Mission & Evangelism

Mission & Evangelism equips Christians and churches to share the gospel and make disciples locally and globally. Explore Bible-based articles on evangelism, outreach, disciple-making, missions strategy, church planting partnerships, and engaging your community with compassion and clarity. You’ll find practical guidance for building a missional culture, telling the story of Jesus well, and reaching people across cultures and generations. Whether you’re serving in your neighborhood, supporting missionaries, or leading a church on mission, these resources help you live sent and invite others to follow Christ.

November 23, 2013

Christian Standard

JUST ONE: Ivan S. Prokhanov

TRUE STORIES OF WORLD CHANGERS WHO STARTED ALONE: This month we share stories of individual Christians who couldn”t wait for others to tell them when to help the hurting and share the gospel. Their clear vision of a pressing need pushed them to do what they could as soon as they could. IVAN S. PROKHANOV   By Victor Knowles He was born April 17, 1869, in the Russian city of Vladikavkas, nestled in the snow-clad Caucasus. The highest peaks in the Caucasus are taller than the fabled Alps. It was perhaps fitting that Ivan S. Prokhanov should be born here because

November 22, 2013

Christian Standard

JUST ONE: Sole to Soul

TRUE STORIES OF WORLD CHANGERS WHO STARTED ALONE: This month we share stories of individual Christians who couldn”t wait for others to tell them when to help the hurting and share the gospel. Their clear vision of a pressing need pushed them to do what they could as soon as they could. SOLE TO SOUL / www.facebook.com/ShoesForKenyaKids By Janet Smith As Andrew and Rachel Scott and their four children, members of Crossway Christian Church in Nashua, New Hampshire, prepared for a mission trip to lead a VBS program at Missions of Hope International in Nairobi, Kenya, an event occurred that sharpened

November 21, 2013

Christian Standard

JUST ONE: An Evangelist from Moldova

TRUE STORIES OF WORLD CHANGERS WHO STARTED ALONE: This month we share stories of individual Christians who couldn”t wait for others to tell them when to help the hurting and share the gospel. Their clear vision of a pressing need pushed them to do what they could as soon as they could. AN EVANGELIST FROM MOLDOVA / www.tcmi.org By David Wright Raised in Moldova, one of the smallest states of the former Soviet Union, Mihai Malancea and his family were different from most of their neighbors. They were Christians. His father led a small house church in the capital city, Chisinau.

November 17, 2013

Christian Standard

JUST ONE: Motivation + Ingenuity = Clean Water

TRUE STORIES OF WORLD CHANGERS WHO STARTED ALONE: This month we share stories of individual Christians who couldn”t wait for others to tell them when to help the hurting and share the gospel. Their clear vision of a pressing need pushed them to do what they could as soon as they could. WATERDROP SHOP / www.thewaterdropshop.com   By Shannon Garcia Josh Weingart was 19 and a freshman at Illinois State University when he felt he needed to get out of his comfort zone and do something overseas. A short-term trip in the United States had opened his eyes to missions, but

November 16, 2013

Christian Standard

JUST ONE: Dancing in Freedom

TRUE STORIES OF WORLD CHANGERS WHO STARTED ALONE: This month we share stories of individual Christians who couldn”t wait for others to tell them when to help the hurting and share the gospel. Their clear vision of a pressing need pushed them to do what they could as soon as they could. RAPHA HO– USE / www.raphahouse.org   By Stephanie Freed Ten years ago, I walked into a junkyard in Cambodia, near the Thai border, and came face-to-face with an enslaved child for the first time in my life. People who lived in and operated the junkyard owned her. She was

November 15, 2013

Christian Standard

JUST ONE: Swish!

