“We become bolder in our local mission when we see what God is doing globally.”
Being a healthy church means being concerned what God is doing throughout the whole world.
Wei Han Kuan thinks that Charles Perry (the evangelical founding bishop of Melbourne) got it right when he said in 1851 that “the best means of ensuring the health of the local church is a vital commitment to world missions.”
- How do have the conversation about how many missionaries you’re supporting in global ministry? And who they should be?
- Can you name the missionaries you support?
- How do you think about a balance different types of mission partners?
- How do you send people out from your local church?
- Are you AIMING to send people from your local church?
- Who is responsible for discerning who should be sent?
- Generous churches breed generous people
TOOL BOX:
Redeeming Babel by Wei-Han Kuan
Gaining by Losing by J D Greear
CREDITS:
This episode was brought to you by Safe Ministry Check
The One Thing is brought to you by Reach Australia
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TRANSCRIPT:
The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.
0:15
G’day, I’m Pete Hughes and you welcome to The One Thing, a podcast designed to give you one solid practical tip for gospel centred ministry.Every week.The One thing’s brought to you by Reach Australia.We would love to see thousands of healthy and evangelistic multiplying churches all over our country, but not just our country.
0:33
I, I One of the the things that really drives me in ministry is this vision from Revelation 7.After this I looked and there was a vast multitude from every nation, tribe, people and language which no one could number standing before the throne and before the Lamb.In our previous episode we were talking to Tanya and Mike Snowden who are both been overseas missionaries but now working here in Australia.
0:58
Mike’s working for a Anglican church in Willoughby.Tanya is working with CMS, a global mission partner.Guys, thanks for coming back.Thanks so much.Today we’re actually going to be spending a little bit more time about why is it a good thing for churches locally to actually be engaged in global mission.
1:19
But let me just what do you guys do when you’re not being missionaries Ministries Like what?What?What’s your idea of fun?Good question.Actually, I listened to one of your Reach Australia podcast the other day with Keith and Sarah Condy talking about, you know, looking after your mental health.
1:37
They like to walk.So we actually did a bushwalk yesterday.That’s not what we always do.It sounds fun to say that we did it though, right?We like hanging out together.That’s that’s nice.That’s a good thing to hear from someone who’s married.Like, yeah, we like spending time together.
1:52
That’s what.Yeah.Don’t you?I just said thank you so much for just slipping in that little Commission.Yeah, we’ll, we’ll send you the Commission for that, the promo there, but yeah.I, I really love making stuff.I, I love whether it’s making food or a video or coming up with a musical.
2:08
I like.I’m, I’m doing all sorts of weird things, but my mind will just love going off and being able to wander and then invent something and see if I can come up with something at the end that might serve others in some way for the glory of Jesus.Actually, you are a very creative guy and we’re not going to put it in the toolbox, but keep an eye out for Mike’s resources.
2:27
There’s lots of really interesting creative stuff out there.He’s a very creative guy.But for now, you press play on another episode of The One thing Why Global Mission is great for reaching Australia.Today’s podcast is brought to you by Safe Ministry.
2:43
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3:04
You’ll have access to four levels of training tailored to your church members, volunteers, leaders, church staff and board members.Head to the website safeministrycheck.com dot AU for a free trial today.And now back to the podcast.OK, let’s let’s, let’s get to the heart of this.
3:24
Why is it a good thing for churches to support missionaries?Not just for the missionaries, but also for what?Why is it good for the church to do this, especially if the missionaries are overseas?Yeah, going back to that Revelation 7 verse, I think that challenged us to say that churches, local churches need a global vision as in that they’re always going to be local gatherings, but they’re always also part of Jesus eternal gathering.
3:53
And so they’re they’re part of the gathering of the nations.And if we don’t have a way of regularly seeing ourselves as partnering in what God is doing somewhere else that we we can’t see and don’t control, then we can fall into that trap of thinking that our local mission is the only important one and we can fail and then I think see opportunities that we wouldn’t otherwise.
4:16
And so when a missionary lifts our eyes to see what God is doing somewhere else, we get more encouraged to be bolder locally, depending on our great God to do that work in people’s hearts where we are.OK, I could argue that I currently live in Sydney.
4:32
There’s nations being brought to Sydney.I I can just do that by crossing the road.Do I really need to actually support someone who’s in another country?Well, I think that we do.There’s a good article, I don’t know if we’ll put it in the show notes, but it’s by the same as Victoria executive director saying that yes, it’s not enough just to cross the road because the nations are coming to Australia.
