TWO ARE BETTER THAN ONE: THE STORY OF AN HISPANIC/ANGLO CHURCH PARTNERSHIP

Co-authored by
Carlos Belza

Mike Measley

Lorenzo Meson

Roger Dorris

Young Argentines Carlos and Claudia Belza crossed cultural and language barriers and arrived in Reading, PA, on Christmas Eve 2010.  As it was for Joseph and Mary, the Belzas’ journey was not without purpose, nor were they acting alone. They responded to God’s call through the Eastern District’s Hispanic Mission to plant a church among Reading’s burgeoning Hispanic population--58% in 2010. Mission Director Lorenzo Meson recruited and mentored the Belzas their first year and introduced them to their ministry partner, Christ EFC in Bethel, PA.

CEFC provided an apartment and, together with the Eastern District, a salary to get the Belzas going. CEFC’s leadership has often met with them for prayer and planning. They even had business cards, flyers, and posters printed.  But Carlos believes CEFC’s greatest contribution has been spiritual and moral support and help adjusting to new surroundings under the leadership of Pastor Mike Measley.

Seeing growth from evangelism and home Bible study groups, CEFC and the Belzas searched the target area for worship space and found God’s provision in an abandoned wing of Hope Rescue Mission.  Over sixty CEFC volunteers joined their Hispanic friends to make it presentable for worship, classes, and an office.  The church, El Portico (literally “porch”) is a gateway to relationship with Jesus where 40 adults participate with their children.

Though CEFC is hard-pressed to provide Spanish-speaking volunteers, they send their  own twice a week to teach what they know well---English.  Carlos  and CEFC are planning a monthly outreach for children and their parents. A couple that Mike has mentored in CEFC’s Missionary-in-Training Fellowship has sensed God’s leading to youth ministry with El Portico.

Partnership is a two-way street, and when asked how El Portico has ministered to CEFC, Mike said that his suburban/rural church had wanted to minister in Reading but wondered how they could have real impact, being removed by distance and language.  By themselves they could provide material goods, but partnering with the Belzas they can now take the whole gospel to those they could not have otherwise.  According to Carlos, shared vision is the key for churches working together.  And one can’t help but notice Lorenzo beaming with joy over God giving birth to yet another church through Anglo/Hispanic partnership.

Questions or comments for the four authors? Share your church's experience in partnering to reach people for Christ.

The Tension Between Mutuality and Charity

by RJ Caswell

I read Fritz Kling's excellent book, The Meeting of the Waters last year soon after it was released. It was a book with helpful insights about the future trends in global missions and in many ways added language to things I am seeing and experiencing in my role as outreach pastor. Of the seven global trends that Kling discusses, the trend that resonated the most with me and my work at Church at Charlotte is mutuality.

Kling states that, "Mutuality may be the single most important current for understanding how to support, work with, and pray for Christian movements around the world. Unfortunately, practicing mutuality does not come easily to people of wealth, including this American. People with money and power easily become blind to resources that Christians from other countries bring to the table. True mutuality among players from different corners of the globe is, in fact, quite rare. The urge to "go it alone" is powerful. Collaboration, and the mutuality it fosters, is expensive in terms of time, energy, and money ... and ego." Additionally, Kling asserts that, "In seeking to practice mutuality with people from other backgrounds, Christians around the world must actively build relationships based on equality, reciprocity, interdependency, and accountability."

In many ways this global current or trend fits nicely with the recent wisdom shared in both When Helping Hurts and Toxic Charity. Both of these books have also been instrumental to me as we strive to make the best decisions possible with financial commitments to both local and global ministry partners. Money can quickly erode a relationship and create an imbalance based on power and paternalism, not mutuality and equal partnership.

In the past year, God has opened amazing doors to develop and foster a mutual partnership between two of our global ministry partners: one in Africa and one in SE Asia. We now have a three-way partnership and are navigating this tension between mutuality and financial resources. This is where I struggle. Even though I know that both of these partners have agreed to use financial resources, the reality is that our church will still fund a majority of costs.

Therefore, is the relationship still mutual? Has a power imbalance already begun without me realizing it? If God has blessed the West with Kingdom finances, should we hold them back? How does biblical charity figure into this equation? These are just a few of the questions I pray and wrestle through on a daily basis. I feel that if I maintain every principle of these best practices, then there is no room for charity as discussed throughout scripture (Isaiah 58:7, Acts 2:45, Matthew 6:1-4, 19:91-20, Leviticus 19:9, Psalm 112:9, for example). I also believe that the West has created a convenient double standard at times, where charity and dependency is okay for our non-profits and missionaries, but is bad practice for the majority world.

So where to go from here? I think for me it will be continued prayer for God's wisdom and direction as we strive for mutuality with our brothers and sisters in other countries, while at the same time recognizing that not all financial decisions are easily packaged.

How have you and your church navigated these waters? What is working? What has not worked?

