What is missions

Now the question is: are you as a follower of Jesus willing to dive deeper into the exciting world of sending missionaries, or maybe even to going as one? This is the first in a series of six articles by Fr. David on cross-cultural missions and the Christian life, initially published in the May edition of The Resurrection Times.

Mary Beth. Our Commission. Our Partners. Our Beliefs. He says: Go. We invite you to. Partner with Us. NASA already has two prospective Venus mission s in the works. America has successfully launched national innovation mission s time and again. As the fight raged on, Ahmed and the three women fighters who were part of the mission , sent out calls for help.

Some pilots consider the infrared marker to be crucial to the close air-support mission to support ground troops. I asked him to describe the U. His deficiencies and self-doubts, amid his epochal mission of liberation, are precisely what make him interesting.

The sad end of the mission to King M'Bongo has been narrated in the body of this work. But, whenever you see "lost tribes," it does not mean they are actually "lost. This served to blur the tribal distinctions, and as they incorporated into one another, became the Jewish population at large, which we have today.

Some of those Jews intermingled with other cultures, and traveled as far as to China as well as other places, not as a tribe, but as individuals, fleeing God and their families. Lost sheep also was a common OT theme, and referred to people as "dumb" sheep that go astray very easily, as a lot of real sheep and people do. Perhaps you have done the same-I know I have Isa. So Jesus calls His crew to go first to the lost sheep of Israel. This meant the message of God's redemption was to go first to Israel.

Israel's responsibility then was to proclaim it to the Gentiles, which they did not do very well Gen. This is the basics of missions, as the Jews were, as a people and culture, the original quintessential missionaries to which every people group looked.

Now, the role and means have been reversed; now we are to go to them. The worship of God has also reversed. Then, the people of God went to the Temple to seek God; now the temple has come to us in the form of Christ, so we become the "temples" on the move 2 Cor. Jesus is not discounting the Gentiles, as He had already responded to them earlier, in Matthew Rather, He means that the "heirs to the Kingdom" are to be first. Later, in this passage, Jesus calls His disciples--and us--to reach the Gentiles, as we are to do now, as we go.

As you go was a phrase Jesus used to fire up the Apostles meaning sent ones. They were modeling what Jesus had done Himself, and was now instructing them to do. This mission was from practical to tactical, hands-on learning, seeing it modeled, being told all the "ins and outs," and then being commissioned to do it on their own. Missions, that is to be real authentic effectual missions, is always in the context of Discipleship! If you are not discipling you are not mission-ing… Remember what Christ told us to do in Matthew Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. There are others flavors and activities of missions that I call support and provision, such as teaching English in a foreign country or building a house in Mexico or global mapping, or what we do at Into Thy Word , which is to research and provide pastor training curriculum, or what my church in Pasadena is doing with Cambodia, or what we at ITW do in India.

Essential and very important; but again, if you are there just to be there and not connecting and desiring someone with whom you are in contact to know and grow in Christ, what good is it? You are on vacation-not on a mission! As Hudson Taylor said, you must love Christ , so you can show that love and that love can be contagious.

The Disciples' mission was within the parameters of what Jesus the Master had instructed. It was not, "See if it works, and let me know. Our reverence is to be to God, regardless of what others think of us Phil.

Allow me to give you a great comfort statement; we are not responsible for the results! We are not responsible for whether or not people accept the message we proclaim; we are only responsible to proclaim God's truth as effectively and as passionately as we can. This takes the "personal responsibility" and "fear-factor of rejection" load off of us.

Our only responsibility is the exercise of our faith and obedience in Christ. We need not fear rejection because we are not being rejected; God is the One who is rejected. He is the One to whom people do not want to conform; we are as a missionary or iron worker as a Christian is merely His means and His servant.

We, as Christians, are responsible to proclaim Christ as Lord with whatever means are at our disposal, using our gifts and abilities. Your mission is your work, or school, or your family and friends-all in what is appropriate and in the Fruit of the Spirit. But, we are not responsible for how or why people respond to us.

It is not our responsibility that they convert, believe, or act in a certain way. We are only responsible for acting in His character, Fruit, and proclaiming His name truthfully and correctly with love and care Gal. Many times, when Christian missionaries and workers, even after all their training and mobilization, see that people do not respond as expected, they quit almost as soon as they start.