4:55
He quotes this first Bishop of Melbourne called Charles Perry.He says the best means of ensuring the health of the local church is a vital commitment to world missions.Now that’s a good pithy quote.We don’t usually think about the health of churches being the metric being how good are they at supporting global mission, right?
5:16
But we think that a healthy local church is one that’s on about what God is doing, right?We think that the how they handle God’s word, for example, that’s a great measure of the health of a local church.I think.What does God say in his word?I think you can trace it right from Genesis, right?
5:33
That he wants the world to know him.And yes, it’s amazing that the that the nations are coming to Australia.There are still so many thousands of people, people, groups, languages out there that aren’t going to come.Like we’ve got to care about that too.
5:49
And going back to the what we mentioned in the last episode, we mentioned Philippians.Isn’t it interesting that that’s like the letter where things are just going so well, but the focus of it is partnership between Paul and the Philippians such that he can say Chapter 4.I rejoice greatly in the law that at last you’ve revived your concern for me.
6:07
And that that partnership, that involvement with what he’s doing somewhere completely different to where they are actually, it seems to revitalise and grow that local church and that in in that area.And it keeps sending out more and more of the the good news of Jesus to their surrounds too.
6:26
There is something about that picture, isn’t there?Of even when you find perhaps where you are, the ground’s a bit hard.You’re not seeing the fruit.And then to hear from somebody who’s in Spain, for example, where you guys were to hear, oh, actually we saw this person become Christian and you go actually, yeah, God is doing stuff.
6:44
I need to actually not just think about what’s happening in my neighbourhood.I need to be thinking about what’s happening around the world.But as you said, Tanya, it’s, it is, it’s about having God’s heart isn’t if we, if we’re followers of God and his heart is for the whole world.It’s not just for my suburb, it’s not just for Australia, it’s for the whole world.
7:00
And so it’s a good thing that we are keep thinking about that.I want to talk about some practical things about, you know, if you’re a church and you’re thinking about supporting mission work, are there some key practical things that are there?Like, for example, we we had a debate in our staff team a little while ago about how many missionaries you should support.
7:22
One of our guys said, oh, as many as you can.Like if you can support 20, do 20.Somebody else was saying, no, actually you should keep it in a small number.Do you reckon there’s an ideal number of missionaries you should be supporting?I don’t think so.I, I find it very hard to pick and that I think is part of the nature of having local churches as in each church is going to be different.
7:43
But if you’re not having that conversation amongst you, like it sounds like that kind of conversation that you’ve had is probably really healthy in terms of working out what’s going to be best for our people in terms of who they can practically support, What’s going to be helpful for them in terms of their engagement.
7:58
Is it, is this the kind of culture in which connecting with just a few is going to be the more called thing to do?But also we’re going to see more involvement in gospel fruit as a result of that.So I think as in knowing your church and having that conversation is a really important thing to do.
8:17
So it’s about the church trying to work out.Is it looking at the church going, perhaps it’s going to be better that we go wide and and shallow in terms of we’re just going to try and show that people are God is doing all sorts of things all over our country.Or is it going to be we’re going to be narrow and deep and go actually we’re going to focus on some key relationships in different places?
8:36
And that’s the thing.It depends on the church.Is that what you’re saying?I I think that’s probably right as in, but part of it might be you might think about your church and go we, we have a really strong small group ministry.And so we’re going to think about how we could connect a missionary with every single small group.
8:52
And maybe that means you actually end up with quite a lot, but you have talked about the responsibility of the small group and the expectation of what the relationship is going to be like.In that way, perhaps you’ve got a big upfront platform ministry and that’s one of the key focuses.And so you’re trying to think about what’s the best way we can do that large scale relationship, but where the where the missionary has a strong feature upfront in that platform presence.
9:19
I would just say I’d be a bit worried if there’s too many.Can your church cope with that?So one thing is money, right?So can you financially support them?But it’s not just about that.Like we said in the last episode, it’s not just about being able to give to them financially and roster them on for prayer enough.
9:37
Like we want it to be a real relationship.So working out what’s feasible for that.I mean, I, I look, I’m going to put my cards on the table.I was, I was 1 advocating for the, the narrow and deep kind of thing because as we mentioned in the last episode, it’s about relationship and making sure you’ve got a good relationship and the capacity for that.
9:57
And I kind of feel like that if it’s just lots and lots of it almost becomes tokenistic, you know what I mean?Because you just don’t have that connection there.Yeah.I think I want to be able to go into a church and ask people in the church who they, you know, who are their missionaries and they can say who they are.
