Kingdom Without Borders

I've been back in the US for 2 months now, and most surface things that once shocked me no longer do (save the gigantic "medium" beverage I had at Hardee's last week). It's amazing how small the world can be, meaning that no matter which country I'm in, I do spend most of my time in a very small geographic region, easily forgetting that the world continues to live and breathe across large expanses. I was in the library about 2 weeks ago, sifting through my favorite section: New Nonfiction. So many gems to be found there, and this trip was no exception. In addition to walking away with The Eastern Stars (the story of sugar and baseball in a small Dominican Republic town), I also picked up Kingdom Without Borders: The Untold Story of Global Christianity. Though still 70 pages from the end, I can't recommend it enough.

Throughout its pages, Miriam Adeney tells countless stories about believers across the world, primarily in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America. I found her story telling scattered at first, and it took me a good bit to get into the book, but now I can't put it down. Reading the stories of what God is doing across his Kingdom encourages and inspires me as I hope and seek to return abroad for the 2011-2012 school year. I read about Chinese believers sending missionaries back west on the Silk Road, about native missionaries in India and Brazil, about Iranian Christians reaching out with the gospel despite the government. Adeney never implores her reader to get involved in global missions, never nudges towards giving- she simply tells the stories, and through them, one cannot help but want to get involved in either sending or going. And the truth is, the global church is growing at an astonishing rate. It makes me wonder if the traditional western church is going to be left behind.

I've never been a big reader of missions books or many of the modern fad-like Christian books out there, but this one I love. Simple, unpretentious, and compelling, it gets me excited about educational mission opportunities I might discover when the job search process begins. It gets me excited to learn another language, to observe and learn another culture, to teach kids from so many different backgrounds. And it reassures me that whether or not we personally can see the fruit, God is indeed doing a mighty work for his Kingdom in my generation.