Propempo International

What are your church missions quandries? I'd like to find out what things are troubling you or your church in the area of missions. Knowing what to address can help us develop the right tools.

Here's a few we've helped other churches with in the past months:

I’ve heard a lot of excuses. But the most dangerous are these common MYTHS about missions believed by church leaders. The following list come from real situations. Sometimes the church leader knows that the myth they believe is so lame that they don’t really want to articulate it out loud. Yet, if you dig a little bit below the surface, you uncover the weak foundation underneath.

Just how important it is a missionary’s relationship to his/her/their home church? Here are ten reasons why the missionary’s relationship to his home (sending) church is, perhaps, the highest priority relationship besides marriage and family for long-term ministry effectiveness.

We've known for a long time that American local churches, in general, are moving away from comprehensive Bible teaching and discipleship/equipping for ministry. Churches and agencies together lean on expediency to process potential candidates, sending them to swim in shark-infested waters too immature and ill-equipped for long-term effectiveness in difficult fields.

Today I was asked to make some observations about trends in local churches related to missions mobilization. This little response is NOT comprehensive. (So, maybe it should be Part 1 of a series.) Here's what I wrote:

We stand amazed and deeply grateful to God for all he has done for us in 2010. We are also very, very appreciative of ministry partners, churches and individuals, who share in the fruit of this work through their prayers, encouragement, and generous donations. The Lord has given us a banner year! We have trained national church leaders and overseas workers in limited access locations with eager receptivity and expanding opportunity.

There are, perhaps, a hundred different facets by which the Incarnation and missions may be connected. Let’s think of a few, at least, to stir our imaginations:

* – Jesus made a huge cross-cultural move from heaven to earth; missionaries cross cultures for the sake of the Gospel.
* – Many of God’s promises and plans were fulfilled in Christ’s advent; God’s promise and plan of salvation is fulfilled through the personal proclamation of missionaries’ ministries.

We have been discussing Paul’s godly ambition in Romans 15:20, but we must careful of our motives and not be radical just for the sake of being radical.

I remember the first time I wrote a letter to a mission board in 1983 about serving God, and I said something like, “I want to go on short term with you because you guys are radical and on the cutting edge, etc.”

The Letter I got back was a rebuke. I wish I could find it.

(see Romans 15:20-24) The name of our mission is Propempo, which comes from the Greek word,
προπέμπω. It means, “to send forth”;

They say that when you leave overseas ministry status to do missions ministry "at home" you lose your halo and your furlough. In practical terms, this means that the home-side mission teacher, trainer, mobilizer, administrator loses the automatic aura and awe naturally attributed to overseas workers. Also, it means that the home-side missionary minister, no matter how effective, faithful and hard-working, is rarely allowed a special time set apart for partnership development (read that: support raising). So, the end result is that there is an inevitable erosion of respect and of resources.