Randy Alcorn, in one of his books, writes about a young missionary man named William Borden. William Borden was a Yale graduate, an heir to a great amount of wealth. His parents gave him everything; withheld nothing from him his whole life. After graduating college, he rejected his life of ease. He gave away almost all of his wealth and he moved to Cairo, Egypt to share the story of Jesus with the Muslims of Cairo. After about four months as a missionary in Cairo, he contracted spinal meningitis and he died at the age of 25. If you go to Egypt, if you go visit the pyramids, in the shadow of the pyramids of Egypt, the great tombs of the pharaohs, there is a graveyard of missionaries. And on one of the tombstones of those missionaries is William Borden’s name with the dates 1887-1913. And the epitaph on that stone under his name reads this: “Apart from faith in Christ, there is no explanation for such a life as this.” “Apart from faith in Christ, there is no explanation for such a life as this.”

We’ve been going through a Sunday evening series on the book of Proverbs and the wisdom that we find there. And I think it was Cory who defined wisdom in this way. He said, “Wisdom is knowing how to life and what to do when there are no rules telling you what to do.” So we looked at Proverbs and the wisdom it gives us regarding life and death, regarding family, money, words. Today, this evening, in preparation for our 2019 Global Mission Conference, I’d like us to look at wisdom in regard to mission. And for that, we’re turning from the book of Proverbs to the book of Romans. And I do mean the book of Romans because we’re going to look at the entire book. It will be a very long Scripture reading and a short sermon. No, not really! It will be an abridged Scripture reading. We’ll just read part of Romans 8 but we’ll actually look at the entire book to make a case. And the case is this - the book of Romans really is a missionary support raising letter. It is the apostle Paul’s magnum opus as he describes what the Gospel really is. But he’s got an agenda. He’s writing a letter to engage missionary supporters - people who will give, people who will pray, and people who will stand with him in the battle to bring the Gospel to the ends of the earth. I hope to prove that to you, and in the process, I suspect you’ll never read the book of Romans the same again. Sounds good?

When I was in the eighth grade we lived in Tulsa, Oklahoma and I attended a school named Tulsa Union and I was playing football and was in a junior high football game and we were playing against our rival, the Jenks Trojans. And late in the game, I was playing cornerback on defense, and often in that position at cornerback you are matched up man to man on an island on a receiver, a wide receiver, and you are to guard him. It's up to you to stop him. And towards the end of the game, we were in the lead, everyone was excited, the stadium was packed, there was an energy on our sideline. We just had to hang on. And late in the game, I let the receiver get past me and he scored a touchdown and we lost the game. And it was my fault; it was on me. And after the game, I didn't want to see anyone, I didn't want to talk to anyone. I remember leaving the locker room and going to an empty gym that was nearby and my dad came and found me. And of all the things he could have said to me, my dad, as many of you know, is a football coach. He knows more about the game than anyone that I know. Of all the things that he could have said, you know, "Why did you jam him at the line? Why didn't you back off? Why didn't you work harder in summer workouts? Maybe y'all should have been in zone instead of in man." Of all the things, of course, that he could have said, he uttered this five-word sentence: "I love watching you play. I love watching you play." The power of words.