"Say Cheese!"
By Roger Carswell
I have always been challenged by the words of Hudson Taylor, the founder of the China Inland Mission when he said. ''lf I had a thousand lives. I would give them all to China''. If I had so many lives, I wonder if I would be tempted even if for just one of them, to be something other than being an evangelist? Those who know me well will not be surprised to read that there is something within me which would quite like to try my hand at business. When the work of evangelism gets tough, I confess that l have allowed my imagination to dwell on alternatives. I love cheese. l've even mused on the idea of a super-chain of take-away foods offering different flavours of cheese on toast. I feel sure that ''Say Cheese'' could be as popular as McDonalds and...
Enough of dreaming - God has called me to something else. But I'm not the first to think like this. One far greater than me allowed his imagination to wander. The OId Testament prophet Jeremiah carried a burden which seemed unbearable and his concern for his people was beyond his ability to cope. From the depth of his heart he cried: ''Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that l might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!
''Oh, that I had in the wilderness a lodging place for travellers; that I might leave my people, And go from theml'' Jeremiah 9 v. l &2
A local wayside bed and breakfast could be a marvellous opportunity for a man to meet with travellers and indeed witness to them, but Jeremiah knew that he had not been called to run an inn. I am aware of some fine evangelistic cafes and hostels. Hoteliers are well able to glorify the Lord in their secular employment, but not if the Lord has clearly directed them to something else. For Jeremiah to do anything other than being a prophet who would ''root out, pull down, destroy, throw down, build and plant'' (Jeremiah I v.5& I 0) would have been at best a dangerous distraction and at worst an act of arrogant disobedience. To consider deviation from duty is not new. Moses made his excuses, Elijah ran into the wilderness and the Psalmist longed for the wings of a dove. Others' needs and our duties can appear overwhelming. The feeling of ''so much to do and so little time to do it in'' can lead to despair. Frankly, seeing the sins of the world around and mentally dwelling on the lostness of the lost at times causes me inward, physical pain. But any sense of hurt should drive us to the Lord, not to the dereliction of duty.
As far as my fantasies are concerned. you will be pleased to know that ''Say Cheese'' has not yet opened! I feel fairly sure that even if town planners gave permission for such a place, the ultimate Planner of Lives would not. God is, after all, ''the God of my life''. (Psalm 42 v. 8). However, there are times when it is good to ask ourselves if we have drifted away from what ought to be the main commitment of our lives. A former policeman explained the tactics of roving bands of thieves. He said that they enter a shop as a group. One or two separate themselves from the group while the others sort a loud commotion in another section of the shop. This gets the attention of the shop keepers and customers. As everyone's attention is turned to the disturbance, the accomplices fill their pocked with anything and everything, leaving before anyone suspect anything. Hours later, when the shop owner discovers what has happened, it is too late. He has been robbed.
Distraction is deadly. We have only one short life. Sooner than we realise, the years will have fled, and the opportunities to serve Christ here on earth will have gone for ever. AII that we are or have or hope to be is to be devoted (afresh?) to the Lord who gave us His dear Son. Times may be hard, and tough may be the hearts of the people we are trying to reach, but we are still under marching orders from our Master, and His arm has not become short so that He cannot save. Jeremiah knew this, and within a few verses of his complaint, we find him again proclaiming, ''Thus says the Lord of hosts.'' He was put in the stocks, lowered by ropes into the miry dungeon, mocked, derided, accused of treachery, opposed by false prophets, forcibly carried to Egypt and repeatedly imprisoned. But this man of strife and contention went on steadily delivering his message for over forty years. The word was in his heart as a burning fire shut up in his bones.
To hold back from preaching the Word of God was a weariness in itself, and he concluded that he could not. (Jeremiah 20 v.9). God calls us each to different spheres of work, influence and ministry, and whatever that is, is not to be our area of concern ( I Corinthians 7 v.20-2 l ). The Lord has scattered us that we might produce fruit wherever we are. Those in secular employment are able to be in daily contact with people whose life-work is in ''full-time'' Christian service. Whether "over-timers'' or "full-timers'', each Christian is called to proclaim the Word of God to the world. We are to live for Christ and seek to make Him known to everyone. We each need to ask ourselves if anything is distracting us from this supreme calling. Satan uses legitimate concerns as well as blatant sins to swerve us from the course of duty which is the Lord's commission to us. But no business, pleasure, pastime, cause or concern is worthy in comparison to the overwhelming need to urgently reach men and women with the gospel.
Whatever the cost or the consequences, surely we will want to discipline ourselves, and arrange our priorities and plans so that our life's work is given to actual, ''eyeball to eyeball'' evangelism. So, farewell to ''Say Cheese''. This life has been bought at a price, and is committed to glorifying God in body and in spirit which are God's. (I Corinthians 6 v.20). I have been to the cross, and cannot let anything deflect me from going straight forward.