I have a friend from Seminary named Paul Both. Some of you know him since he has come to Algona a few times for visits. Paul has an interesting past, with an equally interesting present. Paul was born in southern half of Sudan, which is now its own nation of South Sudan. Conversations with Paul are always a little different. When I talk to him about my childhood of baseball games, Cub Scouts, and family vacations; he talks about a childhood of hunger, threat, and death. I say this, reader, not to make you turn away, but rather to turn you toward one of the many under-reported challenges in the world today.

Paul is the leader of the South Sudan Education Mission (www.ssemhome.org). He’s attempting to bring educational opportunities into South Sudan so that the people there may better help themselves. I had the privilege of talking with Paul for a few hours last week, as we recorded his thoughts on what is happening in South Sudan and how we can best help. You may have heard that there is a significant drought and famine in and around South Sudan currently. In addition, there is disarray within the government, as various factions are struggling for control. The history of this area is one of conflict, hunger, and death. It is also a human history. Paul’s presence reminds me that there are real people with real lives that are struggling to survive every day. Sometimes, they do not win that struggle.

We came across Matthew 25 the other day in our Scripture readings. The last part of that chapter has Jesus describing people as either sheep or goats. The sheep gain entrance into the kingdom of heaven, while the goats…not so much. What’s the difference? Jesus says that the sheep fed Him, gave Him water to drink, and visited Him in prison. The sheep respond that they never saw Him! Jesus tells them that whenever they did any of that for the least of these, they did it for Him. Meanwhile, the goats busied themselves being goats, eating grass, drinking water, and doing other goatly things, instead of helping others. They’ll not be in the kingdom of heaven, Jesus says.

Perhaps you read that paragraph and think that I’m saying we have to do good things in order to gain salvation. I’m not saying that. Of course, Jesus did…so we need to figure out what these words mean, because a cornerstone of Christian belief is that solely Jesus Christ, and not our own actions, save us. And I strongly believe that as well.

So, how can we be saved solely by Christ if Christ also says that to enter the kingdom of heaven we have to do good things for those in need? Well, the basic problem is that we stop reading Scripture when it gets difficult, or personal. If we care to really understand what happened to us through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, we’ll see that, first, we have achieved salvation through our faith in Christ. That’s the easy part. However, there is another gift we’ve been given as well. We should also see that we’ve been given the gift of the Holy Spirit at the same time. Now, think about this with me for a minute. We’ve been given the gift of eternal life through faith. We all know that, right? But what about this gift of the Holy Spirit? What does that do for us? Well, with the Spirit residing within us, let me ask you this: Day by day, do you think you’ll do better things or worse things than you used to do? If the Holy Spirit is within us, guiding us…Oh, and we are listening to the Holy Spirit…then it seems to me that each day we will do better and better. There’s a fancy word for this: Sanctification. There’s another phrase that comes to mind as well: Be a sheep.

If you think that you can impress God by helping Paul and SSEM enough to work your way into heaven, then I invite you to think again. However, if you think you can have the Holy Spirit within you and not want to reach out into this world to help others, then I invite you to think again. It is this simple: Through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we have been given salvation and sanctification. This means that not only our end is assured, but our right now is assured as well. With the Holy Spirit, we will want to do to good things. We will be a sheep. Check out Romans Chapters One through Eight for more details. The first five chapters talk about salvation through Christ, the last three talk about Sanctification.

You’ll be hearing a lot more about SSEM as we continue this year through Spring and Summer. Our Family Fun Fest this year will be a mission fundraiser for SSEM and it’s our prayer that you will join us, following the voice of the Holy Spirit, as all who have been saved work together to help this world.