Why Are There More Miracles on the Mission Field Than at Home?
If you describe the “mission field” as third-world countries, some good reasons are listed below.
Parts of the United States have turned into mission fields in their own right. It used to irk me that I would see more and better miracles in other counties than I would see back in the United States. But after I relocated to a “mission field” part of the United States, I saw miracles happen there that were as good as what I used to see in other countries. The reasons below for seeing more miracles really apply more to third-world countries than simply being on “the mission field,” but even in developed countries, many of these apply on reservations for indigenous people.
1. Miracles Follow the Preaching of the Gospel
Mark 16:15-18 makes it clear that the healing of the sick accompanies going into the entire world. Because the gospel is reaching the lost, God performs “signs and wonders” (which include but are not limited to healings) to get their attention. If you’re not reaching the lost, you aren’t “going,” so why should you expect any signs to follow you? God confirms His Word. If you aren’t giving out His Word, He has nothing to confirm! On the mission field, there is a greater emphasis on evangelism, so there would tend to be more dramatic confirmations of the gospel message.
2. They Don’t Have Christian Bookstores Full of Anti-Healing Unbelief Books
It’s great to tell new believers what they have in Christ before the wet-blanket crowd gets a chance to tell them that you never know what our sovereign God will do, Paul had an eye disease, and you’re Job Number Two. Once people latch on to these arguments, you cannot get them healed unless you can show them why these arguments are invalid. That is one reason for this book. You can give them some good reasons why these traditions of men don’t make sense. See the Objections Overruled! section.
3. They Have a Greater Desperation for Miracles because the Medical Facilities Aren’t as Good
People in some countries can’t just show a card and get medical treatment for most conditions. Many times, either God heals them or they don’t get healed at all. Thus, they are more desperate for miracles. They are like the woman with the issue of blood who spent all her living on doctors, but only grew worse. She was so desperate that she risked execution for being in public with a discharge to get her healing. People who are that desperate are ripe to receive a miracle. If you figure that you can live with your illness because you can get some medicine at the local drugstore, you will likely live with it instead of without it. You aren’t desperate enough.
However, desperation by itself is not faith, and “desperate” prayers don’t work unless they are desperate faith prayers. Remember, the woman in Mark 5:25-34 was desperate, but she came in faith based on what she had heard of Jesus. She was not coming in desperation alone. The people need to hear God’s healing covenant so that they can pray in faith, not simply in desperation.
I used to visit a certain country a lot where you could see bugs flying in and out of open windows at the local hospital! Even the unsaved tour guide said that many people in that country went to miracle services at church when they got sick, as you’d have to be rather desperate to go to a hospital like that! But then something happened that hurt miracle service attendance – the country built a sanitary, state-of-the-art hospital that wouldn’t look out of place in the United States. Sadly, when people have the option to get modern medical care, they often stop trusting God for healing, and from my perspective, that seems to be what happened there.
4. They Don’t Intellectualize Everything
Education is good, but it makes a lousy god. You can’t completely grasp the things of God with your head. Faith is of the heart. Jesus never told you to believe in your head. Sometimes we block our healing by trying to intellectualize it instead of believing it in our hearts. It’s good to educate your head, but not at the expense of growing in the things of the Spirit. People in third-world countries are often less educated and would be less likely to have this problem.
Here’s an aside. Never knock education. Keep learning and get as much education as you want. Preachers do everyone a disservice when they brag about their lack of education. “I'm just a simple ole farm boy with a sixth-grade education, but God uses me to lay hands on the sick!” You don’t even need a sixth-grade education to lay hands on the sick; that privilege comes free with salvation. But ignorance is nothing to brag about. Don’t be proud of your lack of education. If you ever get a big ministry laying hands on the sick, you won’t be able to run the business side of your ministry with a sixth-grade education! You’ll need some other people around you to run your business affairs for you. Ministries are businesses whether you want to think of them that way or not. You don’t go into the ministry for the money, but if you’re in the ministry, there is a business side to run. Good ministries have been destroyed not because they didn’t know the Word but because they didn’t know how to handle money and the business side of ministry. One Bible school founder said that more ministries fail because of the business side of things than fail because of the spiritual side of things.
