During my teenage years, I lived on Reunion Island. Reunion is a French island in the Indian Ocean, about 400 miles east of Madagascar. Not many people are familiar with its location. Perhaps that’s why we had to wait such a long time to receive packages sent by friends or family in the States.
It became a fun family activity to see where packages were sent before they finally made their way to us. One package had a postmark from Greenland. As far as we could tell, the postman confused “Island” with “Iceland,” and decided to send it to Greenland?
In any case, packages sometimes take unexpected detours. Likewise, God doesn’t always send us by the route that seems most obvious. He might even send us to the place we least expect.
But, as I mentioned last week, God is a postman who always delivers.
If we are mail sent by God, then we are sent with a purpose. We are sent in His power. And we are also sent to a specific, intentional destination.
Acts 1:8 says, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witness in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (ESV, emphasis added). We are going to be witnesses here, there, and everywhere.
In Acts 10, Peter is sent to Cornelius, a Gentile and therefore someone he never would have expected to lead to Christ. In Acts 16:6-10, Paul himself, the first missionary, was re-directed along a different path than he thought he would take: “They attempted to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them. […] We sought to go on into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.” (ESV)
God sends us where He wants us to go. Remember, we’re just the letter. We’re not the Post Office or the delivery person, or the sender. We go where He sends. Sometimes that’s difficult. Sometimes it’s not where we would have chosen to go.
But God has someone waiting to hear the gospel. He has a plan, and He is using you to fulfill it.
Will you embrace where God has put you? Will you trust that He can use you, that He has designed you specifically to fit this assignment?
You’re carrying the most important message in the world. Let God deliver it where He intends.
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