NAMB leader encourages students to find wonder in biblical truth

Liberty University welcomed North American Mission Board (NAMB) Vice President for Research and Resource Trevin Wax to Wednesday’s Convocation, where he spoke on the importance of remaining passionate about the Gospel.

Wax joins a strong lineup of pastors and Christian leaders for this semester’s Convocation, including David Jeremiah, Elizabeth Woodson, Chris Hodges, Alistair Begg, Jack Hibbs, and others, reinforcing the emphasis that Liberty places on spiritual growth on campus.

Wax is the main speaker for this week’s “Every Square Inch Conference,” an annual conference on theology and culture, hosted by the John W. Rawlings School of Divinity Feb. 9-10. During Convocation, School of Divinity Dean Troy Temple encouraged the student body to attend the conference to learn how to be better equipped to share Christ with the nations.

“We want to invite you to surrender your call and your vocation to the glory of God,” Temple said. “This university exists to Train Champions for Christ from every single major, every passion, every calling. That Gospel that fills your life should transform everywhere you go.”

Wax took the stage with an in-depth analysis of Jude 1:3. Arguing that Christians often take blessings like the Gospel for granted, he urged students to remain enthralled with the truth of God’s Word.

“The Church faces her biggest challenge not when new errors start to win, but when old truths no longer wow,” Wax said.

Wax broke the verse into three sections, highlighting three words. The first word was the “eagerness” that the writer shows for evangelism. Instead of merely keeping the joy of Christ to oneself, Wax spoke about how Christians should feel called to spread that joy.

“When was the last time you were eager to talk about how Jesus saved you?” Wax asked. “When was the last time you teared up in worship when you were singing a song and you felt that stirring in your heart at ‘Grace unmeasured, vast and free,’ ‘Grace that saved a wretch like me’?’”

He described his personal experience of spending five years as a missionary in Romania starting at age 19. When he returned to the United States to visit family and grabbed water out of his refrigerator, he remembered feeling extreme gratitude in that moment at how easy it was to get drinking water in the U.S., a luxury not afforded to everyone in Romania.

Much like how Americans take utilities for granted, Wax argued that American Christians often do the same with the Gospel.

The second word he pinpointed was “concern,” referring to the concern that Jude showed for Christians drifting from biblical truth. Listing several different reasons why believers drift, he said one reason is that Christians forget about the incredible miracle that happens every time someone is saved.

The final word from the verse was “confidence.” Jude called for believers to be confident in the faith and truth of Christ.

Arguing that truth is not relative, Wax spoke to the importance of remaining strong in Christian teachings. Much like people having different preferences for weather does not affect the weather itself, someone’s opinion of truth does not impact its validity.

“If our tendency is to always put the word ‘truth’ next to adjectives like ‘my’ and ‘your’ and never ‘the,’ well then we are violating the very definition of truth to begin with,” Wax said.

“The beating heart of Christianity is not personal adventure of self-discovery,” he added. “It’s not you patching together your preferred versions of the Christian faith. It’s the connection of saints and various cultures and climates with different languages and traditions, all united by a common confession in Jesus Christ the King.”

Ultimately, Wax issued a call for Christians to find excitement in Christian dogma and biblical study instead of viewing it as stale or boring.

“The future of the Church will follow the path of pilgrims who remain empowered by the Spirit, who are thrilled by the discovery and the definition of orthodoxy,” he said. “Men and women who can see past the fads and fashions of the day, who lean fully into the richness of the truth they’ve inherited and say, ‘We’re going to pass this on to the next generation, the faith delivered once and for all to the saints.’”