...when there is so much to do here?
AIMING BEYOND BORDERS:
I often struggle to keep the concerns of the world in front of me. The gravitational pull of immediate needs makes it easy to forget what’s happening around the globe—and I’m someone involved in international missions!
How can Christians stay engaged with God’s work around the world? Life is busy. Work is hard. We have to pay bills, raise kids, visit doctors. Relational conflict and drama enter our lives. It’s easy for Christians—and churches—to focus on what’s in front of them and miss God’s global purposes.
LOCAL VS INTERNATIONAL
And does serving God happen only “around the world?” Of course not! Glorifying God by being His witnesses to the world whether “here” or “there” should be our overall, unifying theme. We won’t all be cross-cultural missionaries, but we can all live with a missions mindset. “There is a healthy and necessary tension between the local and global dimensions of our calling as God’s people. If you’re feeling that tension, you’re probably in a good place. If you don’t feel the tension, consider whether you’ve lost a vision for either your community or for the nations.”(1)
Jesus said that His disciples would be “witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Sometimes this is interpreted as a sequential process: first your immediate locality, then go to nearby communities, and then if you still have time and energy, go to the ends of the earth. Or, some read it as a list of options. As long as I’m involved in “my Jerusalem,” I don’t need to be concerned about the rest of the world. Denny Spitters points out a flaw in this thinking: “Jesus was not telling His disciples to start at home and to move on when they got that done. The disciples were Galileans. Jerusalem was not their home; it was a strategic launch point to the nations.” (2) Thousands of pilgrims were saved on Shavuot (Pentecost) when Peter preached the Good News and then took the Gospel with them when they went back home.
REACHING THE WORLD TAKES INTENTIONALITY
The more I commit to knowing God and participating in His plan to bless the nations, the more I reflect His Son to people around me. But if I focus only on the immediate needs of the day, I’m unlikely to become a blessing to the nations by accident. I think the same could be said of churches. Churches that have a vision beyond their borders tend to have vibrant local ministries. But not all churches that focus on their own communities have a global vision. Reaching the world takes intentionality whether it is overseas or among the diaspora living next door.
The Antioch church in Paul’s time is a great example of holding community and international missions in good balance. In the middle of fruitful local ministry, the Holy Spirit instructed them to release two of their best leaders, Barnabas and Paul, to go to far-off lands (Acts 13). It is doubtful that the church had finished evangelizing their city. By giving up two of their most experienced leaders, the Antioch church stepped onto the global stage and changed the course of history. As Barnabas and Paul sailed away other leaders emerged and the church continued to grow. God’s commission requires our church to emulate Antioch.
The question, “Why go elsewhere when there is so much to do here?” is frequently asked; it is a valid question with complex and nuanced answers only briefly touched on here. Whole books are dedicated to the subject!
However, statistics clearly reveal that the North American Church is putting substantial human and financial resources to local causes.
Church Spending:
85% of North American church financial resources are used for internal purposes
13% is used for local outreach
2% is for overseas missions and only a small fraction of that is designated to bringing Christ to the unreached
Christian Workers:
97% of all missionaries go to areas where the gospel is already present
3% of all missionaries bring the Gospel to hard-to-reach people groups
Think about this:
42% of the world has not heard the Gospel
81% of all non-Christians do not personally know a Christ-follower (3)
Our Mission Strategy Team is building infrastructure for High Pointe Church to become a sending church “to go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation (Mark 16:15).” But “becoming a sending church begins not with building a missions ministry to serve a portion of the church, but with establishing a sending culture that informs every member and shapes every ministry." (4)
Joy Casey and the Missions Strategy Team
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