Engaging Non-Churchgoers in Missions

In the last post, we started asking ourselves: What if our strategy around mission trips focused as much on the participants’ spiritual health as on our destination? Could we even go as far as to use Short Term Mission Trips as an internal evangelism tool for our organization? I’ve been calling this the Mission-Centric Engagement Strategy (MCES)… mainly because it sounds official and all things need an acronym. Before we dive into an overview of the concepts behind this, I want to acknowledge a legitimate concern around this concept that has been raised. One fear I’ve heard is that, while this approach of engaging non-believers might benefit the team members themselves, would it be at the detriment or expense of the local community or partner? It was such a great conversation that, although there are other concerns we will address in subsequent blogs, I wanted to discuss it here briefly. Ultimately, our goal is to provide healthy serving for a population/people group/partner that lasts beyond the time in which we are in the field. As you are aware, doing this well involves a lot of self-sacrifice and coming alongside the partners that are already in the field and have relationships with the local community.   Remember this is an intentional strategy for some portion of your trips, not “all” trips or service opportunities. So, how do you choose? First, start with your partner. Select which partner would be a good fit even if you had a mixed team.  Next, include your team leaders from the very beginning and let them know why this trip is a good fit for this type of approach.  Then, train the team well. Since you have folks coming from different backgrounds, make sure that you mention the overall end goal repeatedly (Healthy serving) and provide ways for them to learn this process themselves. We would strongly advocate for a theological basis to Missions (God’s heart for the world) and education on how to live that out well. For example, you can have the team read books like “When Helping Hurts”, or “Toxic Charity”, etc. The benefit goes beyond this trip and in the realm of service altogether, but opens up each participant to how they can enact those principles within their daily lives as well.   Over the past several years, the strength of certain training programs prompted this entire MCES concept. While a team participant prepares for their trip, they often receive theological teaching, emotional encouragement, leadership development, and other field-readiness training that has a positive impact on their life regardless of their past faith journey.  If you find yourself doubting the effectiveness of your own training in your organization, we will discuss more ideas in a later blog, but I would challenge you to find one element of your current training program and improve it for next year. Don’t try to change everything at once, but do one small thing incrementally, and you will be amazed at how much that makes a difference in your leaders and teams. For today, let’s dive into a quick overview of the concepts behind this Mission-Centric Engagement Strategy I’m proposing.  Why “Mission-Centric?” As a technology leader, when I start looking at a large project, I often like to challenge myself or my teams to think about the end first. For example: What will the user encounter? What will they take away from the trip? How will we report on this? and so forth… By envisioning the end result, we can often save ourselves effort by not distracting ourselves with many other features; Ideas that won’t actually matter for the end product.   What I love about missions is that we already know the end of the story and we know its purpose. It is found in Revelation 7:9-10: “the great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, trip, people, and language” worshiping God.  There has been a lot said on this passage by people way smarter than me, so allow me just two quick thoughts on this… First, this isn’t some mystic vision, but reality.  This is where the story will really start!  Second, the goal is worship. We often misplace that worship here on earth, but in reading this, I recognize that missions are the mechanism to get to the end goal, which is worship in the Kingdom. John Piper once put it this way, “One day, missions will come to an end, but worship will endure forever!” We acknowledge that missions have never been, nor ever will be, about ourselves. It is always about God and His heart for the world and turning others to worship Him. So if that is the end… where did it start?   In the very beginning! We see God’s heart to reach “all people” through his promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3 where He says “and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” Do you know what the Hebrew word is used for ‘all’?  It’s not a trick question… it means “All!”  (it’s “kol” for you Hebrew geeks, pronounced like “coal”, meaning “all, in totality”).  But the point is, there isn’t anyone who ever existed that wasn’t on God’s heart. So from the very beginning to the end, God’s heart is to reach every tribe, every nation, every language and bless all people through the good news of Jesus Christ.   That is why we must start from a position where the Mission of God to reach EVERYONE is in the center of everything we do.   If we are going to achieve lasting impact, we need to engage and equip folks in ways that align with each individual’s purpose and design. My hope is that a Mission-Centered Engagement Strategy can bridge the gap between the Imago Dei (the image of God within us) and the Missio Dei (the mission of God in the world), particularly for engaging children, students, and adults in a church or ministry setting. The 30,000-Foot View: Connecting Imago Dei with Missio Dei We are all uniquely created to participate in God’s mission. Each individual, regardless of age, carries a set of interests and skills that are not merely coincidental but are part of a divine design. However, for many, there exists a significant gap between recognizing the image of God within and utilizing this inherent spark in service of a greater mission. As I stated previously, we often misplace this in work, relationships, etc.  