Tag Archive for: missionary

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What Does it Mean To Be a Christ-Centered Missionary – Part 2

Have you ever considered yourself to be a missionary? Have you considered entering a different culture, developing relationships with the people, and sharing God’s love by serving and working with the people? 

Whether you have considered it for yourself or not, you know people who have been called and gifted by God to share the good news of God’s love by learning the traditions and activities of the culture and by developing relationships of trust and compassion. 

They have been trained to be cross-cultural workers, immersed in a culture different than their own, to discover and understand the needs and assets of the people they are called to love and serve. 

Are You A Missionary?

There is a need for people to respond to God’s call by leaving the known and entering the unknown. There is a need to cross the cultural barriers, motivated by God’s love, to love and serve people in the name of Jesus. With that said, have you ever considered yourself to be a missionary? As you reflect upon the question, let me offer a perspective to consider. 

The early followers of Jesus found their identity in his mission. They understood themselves as evidence of the resurrection and that they became part of the loving, healing, feeding, serving, and dying of the Risen Christ. They engaged the world and witnessed to the work of Jesus in the midst of a hostile environment. In the midst of the tension, they did not withdraw from the world or forsake the mission.

Baptism as Calling and Commissioning

Baptism was a powerful symbol of new life in Christ. It symbolized death to things of the world and new birth into the way of Jesus. Through baptism, Jesus followers knew they had been called and commissioned by Jesus to carry out his loving service. They understood the mission field to be where they were at the time. So, they lived out their call in the places they lived and worked. They were driven to ask “Who are we in relationship to those around us? To whom are we sent?” It was out of their experience with Jesus and developing relationships that their understanding of mission emerged.

They put their lives on the line for Jesus as they witnessed to God’s love across boundaries of race, nationality, and economics. They were missionaries just by being followers of Jesus.   

Sharing the Good News of God’s Love

Then, during the age of Christendom, when all institutions of the culture were Christianized, the mission field shifted.  It moved from wherever you were at the time to areas outside the boundaries of the empire or country. To be a missionary during Christendom meant that you entered a culture different than your own, developed relationships with the people, and shared God’s love by serving and working with the people. 

You shared the good news of God’s love by learning the traditions and activities of the culture and by developing relationships of trust and compassion. You became a cross-cultural worker, immersed in a culture different from your own, who worked to discover and understand the needs and assets of the people you were assigned to love and serve. 

The Mission Field is Outside Your Door

That brings us to today. The missionary spirit is in our DNA as a follower of Jesus. But we are living with a Christendom mindset. So, what does that mean?

It means we are in the midst of another shift. Although most of us believe we live in a Christian culture, we can no longer assume everyone is Christian or assume that the community is part of the church. A new way of living out the mission is emerging. The mission field is, once again, just outside the front door.

The reality is wherever you are, you have the opportunity to enter a new community, to learn the traditions and activities of the people, and to develop relationships of trust and compassion. In the truest sense, wherever you are, you are a missionary of the love of God.   

Love Like Jesus

The foundation of being a missionary is Jesus. The greatest distinguishing characteristic of Jesus is love. So, your work as a missionary is to love like Jesus in the places you interact with people on a daily basis. 

To love like Jesus means to focus on people and develop communities of care and compassion. It is a love that defines God’s immeasurable, incomparable love for all people. It is God’s ongoing, outgoing, self-sacrificing interest and concern for creation. God loves you, me, humanity, and all creation without condition. To love like Jesus is the work of the Christ-centered missionary.

Love Lived Out in Relationship with Others

To put it another way, this love is not dependent upon the worth of the people being loved. Love does not count the cost based on the return. It is spontaneous and does not consider beforehand whether it will be effective or proper. This love is the extension of God’s love lived out in and through our relationships with each other. 

So, to love like Jesus means to live the highest form of love described and experienced in the Bible.  It is more than an emotion. It is a matter of will. 

