Photo by Craig Hauger from FreeImages

Syzygy frequently comes across situations where mission workers feel (whether reasonably or not) unsupported by their sending churches.

On deeper investigation we can find that these situations arise where a church member has developed and explored a calling into mission independently of their church leaders.  Only when they are already quite a way down the road have they involved their church.  We always encourage potential mission workers to discuss this with their church at the earliest possibility – see our briefing paper on this subject!

When this situation occurs the individual is in the driving seat, developing a vision and then asking the church to endorse it.  The problem with this is that the church should not have such a passive role in mission – sending is an active verb!  We see this in action in the famous calling of Acts 13 which turned the Antioch church into the sending church of Barnabas and Saul.  They may have been talking about it together in advance because God doesn’t tell them what the ministry is to be even though it seems clear to them, but they all hear the call together.  Perhaps that’s why they were meeting in the first place.  Possibly that the idea had occurred to Barnabas and Saul and they got together with the other leaders to seek God about it.

The whole situation of churches finding themselves being asked to endorse a call they haven’t been part of discerning could be avoided if a church is intentionally seeking to be a sending church.  If this happens, the church leadership is driving the process of encouraging people to commit themselves to mission and helping people on their missionary journey.  Sending church should not merely be rubber-stamping an application but should intentionally be looking for people to send.

So how would an effective sending church promote mission?

• It regularly teaches on the importance of sharing the gospel globally as well as locally
• It highlights the needs of mission workers and agencies
• It supports people going on short term mission experiences
• It invests in mentoring and supporting those who are going
• It provides quality support to its existing mission workers
• It gives generously into mission
• It involves its mission workers in church meetings even while they’re overseas.
• It actively prays about who it can be sending next
• It regularly prays for the needs of mission workers and the global church
• It makes it known that it is keen to support those who go
• It specifically identifies suitable people and suggests to them that they could explore going in mission
• Its leadership makes overseas trips to support and encourage mission workers
• It gives a big platform welcome to visiting mission workers
• It challenges its members to think about how they are committed to serving God whether at home or abroad
• It cares more about building God’s kingdom throughout the world than growing its own numbers
• It informs people about mission opportunities

All of these activities and attitudes foster a mission-focussed culture which encourages people to engage with God as they think about mission, and create an expectation that everyone in the church, whether they go or not, are involved in some respect in world mission.  So this creates a context where the church is already driving mission worker calling and is able to move forward readily when a candidate responds to a call.

If you would like to help your church be an effective sending church, just get in touch with Syzygy on info@syzygy.org.uk for a free introductory consultation.