A Personal Experience - "The Missionary's Goal"

I am posting this as an inaugural blog. It is an excerot of some previous thoughts and expressions, and I thought I would post it here, not just to fill the space, but to generate thought and discussion.

Recently I was leaving my Mother's house, and felt led to enter my Father's study. Since he had passed a few years ago, I hadn't spent much time in the room I had come to admire it as a place of great thought and meditation.


My Father was Rev. Robert L. Harris, Sr., of Philadelphia, PA, a United Methodist Pastor in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference. A great and Holy man he was, and I always admired his great collection of books.

Being of the age of the electronic book, I tend to see bound books as having some extrordinary power. They assume a position of wisdom and sage, just for being old and having been touched, stroked, carried, and notated.

I came across such a book and took it home. "My father would have wanted it for me", that's what I told myself, as I felt led to this book. The book title is "My Utmost for His Highest", and I thought to myself, "wow, that sounds so inviting!!"

Taking the book home, I began to page through to find it more of a daily meditation book, so I quickly went to the date. To my surprise the page for the day, that date, September 23, had been marked with a small note from my Father!

"The Missionary's Goal" it was titled, "Behold we go up to Jerusalem" referencing Luke 18:31.

The lesson clearly states that the aim of the Missionary is to do God's will, not to be useful, not to win the heathen; he is useful and he does win the heathen, but that is not his aim. His aim is to do God's will.

How long and often I have struggled and yearned for a word from the Lord, for some direction for my life, and here, at the yielding of an urging, and allowing for an inclination, I found a note that my father left for me one day to find on another.

Thanks Dad, and thanks be to God! I think I'm going to read this book!!

Calvin Harris