Missions on Point

Another common question posed to Propempo by many churches: "How can we get our church to be more actively involved in missions?" The basics start at the top with the pastor and continue with reevaluating the role of the Missions Team in mobilizing the whole congregation. Relationship and experience, paired with good information and opportunities will turn the tide. Don't abrogate responsibility for missions to anyone else (or any other institution)! The local church owns missions and is the God-appointed agent responsible for missions. So, stand up and get involved!

One of the top urgent calls for help we get is this: Help, we just realized that our missions ministry has no focus, no common thread, no strategic purpose. The things we support seem to be a random collection of people, places, purposes, etc. How can we work toward having a focus? What questions should we ask to get us on track? Rifle target instead of a shotgun blast? This episode will not give you a specific road map. But it will give you initial concepts to start that journey to your desired focused vision for missions ministry in your church.

More books! Not the dry, academic, brainiac type, but the warm, personable, practical type. This episode highlights some of my favorite resources, the tip of the iceberg, the frosting on the cake, for helping missionary candidates, some biographies, and some practical books helping families get involved in missions. Curl up or recline with a cuppa and enjoy!

There are lots of times we are asked for recommendations of essential missions books. Here's my latest line-up. Hopefully, these will prove to be friends to you and your church to grow a stronger, more biblical, and more effective mission trajectory.  Today's episode is aimed primarily at church missions leaders. But everyone can benefit and learn from these books. Then, you can use them to encourage and influence others in their missions responsibilities or pursuits.

Discovering Missions Throughout the Bible begs us to consider the practical applications. Knowing these things should find us seeing missions in our Bible reading (and listening, and study)! We should have our understanding tuned to better grasp things of Christ and the Gospel throughout the inspired Word. We see God's heart for the nations through the Gospel even in normal information and scenes of everyday life. It fuels our prayers and changes our perspectives. Then, we share our discoveries with others. 

Way too often, we minimize and marginalize the Great Commission! We think we hear about it too much. We think we know all we need to know about it. We feel that it only applies to a few zealots in the church. How sad to learn that, if we pause and think deeply about what it is, what it means, and how important it is to Christ, to the Gospel, our church, and our world, we find our preconceived notions mistaken. May this re-thinking drive us to repent and pray for God's grace to re-shape our thinking, our attitudes, our obedience. We can only become true "world Christians" by thinking deeply about God's purposes for us individually and corporately. May it be so!

Knowing how to look and see "the nations" and equivalent terms throughout the Bible will reignite and revolutionize your missions insights. God has left us clues throughout the Scriptures to see His heart for the nations for His glory. It is comprehensive in scope and intent. God alone is God. He alone is worthy of awe and worship and loving obedience. He makes His purpose known through all His interactions with us and through all His inspired revelation to us. May we better see and understand "the nations" and our role in fulfilling God's great purpose.

One of the joys of understanding how to recognize Christ, the Gospel, and Missions throughout the Bible is that, as we read the Scriptures, these gems of insight jump off the page and illumine the pathway to see them all connected in God's great plan for His glory. With just a little insight, we can fuel our eagerness to read and understand God's passion for His glory in all of human history. We lift our eyes off of ourselves and discover the majesty and sovereignty of God in the details of seemingly mundane life. We get to see Christ and the Gospel unveiled; and we understand something of our part in God's story. 

As a beginning point, it is important for us to discover and realize that God is the hero of the Bible. The Bible was written by Him for His purposes. And His overarching purpose in all of creation and history is His own glory. God's glory is the end goal and common thread behind all of Scripture. It's also an essential component of our understanding of missions throughout the Bible. Seeing God's glory as the high view of Scripture gives us hope, understanding, perspective, and a grand sense of weak-kneed awe of Him, who alone is worthy of all glory. What reverence and anticipation we should have to read the Bible that way!

Access the episode transcript page.

How can you measure Missions Team effectiveness? Use the Church Missions Profile self-assessment diagnostic tool on Propempo.com.  Your church should plan for growing missionaries from your church body. Regularly teach and preach biblical missions. Expose your church to missionary heroes and practical understanding of their role and of "how we do missions in our church." Don't forget to keep God and His grace at the center of all your vision, strategy, and goals. Amen!

Access the episode transcript page.