Articles for tag: Missions: Principles

American Christians, You Might Need to Start Living Like Missionaries

By Amy Medina “I”m moving to Canada.” Personally, Canada would be way too cold for me, but I understand the sentiment some have expressed. However, instead of fleeing for the hills””or tundra””maybe it”s time for American Christians to start living like missionaries in their own country. Before you get offended, let me assure you I am in no way belittling the millions of American Christians who are already living out gospel-centered lives in their communities. As you learned in Sunday school when you were 5, we all are missionaries. But I”m not talking about living as a proclaimer of the

November 16, 2015

Opening Doors: Sharing the Gospel in Closed Countries

By Name Withheld Unreached need not mean unreachable, even in countries where Christian evangelism is forbidden. Sousida goes to sleep afraid every night. She never knows what the spirits are going to do to her or her family. She thinks she”s done enough to appease them, but she has no way of knowing. She”s never heard of Jesus. In fact, no one she knows has ever met a Christian or seen a Bible. They have no idea they could experience freedom. Generations of her people have lived and died in total darkness. Further complicating her hopelessness, Sousida”s country is openly

November 12, 2015

Mobilize and Accelerate

By Mike Schrage Go and make disciples. This 2,000-year-old command from Jesus is just as compelling and encompassing as ever. It”s a command for obedience. It”s a command for commitment. What must we do today to obey the command? Robert Coleman said, “Evangelism is not an optional accessory to our life. It is the heartbeat of all that we were called to be and do.”1 How”s the American church doing with this command to go and make disciples? Let me share a heart that”s full of concern for the bride of Christ found within our nation”s borders. We”re living in

November 10, 2015

Changes for the Better?

By Mark A. Taylor Every missions leader and missionary watcher will tell you missions is different these days. A generation or two ago, missionaries departed for a foreign field with the intent to spend their lives there. Now “long-term missionaries” stay for maybe two or three years. Those days, and in the generations before, missionaries went from the West to the rest of the world, and most American church members assumed “we” had the solution to the problems suffered by “them.” Now missionaries from Asia, Africa, and South America are going all over the world with the gospel. And some

November 9, 2015

Family & Relationships Parenting

My Third Culture Kids

By Erin Moore I”ve been reading about “third culture kids” lately. The term refers to children who are from one culture but are living in a completely different one. It”s not a topic I”ve researched in depth, but lately it has greater meaning for me as my kids are getting a little older.Â I was reading some essays by an American woman who grew up in Pakistan. She recalls her earliest memories as a child of about 4. I looked at my own third culture kids in awe. I realize as the mother of these three children, I can understand

November 8, 2015

The Test

By Marion Duckworth My husband, Jack, our two young sons, and I drove 3,000 miles from New York to the state of Washington to begin our first assignment as rural missionaries. Since the community had no church or parsonage, we”d be living in a tiny cabin in the woods with an outhouse “down the path.” Upon arrival, we discovered the cabin was dominated by two voracious, wood-chomping stoves, one in the kitchen and the other in the tiny living room. The steps leading to the second floor were Bunyan-sized. But it was the sight of the metal bunk beds where

November 2, 2015

Missions Ministry Toolbox

Interview by Mark A. Taylor We spoke with four local church missions ministers about best practices for missions ministry. Their answers were as inspiring as they were practical. Here areÂ approaches to the local church”s global outreach that build up the church and nourish the workers on foreign fields.Â We think every congregation will appreciate the insights and ideas these four shared: PAT CREECH, global outreach pastor for Crossroads Christian Church, Newburgh, Indiana; DREW DEPLER, global outreach pastor at LifeBridge Christian Church, Longmont, Colorado; TYLER HARI, pastor of outreach, Eastview Christian Church, Normal,Â Illinois; and DAVID THORESEN, director of local andÂ international outreach,

November 1, 2015

Going Short

How one congregation prepares peopleÂ for short-term trips and helps them seeÂ how they are part of a much bigger picture. By Tom Moen We use a document at Mountain Christian Church called “The Anatomy of a Short-Term Mission Trip” to help our people understand the gravity, depth, and commitment involved in getting the team ready to go, serve well, and return home to continue the mission. This information illustrates the great investment of time that goes into making a GO Team trip work. The team leaders and church staff work together to lead the team participants through this process. Our hope

March 23, 2015

Old Testament Theology & Bible

Living in Captivity

By Cathy Mogus The divided nation of Israel was in political, moral, and spiritual decline when God called Jeremiah to become its prophet. The priest wasn”t happy with his new role. Apparently writing letters””not-so-nice letters””to the captives in Babylon was part of his job description. But there was an upside. Jeremiah had the privilege of informing his displaced countrymen, especially their spiritual leaders, that God had a plan. It boiled down to something like this: “Like it or not, you”re not leaving Babylon for 70 years. So quit dreaming of going home and get on with your lives.” He then

