schooled

[Shoot. I only had 8 days left in February and I blew it. I didn't post last night. I'll try posting twice today but...it's just not the same. ]

You meet all types of people. Believers who are just realizing that there is a great commission, folks who have been sending people for 30 years, God takes all kinds. Most of our partners are somewhere in between. But hardly any of them do missions as their main focus. It isn't their main thing - God is. Their church is. And that is the way it should be most of the time. Their lives are happening all around them and if I can bring missions to the front of their mind more often than not, I am communicating successfully.

I think I need to back up a step to explain my mind in regards to mobilizing for missions. Just as a church planter sees the people in their village as his or her flock (or constituents) I, as a mobilizer, see U.S. Christians as my focus. A church planter will ask their partners to pray for individuals and organizations in that village/region; I ask my partners to pray for individuals and organizations in the U.S. to become mobilized (I like to say on fire for missions, but that's just my wording.) The church planter wants you involved through prayer and financial support because it's God's plan and it's good for folks in the village; I want you involved through prayer and financial support because it's God's plan and it's good for you and for our existence as Christians in this country.

So I went into the event on Saturday with certain expectations. Our organization, like many faith-based, nonprofit organizations is feeling the economy crunch. (The exception there is we don't solicit or fund raise.) We just got a new national director. The world of missions is changing. We just released an excellent video series with Perspectives. So I kind of went into it with the attitude that "people will be changed by us knowledgeable experts." This attitude was reflected in my prayer request the night before, that "many people there will be led to respond to God's call on their lives in regards to missions and specifically to East Asia with [us]." It was going to be a learning event ... I just wouldn't be doing the learning, everyone else would. (/arrogance)

God totally schooled me. Though all those things I mentioned above are crucial and were pushed to the forefront of the evening, the real value of the event for me was hearing my friend's story and current walk in missions; about their church's take on missions, and how it's effecting their family -- both for the positive and the negative. I had forgotten (or God-forbid, ignored) this part of the equation. Behind every partner there is a network of others. Those others (and our partner) are believers and are seeking his face independently of us. If they are seeking his face, they will eventually come into an understanding of the great commission on their own. Missions is part of the DNA of a christian life. God can teach me about the great commission through you, just as much as you can learn from anything I've got to say. It is a work we are doing together, and it is often an equal exchange of peers, rather than teach to student.