As much as we talk about the church being a family, this love is greater than friends and family. In fact, this love is greater than race, color, or belief. It is a love that intentionally works for the good of each individual regardless of who they are or whether you feel anything or not. This love is greater than politics, nationality, gender, and race. To be a Christ-centered missionary means you live by and serve with love greater than yourself. 

Be a Missionary of Love

To love like Jesus is to understand that love is the greatest expression of relationships. As a missionary of love, you are working for the good of all people. Relationships, and not agreement, are the issue. As a Christ-centered missionary, you love as you have been loved and you courageously serve the community with that same love.

To love like Jesus is to express your love through action. Too often we talk about love and loving others but are slow to live the love we talk about. John, in his first letter wrote, “Those who say, ‘I love God’ and hate their brothers or sisters are liars. After all, those who don’t love their brothers or sisters whom they have seen can hardly love God whom they have not seen! This commandment we have from him: Those who claim to love God ought to love their brother and sister also” (I John 4:19-21). 

Be Focused on the Good of Others

To love like Jesus is to be focused on the good of others before it is focused on our own good, desires, expectations, or results. As a Christ-centered missionary, you love because God in Christ first loved you.  

Jesus said, “Love one another as I have loved you.” This love is about being who God created you to be for no other reason than being who God created you to be. Who you are is how you love.  

Love the People in Your Community

As a Christ-centered missionary, you love the people in the community where you are at this moment. So, it is important to know your context, your community, the people to whom you are sent (or are sent to you). You love like Jesus so you can fall in love with your community. So, try experimenting with the following: 

  • Take a walk through your community or neighborhood. (This might happen a little differently in some areas. In more rural communities, you might need to drive by your neighbors). Organize a group of people in your church to walk together in twos or threes. 
  • Pray for each family in the homes as you walk by. Ask God to help you be the neighbor God needs you to be for them. Pray for their well-being. Ask God to love them through you. Pray for each business, service, hotel, etc. that you pass by. Ask God to love the people you meet through you. 
  • Engage the people you meet along the way in conversation. Ask them, “What do you like about our community or our neighborhood?” “If anything, what would you like to see changed?” As you reflect upon your conversations, think about how you and/or the church can come alongside the people in the community? 
  • Take note of the different agencies and services in your community. Are there schools? Libraries? Police stations? Fire stations? Extended care facilities? What other assets can you identify? Medical clinics? Social agencies? Begin to engage your church in prayer. Pray, “Oh God, help us see you in the people in our community. What do we need to do that no one else is doing?” 
  • In your conversations, listen to the needs in your community. Is there a need for food? Housing? Childcare? Community park activities? Health care? Pray, “Oh God, send us the people that no one else wants and help us love the people you send to us.” 
  • Identify the individuals in your congregation who can assist in making connections in the community. Who are the leaders in the community? Who are school teachers or administrators? Who has influence among the people? Now, pray for each of them. Ask God to prepare them for the mission of loving the community as God has loved them. At the appropriate time, ask them to assist you in relating to the community. 
  • Identify other churches you might ask to be a partner with you in developing relationships and providing resources. Give God thanks for the opportunity to be a conduit of God’s love to the community. 

So, as a Christ-centered missionary, you love like Jesus, and you love the people in your community. The question is, “do you need special training to love? 

The answer is no. You love people and your community as God in Jesus has loved you. 

Jesus Loves You

Tony Campolo tells the story of being a counselor at a junior high camp early in his ministry. He said junior-high boys have a strange and often cruel sense of humor. There is a strong tendency to pick on anyone who is different, to make fun of them, and make them the brunt of their jokes. 

He said this was the case during one particular week of summer camp. The boys picked on a thirteen-year-old boy named Billy who had difficulty walking and talking. He had cerebral palsy. 

The boys at the camp would often mimic his gestures. They thought it was funny to imitate his halting movements and his slurred speech. Their actions were cruel at best, but the cruelest thing they did was on Thursday morning of the camp. 

On that day, Billy’s cabin had been assigned to lead the morning devotions. They voted for Billy to be the speaker. They wanted to get him up and in front of everybody so they could be entertained by his struggling attempts at speaking.   

