Davis to UM students: ‘Live uncomfortable’ 

 Paul Davis recently shared a chapel message for University of Mobile students designed to equip them as they respond to God’s calling on their life, and he urged them to go and make disciples of all nations.

While serving as the president of the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism, Davis leads a global movement of missionaries and churches committed to taking the gospel to the nations. ABWE champions gospel-centered missions, equips sending churches and strengthens partnerships around the world.

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“Every culture tells lies,” Davis said during the Oct. 15 chapel service. “They may be different cultures and different lies, as a matter of fact as my wife and I travel around visiting missionaries in different cultures, we see the different cultural lies that different cultures tell people that live within that culture. The interesting thing is that it’s often very easy for my wife and I to spot the lies within other cultures as opposed to spotting the lies that my own culture is telling me. I want to tell you about one of those lies this morning.

He noted, “One of the lies that our culture tells us is that we have to live for comfort, that your life should be easy. If it’s difficult or if it’s hard, then there must be something wrong and Satan is really coming after me this week. Why? Because my life is hard and if my life is hard, then it must be bad.”

Davis told students that he and his wife have often told their children as they were growing up: “Hard is hard, but hard isn’t necessarily bad.”

“That’s such anti-cultural language,” he added. “We like to think that Jesus would never call someone to something hard, dangerous or call someone to die; would He? If I’m honest and probably a little transparent here, I work with over a thousand people who have made a conscience choice to choose difficult over easy. There’s not one missionary at ABWE who hasn’t chosen something difficult. They’ve chosen to leave a culture that they have grown up with, to leave a language that they speak and they go to various parts of the world.”

Davis issued a challenge for the UM students to go against the lies of culture as he presented a message based out of Matthew 28 on The Great Commission.

“Here’s a phrase that I want you to walk out of here with: ‘Ease is the enemy of impact,'” Davis said. “If you want to have a life of impact that is missional and reflects the call of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in your life, ease is going to be your enemy.”

Davis shared the testimony of William Borden, a missionary from the late 1800’s who was a wealthy, American philanthropist. He noted that Borden had inscribed the words “no reserve” in the margin of his Bible as he desired to share the gospel with Muslims.

“He was going to live all out of Jesus Christ and leave nothing in the tank,” Davis said. “By the age of 21, Borden was a millionaire and was a brilliant student with many opportunities. One of the things that Borden had experienced in his young life was that his parents sent him on a trip around the globe. He had become fascinated with Muslims and what they believed. As a young Christian, he decided that he wanted to become a missionary to Muslims.”

“Even though he was a millionaire, he began doing things like teaching second grade Sunday School,” Davis noted. “He would give away millions to rescue missions and ministries around the globe. His friends and even his parents would say, ‘William, what are you doing? You’re giving away your fortune before you’re even an adult.  You need to save your money.’ By the way, this was a brilliant student from Yale teaching second grade Sunday School, and people would ask, ‘Why are you wasting your talents on that?’ It was because he wanted to live full-out for Jesus and leave nothing in the tank, even though people questioned him regularly.”

Davis pointed out that after Jesus established His authority on earth, He gave the Great Commission.

“Here’s the reality, if you’re one of those 3.46 billion people, there’s a 90% chance that you will never meet a Christian in your lifetime,” he said. “Jesus is saying, ‘Listen, that’s unacceptable.’ As a matter of fact, the Bible said God is not willing that any should perish. So, what is the answer? Jesus said the answer is for His disciples to take the initiative to go and make disciples of all nations. Ease is the enemy of impact. There’s so much more we can do.”

Davis wrapped up the message noting, “Everything in our culture is going to tell you to live easy and be comfortable, that’s not the picture I see in the Great Commission.”

“I’m not saying that God’s calling every one of us here to be missionaries, but he’s calling some of us to be missionaries,” he said. “Before any of us can listen to the call of the Holy Spirit’s gentle whisper in our ears for us to be the one to go, we’ve got to get through the cultural lie to live comfortably. Live uncomfortable.”