Closing this gap often involves a process of rediscovery and creation where others guide or disciple us to understand, at a foundational level, how we can leverage God-given skills, experiences, trades, and passions in ways that create lasting impact: Rediscovery: Every person bears the unique imprint of Imago Dei. By peeling back layers of personal brokenness —often only possible through the transformative love of Jesus Christ and life within a healthy community— we can uncover passions and purposes essential for missional living. The most effective way is often within relationships where we can be reminded of our identity and challenged to live within that reality.   Creation: We are not only created uniquely but also with the capacity to create. It’s the first thing we discover about God in Genesis 1. Recognizing our inherent capability to create, true discipleship becomes a lifelong endeavor of nurturing and utilizing our God-given talents in accordance with His mission. There is a reason you have the passions and skills you have… you are here for a purpose! Practically, this mission-based identity and awareness usually starts with steps such as self-assessment, both individually and as a team/community, to discover and remove obstacles that obscure our innate abilities and allow us to function within a healthy group. Aside from scripture, tools like personality assessments (DISC, Myers-Briggs, etc), spiritual gifts inventories, Strengths Finder, Emotional Intelligence tests, and leadership mapping can facilitate this exploration, enabling personal growth and skill development.   By engaging in self-assessment tools and community discussions, individuals can identify and develop their God-given potential, preparing them for both local and global missions. Another result of this discovery is that they often become better equipped to operate within a team. Mission-Centric Engagement Strategy to Expand Our Reach to All As we navigate through the post-modern and post-Christian landscape, some of the attraction-based models – where the church uses music, preaching, and programs to draw folks in – are losing steam. There are still effective tools in place, but they could be enhanced by shifting to a mission-centric model that places mission at the core of church activity. This shift from traditional church engagement methods to a strategy that places mission at the heart of all church activities not only invites church members to participate in missions but also attracts individuals from outside the church who are motivated by a desire to serve and make a difference. So, could a shift towards missions as a broader term draw more people into God’s family everywhere? Next Week: We’ll look into the upcoming generations and how they might be wired for missions. In the meantime… Start with yourself. Ask yourself: How has my own identity been shaped by the understanding that I am made in the image of God? What skills, talents, passions, experiences, trades, or education have I viewed as just the result of my hard work or circumstances? Could God be shaping me towards a significant impact in the world?

“Short Term missions are a waste of time and money.” Recently, I heard of a college professor saying this to students as they were about to depart for a mission trip. I’ve also spoken to a friend who recently returned from a trip to Africa where she was profoundly used by God and came back deeply impacted by what He did in her life while she was there. Yet, the experience was tainted, or at least diminished, by some of the “toxic tourist” type of people that traveled with her group.  In my role, I am honored to hear stories across a wide spectrum of organizations, churches, and educational institutions about how mission endeavors changed lives, but I also hear the challenges – and doubts – of people in the trenches of ministry too. Whether you are dealing with discouraged students or jaded adults, if you’ve been in the missions arena long enough, you’re likely familiar with these experiences. While the negative experiences are true for some teams, I believe they should be held loosely. Not as a rule for the majority but an opportunity to reflect and diagnose the factors that inhibited the mission. Because I’ve heard far too many stories of hearts, lives, and communities changed by those trips! I see so many organizations training their teams well and running trips (both short and long) with integrity and purpose, truly supporting their in-field partners in life-changing ways. It does not discount the distasteful experiences, but should bring perspective to a larger reality. The challenge with our thinking is that we often have these two perspectives as either/or. We think one is right and the other wrong without considering different approaches.       My Perspective on the Complexity of Short-Term When I look across the landscape of short term missions, I see how far we’ve come in the past 10-20 years. Things have changed as we implemented valuable lessons we’ve learned from leaders and books like When Helping Hurts and Toxic Charity, etc. We stepped back from trips for a time during Covid and now encourage local leaders all the more to shepherd their communities as we adapt to business centric models. Even with these changes, God is at work in more ways than we can even see. The vast majority of organizations are trying to shift to adapt to where He is leading their own community. From my perspective, I see a lot of teams well-prepared for what might come in the missional landscape (physically, spiritually, emotionally, etc.). They are humble, always learning, adaptable, and keeping the most important values at the forefront.  Still I have a question lingering in my mind… What if the preparation, on-field experiences, and post-trip processes were leveraged as an evangelism or discipleship tool in addition to the “field survival and mission?”   What if Short Term Missions Were Viewed Differently Very commonly during debriefs or stories after trips, you’ll hear at least a few participants mention something about how they went to serve and thought they would be impacting lives, only to realize that their life was seemingly more impacted than anyone at the destination.  