Surprisingly, it did not bother Billy. When the time came for the devotion, he dragged himself up to the front of the room. Except for the snickering of the boys from his cabin, everyone was quiet and attentive.   

Campolo said, It took Billy almost30 seconds to say, ‘Jesus…loves…me…and…I…love…Jesus.’ Then he said, ‘Jesus…loves…you…too.’” 

Campolo said, “When he finished, there was stunned silence.  When I looked over my shoulder, I saw that all over the place there were junior-high boys with tears streaming down their cheeks. Some of them had their heads bowed.” 

He said, “We had done many things that week to try to reach the boys with the gospel message, but nothing had worked. We had even brought in baseball players whose battering averages had gone up since they started praying, but it had no effect on the boys. It wasn’t until Billy, with his slurred speech, declared his love for Jesus that everything changed.” 

It was years later, while traveling, that Campolo met a young man who said, “You probably don’t remember me. I became a Christian at a junior high camp where you were a counselor.” Before the conversation was over the man said, “Jesus reached out and spoke to me through Billy.” 

Friends, God doesn’t need superstars or trained witnesses. As it says in the scripture, God likes to take “the stones which the builders reject” to use as the foundation rock for loving all of creation. 

Are You a Missionary?

Have you ever considered yourself to be a missionary? When you leave your home, your work or your church building, you are entering the mission field where people need a kind, caring, encouraging word. God has already loved you through his Word made flesh in Jesus. The joy and peace of this life come through sharing what you have received. 

When you enter your community, you have the opportunity to develop new relationships and to share the joy and peace you have received in the name of the living God who loves you in Jesus and who empowers you to share God’s love through the Holy Spirit. 

Whether you have considered being a missionary or not, you are a missionary just by following Jesus. Today, love like Jesus and love your community. Be the missionary you have been called and gifted to be right where you are at this moment.  And remember, who you are is how you lead.  

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What Does it Mean to Be a Christ-Centered Missionary?

Who or what comes to mind when you hear the word “missionary”? Is it someone who leaves everything behind and enters a foreign cultural context to serve God? Is it someone who crosses cultural barriers to share the good news of Jesus? Is it someone who goes beyond their natural environment and into a new one motivated by the love of God?  

Who or what comes to mind? Traditionally a missionary has been seen as someone who enters a culture different than their own, develops relationships with the people, and shares God’s love by serving and working with the people. They share the good news of God’s love by learning the traditions and activities of the culture and by developing relationships of trust and compassion with the people. A missionary is a cross-cultural worker, immersed in a culture different than their own, to discover and understand the needs and assets of the people they are called to love and serve.   

Are you a missionary?

Who or what comes to mind? Have you ever considered yourself to be a missionary? Maybe you can think of it this way. Wherever you are called to serve, you have the opportunity to enter a new community, learn the traditions and activities of the community, and to develop relationships of trust and compassion with the people. In the truest since, wherever you are, you are a missionary of the love of God you have experienced in and through Jesus.     

On Mission for Jesus

The early followers of Jesus were missionaries. They found their identity in his mission. They understood themselves as evidence of the resurrection and that they became part of the living, serving, and dying of the Risen Christ. Their witness was seen in their loving, serving, and caring for the sick, the prisoner, the widow, the fatherless, and the poor. 

They engaged the world and witnessed to the work of Jesus in the midst of a hostile environment. Whether it was living in tension with the established religion (Judaism) or being persecuted by the government (Roman), they did not withdraw from the world or forsake their mission. They were missionaries of the Risen Christ.

They understood themselves as called to ministry through their baptism. As baptized followers of Jesus they lived out their call to ministry with the people they encountered each day in the area in which they lived. As they worshiped, they listened to the stories of Jesus and how he interacted with people. It was out of their developing relationships and their experience of Jesus that their understanding of mission emerged. 

They put their lives on the line for Jesus as they witnessed to God’s love across boundaries of race, nationality, and economics. The mission field was at their front door. In other words, they became missionaries of Jesus with everyone they met.