January 15, 2015

A Healthy Church Has a Robust Missions Program

By Rob Maupin My wife and I entered the local sub shop and began to order. The young man serving us noticed our tired, but happy faces and asked what we had been doing. We told him our church had packed 500,000 meals for hungry kids in Haiti, and it took us (and more than 1,000 volunteers) well over 11 hours of really hard work. We explained that even though it was tiring, we had a truly wonderful experience. “Why did your church do that?” he asked quietly. As we conversed, he said, “I”d like to be a part of

November 23, 2014

Exploring ‘the Call’ to Cross-Cultural Ministry

By Carla Williams Missionaries are normal Christians. They struggle with temptation. Their families are flawed, and they don”t always wake up with a smile on their faces and a song in their hearts. But missionaries are normal Christians who had a moment of faithful obedience. God uses different circumstances and situations to draw his followers into his plans for the nations. He leads his people, but each person chooses how to respond. He calls some who decide to disregard his voice. For others, thankfully, the choice is to step out in trust. Some believers don”t know if they”ve been called

November 18, 2014

A Challenge for the Stay-at-Homes

By Mark A. Taylor Success stories about cross-cultural evangelism may make us want to reach unreached people in faraway places. We read articles like those posted at our site this month and decide to give more to missions, attend the International Conference on Missions, or answer our church”s call to take a short-term missions trip. Any of these responses might be good, better for sure than those of a few who may quickly skim these posts and move on because (a) they”re bored by stories about church work overseas, or (b) they”re ashamed because they feel they should be a

November 15, 2014

How Are We Doing with Missions?

We asked five missions leaders in the Christian churches to answer several key questions about missions progress, obstacles, and opportunities: Reggie Hundley is executive director of Missions Services Association, Knoxville, Tennessee. Doug Lucas is president of Team Expansion, Louisville, Kentucky. Doug Priest is executive director of Christian Missionary Fellowship, Indianapolis, Indiana. Greg Pruett is president of Pioneer Bible Translators, Dallas, Texas. Tony Twist is president of TCM International Institute, Indianapolis, Indiana.Â What are the most hopeful signs regarding international, cross-cultural evangelism you see in our movement today? Greg Pruett: Many are valuing working among the unreached peoples of the world,

October 6, 2014

Church & Ministry Church Leadership Eldership

Can a Polygamous Man Be an Elder in the Church?

By Doug Priest Dan Crum and Joe Cluff, along with their families, have served for many years as missionaries among the Maasai people of Kenya. They were interviewed by CHRISTIAN STANDARD contributing editor Doug Priest. When did each of you arrive in Kenya and what has been your ministry through the years. DAN CRUM: We arrived in Kenya in 1988, and lived in rural Maasailand for 10 years in the ministry of evangelism, church planting, and leadership training. The next three years were focused on producing written materials in the Maasai language, followed by seven years as team leader.

June 5, 2014

Seven Hours Ahead and Seven Meters Away

By Tom Moen Nairobi, Kenya, is seven time zones ahead of the East CoastÂ of the United States. The last time I was in Kenya this startling thought occurred to me: Have we made it easier to go seven hours ahead on a mission trip to “be Jesus” to people from another culture who speak a different language than to go seven meters away to our next-door neighbors””the people with whom we share both language and culture””to “be Jesus” to them? I will start by saying I am a proponent of short-term mission trips, though I believe we should call them

May 12, 2014

The Megachurch Missions Minister

By Chris DeWelt “With great power comes great responsibility” (Voltaire, not Spiderman) The megachurch missions minister occupies a new and unique role. In their article, “U.S. Megachurches and New Patterns of Global Mission,”1 researchers Robert J. Priest, Douglas Wilson, and Adelle Johnson make several important observations. One is that the American megachurch missions pastor is a gatekeeper who watches over a very significant portion of the megachurch budget. Their survey found the average annual foreign missions budget in the megachurch was $690,000. Outside of general payroll and facility needs, the missions budget of the typical megachurch easily eclipses all other

May 11, 2014

Megachurches and Missions

By Chris DeWelt Suspicious of missions? Uninterested in missionaries? Disengaged from foreign fields? Not the megachurches I interviewed for my doctoral thesis and this report. Actually, I found just the opposite. The American megachurch is interested in missions! The advent of the megachurch is a phenomenon unique in church history. The fact that the megachurch is here is hardly a news item, but the growth and influence of megachurches is a significant part of our current story.1 Just 53 years ago there were only 16 Protestant megachurches2 in America. The Hartford Institute for Religion Research lists about 1,500 megachurches.3 Currently,

November 25, 2013

Coming ‘Home’: When Missionaries Come Off the Field

By Carla Williams They were so vulnerable and wounded, barely able to look me in the eye. They”d gone into missions directly after college, bright with hope and the thrill of obedience. With sincere love and determination, they”d adopted an unreached people group. Thousands of dollars had been sacrificed for their language study and living expenses. And here they were, three years later, looking so lost and alone, feeling all the weight of their supposed failure. When many missionaries come off the field, churches and families don”t know what to say and the missionaries themselves don”t know how to move

November 12, 2013