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Key Bible Verse: Pay all your debts, except the debt of love for others. You can never finish paying that! (Romans 13:8). Bonus Reading: Mark 10:28–30

Indebtedness after college is the greatest practical hindrance to students pursuing cross-cultural missions.

What do we do with a potential candidate who is $10- to 40,000 in debt at age 22? School loans play into the indebtedness mindset of our culture. Borrowing money and living in debt to pay for school carry over into lifestyle issues that include unrealistic expectations and over-charging credit cards.

Can a generation raised on double-latte coffees costing $3 or more per cup adjust to a world where the majority has no access to clean drinking water? Can Westerners who routinely spend $9 to go see a movie live effectively alongside the 1 billion abjectly poor people living on less than $1 per day? The editors of World Christian Encyclopedia assert that 43 percent of the world will never make a telephone call. Can a generation accustomed to personal cellular phones and dedicated Internet lines make the adjustment?

One missionary summarized the grasp that materialism has on our hearts this way: "When we went out in 1969, we left everything to follow Jesus to South America. To-day's new missionaries bring everything with them."

—Paul Borthwick in EMQ

My Response: Could my standard-of-living choices be pre-empting God's ability to direct me?

Thought to Apply: There was a time when a fool and his money were soon parted, but now it happens to everybody. —Adlai Stevenson (U.S. politician)

Adapted from EMQ (Evangelical Missions Quarterly, 10/03) by permission.

Prayer for the Week

Lord, give me a feel for the world You sent Your Son to save. Show me how to become engaged.

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