Taking the World with a Towel

ByRichard Harrell

“For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:35 NIV).

It’s never about which religion dominates the world. Christianity isn’t an ideology to select off the shelf as one’s option out of many. Nor is it a system of ideas advanced by force or coercion.

Following Jesus is an abdication of ownership, of rights, and of hope in any other solution to our dilemma. Our world is in a pickle. Only Jesus can change it.

Jesus came to heal broken people and ruined nations. He does it one soul, one household, and one culture group at a time by restoring them to the Father. Christians win back to world by the power found in the folds of a towel extended to wash, heal and serve.

Thirty-six short-term mission teams returned for reporting after going north, south, east, and west. Their mission instructions? Find places of hospitality, stay among the locals, heal the sick, free the demonized, and tell them God’s Kingdom has come near.

They all returned to their sending agent. His name? Jesus. And they reported that the Kingdom indeed had come to the villages they stayed in.

Jesus could have responded in any number of ways. He said: “I saw Satan fall.”

The image we might envision is Jesus striking the Evil One with a lightning bolt from his finger. But the power that destroys the Usurper doesn’t streak from the tip of a finger; instead, it comes from the spoken Name and the hand of a servant stretched to heal and deliver.

When Jesus leads the work, when the Name is invoked with the simple act of serving, healing, bringing freedom, or sharing the Good News of the Kingdom, Satan falls.

Don’t underestimate the cosmos-changing power of your prayer for another, your act of service on behalf of someone who hurts, your words of encouragement, or when you yield your time, your stuff, your money, or your space in Jesus’ name. When you and I serve others in Jesus’ name through our words and actions, the power of the towel wins the moment. And Satan falls.

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