By Mark A. Taylor
For several years now the National Missionary Convention, recently renamed International Conference on Missions (ICOM), has met the weekend before Thanksgiving. This morning I”m struck by how good it is for the convention and the holiday to be so close together.
ICOM reminds us how thankful we can be for our fellowship of Christian churches.
Our movement (variously called the Restoration Movement, Stone-Campbell Movement, and more recently the Christian Church Movement) is thriving and well. The throngs of teenagers and young adults crowding the Indianapolis Convention Center November 15-18 bear testimony to that. And so do the displays overflowing into the hallways from the exhibit area.
Nowadays missions agencies sponsor attractive convention displays compelling us to join them as they reach every corner of the globe. At ICOM you”ll still find a fair number of “mom and pop” booths with poster board signs and foreign-made knickknacks. But here”s my impression after spending some time among the ICOM exhibits: our churches are funding cross-cultural evangelism as effective as any sponsored by some denominational home office.
Missions work sponsored by Christian churches and churches of Christ continues to expand and improve. The strategic approaches grow more sophisticated and successful even as the numbers of workers and converts increase.
As others have pointed out, the entrepreneurial leaders among us are free to meet the needs they discover all over the world, without waiting for permission or navigating a bureaucracy. This has worked not only for cross-cultural evangelism but also with church planting in North America. As I think about Thanksgiving this morning, I”m thankful to be a part of such a group: free churches collaborating to meet real needs in ways that work where they”re serving.
The collaboration is happening among Christian churches, but that”s not all. Christian churches and churches of Christ are readily cooperating with believers from every stripe of Christendom to rehabilitate addicts, feed the hungry, renovate schools, fight pornography, redeem people from poverty, and share the light and love of Christ in dark corners everywhere.
I”m very thankful to know these Christians, to encourage others by reporting their ministries, and to identify with our movement that has spawned their service. It”s a great group, these “Christians only.” It”s a great goal, to rediscover the vitality of the first church in the service and worship of the contemporary church. It”s a great era; these are the most exciting years among churches in our fellowship in our lifetime.
This morning, along with family and freedom and health, I”m listing our fellowship of churches among my reasons to be very thankful.
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