Imagine a land where 1% of the population owns every single thing of value. Let’s up the ante: Imagine that the rest of the 99% are starving, sure to succumb to malnutrition and unable to buy food. This isn’t a commentary on the Occupy movement; it’s the spiritual reality at the school I attend.
Somehow I’ve become blind to the real condition of people in a land of prosperity. Momma T got it right when she said, “In the West you have another kind of poverty, spiritual poverty. This is far worse. People do not believe in God, do not pray. People do not care for each other… This poverty of heart is often more difficulty to relieve and to defeat.” We are the 1%. We have the Truth, we have Jesus, we have the hope of glory. We’ve been entrusted with sharing the gospel—the only message that can save everyone from eternal death. We’re the 1% that has it and needs to share it with excruciating urgency.
What kind of person would have this Gospel and not share it like they would if they had unlimited food and were surrounded by starving people? Well, me and a lot of people.
This is the first semester that I’ve really been involved here. It’s a commuter school so it takes extra effort to build relationships. I realize now that my lack of involvement in the past was a kind of unconscious elitism that’s been passively encouraged by my relationships with other Christians. Take for example the situation of Christian clubs on my campus: Growth in these clubs is primarily from people that have attended church for much of their lives. As these groups grow, instead of becoming more missional and outreaching, they become more homogenous and exclusive. It’s comfortable to spend time with people that believe what we do and think the way we do. But, as I’ve been learning, this is not what Christ called us to do.
I don’t have any profound words of my own to change your life to fully embody the person of Jesus; all I can say is read the Bible. It says who we are and what we need to do very clearly: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light,” (1 Peter 2:9 
). What must that life look like? And how different that perspective is from my own! To share the gospel is not a task, not even a commission. It’s a joy and a way of life.
This is a spiritual desert and we’re the 1% with the only kind of water that can quench thirst. My challenge to you (and even more so to myself) is to give: time, energy, money, and—most importantly—the gospel.