TRUE STORIES OF WORLD CHANGERS WHO STARTED ALONE: This month we share stories of individual Christians who couldn”t wait for others to tell them when to help the hurting and share the gospel. Their clear vision of a pressing need pushed them to do what they could as soon as they could. HOOPS OF HOPE / www.hoopsofhope.org By Doug Priest Austin Gutwein was just 9 years old in 2004 when he saw a DVD clip about a starving girl named Maggie who lived in Africa with her aged grandmother. Maggie”s parents had died of AIDS. For weeks, Austin could not get

November 14, 2013

Christian Standard

JUST ONE: Walking, Swimming, Running

TRUE STORIES OF WORLD CHANGERS WHO STARTED ALONE: This month we share stories of individual Christians who couldn”t wait for others to tell them when to help the hurting and share the gospel. Their clear vision of a pressing need pushed them to do what they could as soon as they could. ACTIVEWATER / www.activewater.org / www.rundarenrun.com   By Daren Wendell Am I living? I mean, really living? I remember that thought crossing my mind as I sat with my Bible, drinking my morning coffee. As a youth pastor at a large church in Wisconsin, I had to admit, I

November 12, 2013

Mark A. Taylor

Must-Haves for the Missions-Minded

By Mark A. Taylor Several resources remind me of Standard Publishing”s commitment to missions and a host of special opportunities for missions-minded visitors to this website. The first is actually a set of three books, mission trip devotions and journals by Lena Wood. Called (item 022501113) gives spiritual nourishment and assessment to older teens and adults preparing to go on a short-term missions trip. Challenged (022501213) helps the reader deal with the spiritual transformation he may experience while he”s on the mission trip. Changed (022501313) is the devotional journal to use once the traveler has returned home. How will he

November 11, 2013

Christian Standard

A Conversation with Doug Priest

Meet Our Contributing Editors: This month we talk with Doug Priest, executive director of Christian Missionary Fellowship International, about missions trends, short-term missions trips, and the worldwide multiplication of urban squatters. Interview by Jennifer Johnson How did you get started in missions? My parents went to Ethiopia as missionaries before I began high school. We first heard about it when I was a sixth-grader, and I said, “Oh boy, I get to be Tarzan!” My younger sister was very excited because she wanted a monkey. (She actually did have a pet baboon for a while.) I attended a very good boarding

November 10, 2013

Christian Standard

A New Framework for Mission

By Gayla Congdon It was about four years into our work in Mexico that we decided to start building homes in the Tijuana dump. We recognized that most of the children living at the Tijuana Christian Mission were from families squatting there in makeshift houses. We designed a house that could easily be built and dismantled, so in case the families were ever kicked off the land, they could take the materials with them. That became Amor”s framework for mission as more than 17,000 homes have been built these past 29 years. Over the years our vision has expanded to

November 9, 2013

Christian Standard

Are We Being Paternalistic When We Talk about ‘Missions’?

By Michael Sweeney There are problems with the word, and many are beginning to talk about them. We do well to understand what some hear when we say “missions.” But that doesn”t mean we should curtail cross-cultural evangelism. “That”s not “˜PC”!” Have you ever had to deal with that “politically correct” criticism after saying or writing something that inadvertently offended someone because of a set of connotations you did not share? My reaction, when this has happened, has ranged anywhere from frustration to despair to paralysis. How does one even begin to keep up? As a missionary and teacher of

November 8, 2013

Christian Standard

A Pastor Among the Persecuted

By Darrel Rowland Ajai Lall once preached with AK-47s pointed at him. Another time he had 200 bullets fired into his bedroom for sharing the gospel. Many of his fellow Christians in India have been killed, raped, had their homes and church buildings burned, and/or were driven from their jobs and schools because of their faith. “We are a microscopic minority,” Lall says. “Either you are a committed Christian or you are not. You don”t compromise. You live out your faith.” When Lall looks to the United States, he sees how values and standards have slid as committed Christians become

November 7, 2013

Christian Standard

Persecuted Church, Prevailing Church

By Todd Nettleton “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). It”s not hard to see the truth in Jesus” words when you consider what our Christian brothers and sisters are enduring around the world. In Egypt, the “Arab Spring” was supposed to bring about more freedom and more democracy, but under the Muslim Brotherhood, persecution of Christians actually increased. While many Christians were pleased to see the recent overthrow of President Mohammed Morsi, Voice of the Martyrs (VOM) contacts say radical Muslims actually blame Christians for Morsi”s loss of power.