You are not more spiritual because you are less educated! Never make fun of people because they have advanced degrees. Some such people have unfortunately turned into eggheaded theologians, but there are intelligent people out there who love God and have doctorates. When you knock education from the pulpit, you alienate the intelligent people in the congregation who worked hard and sacrificed to get a good education. That’s self-defeating, because these people usually make better money than the less educated and can give better offerings!
Consider that the men in Jesus’ parable of the talents got different numbers of talents according to their different abilities! Get more education and you get more ability, assuming that you really learn your stuff and don’t just cram to get good marks on tests between wild parties.
5. God Meets People Where They Are
People on the mission field are often more open to the gifts of the Spirit. They may not know much about the Word, but they know that God can do miracles. They are much like the nobleman in John 4:46-53. They are unlearned, but also tenacious and sometimes desperate to see miracles. Such people will put us to shame if we aren’t careful! God is willing to meet them where they are. His perfect will is for them to know the truth so that they do not have to depend on manifestations of the Spirit for healing. But God knows that they haven’t had the opportunities that you’ve had to hear the Word taught, and He is patient with them.
6. They Are Used to the Supernatural
The devil will move wherever he has an open door. Less-developed countries often have more demonic activity than more-developed countries. (I was going to say that some places “overseas” have more demonic activity, but it occurred to me that you might live in one of those places, and overseas to you would mean somewhere else. I suppose that by definition no one lives overseas, since “overseas” to people overseas is somewhere else, like where you live.) The people already know that there is a spirit realm and that the supernatural is real. Witch doctors still make a good living in many places by “healing” the sick temporarily until the devil makes them sick again so that they have to go pay the witch doctor again. I think it is easier for the people to accept the supernatural side of the gospel when they are used to the supernatural in general. I have seen this with my own eyes.
One benefit I’ve seen in such places is that powerless Christianity doesn’t last long there. If you can’t cast our demons in a place where there are a lot of demons, you’re useless to the locals. In one particular country I’ve visited, the locals had a tradition of explicitly inviting a demon to enter their bodies to heal them. So it’s no wonder that when sweet old Granny comes forward to be saved, she starts getting belligerent in a man’s voice because that demon doesn’t want her to receive Jesus. If you can’t deal with that demon, people won’t bother coming to see you preach much longer.
Unfortunately, “Christian” witch doctors out there pose as Christian ministers but actually minister under the influence of evil spirits. Their ministries are easy for us to spot because we know God’s Word. The fact that they act and teach contrary to the Bible is a give-away that their ministries are not of God. (This is why there is a need for teaching as well as evangelism on the mission field. Many times, when we think of a distant country, we just think that they need evangelists. But after the people are saved, they need pastors! They need apostles, teachers and prophets, too, and such people also need to be sent to the mission field.) If the people knew the Bible better, they would reject the fake ministers. Also, some ministers may be Christians who have brought in elements of their old pagan religion into their Christianity and have concocted a mess. Some confused people even worship BOTH Jesus and Satan, or so they say. I guess they are hedging their bets. They are also offending our jealous God in a big way.
When the people have a zeal for God and the gifts of the Spirit but little knowledge of the Word, they are open to fraudulent or flaky ministries that are based on spectacular “manifestations” instead of the Word. That is why zeal must be coupled with knowledge!
I know a country where a fraudulent minister gave out demonic words of knowledge and fleeced the people for a lot of money before they wised up. He would tell people the exact location of valuables and claim that the Lord had instructed him to command the person to give these valuables as offerings. Just because someone can tell you your exact bank balance isn’t a sign from God that you should give him whatever “God” revealed to him that you should give! But the people didn’t learn that until it was too late.