IMPACT

 The greatest impact anyone can make must start first start from locally and then moves internationally. I have been around some places and the focus of their impact is not the local but the community outside their community. I visited my girlfriend's church as they had a program. At the program, one lady sang local songs, and that made the whole place charged with the presence of God so much that you could feel and experience the readiness of the Holy Spirit to move. That part got me to feel welcomed at the church even though it was my first time. So, I was thinking after the worship time, the praise and worship team will follow the same pattern because I know a lot of Ghanaian churches who feel, after all, international viewers or for a better word, worshippers will be joining their live feed, they should sing international songs or English songs that appeal to them. The worship started with local songs and you could see and feel that the flow of worship was continuing in the same direction as it started. There are parts of the worship (the service) that I don’t joke with, one is the praise and worship time. So, the reason for this impact piece is a result of what happened next after the worship was done. I am not saying the church is neglecting the local church but I feel sometimes we should have the mind of Jesus Christ whenever we seek to make an impact with our Christianity.

 

You might ask me who should we impact first with our Christianity. I will point to you a very important scripture that shaped my mindset. Let me share a story about my life when I become a Christian. When I became a Christian, I felt the world was mine to impact with this newfound love and I was right to think that way but wrong to take the world literally meaning the world. The world that I had to impact was first my family. My family was the first to see God’s impact on my life. I neglected my family and I was out there trying to win souls forgetting that my family was the soul I needed to talk to first. I am not saying my family wasn’t a believing family but the truths that I was receiving from God were also meant for my family too. The world is also made up of my family, and I neglected that mission. One time as I prepare for my quiet time, I had this burning desire to ask my siblings if they had ever had their quiet time (time with the Lord) before. I asked and being the last of my family, it felt like something else. They were able to tell me the truth and I appreciated that. After that desire had been met, The Holy Spirit taught me something I will never forget. In John 1:35-42, after an amazing experience of meeting the Messiah, Andrew the brother of Simon Peter didn’t go to his friends or even a stranger, the Bible said he went to his brother and told him about finding the Messiah. He spoke to him about his experience and this is where the revelation is, he took his brother to Jesus Christ and Jesus said Peter will be called Cephas which translates as A stone. Imagine if Andrew didn’t take Peter to Jesus or better still didn’t tell him about finding the Messiah. It is not enough to be the only one in your family on fire for God. It is an error because love cannot be kept hidden but must be shared with another. The impact of Andrew’s discovery of the Messiah is the powerful Peter who became one of the apostles of the new testament. If I was Peter, I would always be thankful to Andrew for thinking of me first when it came to the Messiah. The impact your Christian life should have must start from the family you are born into. The local before the international, the nuclear before extended. That is the method of expansion. If I haven’t been able to win or impact my family with my revelations, it will be hard to impact the world. When we miss this point, that is when our focus shifts so much that we look forward to the extended group not the nuclear, and our impact becomes less.

 

I will share an encounter that happened in my life after I understood this devotion about the impact of nuclear before the extended. So, one day, my mum, a mother who has been the backbone of my life and is still the backbone of my life, comes and tells me that she wants to start her devotions now and that she was going to do it well because of me. I wish you could see my face and how deeply I thought about it. She decided to have time for her devotion and she was going to do it more because she saw how I was always engaging the Holy Spirit in my devotions and how I spent my time with it. With this, my impact was felt at home and it was nuclear more than extended. This is what God wanted the Israelites and wants every believer to do. My Christian life should always impact those who are around me and not always those who are not. It is good to impact the world with what you have learned but the impact will be felt harder and more powerful when the world within your zone has felt and experienced it too. The story of Jesus Christ comes to mind whenever I think of impacting the world. Can you tell me any period in time from the bible that you saw and read Jesus Christ talking to any Gentile? I haven’t read the bible that much and thoroughly but the little knowledge that God has given me shows that He always came to the Jews. Jesus Himself focused on the people around Him that He ministered to them till He left. The impact of His ministry is now being felt everywhere because the nuclear or the local ones that received the teachings of Jesus Christ were able to move with it and make more people like Jesus Christ. You have to make sure the ones around you have received and experienced the truths of God before you aim to go outside. If Jesus Christ is our model and the First Son of God and we are to follow and flow like Him, we should not neglect the local community we find ourselves in because it is with these same people that we changepractice what we are going to communicate to others.

