Transcription
Hello, this is Intro to Missions. I am your professor, Timothy Moore, and this is unit 12. And what we're going to be covering this uh last unit of this course is um is God calling me to missions?
I'd like for us to to think of the scenario. Um, someone is sitting down, maybe you're sitting down with me and you're just saying, "Professor, um, you're a missionary and I think God may be calling me to be a missionary and, uh, how can I know for sure? And if he is calling me to be a missionary, what are my next steps?"
And so, um, let's pray about that together. and then we're just going to have that discussion. Okay?
So, Father, thank you for our time together. Thank you that you are raising up men and women to join you um in your global cause. Uh father I pray that uh for those who are taking this course um within that group Lord you are calling some to be uh to be missionaries in the same way that you called the Apostle Paul to be a missionary to become all things to all people that we might by all means save some reach some make disciples uh Lord crossculturally. And so speak to our hearts about that. help us to understand what that looks like and p and the path to take in Jesus name. Amen. Amen.
So there's a sense and and we've we've discussed that in this course. There's a sense in which we are all called to missions in the sense in the sense that Christ has given us a great commission. Matthew 28 uh 18-20, he says, "All authority is given to me in heaven and on earth. Go you therefore and make disciples of all the nations."
And so I believe the great commission is for every believer. Believers are supposed to become disciples and be on mission with the Lord carrying out his great commission. Uh so that just means that we learn to live with our yes on the table to the Holy Spirit and his daily assignments and his assignments have names and faces.
So, um, I believe the Holy Spirit wants to give us daily assignments so that we can be the love and the light of Jesus Christ to people that we encounter as we move through our days here on planet earth. And that mission is for everyone. It's for every believer. Uh Jesus in John 8 said, "Believers, you become my disciples if you abide in my word and you'll know the truth and the truth will make you free."
And so believers become disciples and they learn how to be on mission led by the Holy Spirit into the daytoday assignments of being the light and love of Jesus Christ in the world so other people will have the opportunity to know and follow him.
But when we're talking about being called to be a missionary, we're not called to that. We're we're not talking about the the the the call on all believers to become disciples, to be on mission with the Holy Spirit wherever they are every every single day. What we're talking about is a specific calling from the Holy Spirit to crosscultural missions where we're leaving our own culture and going into other cultures in order to uh generate disciplem movements and church planting movements. as a uh as a missionary, as an apostolic missionary. Uh the word uh aposto in the Greek means to be sent. And and so apostolic missions is where God calls you and sends you somewhere to do cross-cultural mission work outside of that uh culture that you were raised in.
And so we see that in the Bible in 1 Corinthians chapter 9, and I'm going to pull it up here on my screen. 1 Corinthians chapter 9, the Apostle Paul expresses his missionary call and I believe it begins in about verse 19 is where we will read from. And he says um even though I am a free man with no master, I have become a slave to all people to bring many to Christ. Uh that word slave means um a servant. So he's made himself the servant of all people. His calling caused him to take on that identity even though he's free to become a servant. He says, "When I was with the Jews, I lived like a Jew to bring the Jews to Christ." So in the Jewish culture, he lived as a Jewish man. But he says, "And when I was with those who followed the Jewish law, I too lived under the Jewish law. Even though I am not subject to the law, I did this so that I could bring to Christ those who were under the law." So he entered a culture in order to share Christ with that culture.
Now what is a culture? A culture is like a container and um a culture can contain many things but within the culture there's usually um a common language. There are common things that people gather around. Um there are um for lack of a better word certain flavors of things like styles of music and and uh and things that you experience the food of a particular culture. Uh it may be cooked differently or flavored differently. Um so there's a flavor of a culture um in the in a broader sense and there is uh there are the things that people gather around and that and the language that they speak. There's also a geographical element typically to culture but not always because a person can carry their culture from one country to another country. uh if you're Brazilian, you're going to carry some Brazilian country uh culture into the United States while you're here uh studying with the seminary.
So Paul goes on and he says in verse 21, when I am with the Gentiles, that's the ethnos, it's where we get the word ethnicity. It means other nations other than than the Jews. When I'm with the ethnos, the Gentiles who do not follow Jewish law, I too live apart from that law so that I can bring them to Christ. But I do not ignore the law of God. I obey the law of Christ. And so um what he's talking about there in in the Jewish culture there are lots of rules and rituals and regulations and um applications of say the Mosaic law and the ceremonial law in the Old Testament and those things are fulfilled in Christ and we no longer have to continue to observe those ceremonial laws of the Old Testament. But Paul is saying to reach the Jewish people, I will continue to observe those things in their presence so that I have the opportunity to share Christ with them and make disciples of Jesus. When I'm not with them, when I'm with ethnos, other nations, then I become like their culture because the culture is a container. And Paul can carry Christ and the teachings of Christ into any cultural container. We can take we can uh we can be ourselves full of Jesus in that cultural container.