Too many give up too soon, thinking no one is listening or even cares or deciding the work is just too tough. Truly, most will not listen or care, but that is not our problem. And yes, the work is tough, but guess Who gives us the strength for it… We must break away from the feelings of personal rejection or our fear of leaving our comfort zone. This will be difficult, but we must do so in order to be effective for the Kingdom.

Are you willing to personally help lost sheep find their way to His Way? As Jesus sent His Disciples on their first mission, the Jews believed that the Law was given freely, so we should also freely give away our knowledge of how to live, because in Christ we have so much more.

Jesus was, perhaps, using this Jewish proverb, lost sheep of Israel, to motivate His disciples with a common saying that they used themselves. The instructions were that they were to travel light, and be totally committed to the mission, as Elijah and John the Baptist had been. Are we committed? Is our church?

What is in our way of leading others to His Way? Our life will qualify or disqualify the validity of our words. Witnessing also involves, as the word suggests, speaking testifying, declaring to others of the reality of Jesus in our lives. If we have given our life to Jesus we know from firsthand experience who he is and what he has done in our life. Therefore we want to tell others of his life-changing power. Never underestimate the power of your testimony.

A second aspect of our mission is social action or, in other words, love in action. In essence, this means showing people the love of Jesus, not just telling them. Phrased differently, this component of mission is a demonstration , not just a declaration. What did Jesus mean by the terms of salt and light? In short, Christians are to be fundamentally different from non-Christians. The world is dark, but Christians are to be its light.

The world is decaying, but Christians are to be its salt and hinder its decay. Our light must shine into the darkness and our salt must soak into the decaying meat. Our mission is to declare the gospel and to demonstrate the gospel through acts of care, compassion and mercy. Good news and good works are inseparable. The gospel has social implications. True mission should always be incarnational.

It is Christian to care! One of the lessons taught in that powerful parable is that compassion is more than sentiment. Sentiment is when we are moved, but compassion is when we are moved to do something about it.

Based on this parable, what is compassion? It is love in action! It is more than emotion, feeling sorry for someone or indignation. It is being moved enough to move us to do something about it. The ultimate example of love in action is Jesus.

He did not stay in the safe immunity of heaven, but entered into our pain, our dysfunction and temptations. He not only proclaimed the good news of the Kingdom of God, but demonstrated its arrival by healing the sick, feeding the hungry, forgiving the sinful, befriending the dropout and raising the dead.

He then bore our sins in his own innocent person as a substitutionary sacrifice. Most of us would agree that there is a lot of injustice in the world. Part of our mission as the people of God in the earth is to defend or advocate for what is right or should be put right.

True justice and morality is grounded in the very nature of God. God has revealed himself as a God of justice see Deut. He protects Jer. They were required to advocate or defend what was right.

God required his people to not only show justice within their exclusive community, but also to the aliens living among them. He also revealed himself as a God who hates injustice and oppression anywhere, everywhere at any time. In the Greek it is parakletos. It means a person who intercedes on behalf of somebody else. Jesus has revealed himself as our Advocate. When we are most powerless, he comes and defends our cause Romans , 1 John He speaks for us, stands up for us and advocates for us.

This is where we as the church come into the equation. Through these terms salt and light Jesus taught that Christians can influence non-Christian society. Before the days of refrigeration, salt was the best known preservative.

Either it was rubbed into fish or meat, or they were left to soak in it. In this way bacterial decay was retarded. Light is more obviously effective — when the light is switched on the darkness is dispelled. Who is to blame? If the house is dark when the sun goes down, there is no sense blaming the house.

This is what happens when fallen people are left to themselves. We must advocate for right or for as it should be. Read and study Scripture to understand your position. Share your own experiences and pain. We must live an authentically Christian life with transparency and integrity, otherwise we discredit our voice and undermine our argument. At times, we may feel so overwhelmed by the sheer scale of the issues we face. We may feel so insignificant. We may feel like just a house wife, just an office worker, just a labourer, or just a student, but we are, in fact, a child of God.

We are salt and light.