Our Perspective Measures our Passion

I have always been inspired by the life of Jim Elliot. His passion for God was unending. His life was always centered around one thought doing all He could for God no matter the cost. While I was with my cousin in Florida I watched a drama she had directed called the Bridge of Blood. It was about the life of Jim Elliot. In the drama she had quotes from some of his journals and other things and I was greatly moved by some of them.

"God, I pray Thee, light these idle sticks of my life and may I burn up for Thee. Consume my life, my God, for it is Thine. I seek not a long life but a full one, like Yours, Lord Jesus."

This was a song that the 5 missionaries and their wives sang the night before the left on Operation Auca
We rest on Thee (Tune Be Still my soul)

We rest on Thee, Our shield and our defender!
We go not forth alone against the foe.
Strong in Thy strength safe in Thy keeping tender,
We rest on Thee, and in Thy name we go.

We go in faith ou rgreat weakness feeling
And needing more each day Thy grace to know,
Yet from our hearts a song of triumph pealing
We rest on Thee and in Thy name we go.

This was something Barb Yuderian said when she found out that her husband Roger was dead.
"Tonight the captain told us of finding the bodies in the river. God gave me this verse two days ago. Psalm 48:14 'For this God is our God for ever and ever: He will be our guide even unto death.' As I came face-to-face with the news of Rog's death, my heart was filled with praise. He was worhty of his homegoing. Help me Lord to be both mommy and daddy. I've explained to Beth that daddy is now in heaven living with Jesus but she can't understand why he won't come down and play with her once in awhile. I wrote a letter to the mission family trying to explain the peace I have. I want to be free of self pity. It is a tool of Satan to rot away a life. I am sure that this is the perfect will of God. The Lord has closed our hearts to grief and hysteria and filled them with His perfect peace."
This out of all of them is the one that sobers my heart... Could I respond that way in the face of such trials? Would I? Or would I choose self pity?

One of the things Pete Fleming told his wife Olive, in the midst of her fear, the eve of operation Auca was "we never ask why only when". Everyone of them seemed to be at peace and perfectly resting on the Lord. Their lives were of no consideration. They were willing to give up their lives so that souls who had never heard the gospel could hear it.

Oh that God would give me that kind of passion to serve Him. I long to be in the place where He is consistantly my focus and my passion.