And so uh he goes on to say in verse 22, when I am with those who are weak, I share their weaknesses for I want to bring the weak to Christ. Yes, I try to find common ground with everyone, doing everything I can to save some. I do everything to spread the good news and share in its blessings. Um, so Paul is expressing his missionary calling in 1 Corinthians chapter 9.
Um, I remember early on in in uh in my pastoral ministry in America uh about 30 years ago, there was a young man who was called to missions from the church that I pastored and he had this kind of missionary call and and God raised him up from western North Carolina and sent him to Afghanistan. And so he he became a part of the culture in Afghanistan to the degree that if I showed you pictures of him with other men and other people in Afghanistan, he dressed the way that they dressed. He had a beard the way other men have the beard in Afghanistan. He he wore uh a head covering, a turban, and um you could not tell that that young man was raised in western North Carolina um in America. And um whenever when 9/11 happened and uh they they pull all mission agencies pull their missionaries out of Afghanistan. He was the uh he was the only person that stayed and they wrote a book about it called Inside Afghanistan, the John Weaver story. But you could not tell John from anyone else in the culture except if you were with him in that culture. He connected and he he loved them with the love of Jesus Christ. He served them even when the bombs were dropping uh after 911 and and war was happening in Afghanistan. And um and John, God used John because of his selfless uh sacrifice of service there. He earned that ask like why are you doing this? And he says because God loves you. I love you. Christ loves you. And and what God has for us in Christ is for you as much as it is for anyone in my country. and he was able to bring uh people to Jesus inside Afghanistan even when that was happening.
That is the kind of missionary calling that we're talking about. So, we're all called to the great commission. We're all called to be disciples. We're all called to have our yes on the table to the Holy Spirit daily for those assignments that he has for us. But periodically he will call pe the Holy Spirit raises people up and sends them aposto another culture to connect to bridge build uh build bridges to serve and to share the Lord Jesus Christ.
And so as I tell that story, am I talking to you? Is that what you sense the Lord is calling you to do? To go outside of your culture and to become an apostolic missionary, someone sent to another culture to make disciples and start churches?
Uh if the answer to that is yes, then I want to talk to you about next steps because that's that's God's call on my life. that's taken several different forms uh in my lifetime over the past 34 years. I've been in a lot of different places and and done a lot of different things. I have I have done um mission work in different countries. I've started uh new churches and unchurched regions of North America. I've trained people to start new churches and revitalize existing churches. But it does. The call that he has on my life is not a call to be a pastor of a single church. It's never been that. It's always been to uh give birth to new churches through disciplem movements and training people to be uh to do multiplying missions.
And so what are your next step? If God's calling you to do that, what are your next steps?
Um, the first thing that I would advise you to do is develop a prayer team. Get very intentional about developing a team of people who will be praying for you as you seek the pathway uh to to that um to deployment in your missionary calling. You want uh people that that know and serve the Lord. You want pastors. You want any missionaries that you know. You want spiritually mature people to be praying for you. Get on their prayer list and develop that list. One of the first things that I did is I developed a list of a hundred people. said, "God, I want a hundred people praying for me uh and and seeking you on my behalf, praying for your direction, your provision, your protection and direction in my life." And so, uh, I I worked on that. I was diligent about developing a list of a hundred people that would pray for me early on as a young man called to be a missionary.
And then beyond that um I would start uh researching missionary pathways. So mission organizations um global mission organizations uh for me I was contracted for many many years. I had three different mission contracts um related to the same large mission agency, the North American Mission Board, but I was a uh a church multiplier with the North American Mission Board. And each mission agency uh has a pathway, a clear pathway. So if you go on to the um the North American Mission Board website for instance, it's NMBB North Americanmissionboard.net. Uh what you're going to see, let's go to their homepage and under get involved. You have churches and you have planters. And so I'm clicking on planters. A church planter is someone who's who's aimed at multiplying churches through disciplem, just what we've been talking about in this course. And uh you see there that they're they have a pathway and it's expressed with the word P A C E pace. And the P stands for prepare. The A stands for assess. The C stands for care. And the E stands for equip. And that's a great way to express a planter pathway. So you so you come, we talk, and we're both convinced that God has called you into um called you to be a missionary. So where do you start? Preparation. That's where you start.
