In Revelation 7, the apostle John describes his vision of a “great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb.” There must and will be a multitude from all nations singing the praises of Christ for all eternity. God deserves worship. And he has decreed that he will be worshiped by people from every nation– an ethnically diverse multitude from all of history joining to cry, “Worthy is the Lamb!”

That’s reason #1 we are going to Prague as missionaries. More worshipers of Jesus from the Czech Republic, from England, from all over Europe, even from the US.

Also, since we’ve been in Charlotte the Lord has impressed on us the importance of the local church. When you begin to think about it, the NT talks a lot not just about Christians, but about the church.

• Christ gave himself up not just for individuals, but to present to himself the church in splendor (Eph 5:27).
• When Paul wrote to the Christians in a given city, he often addressed his letter to the church in Corinth, the church of the Thessalonians, the churches in Galatia.
• Christ promises he will build his church, and that the gates of hell will not prevail against it (Matt 16:18).

Christ died to make his people, that multitude from every nation, into one church, and that one church is represented in smaller gatherings of believers all over the world. It is these local bodies that God primarily uses to call worshipers to himself and expand his kingdom through the preaching of the Word, the sacraments and the fellowship of believers. So the best strategy for recruiting and discipling worshippers of Jesus is to plant solid local churches in every region of the world.

This is reason #2 why we are going to Prague, and why we’re going as church planting missionaries. Prague needs the gospel, and they need solid, Bible-believing, Christ-loving churches. Churches need pastors. I want to be a pastor. When you add to that the fact that there’s a team in place with people we track with really well, and that some of the things I can do match up with some of their needs, it seems like an even better idea.

So all this doesn’t mean it was an easy decision to make or that it’s not scary to think about now, but these two things are what convinced us that God has called us to Prague as church-planting missionaries.