Macedonia Is Still Calling

By Don Matchett

Someone said, “The hardest thing about finishing a project is starting it.” To be honest, I do not find this to be the case. Starting projects is easy. The hardest thing about a project is actually finishing it—with excellence.

Have you started a project you didn’t finish? Perhaps your upstairs bathroom still needs baseboards and fixtures installed. Maybe a book sits on your nightstand with a forgotten bookmark holding the last page you read. I think we all have projects that slide to the back burner because something else claimed priority.

A few years ago, we began a huge remodeling project of our home in Arkansas. We worked tirelessly to finish the nine-month project. And we did. Well, almost. We left a few things to finish later. Almost two years later, to be precise. These unfinished projects occupied my thoughts daily. Actually, the thought of leaving them undone made me anxious. I couldn’t stop thinking about “the unfinished” until I marked the last task off.

Free Will Baptists have worked with tireless determination to open new fields around the world. Through the years, not only have these fields been opened, they have matured. Now, national leaders plan and lead their works in several countries. However, this does not mean our task has been completed. Much work remains. Our friends and fellow Free Will Baptists rely on us to help them evangelize, disciple, send medical assistance, and build churches. The work is not finished.

I love the story of Paul’s Macedonian vision in Acts 16. The Holy Spirit closed doors for Paul to continue evangelizing Asia. Finally, Paul received a vision of a Macedonian man who beckoned, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” Paul responded, and met Lydia of Thyatira.

A seller of purple, she became the first European convert and a great herald of the gospel. I like to think she continued in her prosperous business and became a huge financial supporter of those early missionary endeavors.

After opening Macedonia to the gospel, Paul continued visiting until he was jailed. Even from his jail cell, he wrote to and about the Macedonians. Why? He knew his work was incomplete. The Macedonians still needed him. The work was still unfinished.

Come Over and Help Us

Today, real people, in real conversations, call, “Come over and help us.” People like Pastor Kouassi N’Guettia who pastors two churches in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire, West Africa. One of the churches he pastors desperately needs an expansion of their unfinished church building.

Brother Sie Noufé serves as both pastor of a local church and president of the Association of Free Will Baptists in Côte d’Ivoire. He believes God has appointed him to be a pastor to pastors. In his words, “There is so much work to be done, and we cannot do it alone.”
And what about Veronica Reyes Solano? She leads a teen camp in Cuba with few resources. How many more teenagers could the camp reach with the Good News of Jesus Christ if she had adequate resources?

We can’t forget Pastor Clovis Leandro and his wife Cristina. They work alone in the state of Alagoas, Brazil. Far from their Free Will Baptist family, they diligently labor to plant a church in a village with no other evangelistic witness. As I write this article, they are planning a children’s event, preaching services, and a baptism for this weekend.

By the time you read this article, I believe new believers will be baptized and discipled in a church with no building. It doesn’t get much more “Great Commission” than that. After all, fulfilling the Great Commission is what we are talking about.

Many regions in our partnership countries are still unreached. What greater action could we take to fulfill the Great Commission than to help our friends and partners in countries we already serve? Many doors are open to preach the gospel right now. How long will they stay open? We have a duty to Christ and humanity to provide as many resources for the gospel to spread as possible.
I want to ask a personal question. How much do we really care about finishing this unfinished task? Is it something we think about often, occasionally, or not at all?

Great Commission Priority

I think we should elevate the Great Commission to our highest priority for two reasons. First, we should consider our international associations, churches, pastors, and church leaders in the same way we think of our local churches in our district or state associations. We should pray for them like we pray for our local churches. We should come to their aid as much as possible. We should hurt with them, rejoice in their victories, and seek to help them achieve their goals, just as we do the churches within our own circles. Why? Because they are our brothers and sisters in Christ.

They sacrificially serve their local bodies. Their ambition is to see the gospel spread within their Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. They are in the Free Will Baptist family—just like you and me. And, Free Will Baptists support each other.

Second, we cannot afford to ignore the command to take the gospel to the ends of the earth. Every day yields the ultimate consequence for those who haven’t heard the gospel. We can’t waste a single minute. We must do everything in our power to reach as many as we can for the Kingdom of Christ, for the sake of the One we serve, and for those who need to hear His good news.

In October, I walked my daughter down the aisle and gave her away to her soon-to-be husband. The walk from the back of the auditorium to the stage of Union Grove Church is probably no more than 70 feet. Yet, in that short walk, a flood of memories came rushing back. We had come so far together. When we first brought her home, she could not survive on her own. When she became a teenager, though she probably could have survived, she would not have thrived on her own. But in this moment, she was a beautiful young bride, ready to start making a home of her own. I am glad to say this task is unfinished. She still asks for advice, and she needs our support and encouragement from time to time.

On our mission fields, the Bride of Christ is maturing. She is beautiful, and the Kingdom is expanding at an amazing pace, but Macedonia is still calling: “Help us. The work is unfinished, and we cannot do it alone.”

About the Writer: Don Matchett is director of church relations and development for IM, Inc. Learn more about how you can get involved in the work of Free Will Baptists around the world: IMinc.org.