Prepared to Be Messengers

Those early followers were missionaries of the Risen Christ. In the bible, you can read about the Acts of the Apostles. I’m being a little “biased” here, but some of my favorite stories are of people like Philip, Peter, and Ananias meeting people along the way. God has prepared them to be God’s messenger as they meet those who have been pushed to the edges of society and cut off from the community of faith, who are theologically and religiously misaligned with the new community of Jesus followers, and that Jesus is greater than cultural norms and religious laws.

As missionaries, they saw themselves as evidence of the resurrection of Jesus. They told everyone they met about Jesus. When the religious council heard of what they were doing, the followers of Jesus were told to stop. But they persisted. So, the religious council had them arrested and beaten. 

Then the followers of Jesus were told not to speak in the name of Jesus again. Read the words for yourself from Acts 5:33-42. 

“As they left the council, they rejoiced that they were considered worthy to suffer dishonor for the sake of the name. And every day in the temple and at home they did not cease to teach and proclaim Jesus as the Messiah” (Acts 5:41-42).

Worship as a Celebration of Christ

Worship was the celebration of their experiences of the Risen Christ and of what God was doing in the lives of the people they met each day. To be considered worthy to suffer for the sake of Jesus was reason to worship and to continue to witness to the mighty acts of God. So, these early missionaries, freshly beaten, walked down the road with their heads held high, smiling, giving each other first-century high fives, because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the name of Jesus.

To our modern-day ears, being a missionary does not sound very inviting. You and I have been shaped by a different worldview. Those early followers were part of a missionary age while we have been influenced by Christendom. In a missionary age, the mission field was wherever you were at any given moment. In Christendom, the mission field moved to countries beyond the borders of the empire or country in which you were living.

Specialized Ministry

The shift came with the conversion of Constantine. He declared that all the empire was Christian. With that edict, the identity and mission of the church shifted from being a voice and force in a hostile culture to becoming the official religion of the Roman empire. With that shift came a different understanding of being a missionary. As a follower of Jesus, you were no longer a missionary as you stepped out the front door. Being a missionary became a specialized ministry that carried the good news to countries outside the empire.

Baptism was no longer a call to ministry but became a rite of claiming new followers of Jesus for the empire or the institution providing the baptism. The shift was from being centered upon Jesus to being centered upon a particular culture, theology, and worldview.

Most of us, if not all of us, have been shaped by the idea that being a missionary means you pack up your belongings, travel to a foreign culture, to serve God by crossing cultural barriers to teach people about Jesus. There is a kernel of truth to that idea, but only a kernel.   

A Christ-Centered Missionary

When I ask the question, “Who or what comes to mind when you hear the word “missionary?” We have been shaped by a worldview different from those early followers of Jesus. So, take a deep breath in, now let it out. You are not going to be beaten for your faith in Jesus today.  But you are not off the hook.

What does it mean to be a Christ-centered missionary today? We are living in a new missionary age. Although most of us still believe we live in a Christian culture, we can no longer assume everyone is Christian or assume that the community is part of the church. A new way of living out the mission is emerging. The mission field is, once again, just outside the front door. And you, as a follower of Jesus, are a missionary in the places you live, work, and play.

Follow Jesus in the Every Day

So, being missionary today means you are a follower of Jesus in everyday places. You are learning about the traditions and activities of the community. You are developing relationships of trust and compassion. You are listening to and learning about the hopes and dreams of the people, while at the same time being the evidence of God’s love in every situation and circumstance. Your witness is seen in your loving, serving, caring for the sick, the children, and the poor. You are engaging your community and witnessing to the work of Jesus in an environment crying out for connection and care. You don’t have to have special training or go “overseas.” You are a missionary of the Risen Christ right where you are at this very moment.

Oh, there is much more to be said about being a missionary today. I will go deeper in the meaning and purpose of being a missionary in the blogs that follow this one. But for now, let this story illustrate what it means to be a missionary today.

