Mission - SUPPORTING
Instituto Biblico Baja and NLM as sending organizations recognize the importance of continued support of the pastors and missionaries we send out. We have identified several areas of support that are critical to healthy growth and sustainment of our missionaries and church planters.
1. Preparation for mission - Preparation is critical. As seasoned missionaries and seasoned ministers we know how these servants of God must be prepared.
Examples: understanding and employing iniciative and personal spiritual gifts; overcoming fears; learning total dependence upon God; practicing being uncomfortable; memorizing key scriptures for critical circumstances; knowing by memory scriptures in leading a person to Christ; practicing hospitality; understanding and practicing financial accountability in personal and ministerial management of God's resources; prepared with sufficient skills to work to sustain a family if ministry resources were insufficient, and much more.
This process is individual in length, but can be a year or more in most instances.
2. Communication system in place: This is referring to regular telephone call times set to hear from the distant missionary or pastor; regular internet correspondence between the sending organizations and the pastor or missionary. No less than once every two weeks.
3. Banking and financial support system in place
4. Committed prayer team identified by the missionary with regular reports and prayer requests for this team.
5. Continuing education at IBB offered free to graduates and taken to the missionary about every 6 months.
6. Personal contact with distant missionaries no less than every six months for encouragement and training.
7. Identifying ministry needs of the missionary and church planter and empower partnering churches to assist their brothers in Christ with these needs. (vehicles, water systems, Bibles, videos, etc.)
8. Teach our leaders how to prepare for and meet the needs of a returning church planter or missionary. Missionaries and church planters will return to the school and church from where they were sent and loved. We must understand their needs and be prepared to meet their needs so that we can send back to the field men and women longing to return to "press forward".
50% of missionaries leave the field to never return. Much of that is because of the church's lack of continued care and support of their missionaries and friends they sent to the field and also lack of understanding their needs when returning home for a visit or for other reasons. We need to be prepared to restore, refresh and revive these precious servants of God by loving and listening.
I Thessalonians Chapters 1-3
Paul gives us a look at mission and church planting through the eyes of a missionary... He gives us a glimpse of the intense love and bond that many missionaries feel for the people to whom God has sent them. He tells us how intensely difficult it is to see them suffer and to be parted from them.
He tell us what missionaries should be prepared to confront: attacks and roadblocks of the enemy; separation from our loved flock; seeing the suffering of others. He teaches us how to begin a ministry... with the love of a mother for her baby and then as our "spiritual children" grow, the father side of us must lovingly correct.
We encourage you to read this passage and see for yourself how Paul develops a plan for the missionary or church planter.
SEPTEMBER 2009: SUPPORT TRIP TO CHALCATONGO, OAX BY ILENE NAGLE AND LUZ ELENA RUIZ TELLO
