By Brad Dupray
As a youth minister in Southern California, Dick Alexander led regular missions trips to nearby Mexico. Those first ventures into the mission field put a desire in his heart to see cross-cultural ministry take place on a broader scale, which has carried forward into his 25 years as senior minister with LifeSpring Christian Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. He leads by example, helping facilitate numerous overseas partnerships. Dick has deep roots in the Restoration Movement, having grown up at First Christian Church, Canton, Ohio, where he was baptized by P.H. Welshimer. He is a graduate of Cincinnati Christian University, earning both bachelor”s and master”s degrees. He and his wife, Betty, have been married for 43 years and have two children and two grandchildren.
What is your overriding philosophy of missions for the local church?
I think the simple thing would be this: to go to the unreached or least reached people in the world. That”s at the very heart of missions. It”s taking the gospel where Christ is not known.
LifeSpring has a reputation as a “missions church.” How does a church become a great missions church?
We don”t think of ourselves as a great missions church. We never set out to be a great missions church. We just set out to do what any church ought to do in missions. There are a handful of things God deeply cares about, and taking the gospel to unreached people is one of those things. So we just try to make missions part of our DNA.
Is being an evangelistic church and a missions church the same thing?
I think of them as being one and the same, because lost people are lost wherever they live. In that sense, a soul in the U.S. and a soul in Kenya matter the same to God.
Wouldn”t reaching people in the U.S. be “missions” then?
People in this country who want to find God can find him. There are many opportunities in the U.S. There are more than 300,000 churches. There are Christian radio stations. There are volumes of printed material. People who want to know God in America can find him. That is not true everywhere in the world. There are at least 2 billion people in the world who have never heard a coherent presentation of Jesus from people they know and trust. They don”t really have access to the gospel.
So you see a distinction between “world missions” and “home missions.”
Yes. When I think missions, I think cross-cultural. I think global. There are many worthwhile works in the U.S. that need to be supported and should be supported better than they are. There are all kinds of Christian ministries (Bible colleges, camps, etc.) that need better support, but I don”t think of them as missions. There”s also a huge task in church planting in the U.S. because Christianity is declining in this country. We”re on a path to become like England, and we need to change that. A large majority of U.S. churches are dying and declining. But church planting in America is something different from missions. When I think missions, I think overseas and cross-cultural.
Which should a church do, then? U.S. evangelism or world missions?
It”s not an “either/or” issue, it”s “both/and.” There”s another practical side of this: in developing nations, American dollars go a long way. What we give overseas does a huge amount of good in developing nations because of what the American dollar will buy.
What about all the benevolence projects churches are supporting overseas? Do you see a drift toward the “social gospel” as opposed to an evangelistic emphasis?
Jesus did ministry that was holistic. He served the whole person. In American thinking, in the last 100 years, there”s been a false dichotomy. The theologically liberal churches did what we came to call the “social gospel,” and biblically conservative churches did evangelism. Jesus did both. So what I think is happening now is that Bible-believing churches are embracing more of a holistic ministry.
Is there a danger that there could be a pendulum swing? Yes. But one of the good things happening today is a trend toward holistic ministry. We”re seeing that both here and overseas. That”s valuable. As we meet a wide range of human needs, we also gain greater credibility for evangelism.
With so many opportunities worldwide, how do you decide where to go?
That is the strategic question of the unreached and least-reached people. Where is the gospel least known? For us, that has meant major involvement in India, Cambodia, and the former Soviet Union. As we prayed for opportunities, those emerged. Other churches will serve in other areas where the gospel isn”t known.
How should a church designate a portion of its budget for missions?
There is no magic formula and there”s no one answer. Church situations are very different. For example, a new church plant might be meeting in a rented facility and trying to buy property or trying to get into a first building, and the church might also be dealing with staffing challenges and have limited resources. In contrast to that, an established congregation with facilities that are paid for has a much greater capacity to be involved in mission work. That”s why there”s no cookie-cutter approach to it.