And so um I developed a plan that has been used within the North American Mission Board and other mission agencies called DMI, the Disciplemakers Institute. DMI Global. Uh the website for that is dmi- um dmi-equipped.org. We'll have that up on the screen. dmi-equipped.org. And so we prepare missionaries in four areas. disciplem, belief and Bible interpretation, um mission strategy and biblical leadership. Um you can see that the mission board also has um nine essentials. So they expanded out to nine there under under P and you can click there and you can see different videos on the nine essential things that need to happen if you're going to uh start new churches as a church planter with um with the North American Mission Board.
And then the A is assess. And the assessment process um it assesses where you are right now in your spiritual maturity and your understanding of those essentials. And so there are there are several questionnaires and um and processes that you do when you when you enter this PACE kind of process. and and then um if those questionnaires and those assessments um show that you are ready uh to be contracted as a missionary. Let's say you've gotten the preparation that could include seminary. It could include something like uh disciplemakers institute. You come through that and you're prepared uh and then your questionnaires show that you are ready. Then you go to something called an assessment retreat typically with a mission agency. And that's two to three days with people who are experts in those fields. And those experts in those fields assess where you are currently and decide whether you whether you uh you have a green light and you're ready to go in all of those nine areas or a a yellow light in some of those areas, which means slow down a little bit. There's some growth and development needed. And then they give you a growth plan for that and things that they want you to do to develop and then you can be contracted with the mission agency or sometimes you're given a red which is just uh we don't from our perspective um we don't think God is calling you to do this like this is not your calling. Now that doesn't mean you you can't do it. it just means that uh you're not going to be contracted with that particular mission agency.
But what I found in doing assessments and I've done assessments for mission agencies for many many years and I've done assessments for the North American Mission Board uh many times and led their assessment centers. Um people discover uh that they think God is calling them to do one particular thing, but then God redirects them and and they would have been miserable in this and God uses them in a great way in another path. And so um so you either are assessed and you're green light and you're ready to go or you're assessed and you're given a growth and development plan and you may work on that for four to six months and then you come back and uh and you either are assessed again or that's evaluated and then you're you have a contract with that mission board.
Now what does that mean when you get contracted by a mission agency? Uh it means that there's some level of financial support. uh they're going to partner with you financially. Um they're going to endorse you with um the churches that are connected with that agency. Uh in the case of uh the North American Mission Board, there over 44,000 partner churches of the North American Mission Board. So when you go through assessment and you're endorsed and contracted as a North American Mission Board missionary, uh that says something very clearly to those churches that you are ready. And our mission agency that we are we are a part of of and have and network with and contribute to and pray for, they're saying you're ready. And so those churches are much more likely to partner with you uh in the mission that you're called to wherever you're called to to do it.
Now, what does what does that look like? Churches partner with you. Um the way I help people uh remember partnership and what partnership is about is four Ps. Uh they will pray for you. A partner prays for you. Um they participate with you. They provide for you. They they give financial resources. Maybe if it's an individual, they may give $50 a month, $100 a month. If it's a church, a larger church, maybe they give 300 or $500 a month. Um, but they provide for you and they do what I call parlay for you. And a parlay is just who do you know that we need to know? Who do you know that I need to know? And so is there another church that um would make it would be a good partner, another person or another church. And the list continues to develop and of and most of the time missionaries develop partnerships and those partnerships are are what provides uh for the mission. um they pray and they un they they undergur the mission with uh with prayer support and they participate uh in the missions that I that I have done personally. I've always had church partners that sent teams of people to do outreach and uh and through our partner churches coming and doing outreach with us. We've seen thousands of people come to the Lord over the years. And so that's very very important. the people that will pray for you, participate with you, provide for you, and parlay for you, let other people know about you. And so assessment helps with that, right? If you're assessed and you're approved by a major mission agency, then it helps you in your partnership development.
And then the C is care. So P is prepare, A is assess, C is care. And and if you are with a large mission uh agency um there there are teams of people within that agency that check on you. They check on your wife. They do things for your children. Um, a a good mission agency make sure that that your family is cared for and feels cared for and gets prayed for and uh they just look in and and and uh the mission agencies that we worked with at times provided um getaways for our family. uh we didn't have the resources to take our family on a vacation at times and sometimes they would provide for us to go and do something really fun and get away as a family. And so the soul care, the emotional care and support is there uh when you're connected with a larger mission agency uh like the North American Mission Board, the International Mission Board uh and and there are ways to find many many others and I'm going to talk about that in just a moment.
