Vinnie Carafano, author of the Intensive Discipleship Course (IDC), knows a thing or two about young people. He and his wife, Jodie, live in El Paso, Texas, and have four children and scores of spiritual children—teens and young adults they have guided in becoming disciples of Jesus. Vinnie was the youth pastor of Jesus Chapel East for fourteen years until God called his family into King’s Kids in 1993. His lifetime commitment is to see young people come into a living relationship with Jesus Christ and affect the world around them.

The Carafano family’s missionary travels have taken them to India, the Philippines, Korea, Paraguay, Panama, Nicaragua, Mexico, Canada, Haiti, St. Croix, Barbados, Grenada, Jamaica, Russia, Ethiopia, Ecuador, Taiwan, Thailand, China, Iraq, Turkey, Lebanon, Romania, the Czech Republic, Ukraine, Brazil, and throughout the United States.

Right now, Vinnie is putting the finishing touches on  Knowing God’s Heart: Missions and Evangelism, the fourth book of the IDC (coming this summer). Here’s a short yet powerful excerpt from Vinnie’s upcoming book:

We tend to wait passively for God to give us things we’re not sure we really want. Contrast this passivity with our persistence in seeking God when it’s something we really want.

We realize that if we ask for boldness, God might actually hear us and give it to us. That would mean He expects us to use it, and that might be uncomfortable. That’s why we wait for God to change us someday, maybe, if He gets around to it, rather than actively seeking Him for the things He makes clear are His will for us. We’re buying time for our own desires.

Psalm 138:3 says that when we cry out to God, He will answer us that same day. Crying out to God is drastically different from passively waiting. It’s the difference between a prayer with passion and fervency and one that comes out with a yawn. Who’s willing to say, “God, use me to reach a world full of perishing people”? Who’s willing to cry out to God until He is using you to reach a world full of perishing people?

Visit our website to read more about Vinnie’s books, Developing Godly Character, Being Useful to God Now, Reaching a Lost World: Cults and World Religions, and the upcoming release Knowing God’s Heart: Missions and Evangelism.