"If you don't go..."

I've often heard it said of missions, "If you don't go, who will?"

 

While it's true that it takes action to take the gospel to the world, to phrase it in that context is misleading and blasphemous. God commands us to go because he is sovereign Lord of our lives. He doesn't need us to reach others. God can speak through storms, through trials, through all of Creation. God does not need anything of us, and the Christian who appeals to the ego (or tries to instill a sense of guilt) in others in order to recruit workers for the harvest is doing a disservice to his brothers and sisters, to the unsaved, and to the Lord.

 

We go because God is our Lord and Master. It is he who works through us to save others. It is by his hand that we and they are saved, and by no other way.

 

He must become greater. We must become less. "If you don't go..." God can still do his marvelous work of salvation. He doesn't need us. We are completely helpless without him. We go because he is our Master, not because we are needed.