Go to Jesus

Will Davis Campbell was a minister, author, and activist. He was a supporter of civil rights in the southern United States during the 1950’s and 60’s. He is best known for his book, Brother to a Dragonfly.  I wanted to introduce him to you to tell you this story.

As a preacher in the tradition of “altar calls”, he preached a sermon critiquing “the invitation” given in at the end of the sermon.  The preacher in most southern churches invited people, who wanted to commit their lives to Christ, to come down the aisle to the altar of the church to indicate their desire.

In his sermon, Will Campbell said, “I hope that someday there will be an evangelistic service when the preacher gives the invitation and people start coming down the aisle, and he yells back at them, ‘Don’t come down the aisle! Go to Jesus! Don’t come to me! Go to Jesus!’

“Upon that declaration, the people who are coming down the aisle will turn around and exit the auditorium, get in their cars, and drive away. He then yells at the rest of the congregation, ‘Why are you hanging around here? Why don’t you go to Jesus too? Why don’t you all go to Jesus?’ The people will rise quickly, leave the church, and soon the parking lot is empty.”

We Want to See Jesus

Campbell continued, “What I imagine is that about a half hour later the telephone at the police station starts ringing off the hook, and the voice on the other end says, ‘We are down here at the old folks’ home and there are some crazy people at the door yelling that they want to come in and visit Jesus. I keep telling them Jesus isn’t here. All we have in here is a bunch of old lonely and forgotten people. But they keep saying “But we want to visit Jesus. We want to visit Jesus.’”

“The next call is from the warden down at the prison.  He is saying, “Send some police down here. There are a bunch of people at the gate yelling, ‘Let us in there. We want to visit Jesus. We want to visit Jesus.’ I keep telling them that all we have in his place are murderers, rapists, and thieves. But they keep yelling, ‘Let us in. We want to visit Jesus.’”

“As soon as the phone is put down it rings again. This time it is the superintendent of the state hospital calling for help.  He is complaining that there are a bunch of people outside begging to be let in. They, too, want to see Jesus. The superintendent says, ‘I keep telling them Jesus isn’t here. All we have a bunch of sick people, but they keep yelling at us, “We want to see Jesus.”

Follow Jesus into the Community

As much as the story is slanted, it reflects the truth. As a missionary, you follow Jesus into the community to meet his friends who are sick, lonely, broken, lost, hungry, homeless, imprisoned, marginalized, and forgotten. As a missionary, when you worship, you gather to celebrate where you have seen God at work, where you have experienced Jesus and his love for people and the community.

In the day in which we live, in the context of our culture, you are a missionary where you are at this very moment. The question is, “Where are you seeing Jesus in the lives of the people?” As you reflect upon that question, consider this: Ask yourself, “Where am I experiencing Jesus in the community, at work, on the golf course, and at the ballpark?”

Look for Jesus in the Lives of People

To be a missionary is to get outside of the walls of the church building and look for Jesus in the lives of the people God sends your way. As a follower of Jesus, you have the opportunity to love others as you have been loved, to serve others in Jesus’ name, and to become the leader you were created to be by leading others into the mission field. 

As a missionary, you have been given the power to communicate across the barriers taught and experienced over centuries. You are a witness to God’s love in Jesus which is greater than the prejudices that keep people out of the community of faith. You have been given the power to address the barriers of biblical and theological ignorance rooted in the misunderstanding of who has received God’s grace and who is included in the community of faith.  

Communicate Beyond Barriers

You have been given power by God, through God’s holy spirit, to be a witness, starting where you are, in the church, in the community, and in all the world. It is God’s power given to you that communicates beyond the barriers. 

So, put this blog down and get out in the community to see Jesus. Look for him everywhere you go and when you gather with other believers, tell them where you have seen Jesus and what he is up to in loving, caring, serving, and forgiving. Put this blog down and get out there. Your community is crying out for the love of Jesus that holds them and will not let them go.

Be the leader you have been created to be. Because who you are is how you lead.