International Conference of the Wesleyan Church

I'm not a delegate, but have enjoyed worshiping and learning at the International Conference of the Wesleyan Church last night and today. I grew up around missionaries and have always felt at home with this special breed of person who answers to the call to live long stretches of their lives in a foreign culture so that they can share the good news of Christ. I don't know if that's where the seed in me of loving other languages first came from.

It is quite amazing to me. Look at me or any of the missionaries in the room (for that matter look at those from other countries in the room). We are not powerful or important people. Few in this room are even upper middle class, and many missionaries spend months every few years just trying to scrape together a minimal salary.

Yet we have been around the world. Here I have shaken hands with people from Sierra Leone, Egypt, Haiti, and Puerto Rico. I have greeted others in Arabic, Spanish, and Tagalog (Philippino), sat behind people from Japan and said, "kamsamnida" after hearing from the leader of a Korean group that has more than double the churches we have here in the US. We've heard from people who live in countries they won't even tell us the name of because of the potential threat from radical Muslims, along with a pastor from Pakistan.

It is quite amazing. Want to meet people from all over the world and travel to countless lands? Want to speak a dozen foreign languages? Join a missionary minded church!

The passion to bring good news to the world is contagious in these rooms. There is also wisdom in these rooms. God is bringing people to them. They are not Crusaders.