But I think it is necessary to send back to you Epaphroditus, my brother, co-worker and fellow soldier, who is also your messenger, whom you sent to take care of my needs. 26 For he longs for all of you and is distressed because you heard he was ill. 27 Indeed he was ill, and almost died. But God had mercy on him, and not on him only but also on me, to spare me sorrow upon sorrow. 28 Therefore I am all the more eager to send him, so that when you see him again you may be glad and I may have less anxiety. 29 So then, welcome him in the Lord with great joy, and honor people like him, 30 because he almost died for the work of Christ. He risked his life to make up for the help you yourselves could not give me. Phil. 2:25-30
I was in Honduras, doing OB/GYN stuff with World Medical Mission, and I met a guy who was a handyman who was sent from and supported by a church back in the states. He and his wife, in their 50's, felt a calling from the Lord to go help this Hospital/medical compound in Honduras. She was good at computers and office work so helped with the charting and business end of a mission hospital. They weren't involved in the evangelism and were very weak in Spanish - they just helped make it possible for those called and gifted in those fields to function.
This is like Epaphroditus who was sent from the church in Philippi to assist Paul. Paul refers to him as brother, fellow soldier, co-worker, messenger who met Paul's needs in a way that the church couldn't. We know Paul had problems with an eye disease so maybe he had some medical skills. We know that Paul, maybe because of his vision, wrote very large so maybe Epaphroditus did some writing for Paul who wrote three epistles while in this prison. The fact is, he assisted Paul in ways not everyone could and probably delivered this epistle back to the church as he convalesced back home. He was a vital part of the mission effort of Paul yet probably never led anyone to the Lord and I doubt my handyman friend in Honduras never did either.
What does Paul think of non-evangelistic helpers on mission trips? Worthy of honor for one. Even in our churches, I'm pretty sure the deacons and elders and pastors get more honor than the secretaries, accountants, nursery staff, and information technicians. Paul actually goes on to say that if he died because of his illness - not from stoning, shipwrecks, starvation, beating, flogging, crucifixion, beheading but illness - that he would have died for the sake of the gospel even though he probably never even spoke publicly.
So, what does this tell us? First that spreading the gospel is imperative and we should be using our abilities and gifts to make that happen both in our locale and also around the world. Second, if you are feeling a call to go outside your locale, chances are your abilities can be used, and they don't have to be speaking gifts. Third, if you don't go, we need to be praying for and supporting missionaries giving help in ways that we can. Lastly, and this is kind of heavy, we tend to divide life into two categories - sacred and secular. If we are all in for Christ, we are in "full time Christian service" whether we work for a church or at Wal-Mart. We are doing the work of an evangelist or missionary everywhere we go. Therefore, if someone works in construction building a new hotel in Pigeon Forge, TN, and they are being Christ to that team, witnessing, loving, serving, sharing - and they died in a crane accident, I'd say they died for the sake of the gospel.
Epaphroditus and hopefully me are in "fulltime Christian service". Are you?
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