10:14
So if you’ve got too many, you can’t even say who they are, let alone.Just it’s overwhelming.Yeah.Actually, that’s a really good measure, isn’t it, to be able to go.Can you name the missionaries that you support?And if people can’t, you’ve probably got too many.I think that’s or you’re not doing a good job of supporting them.
10:29
It could be that too.But that’s a, that’s a really helpful kind of measure that’s there.Yeah.What about different sorts of Now I realise I’m talking to someone who works for CMS, who has a vested interest in making sure that CMS missionaries are being supported, but what about the different types?
10:46
Because there’s different types of missionaries, isn’t there?Do you reckon there’s a, there should be a sort of a, so to speak, a, a balanced diet or should there just be a focus on global on global mission?Only CMS, that is the only organisation.No, I must say very clearly that is not true.
11:02
Yeah, we do love CMS.And also I think CMS is an organisation is also doing a lot of different things.Yeah.So I guess I would say definitely a balanced diet as you put it, is really good because we don’t want to say we’re all on about this mission organisation.No, we’re on about what God is doing in the world and showing people he’s doing, you know, this thing with Muslim ministry and exercise classes in the Middle East.
11:26
And he’s also, they’re doing this great thing with students in France.You know, I think that’s really good.But I would value the the strength of the relationship over the type of missionary.So if there’s the possibility of stronger partnership with the church, and I think then you can even include the mission organisation in that, which is something I really valued about CMS being able to link us up with some churches that where there was an existing relationship.
11:52
It’s that if you can have that strength of relationship and build that from a firmer foundation, that’s going to really just help in the ongoing strengths of the partnership with the church and the missionary.Actually, I want to come back to that, that question of if the person who is actually going is being sent by the church, what’s that relation?
12:10
I will come back to that question in a moment, but I want to just kind of dig into we’re talking a bit about global partners, but also I mean we’re about Reach Australia.So I’m going to, you’ve had your chance to plug the CMS and plug Reach Australia.We want to see more and more churches planted and so supporting church plants, I think that’s an interesting thing because you can have that relationship as well, can’t you?
12:31
Yeah.So if you’re, you know, a church, say, in Sydney and you’re supporting a church plant, say, in Yarra Bilba up in Queensland, you can actually go and visit them.Like it’s much easier to visit them than to go to Spain.I’d love to go to Spain, but just can’t afford it.So, yeah, there is those relational kind of things there, yeah.
12:48
Any thoughts on other mission kind of things around Australia?Yeah.I think that’s really good.I think you definitely want to mix.You want to say that it’s not just your suburb that needs the gospel?Yeah.If you can support like our church does, the local scripture teacher in the high school, yeah, that’s great, you know, Yeah, the congregation can’t all go to the high school to share the gospel there, but we can give and partner with them.
13:11
Then, yes, other parts of NSW, other parts of Australia and then the world.I think that’s just a really good.Yeah, I’m doing it.Yeah, and there are other ministries that are never going to be self sustaining just because of the nature of their ministry and but we still want to make sure that they are ministries that take the gospel to the world, including Australia.
13:30
So, yeah, OK, let’s come back to that question of if the person who is going they’re being sent from that this is their home church, How important is it that particular relation?Because that’s a different relationship, isn’t it?To I’ve heard you guys are going to Spain and so yeah, we’ll support you.
13:46
I like Spain.That sounds great.But that’s different, isn’t it?What?What should that relationship look like?I guess I can say something there.I think you don’t just need to be sent by one church.So there are churches out there who do raise up their own missionaries and send them.
14:05
And that is a beautiful thing, that relationship where people can say I knew this girl in Sunday school and she’s now, you know, going to, I don’t know the Middle East to share Jesus there, but I think the variety is good.So I can only every mission organisation does this a bit differently as well.
14:23
So again, sorry I can only talk about CMS well.You know that that would just be realistic.That’s where you’re from.So yeah.So I do like the way that we partner with lots of different churches.I think there’s something really amazing about strangers that you’ve never met in a church who you can go to, and you’ve got a real unity in Jesus.
14:43
You’re part of the same family and they welcome you as if that’s true, because it is true.And they really partner with you going that is different to the church you’ve grown up in.There are a few dangers, I would say, for the person who’s going from the church they grew up in.Just relationally, things can be assumed.
15:01
So I think you want to be particularly careful about that.But I would want to say if you grew up and being sent by a church that’s got great potential for good partnership as well.Yeah.Yeah, and sorry.But there’s also a fundamental question I think as well as to does your church have ascending vision?