And then the E in that pathway is equip. And that's that's like further equipping and evaluation. Like you're you're on the field and you're making disciples and you're you're starting that first church and um and maybe you're not you don't feel like you're doing a great job of connecting with your community. A good mission agency will come alongside you and they will send people to help you and teams to help you connect with your comm communityities, serve in some way. Um, and I and and I took full advantage of that uh as a as a North American mission board missionary. uh our partner churches and this churches that are that are affiliated those 44,000 churches. I would put out things that I wanted to do in a community where I was starting a church and um a lot of times we it was we were brand new and it was my family and only my family and I didn't have the manpower to do something that would serve uh the community. Uh and I would reach out and several of those churches would seem send teams of people and we would be able to serve our community in ways that we could never have on our own. And it accelerated our connection in the community, our legitimacy in the community. The pe the the people of the community valued what we were doing for the community and it created a platform to share Christ. And then we were able to um to lead people to Jesus and make disciples and start multiplying churches. And so that's there's an ongoing uh equipping evaluating equipping aspect when you're connected with a mission agency.
So let me say this. There are lots of great mission agencies. Uh I want to just give you two ways that you can I give you three three ways that you can connect with uh with mission agencies if you feel called to cross-cultural missions. Um, one is, uh, mission mission conferences. I want to give you two mission conferences. GACX, you've heard me mentioned them before. The Global Alliance for Church Multiplication has a mission conference um, in in the fall at uh, Ridgerest Conference Center in Western North Carolina. And at that conference, hundreds of mission agencies uh around the world will be gathered and you can see what each of them do and it's open to the public. You can register and you can go and you can see what's happening in the global cause of Christ through major mission agencies around the world. That's a very good place to go if you feel like God is calling you to cross-cultural missions. Uh, another one, uh, here in Seattle is, uh, Missionsfest. And, uh, same thing, same kind of thing here. I teach at Missionsfest. And it's a gathering of 2500 to 3,000 people. Uh, it's also in the fall and you can just Google it online, Missionsfest Seattle. And it's a gathering of mission agencies and alliances around the world for disciplem and church planting missions. And so again, great opportunity. Uh you can learn from some of the the best and most fruitful and effective um missionaries around the world. Missionsfest Seattle.
And um another thing that you can do is [Music] um conventions of uh state conventions of major denominations. For for instance um the the Baptist denomination has a state convention for each state uh or sometimes a region. In in the Northwest it's a region northwest Baptist Convention. But at those conventions um they have uh displays with mission agencies and and leaders of mission agencies um that are partnered with their particular denomination but may may not be Baptist but they they're they're partnered because they're like-minded and want to um reach and make disciples and start churches. And so, um, conventions, denominational conventions will have displays with mission leaders that you can connect with personally and explore their mission pathways.
And we're going to we're be because I for over 20 years I worked with the North American Mission Board, uh, we're going to include some some videos of these essential areas uh, from the North American Mission Board. uh that they are looking for and I believe all mission agencies are looking for these things in uh in the missionaries that they uh contract with. And so it'll be important for you to pay attention to what they're saying here because I believe there it it is u it's kind of crosspollination with all the all all the mission agencies and what they're looking for.
So, I I've enjoyed being your professor for Intro to Missions, and hopefully you've gotten a good um foundation biblically for what mission work is, and you've you've looked at good and transferable frameworks of making disciples and starting churches. And then, uh you understand some global alliances for the global cause of of Christ. and ways if he's calling you that you can connect through the pathways of these mission [Music] agencies.
Church planting is the air you breathe when you open the New Testament as it's largely written to a collection of church plants. In the book of Acts, we read of the origin of several of them. And we get to carry on this vision today. What a privilege to be part of this work. What a responsibility we have for seeing to it that we are planting and leading healthy, multiplying churches. We have been given a great stewardship. At Sin Network, we want to see churches planted everywhere for everyone. And so, we work hard to help equip church planters and church planting teams. We've developed a list of nine essential qualities that provide the foundation for all of our work in preparing, assessing, caring for, and equipping church planters. A list of competencies can seem overwhelming. You may be led to ask yourself, who is sufficient for these things? The Apostle Paul not only raised that question, but answered it. In his letter to the Corinthians, he said, "Not that
We are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant. Paul recognized his sufficiency or competency came from God. We are not sufficient, but our God is. Left to our own resources, we fall short. But our confidence is in the fact that God's grace and power are enough. Ultimately, it is God who makes us competent. He makes a church planter.
