Playing your part in God's restoration story

Christians around the world are answering God’s call to restore relationships with him, with one another and with creation. So how does your faith motivate you to get involved in tackling poverty? Jack Wakefield introduces Tearfund's Restoration Story

 

Do you remember when you first thought about justice?

For me, it started early. While at primary school, I performed in a school play about the Amazon rainforest and its deforestation, and a few years later joined in a fundraising effort for the Boxing Day tsunami of 2004. From an early age I knew these were important concerns, but it would be a few more years until I really understood God’s mission, and my part in that.

There I was, sitting in a cowshed on some purple carpet, at my first Christian summer festival aged 15, knowing God loved me but not really knowing what that looked like before heaven. I attended the youth seminars, and a speaker from Tearfund began explaining how God’s church isn’t simply a waiting room for eternity but a body we’re invited to be part of, a community with a mission – a mission given to them by Jesus to bring restoration to everyone and everything that sin has broken. She went on to explain the huge inequality in the world, and my heart was broken.

Seeking justice went from a nice add-on concern to being a core part of my faith and life, and I remember it vividly. Maybe you have had a moment like this too?

I couldn’t go back to normal. I asked God to help me commit to this mission, and in the following year I began to join him on the adventure. I created a poverty prayer room in my school, spoke in assemblies and at church about fair trade, and I put little signs all over my parents’ house, from the thermostat to the tumble dryer, to remind them to use less energy and help tackle climate change.

Listening to that talk about ten years ago set me on a different trajectory. I saw how God’s heart breaks over the injustice of poverty and climate change and I promised that I would follow him with all my life, from how I pray and spend money to the clothes I wear and the food I eat. It’s been a blessing to play my small part in God’s big mission ever since.

This is my story, but we each have our own personal story that motivates and inspires us. When these stories come together, we can make a new story, a story of the church around the world tackling the injustice of poverty through how we act, give and pray. A story of the body of Christ bringing restoration.

Tearfund has launched an exciting new initiative called Restoration Story and would love you to join in by sharing your story about how your faith motivates you to get involved in tackling poverty.

So what’s your story?
 

Jack Wakefield is Tearfund's UK Campaigns Associate 
 

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