"GRAB SOME LEADERS AND TAKE THEM ALONG"

by Jay Childs

I can still remember their faces as they sat around my dining room table. Until that moment, it had been a fairly typical elders meeting. But as I began to share about my recent missions trip to Southeast Asia, eyes began to glaze over. I had accompanied our outreach pastor to scout out a second people group for “adoption” (our first such group is located in central Russia). As I finished up my impassioned report, I suddenly realized that my guys seemed a little bored. Their exteriors were gracious enough, but their non-verbals screamed, “Enough already – let’s get back to the real business of the church.” I quickly threw down the gauntlet and said “You guys are bored – ok, next year (I was making this up as I went)…next year, I’m going to take you and your wives with me and my wife, and we’re heading to Southeast Asia!”

Immediately, my wife and I went into action. We planned and designed a leadership mission trip to Southeast Asia for the next year.

Since that first leadership trip, my wife and I have had the privilege to lead several more trips to Southeast Asia. We’ve also led modified versions of these trips to Russia and Ireland. Each time we have tapped influential leaders within our church to join us. The key is to not go alone and waste a great opportunity to train someone along the way.

Jesus and Ministry Trips
One of the things I have noticed about Jesus is the way that He trained his disciples. Robert Coleman and others have detailed this in a variety of books and articles. What becomes clear is that Jesus used “extended contact” with those He wanted to impact. Matthew records over sixty different occasions when Jesus and his disciples spent quality time together – sometimes in cross-cultural settings such as Decapolis. What is especially interesting is that much of this extended time occurred on the road. Sometimes these were short trips (ie., six miles from Jerusalem to Bethlehem), and sometimes they were long trips (ie., over seventy miles from Jerusalem to the Sea of Galilee).

Think about it for a minute - Jesus and His disciples spent most of their three years together – walking! This is the theological and strategic foundation for leadership trips. While these trips were not always to far off places, they nonetheless afforded Jesus extended time with these men – time to talk, see God at work, and even minister in cross-cultural settings.

I have tried to duplicate this model in my own ministry, whether it is shorter ministry trips within our own state – or church visits to other states – or overseas mission trips. The investment is well worth the effort!

Comment about your church’s experience with these trips. Or, if you have never taken such a trip, contact connect@efca.org to get in touch with others who have.

WHAT THE PERSPECTIVES COURSE CAN DO FOR YOUR CHURCH

By Brent Whitefield

For a number of years our church has required prospective missionaries to take the Perspectives course as part of their pre-field training. In fact, anyone who wants to play an important role in our missions program is expected to take the course at some point. I have been a believer in the course since I first encountered it a decade ago and have subsequently taught in the course for several years. One of the things that I like about Perspectives is that students get to learn from the wisdom and experience of many different missionaries and missiologists. It challenges their pre-conceived notions about what a missionary is and does. In the process, some people who do not feel that they fit the traditional missionary mold find that there is a place for them in cross-cultural service. Some people who never imagined that their set of experiences or skills could be valuable discover the multi-faceted nature of the modern mission enterprise.

Such was the case this last year with a couple who felt a call to serve overseas but had limited gifting in the area of preaching or evangelism. Through participation in Perspectives, they came to realize that their proven entrepreneurial skills could open many doors for them in their proposed destination. Having investigated more thoroughly, they are now preparing to be sent as career missionaries to East Africa with a coherent plan for fruitful, multiplying ministry. Over the past few years, I have witnessed similar stories of eyes opened and visions imparted by the Perspectives course. Nearly everyone I know who has taken the course has reported that they have had their mind stretched and perspective broadened. For those preparing for specific cross-cultural mission assignments, it has been invaluable in providing a biblical and historical foundation for thinking missiologically and helped them in ‘counting the cost’ to answer the call to mission.

Sign up for a special, intensive Perspectives course, April 9-17, 2012, here.

OPENING UP THE MISSIONS BOTTLENECK

By Steve Scott
Steve served for twenty years as an Evangelical Free Church pastor, seven of them as a missions pastor.

• Does your team long for more people to be involved in your church’s missions ministry?
• Is your missions team overwhelmed?
• Does the congregation as a whole seem disconnected from the church’s missions ministry?

A “yes” to any of those questions may mean that your missions team has become a bottleneck for missions.

Often, six to ten people on a committee hold all the missions cards in a church. Our missions committee made a decision to deal out the cards. Within four years, we went from seven people serving on a committee to over 140 missions ministry volunteers.

The key was to restructure the missions program to resemble a youth ministry model with many people doing one or two ministries about which they are very passionate. This involved several steps.

First, we determined the Key Result Areas (KRAs). In our case, we divided the responsibilities into six KRA’s: Administration Team, Candidate Development, Short-term ministry, Advocacy (projects, training, and education), Local Outreach, and Missionary Care.

Next we determined an implementation plan. We could not change everything at once, so we started with two areas and added others as key leadership was identified. Our first team was the Administration Team that provided general oversight and handled the finances. We also added Missionary Care that first year. The next year we opened up Candidate Development. The third year we did Local Outreach and Short-term Teams. The fourth year we started Advocacy.