Together, our family of churches has planted more than 11,000 new churches. By God's grace, we'll plant many more. Let us continue to join in God's activity to see his kingdom expand in North America and among all nations. To learn more about Sin Network's nine essentials for training planters to be faithful and effective in ministry, check out the rest of the videos in this series. [Music] [Music]
Sin Network is a vibrant and diverse family of churches engaging their cities with the gospel, making disciples of Jesus Christ, and planting multiplying churches everywhere for everyone. We partner with sending churches to train and equip church planters by developing them in nine essential qualities for faithful and effective ministry. Our first essential considers a church planter's heart. Does he walk with God? A key verse in the Bible's wisdom literature is Proverbs 4:23. Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. We live out of the overflow of our hearts. And the Christian life is to be lived out of the overflow of a Christ-adoring heart.
So how does a church planter with a Christ-adoring heart live and lead his church to live for God's glory? He seeks first the kingdom. He has a vibrant devotional life. He lives in Christian community. He pursues holiness and humility. He has good rhythms of hard work and rest. He demonstrates desperation for God through prayer privately and with others. This is very personal for me because my own journey of church planting for over two decades was born out of my own devotional life. My call to church planting didn't begin in a strategy session or a whiteboard meeting. Mine began in a devotional moment with the Father.
September 1999, I was minding my own business, pursuing Christ's life in the Gospels. I'd been challenged by a mentor to look for things in Jesus that were not in me. I get to Luke 4:43, and I read the verse where Jesus said, "I must preach the kingdom of God to the other cities also, for I was sent for this purpose." When I read that verse that morning, I saw some things in Jesus that were not in me: a passion for the kingdom of God to be expanded to other cities. I ran and grabbed my wife. We knelt down together and said, "Lord, yes." We don't know where. We don't know when, but the answer is yes. We wanted to join in his kingdom activity in seeing his kingdom expanded to other cities. Two weeks later, my sending church reached out to me and said, "We feel led of the Lord to start a church in the fastest-growing city in North America, Las Vegas, Nevada." We said yes. God filled in the blank with Las Vegas. And for over two decades, we joined in God's activity of church planting. All born out of devotional intimacy with the Father. We saw thousands of people come to faith in Christ. Churches planted up and down the West Coast. Missionaries sent to four continents. And you know what? I've asked myself a thousand times, what if I hadn't been with him that morning? And don't miss what I'm asking. God didn't need Vance Pitman, but God was doing something and he invited me to get in on it out of the overflow of my devotional time with him. I learned a lesson that day. Everything Jesus wants to do through my life, he's doing out of the overflow of what he's doing in my life.
Churches flourish under happy, holy, and humble shepherds. We need spiritually vibrant and healthy church planters who are seeking the kingdom, not their own platforms or their own glory. We minister best out of health, not gifting or effort. Let it be said of all Sin Network church planters that we walk with God and lead our churches to do likewise. We join God in his kingdom activity across North America and among the nations. So many others will know the joy of walking with him [Music] too.
S Network is a missional family of churches who long to see multiplying disciple-making churches planted across North America. We know the importance of training and equipping church planters for this worthy task. That's why SN network partners with sending churches to develop planters in nine essential qualities for faithful and effective ministry. One of these essentials examines a church planter's relational health. Is he cultivating healthy relationships? Relationships matter in Christian life. Church planters and ministry leaders are to set an example in building and maintaining Christ-honoring relationships.
