I heard a very powerful message by Dr George Wood, the General Superintendent of the General Council of the Assemblies of God (USA), at the recent Empowered21 London Congress. His message was based on the well known story of Jesus feeding the five thousand. Although I’ve heard many messages preached on this notable event in Scripture, Dr Wood’s sermon was simple and powerful. He surfaced three truths that we, as believers, must grasp and internalise. First, we must never be afraid of the size of the task. Second, we must not be discouraged by the little we have. And finally, we must never, never leave the Lord out of the picture. Simply put, with God on our side, we can accomplish great things – even with our meagre resources!
Dr Wood used many testimonies of great men and women of God, both renowned and unknown, whom God has used throughout human history to do mighty things for Him. Immediately, I was reminded of our 1728 goal – that every 1728 disciple finds his/her 12. I understand that it is a great feat because we ask relatively new believers, with little experience in the ministry, to win and disciple 12 persons. Yes, the size of the challenge is great and our resources are limited. Yet, our God is great, if only we believe.
One of Dr Wood’s illustrations encouraged me greatly. He said this: “Over and over, the church of Jesus Christ has faced this great task – on the day of Pentecost, there were 120 spirit-filled believers, and it’s estimated that the then-population of the known world was about 250 million people. That’s over two million people for each spirit-empowered believer. And they were to do that in a generation without the Internet, without social media, without trains, planes and automobiles, without even bicycles or the printing press – and they did it. The task then was great. But you know what, if you take that same equation of one spirit-empowered believer for every two-plus million people and jam it into present-day Europe, it will only, in one generation, take 450 spirit-empowered believers to reach 900 million people with the gospel in this generation, and there are more than 450 people in this room.”
Our God is the God of the impossible, if only we would move out in faith with our five loaves and two fishes. This axiom remains true: “It’s not about your ability, but your availability.” As His Word assures us in Ephesians 3:20 - 21 (NKJV), “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.”
- Senior Pastor Lawrence Khong