How the Whole Church Can Care Well

Reaching & Teaching seeks to come alongside local churches to send missionaries around the globe to make mature disciples, establish healthy churches, and train local leaders. RTIM depends upon the local church to identify, develop, and send out these missionaries. But the church’s responsibility does not end with sending. The church must continue to provide ongoing care to those they sent out.  

RTIM’s Member Care team longs for local churches to serve missionaries well. At minimum, local churches should make four commitments to missionaries on the field. Though not exhaustive, it’s my hope that these commitments will encourage missionaries and inspire churches to be a blessing to them. 

Understand biblical missiology.

Understanding missions is not only important for seminary professors and authors. The local church, as both the means and the goal of missions, must embrace a biblical missiology. In its simplest form, missions is cross-cultural gospel proclamation, disciple-making, and leadership training with the goal of establishing a healthy, biblical church. Churches who are clear about this will ensure unity of purpose which will encourage their missionaries to stand firm in their convictions, even if they feel like they are standing alone.

Prioritize sending.

Churches must work as hard to send out as they do to bring in. In Acts 13, the church at Antioch sent out two of their very best: Paul and Barnabas. Antioch understood the mission of God and faithfully sent. But how does sending more missionaries show care for existing ones? Recently, one of our missionaries shared that the best way I can care for her is to send more workers to join her team. Sending missionaries is the church’s responsibility, and it’s another powerful way to serve those on the field. 

Support sacrificially.

As he prepared to travel to India, William Carey told Andrew Fuller and the missions society, “I will go down into the pit if you will hold the ropes.” If someone uses a rope to descend into a pit, the weight at the bottom of the rope will be equal to the weight at the top. Could this mean that the weight of our support for missionaries should be similar to the weight of their sacrifice in going? If we aren’t sacrificially giving and praying, can we really say we are holding the rope? 

Numerous families are willing to leave the comfort of home for foreign soil. And yet they are still not on the field because they need support. John wrote concerning gospel laborers, “You will do well to send them on their way in a manner worthy of God. For they went out for the sake of the Name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles. Therefore we ought to support such men, so that we may be fellow workers with the truth” (3 John 6-8 NASB). We can support such workers by praying and giving in a way that equals the sacrifice of their going.

Care about missionaries more than football.

 A missionary was home for the Christmas holidays after several years of serving a difficult people group in North Africa. His father-in-law asked him after their meal to share what he had encountered and accomplished over the last several years on the field. The missionary began to share his experiences, but moments into his report, he noticed his father-in-law slowly turn his head back toward the television where his favorite SEC football team was playing. The missionary said he learned a valuable lesson that Christmas: some people care more about football than missionaries. 

Missionaries often feel alone and unappreciated. We can show them we care by actually reading their newsletters, providing a listening ear, visiting them on the field when appropriate, and establishing a rope-holder team that is in regular communication with them and in prayer for them. Those are just a few examples of how we can show them we care about them and their work more than football. 

How can your church care for missionaries well? The list of possibilities is endless. But at a minimum: understand the mission, prioritize sending more missionaries, sacrificially pray and give, and care deeply. Churches who care well for their missionaries make sending agencies more effective, the labors of missionaries a little lighter, and the joy of churches that much fuller.