Matthew 28:19-20 are the verses I know might be used to counter what I am trying to communicate but this verse has exactly what I want to reveal to those who are or might reading. Matt. 28:19-20 says Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit, [20] teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age. The part I want you to notice in this command is verse 20 (all I have commanded you). They didn’t just move the first day they met Jesus but they stayed and He impacted them so much that They could move to other places and share that which He has commanded them to share. The only logical reason you should move and target the international community or the extended community is when you have been taught that which you need to share with them. And this is where many make mistakes. You only move from your nuclear when you have a message from God or the desire from God to do so. When Jesus Christ first sent His disciples to go and preach in Luke 10, I believe he sent them to the Jews and not the Gentiles because He was sent to The Jews. But in Matthew 28:19-20, He sent them to the world because, at that time, they have fully felt the impact of God in their life. There was a command and the command was and is what made them extend their impact to the world. The world will be ready to feel your impact only when the time is due and only when you have fully impacted the local community and the world has come for you to move.

 

You were and are created for the impartation of the world when you have done that which is needed for the world around you. Apostle Joshua Selman is an international preacher now not because he can preach on the internet but because he was diligent enough to impact the town, the city, and the country he is in and now his impact is being felt everywhere. I can say the same for Joe Mettle (one of my favorite worshippers, who could have imagined the singer of local Ga songs could be an international worshipper now). The same thing happened to him, he so impacted the local community with a diligent and all earnest desire to do what the Lord had called him to do. Not just Joe Mettle of Ghana he is an international worshipper for the world and the Body of Christ. You miss your significance and purpose when you miss the essence of impacting your local community. I can say with authority that when God call Archbishop Duncan Williams to be His servant, He didn’t envision what the Lord will do with His Obedience. All he saw was God wanted to use him to be a blessing to the body of Christ. Now see what the Lord has done with Him. He is the Papa of the Charismatic move and a blessing to many men and women of whom I am included. He didn’t plan to just bless the world but he diligently served the plans and thoughts of God in his community, fast forward, Action Chapel International was born and it is serving International and local purposes. I can mention more great men and women of God who have followed this pattern and now they are blessings to the world. Rev KK Baidoo, the man who led me to this point of my life that I can be a blessing to you reading this. He concentrated on the local church, and after a burning desire to impact the world He moved, and now his impact is being felt in almost all African countries. Go to any of the major universities in Ghana and his impact is everywhere. He also followed the pattern of Jesus and the results are the same.

 

Being a local champion is not what I am saying you should do as a believer. A local champion is content in one place and not ready to move or leave that place. We are not called to be local champions but we are called to be world champions. We should have the ability to move from one place where have been so dominant when God calls us to move because that is how He wants us to do. The disciples needed persecution to move, which can happen when you dominate one place for a long time. They were content in Jerusalem doing the part of the work they were called to. In as much as we have to impact our locality, we should not forget that God can command us to move anytime and I feel when we have that in mind, we can impact the locality we find ourselves in and prepare for the world when the command comes from God.

 

You might be a singer, instrumentalist, dancer, or even evangelist or prophet, this is the blueprint to impact the world. No one can say there is another way of reaching the world without reaching the world around you. The world will feel a great impact on your life when you have been able to impact the world around you first. Matthew 7:1-6 speaks volumes of what it takes to see clearly to be able to remove the speck from the eyes of your neighbor. No one can impact the world well when they had neglected the call to impact the people around them. You have to remove the log in your eyes then you can be able to help heal the world. I believe this scripture can be used to make a solid point here. Because if the local community is lacking what you want to take internationally, how can you be effective there? To be effective and productive with your gifts and talents, you must have impacted the local church (your eyes must be clear to see) to know how to impact the world (to remove the speck in your neighbor’s eyes). I pray that you will be able to see the ones in your community that need your impact and do the needful and not neglect them for those outside your community.

 

We are ready for the world but it takes baby steps in our locality to make that move. God bless you. You are a blessing to the Body of Christ where you are now.