A new hymn holds a refrain that was frequently sung around the Radius International campus this year:
“I belong to the Lord, I am not my own.
I will honor Him for this I know
I belong to the Lord, I am not my own.”

The tune is certainly catchy and well crafted, but what drove the constant melody on campus is the simple yet foundational truth that our calling is directly linked to our identity and ownership. I am a recent graduate from Radius International and much of the training I received was established on that same theme: a missionary’s call to gospel proclamation among the unreached flows from our belonging to the Lord.

If the Lord’s grace is gifts that we don’t deserve, then serving Him in ways unique to this life is nothing short of grace to us from His tender hand. Why would the Lord choose us to be heralds of His gospel message?

Profound to me is what stands at the core of this call to follow the Lord: a gracious invitation into participation. If the Lord’s grace is gifts that we don’t deserve, then serving Him in ways unique to this life is nothing short of grace to us from His tender hand. Why would the Lord choose us to be heralds of His gospel message? Who are we to have such an eternally significant task extended to us? I am grateful and in awe that the Lord would graciously invite us, His church, into partaking in His kingdom work!

I’ve been increasingly grappling with the reality that this invitation into participation is also an invitation into a life of dying. Could it be that servitude to the King and the way to glory, joy, and fullness is not through escaping what is menial or painful in this life, but by entering into those things? By entering into a life of dying? In Matthew 16:24-28, Jesus’s invitation into participation is, “Take up your cross and follow me.” In John 12:24, this is illustrated using a seed. Unless it shrivels and dies it can never come to life. Maybe what looks like giving away our life through dying to the things of this world, to myself, to temporal glory and joy, is, in actuality, a gaining of something that this life could never offer, resurrection into newness of life. Christ as our prize is sufficient, but maybe a life gladly spent in service to the Lord is itself a deeper joy than anything that the escape from death could promise us. As we live a life of dying, praise the Lord for resurrection hope, for in all of the dying we are actually entering into fullness of life!

The task of going to an unreached language group to plant a church often feels like signing up for a life of dying. In a very real way, some of the things I hold so dear or fear losing are what is required in the cost of being sent. (Luke 9:23–24) It’s a strange thing to be thankful for something so painful. But if the gospel is going to be communicated effectively, it requires sacrificial living. Setting aside preferences, cultural norms, and personal rights and privileges is essential in order to keep from building unnecessary barriers to others hearing and understanding the Truth. (Gal. 2:20) I don’t want a life of wanting, of separation from my family, of inevitable trial and suffering, of potential loneliness and uncertainty. Although the ultimate reward is great, the dying is still death. The call is not to suffer for suffering’s sake, but maybe a loss of these sweet, yet temporal, things are what it looks like for the seed to shrivel up and die in order to experience resurrection. (John 12:24-26) Therefore, giving up everything for the sake of Christ’s name is actually not loss at all, but an entrance into a deeper joy: service to the King and the nations brought before His throne!

Radius provided a helpful context to wrestle with surrendering myself to the Lord in the reality of the task ahead. Often in class, we would talk about “pounding your stake in the ground ever deeper.” Not in defiance or stubbornness, but in the immovable conviction of God’s sovereignty and in surrender to and trust in the One to whom we belong. If the purpose of our life is to be spent for an end beyond ourselves, then being called as servants of Christ, to pick up our cross and live a life of dying, is cause for joy, thanksgiving, and eager participation. If I have been won by the Lord then all of me belongs to Him. If the Father gave His best, His own Son, to me, then what do I have that is not already His? I ought to then give my best; my life, my all to Him. “I belong to the Lord, I am not my own.”

“A little sacrifice for the cause of Christ is not worth naming; and I feel it a privilege, of which I am entirely undeserving, to have had it in my power to sacrifice my all for him who hesitated not to lay down his life for sinners.”    ~ Ann Judson