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MentorNet #60 MISSIONARY
RELATIONS WITH CHURCHES Copyright ©
2009 by Galen Currah and George Patterson The
role of Western missionaries in church planting and disciple making is
changing because of fewer volunteers, legal restrictions, reduced funding,
and a shift to short-term mission. While some missionaries are becoming more
fruitful, others show symptoms of despondence as sending churches lose their
missionary vision. Great missionary work is yet to be done,
but it may not be done in the same ways it was done before. Here are a few
recommended points of counsel with which mentors should be able to help
churches, missionaries and candidates think, pray
and plan. Keep mission a priority. Combat waning ardor for mission in
the West by strongly affirming God’s purposes. All through Scripture, the
Creator has been inviting peoples, families and individuals to repent and
receive new life. Thus, missionary work is part of God’s mission. This is
more urgent now than ever because pressing social needs, cultural trends and
rationalistic theology have steered many churches away from serious
involvement in mission. Combat apathy due to rising costs. Promise God’s power to do mission. God gives his
Spirit, opens opportunities, and provides material means to those who
determine to extend His kingdom into neglected peoples. This is crucial now
because in the West mission budgets are declining
and churches perceive mission as wastefully expensive. Meeting the costs of
maintaining church programs, clerical salaries and expansive building
programs have reduced the funds available for supporting missionaries. Also, some missionary societies require candidates to
raise huge amounts of support, even if the candidates have never proved their
ability to do mission work. Find support creatively. Options
include bi-vocational workers, missionary business folk, supported two-year
terms, self-supported volunteers, retired folk and
emigration. A current trend is to mobilize more “tentmakers.” Workers with a
vocation that authorities permit can reside in fields otherwise closed to
missionaries. This is more crucial now than ever, because for some workers,
money has become more prominent than proven methods. Often Western missionaries
prefer to support high-budget projects with lofty goals, rather see churches
multiply, which requires less pleasant work. Have churches send missionaries. In the New
Testament, churches sent missionaries. In later centuries, missionary
societies were launched to help churches. Good
agencies do not replace churches as senders, but rather help them with
cultural matters and logistics. Assert God’s mission over “missions.” Your church
will grow in strength, maturity and numbers as it seeks to participate in
God’s mission to the nations, with or without missionary societies. Many
societies focus on reached fields and have an institutional mentality.
They send workers to countries and peoples where they are
not needed, and support schools where graduates do very little
evangelism, church planting and mission. Uphold a biblical model. Send proven
workers in small, temporary teams. Only send missionaries who have shown proof of their
abilities,
and allow them to reform their teams as often as their work requires. Let’s face it: some missionaries have not won believers
and started churches, yet they seem to enjoy living overseas at home
churches’ expense, and often form an elite caste, living several social
levels above the receptive segments of society. This opposes the apostolic
model and seldom produces lasting fruit. Send missionaries who are able to travel, following the
gospel into receptive regions. Some Western workers become immobile
trying to make life comfortable for their families. Keep disciple making first. Jesus said
that his mission is one of making disciples who lovingly obey his
commandments. Every mission effort must be evaluated
by its disciple-making outcome. Multiply workers and churches. Effective
missionary work helps believers, churches and their leaders to reproduce, by
training them to employ methods that others can afford to imitate. Make these recommendations to missionary candidates: Confirm your apostolic gift. Do not seek
to do mission work until you have made disciples at home, formed them into
new churches or cells, and raised up leaders among
them. Hone your skills. Learn on the
job in your home church and city, so that you will have the required skills
when you go to another place, people and culture. Affirm your role. Let your
apostolic gifting and call be evident to those whom
you expect to send you by laying hands on you, supporting you, interceding
for you and welcoming you back. Lay concrete plans and keep updating
them. Lay
out a plan to complete the task within a few years. Review your plans at
least annually and change them to fit opportunities. Report on progress
regularly to those who send you. Make these recommendations to sending churches: Seek evidence
of God’s call. Provide opportunities for potential mission workers to do
local mission work with your counsel, training and
public approval, observing outcomes. Provide on-the-job mentoring. Most gifted
apostolic workers will respond positively to mentoring that empowers them,
trains them, affirms them and makes their work
fruitful. Agree on purposes, goals
and methods. Expect reports and provide guidance. If you send through a
mission agency, then secure its agreement on the work your missionaries are
to do. Evaluate outcomes and lay new plans. Jesus ordered
his followers to make disciples. Every activity and budget item should be evaluated by how it contributes making new
disciples. Make these recommendations to receiving churches: Ask for gifted, skilled missionaries.
Hosting
workers from other countries may help your ministry win and teach new
disciples. If current ones cannot do so, then ask for those that can. Assign missionaries to empower your
workers. The
most valuable missionaries are those who have godly passion, gifts, skills
and a plan to train local workers to become successful. Beware of the money trap. You and your
churches never have enough money, and you could be tempted
by some foreigners to adopt costly programs that do not succeed very well. Inform missionaries when their work is done. Find a gracious manner in which to
let missionaries know that it is time for them to go home, before they become
more a hindrance that a help. Recommended
Resources P. O'Connor, Reproducible
Pastoral Training, <www.MissionBooks.com>. Free CP training software “Come,
Let Us Disciple the Nations” from <www.Paul-Timothy.net/dn/>. Free mentoring tools and materials
for new leaders from <www.MentorAndMultiply.com>. Train & Multiply® church
planting and pastoral training course from <www.TrainAndMultiply.com>. Order Church
Multiplication Guide from a bookshop or at <www.WCLbooks.com>. To subscribe to MentorNet or
to download earlier messages, visit: <www.MentorNet.ws>. |