So what are some key qualities of a relationally healthy church planter? He has a strong marriage and manages his household well. He deals with conflict in a Christ-honoring way. He values and develops Christian friendships and brotherhood. He treats people warmly and honorably. He collaborates with other like-minded people to engage the city. He participates in Sin Network. There's absolutely no way I would have thrived or survived in the journey of church planting without a life-giving brotherhood I had right on the ground there when we planted in Memphis, Tennessee. You know, Proverbs 4:23 says, "Keep your heart, for from it flow the springs of life." Another way I like to say it is find what gives you joy and put it on repeat. For me, that was playing golf several times a month with this group of brothers. We would laugh, get sideways with each other when we thought one person was not doing the math right when adding up golf scores, as if it really mattered. But ultimately, these men became a safe place for me to just open up and say, "Here's what's really going on with me." Their godliness, brotherhood, and just all-out fun created an oasis for me to receive the refreshment my soul craved while I was storming the gates in church planting. I have grown to see that this kind of life-giving brotherhood isn't just something nice to have, but absolutely necessary. Church planters need to be good relationally. Having been in pastoral ministry for some 20 years, I have observed many who are great with theology but terrible with people. That simply won't work in ministry. Ministry work is people work. It's easy to love the idea of the church, but quite another thing to love real people in the church. This is why we need the regular renewal of our minds. Renewed minds lead to new attitudes, relationships, and practices that are not conformed to this world. May the witness of Sin Network planters be enhanced as we cultivate healthy relationships in deeper conformity to Christ. Let us love, value, honor, and collaborate with others across our diverse network for God's great glory on earth. [Music] [Music]
Send Network is a family of churches joining in God's activity of planting churches for the expansion of his kingdom in North America and beyond. Critical to this bold mission is the equipping of church planters. We develop planters in nine essential qualities for faithful and effective ministry. One of our essentials focuses on a church planter's calling. Is he confident in his calling? Calling and commendation, they bring together the inward desire to start a church along with the outward affirmation from other leaders. Calling speaks to one's inner conviction or ambition for the work. Commendation speaks to the need for others to recognize and affirm the planter's gifts and maturity required for the work. Both serve to provide confidence in the life of the church planter.
So, how does a church planter exhibit confidence in his calling to plant the church? Well, he has a deep compulsion for the work. He has a sure sense of God's vocational leading confirmed by his local church elders or leaders. He seeks the Lord through prayer with others for affirmation of God's calling on his life. He's passionate about serving God and deeply aspires to be a planter and a minister of the gospel. He sets a godly example for others and has a lifestyle that's above reproach. And he demonstrates the spiritual gifts necessary for the tasks. I remember the season of God calling me and my wife to plant a church. The pastors at my home church had affirmed me to ministry, ordaining me as an elder just earlier that year, but they had never planted a church and didn't really know where to start. My wife affirmed the calling. My friends and close family members affirmed the calling. I even went through a church planning assessment where they affirmed my gifts and qualifications. Yet, I knew there was something missing: one piece of affirmation not yet in place, that of a sending church. My sending church pastor, who was a dear friend who had discipled me in college and believed I was being called by God, he was asked this question: Would you follow him into this work? To which he wholeheartedly said yes, absolutely. But then he was asked, would you send your family, your wife, and your kids to follow him into this work? He paused for a moment and then he said with deep love yet absolute sobriety, "Not yet." But almost a year later, after my church planning residency was finished, the elders of my sending church laid their hands on me and my wife and they prayed to send us out. My sending pastor told that story and then he said, "Now you're ready." You see, he wanted to be absolutely sure of my calling and now he was and so was I.
May God continue to call more planters to join his kingdom activity through Send Network in our neighborhoods and among the nations. And may our 11,000-plus churches go into the world each day with confidence that God is calling people to himself, knowing that as the gospel is proclaimed, many will respond in [Music] faith. Our God is at work locally and globally and so are we as we unite as a family of churches to plant churches everywhere and for everyone. We want to train planters to have an international mindset as they lead their churches to make disciples. Scent network develops planters in nine essential areas for faithful and effective ministry. One of those essentials considers the nations. Does the planter prioritize global engagement? We want planters to be globally engaged in God's mission around the world and lead others to do the same by embracing the nations with proclamation and prayer.
So, how does a church plan to prioritize this type of engagement? He builds strategic partnerships to engage God's mission and to mobilize the church. He leads the church to join in God's activity by praying for unreached people and places, missionaries, and God's fame among the nations. He gives generously and strategically to gospel-advancing partners. And he participates in international missions trips to gain exposure to and experience in cross-cultural ministry. And he sends individuals, teams, and long-term missionaries into the mission field. As a church planter myself, I remember the day I invited our first missionary to come and speak at our Sunday morning gathering. I was excited for our young people to engage with a missionary and get excited about God's activity in the world. After he preached and the service was over, one of our members shared with me that they came with a sizable donation with every intention to meet one of our many pressing needs as a young church. But they were so moved by the ministry and life of this missionary family. So I said to them, bless them with the gift. And so they did and we all rejoice. This act of generosity stirred and formed in us a culture of generosity that persists to this day. I believe every church planner should prioritize international engagement from the beginning days of the church plan. Because as Vance Pitman says, when God blows out a church, he has the nations on his heart. Even though the church planter will be focused in his city, he should still have a worldwide vision realizing that his church can also reach the nations with the gospel of Jesus Christ.