Moyshin Moyshi

Believe me, friends, all I want for Israel is what’s best for Israel: salvation, nothing less. I want it will all my heart and pray to God for it all the time. Romans 10:1 (The Message)

Do you have a great passion in life? Or, is your life one of those drab, small existences that are meaningless and without purpose? Will your life have an impact on those around you, or will people respond with “Who?” when informed of your death? Many are looking for meaning but are missing the great battle that rages around them. We have become so materialistic that we fail to notice the spirits, angels, demons and forces battling for the souls of men. We blithely stagger through the battlefield, looking neither to the left or the right because our eyes are fixed on our god – mammon, materialism.

Not Paul. He went to the Gentiles when the Church was still predominantly Jewish and hesitant to reach out. He stood up to the great Apostle Peter’s hypocrisy. He braved storms, beatings, imprisonments…once he was stoned and left for dead. He got up from the pile of rocks, brushed himself off, and went right back into the city of the people who had just stoned him. God used him to write over half the New Testament. Where did this power come from? What was the source of his strength? Paul explained, “I considered everything else that I once thought was important as manure. My great and only concern was for the salvation of those around me.” He was so obedient to this vision that at the end of his life he was able to say, “I am free of the blood of all of you.” He had been obedient to the call.

Do you have such a passion for souls? Does it regulate where you work and how you work? Does it change your life patterns? Or, are you one of those who simply eat, work and sleep your life away? The Japanese have a phrase for this kind of person: “Moyshin moyshi.” It literally means they were born blind and they’ll die drunk. Born victims totally unaware of their environment - trivial to history. God does not call us to trivial lives. Jesus told us that he wanted us to have a “real and eternal life, more and better life than (we) ever dreamed of” (John 10:10).

Perhaps your passion need not be the whole world. Perhaps you can start with your family, or your co-workers, or your block or city. It doesn’t mean that you have to personally lead every one of them to Christ. It DOES mean that you pray for them passionately; that you witness when the occasion arises; that you make it possible for others to witness to them. Maybe you could be instrumental in establishing a church or a crusade in your town. But until you awaken that great passion in your heart, you will remain a colorless “moyshin moyshi”.