Most Western lives are highly organized. We have the luxury of seeing what we want to see. We do much seeing. “Be careful little eyes, what we see.” However, sometimes it is not about what we see but what we do not see. There are some things I simply do not want to see because once you see them, you cannot unsee them. That happened to me on a hospital visit when a man wanted me to see his colostomy bag. Before I could say “No thank you,” it was too late. I was traumatized. This is one of the hazards of ministry. Though I jest, there is a much more serious matter of things most of us do not want to see. Paul was planning on heading north when the Holy Spirit had other ideas. In a vision, Paul saw a man from Macedonia calling out for him to come over and help him. This vision to enter Europe ultimately led to Paul’s execution. Peter had a vision he did not want to see. It was a sheet down from heaven filled with all kinds of detestable (to him as a Jew) unclean animals. God called him into a Gentile world that tested his conscience and stretched him to the limits.
In 1985 I saw something I will never be able to un-see. It was a land called Haiti. I saw poverty, unlike anything I had ever experienced. I saw raw political unrest. I saw people everywhere scrambling like ants, just trying to survive daily. Children were orphaned and ill-clad. Men were hardened by hours in the sun or looking for work they could never find. Women were destined to try to eke out a living carrying bundles of charcoal on their heads or five-gallon buckets of water. Their washing machine was often a filthy stream and a rock. But I saw something else. I saw men and women hungering and thirsting for the gospel, for some hope in a dark world. I saw the sacrifice that I seldom saw in American churches. I saw joy amid sorrow and struggle. I saw people who clung to their Bibles when they could afford one. I was hooked. I could never un-see this mission field, ripe for harvest.
If you could get a vision for the mission fields of this world, your life would always be changed forever. Mission work requires the eyes of your heart to see the fields. This is why Jesus said, “Lift up your eyes and see…” CMI wants to show you the fields. Our web page is filled with images of your brothers and sisters, people you have never met but who depend on you to be able to reach the lost in their part of the world. Won’t you take a few minutes to look? Seeing is believing. Look into the eyes of those you see. Hear them silently say, “Thank you.” Here is where you can go for your opportunity to see…cmiministeries.org.