You are currently browsing the tag archive for the 'Missionary Methods' tag.
The Lord has taught me, over the last few years, that an incredible amount research needs to be done to effectively live out our Gospel-derived missionary identity in our local context. Many Christians mistakenly assume that this is something that needs only to happen in “foreign missions” but it is just as necessary in the local mission field. We must understand our local culture/context if we are going to relentlessly confront its’ idols with the gospel of Jesus Christ. We research our culture like a doctors researches his patient. We do it so we know where to insert the scalpel. This requires that we actively involve ourselves in the community God has sovereignly placed us. Here are few practical steps that I have personally found helpful.
Read…
• local blogs
• local mainstream paper
• local alternative paper
Pay special attentions to recurring issues, issues that cause celebration, and issues that cause woe. Moreover, be sure to read editorial sections in your papers as they focus on hot button issues and usually seek to draw lines between the opposing sides. This will help you understand the “said” values of your community. Also, it will inform you where the greatest resistance to the gospel will be.
Listen/Watch…
• local bands (Myspace is a great resource to track them down)
• local lectures (given at libraries, college, coffee houses, etc.)
• local concerts (big venues and small venues)
• local films (mainstream theaters and also alternative theaters)
• local plays (mainstream theaters and smaller theaters)
• local sermons (what type of preaching do people hear in your community)
Pay attention to the content of the songs, lectures, and performances as they will not only reveal the “said” values of the performers/speakers but also the “said” values of the participants.
Participate…
• local bars
• local pool halls
• local drive-inns
• local play groups
• local farmer markets
• local coffee houses
• local clubs
• local art galleries
• local wineries
• local gyms/YMCA
• local restaurant
• local parks
• local governmental meetings
• local churches
• local homeowner meetings
Pay attention to the demographic makeup of the local people. Lower, middle, or upper class? Black, white, Asian, etc.? Younger or older? Hip, unhip, somewhere between? Families or singles? How do the speak? Is sarcasm and irony welcomed or considered rude? Pay special attention to the men. Are they ultra-macho (aka thugs), healthy masculinity, or effeminate (e.g. metro-sexual, home-sexual, etc)? This will help you know the actual make-up of your community and will put a face on what would only be a percentage on a demographic report.
Engage/Ask
I could list a thousand questions to ask but it’s more important that I underscore the goal. The point is to investigate people “said” values in an effort to discover their “actual” values. What are their real fears, dreams, and hopes? What are the idols that they worship in place of their Creator? This will inform you in how to share the gospel (i.e. incarnate the gospel) to them. I will give my big three questions that I am trying to get answered as I develop relationships with new acquaintances.
• Why are you here? (e.g. job, fame, pleasure, family, etc)
• What do you think is wrong with the world/you? (e.g. lack of education, global warming, mankind’s nature, etc)
• How do you intend to fix it? (e.g. education, technology, meditation, etc)
Please note that I rarely ask those exact questions. I use lots of “smaller” questions that inch me towards a correct understanding of the people in my surrounding context. God will provide you with opportunities to invite people over for a meal. These shared meals are great time to ask the smaller questions. Where are you from? Why did you move here? Do you have siblings? How were you raised? Did grow up “religious?” Etc…
I hope you find this list helpful. Please share what you to have found to be a good way to research your God-given context.
I despise this not-so-new but ever so popular form of Christianity that prides itself in so carefully nuancing the Gospel that all hearers walk away still thinking that the bearers of the message of the cross are swell guys. It is as A.W. Tozer says:
The church has lost her testimony. She has no longer anything to say to the world. Her once robust shout of assurance has faded away to an apologetic whisper. She who one time went out to declare now goes out to inquire. Her dogmatic declaration has become a respectful suggestion, a word of religious advice, given with the understanding that it is after all only an opinion and not meant to sound bigoted.
This great prophetic voice from the Windy City nails it. The truth is that all our nuancing has little to do with contextualizing the message of the cross and more to do with a wicked attempt to remove the offense of the cross. We don’t want to be labeled bigoted. We want to be labeled reasonable, respectable, and open-minded. We want the praise and acceptance of men. I long for an army of men who will speak the gospel with such a great clarity that no-one can walk away without having their heart shaken by Christ and his cross. We need loud voices crying out in the wilderness of dead evangelicalism. We must speak up and speak clearly. Don’t silence any part of the gospel. Silence is sin. Hear Tozer again:
Could it be that too many of God’s true children, and especially the preachers, are sinning against God by guilty silence?…I for one am waiting to hear the loud voices of the prophets and reformers sounding once more over a sluggish and drowsy church. They’ll pay a price for their boldness, but the results will be worth it.
