I didn’t expect this month’s missions team to teach me so much about obedience.
When I found out that most of our short-term team would be in their 70s, I’ll admit—I wondered what the trip would look like.
They wouldn’t be the fastest team.
They wouldn’t be the strongest.
They probably wouldn’t look like the typical picture we have in our minds when we think of a missions team.
But after watching them go from house to house, walk for hours, pray for people, and share the Gospel, I began to see something I hadn't considered before.
There are strengths that only time can build.
They carry decades of walking with God.
They carry stories of His faithfulness.
They know what it means to keep going when life is difficult.
They know how to listen, how to encourage, how to pray, and how to remain faithful.
And perhaps the most powerful thing they carried into this trip wasn't physical strength.
It was the quiet confidence of people who have spent decades learning that God is worth saying yes to.
It reminded me of Caleb in Joshua 14:11:
“I am still as strong today as I was in the day that Moses sent me; my strength now is as my strength was then, for war and for going and coming.”
Caleb was 85 years old when he said this.
He came to Joshua and reminded him of the promise God had given him.
At 85, Caleb wasn't asking for retirement.
He was asking for his mountain. His inheritance.
There is something beautiful about that.
Because sometimes we have a very narrow picture of who belongs in missions.
We imagine someone young.
Energetic.
Physically fit.
Highly trained.
Ready to do the things we associate with “missionary work.”
And somewhere along the way, we begin believing that our usefulness to God has a limit.
“Maybe I’m too old.”
“I’m not fit enough.”
“I don’t have the right qualifications.”
“Surely there are other people who can do this.”
But this team has reminded me that it is our own excuses that disqualifies us from obedience.
In fact, there are things they carry precisely because they have experienced life fuller.
They carry stories of God's faithfulness.
They carry decades of experience walking through hardship.
They know how to listen.
They know how to be patient.
They know how to keep showing up.
They know that ministry isn't always about having the perfect words. Sometimes it's about sitting with someone, praying with them, encouraging them, and sharing what God has taught you over a lifetime.
They may not be the most physically dynamic team.
But they bring something that cannot be gained overnight:
perspective.
wisdom.
resilience.
faithfulness.
And they are teaching the younger generations something too.
They are showing us that missions is not just a season for the young.
It is not something you age out of.
You may have a different role.
You may have different limitations.
But there is always something you can give.
This team has been walking for hours, visiting houses, praying for people, sharing the Gospel, encouraging others, and doing what they can with what they have.
And if you looked at them from the outside, you might even wonder,
“What are these people doing here?”
But maybe that is exactly the point.
They are showing us that obedience doesn't always look the way we imagined it would.
Sometimes it looks like a group of people in their 70s saying,
“We still have a yes in us.”
And I think there is something powerful about that testimony.
Because the younger generations don't only need people to go before them.
We need people who have walked with God for decades to show us what faithfulness looks like.
We need their stories.
Their wisdom.
Their prayers.
Their perspective.
Their courage to keep saying yes.
Caleb's story reminds us that what one generation fights for can become another generation's place of victory.
Caleb received the inheritance God had promised him—the mountain of Hebron. And years later, Hebron would become a significant place in Israel's story, including becoming the place where David was crowned king.
Caleb may not have seen everything his obedience would eventually mean.
And neither will we.
We may never see the full fruit of our obedience.
But what we say yes to today may become the place where someone else experiences victory tomorrow.
So let this be your reminder:
It is never too late to say yes.
There is still a mountain to climb.
There is still an inheritance to claim.
There are still people waiting to hear the Gospel.
And there are people waiting on the other end of your obedience.
You still have something to give.
You still have a story to tell.
You still have prayers to pray.
You still have wisdom to share.
You still have a yes to offer.