15:23
And so whether that’s overseas or to Australia, you want to ask that question of what is, what does it say about what we’re seeking to do in terms of both locally and globally?And it’s not always possible to obviously send a missionary from your church.
15:40
And so of course you’d hope there’s going to be churches who are going, please like tell us a missionary that we can partner with.Like as in you don’t want to say that’s not a good thing.But as in for both ways, it’s like, do we have that vision of of sending people outside of our own patch to other places?
15:58
And I wonder if that’s lacking in a lot of churches.I don’t know if we talk about that very much.What’s the vision for our church?Is it to raise up someone to send them off?I don’t know.I think that’s a great question.I think it’s, yeah, I’ll, I’ll put a book in the in the toolbox that kind of addresses that a little bit more and I’ll, I’ll come back to the moment.
16:18
But yeah, is that is that is that, is it just to kind of keep getting more and more people in rather than actually send people out in terms of, you know, if someone comes and says, I want to go to the Middle East and you’re going, look, you’re a 16 year old kid, right?You need to kind of do some growing up.
16:34
How much is the the that question of suitability?Is that the role of the local church or is that the role of the mission, the sending organisation?I mean, who has that difficult conversation?If you’ve got somebody who goes, I want to take the gospel to the world, you’re going, I don’t think you’re the person to do this.
16:52
Who has the difficult conversation?Excellent question.I’m taking this answer because it is part of my job.I think the local church has a really key role.So my job literally is that if someone is thinking about mission, they might call the office and they get flicked to me.I don’t know this person from a bar of soap.
17:09
So I’m trying to, you know, discern so many things in that conversation, but I always ask, who’s your local church?What does your minister think about this?What does your small group leader think about this?Because it’s a community decision.So I would hope that if the local church thinks this person’s not suitable, that they would say it, right?
17:29
Also, part of our role at CMS, though, is part of that discernment process.And we do say no to people through the application process, but a lot of it is reliant on a whole bunch of time with people in interviews and all of that, but also references.We want to talk to the people who know them and have seen them over years.
17:47
But.That’s a different role, isn’t it?I think when you’re you’re discerning whether someone’s suitable for the mission field, that’s one thing.In a local church you can actually turn around and go hey, you’re not ready yet because of this.And my role in discipleship is to help you grow.
18:04
And so that’s a different thing.And the local church does the discipleship thing that a mission organisation can’t do.So to just throw it on the mission organisation is actually not really fair.Exactly right.Yeah.So if a 16 year old comes to me, which sometimes they do, how exciting is that?Yeah, that’s great.Yeah.Yeah.Sorry.
18:19
If you’re 16, you think about mission awesome.You should do that, just not just yet, but anyway.I’ll have a chat with them.Yeah, that’s fine.But yes, in the next 10 years, they’re going to need to be discipled by their local church.So they’re going to have to try their ministry skills where they are in their high school, then at their church, have a mentor, have a, you know, people meet with them, grow their relationship with with Jesus, have some training.
18:43
Like all those yes, that’s all the local church.And can I say not all churches are doing that?Like, it’s, it’s sad.University ministry is doing a really pretty good job at that.I’d love to see, well, we can say more about that.
18:58
I would love to see churches play a key part of that too.Yeah, OK, Mike, you, you picked up an interesting thing.You would hope that churches would want to partner with global missionaries.Is there every case where a church, a church is exempt from that going?
19:15
We’re too small.We’re just, look, we’re just barely, you know, scraping by in terms of paying what we need to pay our responsibilities.Is there ever a point where it’s like, no, we’re too small, we’re too awkward.We’re too whatever, we’re too focused on a particular group of people in our in our particular suburb.
19:35
Is there ever an exemption?Before I answer, let me just say that I feel that in so many ways of going how like there’s so many things that you just feel the burden of locally and go, this is hard and and that’s a real factor, but no.
19:55
No, actually there is no, but it does feel it doesn’t when you’re doing the budget and you’re going, yeah, we are barely scraping by and then someone says we need to put 10% into global mission.You’re going.Oh.It’s it just hurts.That really hurts.But it’s no, because you don’t see in that moment that you’re missing out, that your local church is missing out by not being involved in global mission.
20:18
It’s hard because it’s doesn’t seem like an urgent thing, but long term it will be painful because you’re not lifting your eyes to what God is doing outside of that and you’re not depending on what he might do for you locally because you you have to get through that anxiety and stress of having all those local things met.