While only a few people might actually go overseas or into a specific ministry, the mission work isn’t only for them; it’s God’s work and He invites all those who follow Him to partake in fulfilling the Great Commission. There are countless ways to incorporate missions into every aspect of the local church, and we’ve listed a few here for you to help you get your creativity flowing! We want to help you discover ways to involve your whole church in God’s Kingdom work.
Empower Each Ministry
The various ministries in your church all play an important role. There are ways to bring a missional focus to every ministry in your church by including a missional aspect. By incorporated a missional heart in your ministries, such as worship or children’s Sunday school, it invites the whole church body to be joined together in God’s Kingdom work. This is an invitation not only to learn more about missions, but to practically apply what they learn in their day-to-day life.
The last thing we want to do is burden an already overworked, overcommitted volunteer with a vague expectation of what this could look like. To avoid overwhelming your staff or volunteer with another obligation, we encourage you to empower your existing missions committee to be the people who drive this in each ministry. This could look like assigning each member of your committee to oversee one or two ministries to work directly with the director on brainstorming different ideas of how to be missionally minded in their specific role.
Church-Wide Events
By hosting events that the church can attend, it shifts the missions focus from being something that is only heard about in the occasional Sunday morning announcement, to a more tangible reality that can be participated in. It goes from being something that someone else does to being something that each individual can also do.
A practical way for your church to accomplish this could be fundraising to send care packages to workers that your church supports; bake sales and bottle drives are easy to organize and can be a great way to involve your children’s ministry. Another suggestion could be to host prayer evenings to raise awareness about workers your local church supports. The benefit of something like this is that it would be more informative for the attendees and would uplift the workers in much needed prayer.
If you have a missions committee, encourage them to find practical ways that your church can support mission workers who are on home assignment. This might look like finding a car for them to borrow so they don’t have to rent one. Another option could be to help them arrange childcare if they need it; you could also offer to buy them groceries or drop off a meal. Even something simple, like buying your worker a gift card for all of the coffee meetings that they will likely have, can be a support to them.
Short-Term Mission Trips
If your church has never done a short-term mission before or it’s been several years since the last one, consider organizing one for the youth or young adults in your church. Trips like these can be eye-opening to the need around the world for the gospel and can deeply impact the lives of those who go in a positive way. In considering a trip like this, give yourself a year to start planning, fundraising, and thinking ahead to host a short-term trip next summer.
For your convenience, we’ve put all of our short-term podcasts into one playlist which can be found on our YouTube page. This is an excellent way to get started and how to do it well. We also have the GoJournal for you, a fantastic guide to walk you through the before, during, and after your trip. It includes helpful checklists to assist in planning, daily devotions while you’re on the field, and a thorough debriefing process for when your team returns home.
Intentional Study Materials
Hosting courses such as Perspectives or Kairos is an excellent way to educate and equip your church body on missions. If you’re looking for something more flexible, another option to look at is God’s Heart for the Nations by Jeff Lewis. This is a self-guided, workbook-style option that gives a full survey of Scripture and traces the theme of God’s heart for the nations from Genesis to Revelation. The benefit of this book is that it is a great beginner’s introduction, it’s biblical, and is exceptionally interactive. Inviting your adult Sunday school class or using your weekly Bible study time to go through this workbook is an excellent way to gain a deeper understanding of missions as a whole. Jeff’s book is available for purchase on the 16:15 website.
Mission Sundays
In a service with a missional focus, some elements to include could be highlighting the work of a specific mission unit and taking time to pray for them. You could also take a special offering and choose worship songs that are intentionally globally minded. Along with these, your pastor could also preach a sermon that ties back to the Great Commission.
As for how regular these services could be, one idea would be to have a Mission Sunday in the months that have five Sundays; doing this would allow for around four Sundays each year to be dedicated to missions. This is only one way that this could be done, so feel free to utilize the rhythms of your own church to find what fits your context the best. We recommend having a Mission Sunday twice a year because we have found it sets a church up well to have a consistent touch point with missions.
These are some of our best recommendations for inviting your whole church body, whether they’re seven or seventy, to participate meaningfully in the Great Commission and care intentionally for your mission workers. You know your church best, and our heart is to empower you to walk with your church meaningfully and challenge them to go deeper. Our team would love to support you in any way we can, so if you have any questions, feel free to reach out at info@globalmissionstoolbox.com.