Give us loud voices, Lord!
Ryan Benhase has put together a great post on everyday missionary methods for the “average believer” called, 7 Ways to Live Missionally in Everyday Life. I really enjoyed this quote from his concluding thoughts:
“I fear that sometimes we’re so obsessed with figuring out how we can turn a conversation into an opportunity to preach that we often forget the importance of meaningful relationships and neglect to invest in building them. However, if we were only better at making friends, perhaps we wouldn’t have to worry so much about coming up with sneaky transitions into evangelism. We need to lay off the bait and switch, knock it off with the marketing, and stop making excuses for our laziness when it comes to programming mission into our daily lives.”
I totally agree. Give Ryan’s blog, Missional Musings dot Com, some love. Also, if you find Ryan’s post helpful let me be ever so bold to recommend my a similar post I wrote a while back called, “Everyday Missionary Methods.”
I would like to share this quote regarding the proclamation of the gospel that I found to be quite stirring today:
“There is a tendency in some quarters today to promote a kind of evangelism without proclamation. Acts of service are done or people are invited to experience Christian worship. But without words of explanation these are like signposts pointing nowhere or, worse still, signposts pointing to our good works. The gospel is good news: a message to be proclaimed, a truth to be taught, a word to be spoken and a story to be told. The gospel is good news: a message to be proclaimed, a truth to be taught, a word to be spoken and a story to be told.”- Total Church
The gospel must be lived out in everyday life. Community building can’t be merely regulated to a mid-week small group meeting and a Sunday morning service. It must extend far beyond these events to fulfill all the great “one another passages” of the New Testament. Moreover, the work of evangelism (mission) can’t be accomplished through mere door knocking, tract passing, or making sermons more “relevant to the unchurched.” Our missionary methods must extend into the ordinary activities of our routines if we are to follow the New Testament model. We must intentionally evaluate and reform our everyday lives around the gospel. I created a simple exercise to help the folks at my former church to move away from a primarily program-based way of “doing” the Christian life towards a more natural way. Maybe you’ll find it helpful as well.
First, simply list out all the activities that make up your daily, weekly, and monthly routines. You should write down everything in these routines even if they seem mundane. Your daily list might include things like eating meals, go to the gym, driving to work, walk the dog, and play time with the kids. Your weekly list might include things like watch football, go to the park, grocery shopping, trip to the library, and play basketball. Your monthly list might include things like see a movie, take trash to the dump, get a haircut, camping, and budgeting. I would recommend opening up a Word doc and revising it as your routines shift over time.
Second, begin to assess all these ordinary activities through a tri-fold lens of community, mission, and gospel. You want to consider whether or not you can take these activities and add each of these three components. For example, let us consider the universal routine of grocery shopping. It is quite easy to add a communal and missional component to your weekly trip to the grocery. The first step would be to invite a Christian from your local church and a non-Christian friend to join you in this common routine. The second step is to bring the gospel into the activity. The gospel component can be added in a natural but intentional way as you converse throughout the activity. Shopping will bring up very important topics such as stewardship, family, and health. These topics can easily be used as a path to explicitly talking about the gospel. The third step and perhaps the hardest is to try your best to make this more than an one time event. You want this to become part of your weekly shopping routine. Just think how the kingdom would expand if you took as many of your routine activities as possible and disciplined yourself to include these three components! Moreover, you aren’t adding yet another event to you already crowded routine but rather sanctifying your everyday life!
In conclusion, I understand that this is exercise doesn’t answer everything. Some of your activities are meant to be solitary. This certainly is acceptable. However, it is probably a different issue altogether if the lists you have constructed don’t include about dozen activities that can be reformed to include all three components. I find people prefer programic evangelism and community life (if you can even call it that) because it doesn’t invade their personal space. That is irreconcilable with the life of Jesus and implications of the gospel. You must change.