The third step for implementation was to find a champion for the particular ministry area or responsibility. This is critical. The right people make all the difference!

Fourth was to provide each champion with a charter for the ministry area. This set the vision, provided boundaries, and defined reporting and support structures.

Fifth was to support the champions. Quarterly check-ins determined if there were any gaps regarding strategy, mobilizing people, training, or implementing projects. Each champion had different gaps in their ministry areas, but my role was to help fill those gaps.

Finally, the champion would report at least once a year to Administration Team representatives. This kept the budget people connected to the front-line ministry workers and provided an opportunity for celebrating the champion’s vital role in the success of our missions program.

Opening up the bottleneck improved every aspect of our missions program. We involved more people, mobilized many first-time volunteers, and brought relief to the original, overworked missions committee.

From Doing Missions to Being On Mission

by Dan Witwer

Hershey Free Church is now 38 years old and has a long history of international ministry. Like your church, we are living through quantum changes in resource availability, questions of what is a mission field, and what are best practices in gospel declaration and doing good. During the past 38 years, God has raised up (or the West has finally recognized) godly, skilled, vision-filled national leaders. The contour of missions has changed and continues to do so even as you read this brief update. Hershey Free is in the process of thinking how to be strategic and effective as Christ’s church in the world. Here are two areas that we are working on:

1. We are blurring the line between local and global disciple-making. With the shrinking embrace of a Christian worldview at home, as well as clusters from many people groups arriving in North America, it is tempting to focus all of our outreach efforts at home. These culture shifts present tremendous opportunities at our doorsteps, but we do the glory of God a disservice if we ignore the remaining continents. At Hershey, we have renamed our outreach ministry Engage3. Engage is ‘how’ we do outreach with and among the lost, the least, and the last. The exponent 3 indicates ‘where’ we do ministry—in our neighborhood, region, and the nations.

2. We are emphasizing next steps in relational discipleship. Hershey’s staff and elder leadership have been casting a vision away from an individualistic approach to following Jesus to a cooperative, communal, and together-oriented journey of faith that emphasizes next steps. As Christ-followers grow together, we seek God for ways to engage with others who need to see and hear the forgiving mercy of Jesus Christ. We do this when life’s routine is steady as well as times when floods and fires interrupt that routine. Sometimes the engaging next steps take place in our community (recently flooded by Tropical Storm Lee), or in earthquake-ripped Haiti, or Christian-persecuting locations in Central Asia.

These two emphases are causing us to rethink our leadership structure for missions and past policies, but we fully expect that outreach will increasingly be a normal part of life at Hershey Free.

Elephants Are Not Just in Africa

by Susan Demel

A coworker asked, “How are you?” as he passed me in the hall. Like many people do, I responded very quickly with, ‘Fine’. Then an unusual thing happened, he turned around and marched over to me emphatically stating, “That was a pat answer.” (pat adj.- Trite or glib; superficially complete or satisfactory)

After I dusted myself off, I reflected and gave a genuine response. “Today is a bad day,” I said. I was relieved. It didn’t alter the circumstances, but it changed something in my mind and heart to be open about it.

Imagine for a moment that you are walking out of your office or down the street. Someone you know greets you and asks, ‘How are you? How are things in missions these days?” What would you say? As you imagine your response, consider the feelings that arise and the thoughts that emerge. Would you be honest about the likely scenarios playing out in your setting, or would you give a pat answer? “Fine, thanks. Everything’s great.”

It’s likely that some of us have meetings where uninvited elephants have taken residence at the table. Elephants are not only in Africa; they live with us -- topics and issues that go unspoken and unaddressed.

It’s likely that some of us have inherited strong personalities’on teams or boards who have been with the church since the early days -- folks you can’t move and must, instead, mow around.

It’s likely that some of us have too many things that need tweaking. When we get traction in one area, we lose ground in many others. It feels like a constant dance with two steps forward and three steps back.
It’s likely that some of us transfer the complexities of leading and facilitating missional efforts into twisted evidence of our imagined incompetence.

It’s likely that some of us rely more on our minds and our meetings then our great big God. Do we trust more in our abilities, or do we believe and act in alignment with Proverbs 3:5-6? “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He will make your paths straight.”

It’s likely that some of us have allowed busyness to depersonalize the work we are doing. We have let it get in the way of our own active expression of compassionate missional involvement.

Why don’t we reveal reality? Why don’t we just say, “Today is a bad day,” or “This is a particularly hard and draining season we’re in”? We don’t have to give a poetic psalm in the moment, but we have the opportunity to give a vulnerable response, even if all we can muster is a grunt.

Are we concerned about our image if we admit difficulty, afraid for the security of our position or of the feelings of inadequacy that may come flooding over us? Let’s be optimistic, thankful and grateful in the great and promising moments and in the hard times as well. But let us not pretend that all is perfect and well. If we do, we may miss a unique opportunity to be real with one another, and we may forfeit a chance to be transformed by God, who is brilliant at meeting us in our honest, vulnerable, messy moments.