September 1, 2013

Christian Standard

Taking Christ to Patrons of Local Clubs and Bars

By Jennifer Johnson It took a trip to Bosnia for Daron Earlewine to launch a new ministry in America. “The coffee shops become pubs in the evening,” he says. “At midnight they close and all the adults go to dance clubs. It dawned on me the same thing happens in every town in America””adults are gathering at bars and clubs. And if we could find a way to “˜own” those rooms, we could impact thousands of people.” Earlewine, then on staff at East 91st Street Christian Church in Indianapolis, also played drums in a rock band. He suggested they try

August 4, 2013

Christian Standard

Church Goes “˜All-in” to Reach Latinos

By Jennifer Johnson Many congregations start Spanish-language services, but few go “all-in” like Eastside Christian Church in Anaheim, CA. “Our mission is to reach 1 percent of the 5.8 million people within a 20-mile radius of our building,” says communications director Jan Lynn. “A third or more of these people are Latino, so we needed to be intentional about creating new ways to serve them and share Jesus.” For Eastside, that”s “Semilla@Eastside,” a new service held each Sunday at 2 p.m. Hector Hermosillo serves as the new pastor for the initiative, and works closely with the rest of the staff

July 27, 2013

Christian Standard

¡Evangélicos Explosion!

By Brian Mavis “I really liked today”s Mass, Father.” If you are a preaching minister, you”ve probably been greeted like that after church. It”s not news that in the United States many former Catholics are attending and converting to Protestant churches. What is news, though, is that many of those Catholics aren”t from Irish or Italian decent””rather, they are Latinos.1 Latin America has been experiencing Latino conversions from Catholicism to Protestantism much longer than the U.S.: “¢ From 1900 to 2000 the number of Latin American Protestants swelled from 50,000 to 64 million! “¢ In 1930, Protestants amounted to 1

July 14, 2013

Christian Standard

Introducing Prisoners to Christ

By Jennifer Johnson God Behind Bars is a nonprofit organization that holds video campuses inside several women”s prisons. Today, the ministry is pursuing a multifaceted strategy to not only introduce inmates to Christ, but to walk with them as Christ followers. To that end, God Behind Bars partners with Central Christian Church (Henderson, NV) and several others church to launch ministries inside prisons. GBB still holds video services, and the first step is for a prisoner to attend. Because 90 percent of inmates have struggled with addiction at some point, step two is participating in a small group or Celebrate Recovery. “After a

June 18, 2013

Christian Standard

Real Churches, Missional Ministry

By Mark A. Taylor Of all the articles about missional ministry we”ve posted this month, I like the stories from churches most. Maybe you agree. Although we”re energized by the insights of missional leaders like Matt Smay and Alan Hirsch, their ideas come to life in the strategies, experiences, successes, and failures of local congregations. Rivertree Christian Church, Massillon, Ohio; Community Christian Church, Naperville, Illinois; and Southland Christian Church, Lexington, Kentucky, encourage us with the new paths they”re blazing. And now you can hear leaders from these three churches discuss their ministry. We”re bringing them to you via CHRISTIAN STANDARD”s

June 13, 2013

Christian Standard

City on a Hill Producing Films and Filmmakers

By Jennifer Johnson “You could call us “˜media missionaries,”” says Cyndi Moreno, director of development at City on a Hill Productions (Louisville, KY). For more than a decade, the nonprofit organization has used film to share the gospel and support the work of local churches. “We provide Bible study resources like The Easter Experience and Kyle Idleman”s Not a Fan; help churches share their stories, recruit volunteers, or raise funds; and equip local church leaders working in media,” she says. “We want to reach the world with the message of the gospel.” City on a Hill is currently in the

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