I believe every person in this room can be a missionary. In fact, I believe that each of you here, if you are a follower of Christ, already is a missionary. The question here is what type of missionary are you, or will you be?

CALL

I rarely use the term “Call to Missions” For some it implies a “struck by lightning sort of event.” If you are struck by lightning, go to a hospital not the mission field. I prefer to talk about a Process or Journey to Missions. I will give a very brief version of ours right now.

As a teenager, I wanted to be a mechanical engineer, but I also wanted to serve God in a more full-time capacity. During the school year, I trained to be an engineer. During the summer, I served as a counselor at a Christian Summer camp.I did that for 5 summers. I found great joy and purpose in it, but I left it uncertain whether I really should serve God in full-time ministry or not.

Celia served God in Norfolk with an evangelism and discipleship organization that focused on navy personnel at the Norfolk Naval Base. She found it rewarding, but hard to balance with a job as a nurse. She decided that she would quit her job, go to Moody Bible Institute, and train to be a full-time missionary. She was accepted into MBI, but when she was not able to sell her townhouse— she could not go. Like me, she was left uncertain about what God wanted in her life.

Since she did not go to Moody, we met and got married–. Over the first few years we would talk sometimes about missions, but generally saw it in terms of something to do when the kids are grown up and we were ready to retire. However, we realized that doesn’t always work. My mom attended Nyack Missionary Training School when young planning to be an overseas missionary. But life got in the way. She then hoped to go late in life, but health problems kept that from happening. If God wants us now, it may not be right to tell Him, “Happy to go… in 20 years.”

Celia tells the story of my coming home after work one day and telling her that I had good news and bad news. The good news was that I believed that God was leading us to serve Him as full-time missonaries. That, however, was also the bad news.

Our first step was to learn more about missions. We began to read up on missions, watch missions videos. We began to get information from mission agencies. We found that the number ONE reason that people are rejected is financial debt. Therefore, we worked to pay off our debts and live on less.

Our second step was to prepare for missions. We homeschooled our children because in the mission field there may not be schools available for our children. We started visiting more unusual restaurants, to get ourselves and our kids comfortable with food from around the world. We focused more on foreign movies and foreign news, and less on American movies and American news.

In 2002 our pastor at Spring Hill spoke to us and shared his vision that we serve God full-time either locally or overseas. We had never shared with him our thoughts before… so it was an affirmation for us. We all are social beings. Few can self-motivate. We need support and affirmation from others. We actually applied with the International Mission Board (IMB). I went on a short-term mission trip with members of Spring Hill to Londrina, Brazil. Awesome. We tried to do a family mission trip to the Carolinas, but health issues or something came up. Things were going fine with the IMB, but then they slowed things down because the IMB wanted me to lose weight— I was chubby. This problem I have obviously since solved. … maybe. Then the IMB ran out of money… slowing all mission candidates. Pastor Dan said that if we chose to go on our own, Spring Hill would support us— But there were problems… One was that Spring Hill could not work out the arrangements for us to get into another country for long-term service. Also, the church could not address the issue of retirement. However, in our research and planning, it seemed like God was bringing us to the Philippines where Celia was raised. Laws had changed recently making it easier to stay long-term, and there was a seminary there in which we could train. Our former jobs as engineer and nurse could help provide for our retirement.

Up to this point, we still had not accepted the call to missions. I think one should always research, plan, and pray. After a lot of prayer and discussing, we finally agreed, accepting the call-— we were going into missions. I notified Northrop-Grumman that I was leaving. We sold our house and in March 2004 we flew to the Philippines. We placed our trust in God… but not in ourselves. We agreed that if everything fell apart we would return after 1 year. But after 1 year we decided to stay. We considered coming back after 3 years but then decided to stay. We seriously mulled returning at the 9 year, 10 year, 11 year and 12 year points. We considered it again at the 17 year point. But we are presently at the 20 year point, and will be returning in 3 days.

Don’t focus on a “Call to Missions.” Focus on seeing the journey God is leading you on and sharing this with others.