How would you counsel a young church to get involved in missions?
From the first day you open, get involved with missions””even if only in a very small way. Your long-term goal is for it to be a part of your DNA. You may start with one project and one missionary, and it may be a very small commitment, but start right from the beginning. That helps the spiritual development of your people as well. God is a God of the whole world. When they join God in what he”s doing on the other side of the world, it expands their view of God.
What kinds of things does LifeSpring do to increase missions awareness among its members?
There is a steady flow of information. It is part of almost every issue of our newsletter. Almost every week in worship, when prayer needs are shared, we include at least one global concern. When we”re doing short-term mission trips, we try to recruit strategically for those (in addition to issuing open invitations). We try to be sure elders, staff members, and small group leaders have onsite involvement overseas. We do a major emphasis on world outreach for three or four Sundays every year. We prepare and send our own people as long-term missionaries.
Beyond missions awareness, do you have means of raising awareness of global needs?
It”s been helpful for us to be involved with at least one project that deals with a well-known global issue. For instance, when we were in Ukraine at the time of break up of the Soviet Union, it was everyday news in U.S. newspapers for a year. Our current involvement in Africa is HIV/AIDS-related. These are things people hear about in the mainstream news media. Knowing the church is involved in those things raises the profile of all mission work.
What is at the core of overseas missions?
Long-term mission work is the bread and butter of missions. People who go and stay for many years is how mission work gets done. You have to have people who build relationships, learn the language, understand the culture, serve, and share the gospel. That only happens by long-term missionaries. Short-term workers can be a valuable support to them.
Are we losing long-term missionaries at the expense of the availability of short-term missions?
I don”t think so. In fact, rightly done, short-term experiences feed the long-term. In today”s world most of the people who go as long-term missionaries have previously had shorter times overseas.
Is the approach to long-term missions changing?
One of the things we see today is fewer people spending lifetimes overseas. Fifty years ago it was more common for someone to go overseas in their 20s and spend 40 or 50 years. Today we”re seeing more people go for 10 or 20 years and then return to the U.S. for service. The concern is that we still need those people who will go for longer periods of service overseas, learn the language and culture, and become really effective.
Are short-term missions worth the expense?
It all depends. It”s worth the expense if those who go make a genuine contribution, and if they are changed by the experience. Some research says that after people have been home from a short-term mission trip for six months, that there has been no change in their lifestyle. In a good mission trip, people come home not only more grateful, but are willing to live with less “stuff” in order to give more. In addition to their financial giving, they pray more. And hopefully, in nonobnoxious ways, they share with their friends the good news of what God is doing overseas. Good processing of the experience onsite and debriefing of the experience as it concludes are a couple of things that can help make it a transforming experience.
But couldn”t those dollars be redirected to help the (more valuable) long-term missionaries?
Part of what makes short-term missions worth the expense is that people have taken their vacation time and money to make these short-term trips. This is money that previously would likely not have gone to mission work, so it”s a way to get additional resources channeled to missions that wouldn”t otherwise be invested there.
Do short-term missionaries create “nuisance factor” to the long-term missionaries?
The short-term missionaries need to make some significant, legitimate contribution while they”re there””to actually provide value to the missionary and the nationals. It”s not just for “your” benefit. They need to be prepared well so that there is cultural sensitivity, they are flexible, they go with a servant”s spirit, and they are not demanding while they are there; they must go as servants, not sightseers.
How do you determine you”ve made the right decisions in directing mission efforts?
I think we”ll know in Heaven. We”re always asking: Are we doing the right thing in the right way? Are we doing it as effectively as we can in seeing the most people won to Christ and discipled? Are we doing it in ways that facilitate indigenous church planting movements? Are we doing it in ways that don”t build dependency either on American dollars or American personnel? I don”t have any sense that what we”re doing is doing it right. We”re doing it the best way we know how, and we”re always trying to be wiser and more effective.
Brad Dupray is senior vice president, ministry development, with Church Development Fund, Irvine, California.
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