Winter people

By 2040, estimates are the world will need millions and millions of workers to populate factories, said Jordan in a Bible conference study several years ago about “wintertime.”

He says, “My point is, don’t give up on America. Somebody told me the other day, ‘I think we’re going to get married and move to Hong Kong.’ Are you nuts? If I was going to move somewhere, I’d move to New Zealand. The Crown Colony is like 40 years behind us in apostasy.

“But don’t give up on America. Our geo-political positioning, and the influence we have--the power we have of our national institutions and economy--means that this century is still going to be a good century for America. We’re going to face west more than we face east. In the past century, we faced Europe and interfaced. In the future, we’re going to face and interface with Asia. But we’re still going to be a lynchpin. Which tells me, with regard to ministry, that I need to continue to understand that ministry in America is going to be critical and vital to the future.

“I tell our people here in Chicago, ‘Reach the world by reaching Chicagoland.’ There are 200 languages spoken here. There are over 200 communities of every identifiable people group on the planet in this city’s metropolitan area. Who do you want to reach? Go find the group in Chicago and reach them. Then they can go home and reach their home. Who’s going to have a better chance of reaching their homeland?! They are!

“So instead of me going there . . . but you see it’s more glamorous and more lucrative to do that. I asked a nine-year-old from Ohio, whose dad is a preacher, ‘Paul, what do you want to be when you grow up?’ He said, ‘A missionary on furlough.’ You know why he said that? He’s a pastor’s son and he’s seen the missionaries come to town and how they’re treated and he’s seen how his dad’s treated. I’ll just cut to chase with you. He’s seen the missionary come to town as the hero. ‘Hail the conquering hero! Whatever he wants we’ll give him. Things he doesn’t want we force him to take.’

“I’ve seen missionaries come to town and rob people of their possessions just out of the guilt of, ‘You need to be giving to the missions.’

“Paul targeted strategic metropolitan areas and did the work of evangelism. He got people saved and then he established them in the truth and organized them together in a local ministry. Then he entrusted them to do the work of the ministry and used them as a base to reach to the next area. Is that hard to do? Not if you focus on it.

“Now, if what you’re trying to do is build some big organization out there that’s going to be hard to do because you don’t DO it. But if we go back to focusing on ministry the way Paul was doing it . . .

“One brother said, ‘I fear for the future of our country.’ Well, I would, too, if I thought summer was never going to end! What I fear about the future is not being prepared for winter; dressing like it’s in the summer.
“I’d say get unplugged. By that I mean Romans 12:1-2: ‘I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.
[
] And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.’

“Don’t follow the cohort thinking. You go to get over seasonal thinking and learn not to evaluate the way things were yesterday, but understand the way it’s going to be and go back and figure out the cycle. Get over the post-seasonal thinking, the myth of the Christian nation, all that kind of stuff that the political action and the arena is where the real action is. You know, we’re not called to political dominion and law-motivated service.

“And when you’re involved in that, that is nothing but to be consumed with mammon. And everybody’s who’s always worried about the government and the politics, and making the law do things and make people do things, all their concerned about is mammon. I say that and I know that grates at some of you.

“People are going to watch this DVD and they’re going to: ‘Well, if that’s the way you feel then just don’t have any of my manna.’ Well, I don’t want your manna; I want your heart. You know what you need to do; you need to get busy talking to people about the Lord and sharing the revelation God’s given us today. Be involved in getting that out and get over all the form issues that it’s got to be done my way or the highway. My form or no form and understand that the key is to take the truth and put it in people and let that truth in them do the work of the ministry.

“Paul says, ‘Only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ: that whether I come and see you, or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind
together for the faith of the gospel;

“When he says one mind, the business way of saying that is we have ‘agenda harmony.’ We’re all on the same page about where we’re going and we’re striving, we’re working, we’re laboring to the point of exhaustion to get there. And then he says ‘in nothing terrified by you adversaries.’ Because there is opposition. You and I have been called to radical risk-taking faith and service. We haven’t been called to living lives of ease. We have been called to lives of united, radical, risk-taking service for the gospel. That’s what you do in the wintertime!

“It may look radical to the system, but if it’s based in the Book, it won’t be radical; it’ll be faith. In the wintertime, you’re going to get the greatest privilege of your life, and if you’re older, they’re going to need your wisdom. If you’re younger, you’re going to be building what you’re going to carry through the future.

“The Gen Xers are going to be a crucial part of this. They will be the group (my children’s’ ages) who is going to kick the butts of the Baby Boomers into gear! They’re going to be the ones who restrain the Baby Boomers’ excesses and say, ‘You’re not getting the job done, get out of the way, we’re going to get it done!’ And that’s how you’re going to get through the wintertime. Look at the last winter. What came out of it? The G.I. Joes, the Civics--we call them the heroes. The Greatest Generation, we call them. It’s that kind of a mentality.”