CATEGORIES OF MISSIONS

I like to talk about missions in terms of Three big picture categories. They are…

Missions is serving God where the church IS NOT

Missions is serving God where the church HAS NOT

Missions is serving God where the church CANNOT

A. Missions involves going where the Church IS NOT.

The gospel has not reached everyone on earth. There are those who have never heard. Additionally, there is a far greater number who have never heard the gospel presented in a way that is understandable to them and culturally resonant. In some cases there are no churches around, while in others, churches may exist in their neighborhoods but these churches target people who look, sound, or act different.

People act as missionaries when they go to such people. The Role is PIONEER. They Evangelize, Baptize, Church plant. This does not happen all that much in its strictest sense in the Philippines. A large percentage of the population would describe themselves as Christians… and the vast majority of places there are churches within range of a jeepney or tricycle.

I have known pioneer missionaries. I have a friend who is a retired missionary who was the first to effectively bring the Gospel to the Ifugao Antipolo tribe in the Northern Philippines. We have friends/colleagues who work with groups in Indonesia in which there are so few churches and the culture so hostile that they hold church meetings in private homes in rooms with no windows so that they won’t be caught and have their members abused or worse.

A far larger group of missionaries minister where the church technically is… but is in some sense unavailable— especially people who are marginalized or ignored. Aaron and Emma Smith, who this church supports, have worked in the slums or settlements of Manila with informal settlers— a group that used to be called “squatters”— an insulting term. Celia and I are presently discipling a group in Caloocan city— a group of leaders of a church that reaches out to informal settlers and the destitute. There are churches nearby, but these churches are unwelcoming— because the the residents are poor, and viewed as outsiders. But this leads to the second category.

B. Missions involves going to where the Church HAS NOT.

Missionaries serve where the Church Has Not. Missionaries really should not have to plant churches for the poor, for Muslim background believers, for Night entertainers (singers, dancers, prostitutes), for those struggling with substances. But churches have blindspots and biases. Sometimes the churches need help. I remember back in 2004 how worried many church leaders were in Baguio that so many Filipino Muslims were moving to the city from the Southern Philippines. They feared they would take over and turn the city into an Islamic state. Thankfully, today there are many churches and ministries that work specifically with Muslims and Muslim converts to Christ in Baguio.

Although Celia and I run a counseling center, to help church members, church families, pastors, and missionaries, we see our primary role as a training center. A lot of churches are not that good at pastoral counseling… but they can be. The church is meant to be a place for holistic healing. But many have not been trained. The Smiths train up Christian leaders to reach out to the Great Urban Centers of the world. This is a Parenting role… one trains, one inspires, one motivates one mobilizes with the intent of passing things on to others. If we do our jobs well, we work ourselves out of a job. A few years ago, whenever we traveled to the US, much of what we did… stopped. Today, much of what we normally do is being done by those we have trained. That is a good thing. Missionaries are mortals… they must always train the next generation.

C. Missions is serving where the Church CANNOT.

The line is not clear between what a church cannot do and what it can be has not. But here is an example.

For years we did medical missions. We worked with local churches. Local churches did not have medical doctors, dentists, surgeons or nurses. They did not have access to pharmaceuticals. They did not have the finances to reach out to hundreds of their neighbors. We, as a parachurch ministry, could do all of that. But there were a lot of things we could NOT do. We were from outside, so we needed the local church to work with community leaders to make arrangements for the mission. We needed them to help us to know what they really needed, to tailor what we were doing to their context. We needed them to invite their neighbors. And, most importantly, we needed them to do follow up, discipling those patients and bringing them into the church. Serving God where the church CANNOT makes us not really Pioneers, and not really Parents. Rather, we are Partners.

I teach missions at Philippine Baptist Theological Seminary and Aaron Smith teaches at Asia Theological Seminary. Celia supervises an accredited chaplaincy program. Seminaries, counseling centers, and accreditation organization, and other Non-government organizations, are partners with churches— along with Christian publishing houses, Bible translators, Radio ministries, Mission hospitals, and more.

So those are three— where the church is not (Pioneers), church has not (Parents), and the church cannot (Partners).