Even team members who may not walk as closely with Christ as others often experience that “something” tugging at their hearts through the trip experience, even if they downplay it as just “it was cool.” Although we have all been there, I think the commonality of that experience reveals something in our approach that bears consideration.   What if our primary ministry target was actually the participants?   What if their experience with God was one of our most successful “outcomes” of a trip?   What if the impact of folks returning and seeing God at work, gaining new perspective, and feeling something they’ve never encountered before that they can carry into the everyday lives and communities was a primary discipleship strategy of our churches and communities? What if we are overlooking something deeply profound in how God is using moments and special experiences to set that person on a new trajectory in life? What if… we used some trips as an outreach tool to our neighbors, community, and friends who’ve never seen God at work as vividly as they would pulled away from their normal lives through an opportunity to serve? Or as Jesus said at the beginning with his soon-to-be disciples: “Come and see!” Now, let me pause for a moment because I know some of you are ready to object – and I love you for it! If you know me well enough, I’m not saying that “all” trips need to be run with this as the primary purpose. After all, if you are going into any spiritually contested arena, small cracks become big quickly, so wisdom needs to be applied.  I also realize that there are other challenges to short-term missions (e.g. most short-term trips reach population groups that already have access to the gospel, etc).  I understand that going into very different cultures from our own requires sensitivity and a level of focus on the time spent in that culture and with those people. Rest assured, I will have additional posts outlining some of these challenges and suggesting potential implementation guidelines for trips. However, don’t discount this concept entirely. Let me challenge you to wrestle with this idea for a bit. For today, consider this. What if you took 20-30% of your teams and intentionally leveraged them to engage those in your community that didn’t know Christ?   We spend a lot of time intentionally preparing our team. In many cases, there are theological components already included in that training. Could we leverage someone’s God-given desire or skills to serve those less fortunate to have conversations and experiences that might open their eyes to His heart for the world? I heard of a college volleyball team that recently assisted an organization running a sports camp for kids. Four of the team members were baptized while they were abroad.       When teams come back, are we actively following up with participants and finding ways to continue their discipleship journey?  Or for some of you… are you following up with your team leaders to make sure that those conversations are happening?) The average person lives around 4,000 weeks… so we know that the 1 to 2 weeks that a participant just experienced will quickly fade without intentionality and the “rubber band” will snap back into place within a few months.  From my perspective, I see an enormous potential for actively investing in these participants for a long time. Too often, we think the impact is “just” 1 person for 2 weeks. Most participants will receive donations and talk about the trip with dozens (if not hundreds) of friends, family members, and neighbors. When you consider a team of 10 or 20, the potential reach quickly increases to several hundred just within their own communities… and the story in the participant’s life can extend forever.  Therefore, I believe we need to start with that end in mind. If we have a clear picture of what we want to see, not just for the partner and people groups in the field, but for our participant… then that will naturally start to change our approach and our Team Leaders’ approach for this journey.     Here are Tips on this Perspective on Mission Trips Since this blog post is too long already, check out these examples: If we believe that our primary goal for participant engagement is to see the participant’s life transformed… we start to look at: Who are we prayerfully considering for that trip? How essential will a deep relationship with Jesus be on this particular trip?  What if God is nudging you to say yes to “that” person (whoever your “person” may be)? What if we get someone on our trip who is more interested in taking selfies? (and this isn’t just students… adults just hide it better!) Could we perhaps give some grace or draw alongside them to lovingly disciple them without inwardly/externally shaming their behavior? How can we actively be praying for our teammates while in-field for that individual to encounter God? What stories come up that can be shared with donors, relatives, and friends that expand the possibility of someone hearing about what God is up to in that participant’s life?  (Stories, especially while on-field, can be meaningful seeds for spiritual conversations.) We know that there will always be struggles as a team, with personalities, travel, stress, warfare, etc. We sign up for it when we apply and try to prepare ourselves and each other as best as we can… and extend grace as much as we’re able. What if the healthy interactions and grace we extend to others in the field opens up possibilities of relationships at home to continue conversations about how God might be working in that person’s life? Maybe, just maybe, God could use that in our own communities to light a fire in people’s lives. Consider this: Are there any examples you can think of where someone on a trip came closer to Christ? What might that look like if we used some intentional trips as a means of evangelism, not just to the destination, but to the trip participants themselves? Please tune next week! We’ll talk about cultural and theological considerations behind shifting to a mission-centric engagement strategy.