.

Here are some of the ways that you can help:

Gifts of Cash of course are the simplest and easiest ways to give.

Gifts of Appreciated Property create great benefits to you the donor, such as being able to receive regular tax savings, and avoiding the capital gains tax on qualified assets given for charitable use.

A Will or Living Trust can establish a lasting legacy, one that will continually provide funds that will help spread the Good News of Jesus Christ throughout the lands.

A Life Insurance Policy that has fulfilled its original intent could offer excellent tax benefits.

A Gift Annuity that provides an income and offers a tax advantage for you and or someone else is an option that offers a way of receiving regular payments for life or another period of time.