So how does this relate to everyone else. How is every Christian a missionry. Of course, one way is that every Christian can work with overseas or cross-cultural missionaries without leaving home. When you send finances or goods to missionaries or mission organizations you are involved in the mission effort— You are a Sender/Supporter. When you help a missionary on furlough, visiting home, You are a Welcomer. When you send emails, letters, care packages and such, You are an Encourager. When you pray for missionaries— you are a Prayer Warrior. When you provide oversight of what is being done through reviewing reports or even doing field visits, you serve as an Accountability Partner. These are all vital… but I want to focus on other ways every Christian can be a Missionary.

COMMISSIONING TO MISSIONS

Missionaries focus much on the Great Commission. This was Christ’s charge to His disciples before He left the earth. There are several versions of it found in the Bible. The two most well-known are in Matthew 28 and Acts 1.

Matthew 28:19-21.

“Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” HCSB

People often read it as GO, therefore and make disciples. But in the original, that was not the emphasis. For a clearer emphasis it could be translated, “MAKE DISCIPLES, wherever you go.” All of us go… somewhere.

In Acts 1:8. Jesus says,

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come on you, and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Jesus was saying, Be my witnesses. Back home… Jerusalem… be my witnesses. Nearby… Judea… be my witnesses. In Samaria… the neighbors we often ignore, be my witnesses. Anywhere, everywhere… even to the ends of the earth…. Be my witnesses.

Both versions place less emphasis WHERE it is done— way over there, or over here. The emphasis is on WHAT is done— serving as a witness to the lost and a discipler of new followers of Christ.

So let’s parallel this to the situation right here at Spring Hill Baptist Church.

-We can serve God where Spring Hill IS NOT. Here in the Ruckersville area, there are lots of churches… for most people a church is within a short car ride. However, for many of you, when you start a Bible study, or do a backyard Bible club, or a similar activity out of your house, you are bringing the church in a meaningful way into your neighborhood. One might call this Jerusalem or Judean missions. Or one may reach out to people who do not FEEL as if there is a church for them. Our Samarian missions. The impoverished, or the homeless, documented or undocumented migrants, Muslims, Hindus, other faiths. International college students, people in hospices, special needs individuals, those sensory impaired, those whose jobs make them unavailable on Sundays, shut-ins and more, there are people who in one way or another the church has missed. You can be a pioneer in your community. If there is not this sort of diversity in your neighborhood, check the next neighborhood over. Or… pray that people of other races, ethnicities, languages, religions, or legal statuses would move into your neighborhood. Your present neighbors may not like this… but you don’t have to tell them what you pray for.

-We can serve God where Spring Hill HAS NOT. Spring Hill has many wonderful ministries, but many if not most of them were started by one or two people taking on a ministry, building it up, inspiring others, and training the church to embrace this new form of service. Of the ministries that are now deeply engrained in our church’s DNA— Hope For Appalachia, Spring Fling, Trick or Trunk, and more, there was a time when these were not done. In many cases, these started by the inspiration and determination of one or more members. I pray that God will inspire some of you to open up our church to new and great things.

-We can serve God where Spring HIll CANNOT. Sometimes you are in a unique position or have unique skills to serve in a setting or ministry that others in the church cannot. We have had people in Spring Hill who had special ministries that due to distance, specialization, or other barriers, found ways to serve God where the church as a whole could not. That is not bad. Each of us are part of the church— and an extension of the church— and a partner of the church. Look around and see if God has placed you in a unique place to serve where Spring Hill cannot.

Missions where the Church is not, has not, or cannot is important. But so is Missions where Spring Hill Baptist is not, has not, or cannot. I am hoping you will pray that God will lead you into one or more of these categories of missions. Whether Pioneer, Parent, or Partner, All Christians are missionaries.

If you believe that God is speaking to you in some way about Christian missions, Celia and I will be hanging out here after the service and we would love to hear from you. However, I will admit, we MIGHT not be the best to talk to. The best people are probably your families and in your Bible study or other small groups, or your ministry teams. It is with the pastoral staff or deacons. They are the ones who know you the best and can encourage and empower in what and when and where to serve.