2008 Woodie Awards
Missionaries share what missions work means to them and what it really takes
Yong Kim, Assistant Scene Editor
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Note: This article contains edited material from its originally published format.
A man wakes up early in the morning, just as the sun is peaking above the horizon. Living in Bhutan, a nation between India and China, he picks up his camera and sets out with his camera crew toward one of the Himalayan mountain peeks to record the next scene in their latest movie.
Meanwhile in Hungary, a woman opens her business and prepares for the morning rush. The sound of grinding coffee beans can be heard, as the smell of lattes and espresso permeates the small coffee shop.
In the southern hemisphere, a group of surfers hit the waves in Indonesia, surfboards in hand, hoping to catch some waves.
What do all three of these people have in common? They are all Christian missionaries.
With the missions front extending into the 21st century, the face of Christian missions has changed. Being a missionary is multifaceted, missionary Robin Soard said.
"The sky's the limit," said C. Marvin, Northwest college campus coordinator for Frontiers.
Marvin represented one out of roughly 18 missions organizations that visited Whitworth during Global Missions Week, March 11-13.
Relief, development, education and health are just some of the avenues missionaries can focus on, Marvin said.
Among the mission organizations that visited Whitworth last week, many focus on different aspects within the missions field.
Frontiers focuses on church-planting, primarily in Muslim-dominant countries.
The City Gate Spokane focuses on inner-city issues in an effort "to reclaim, rebuild, and restore lost and broken lives" in Spokane, according to their pamphlet.
Children With Hope Inc. is dedicated to helping children all over the world suffering from difficult circumstances such as HIV/AIDS, child prostitution and abuse.
During a discussion in Duvall Hall, on Wednesday, March 12, missionaries said with the field of missions expanding in terms of what someone can do, many people interested or planning to be missionaries have a great amount of resources.
Russell Wiesner, West coast mobilizer for PIONEERS, said there is a missionary involved in the surf culture in Southeast Asia, a non-traditional way to do mission work.**
"The PIONEERS worker brings Christian surfers over and puts them up in Muslim homes so they can surf the waves and be salt and light to families," Wiesner said in an e-mail. "After the Christian surfers leave, [the missionary] follows up and shares the Gospel with those same families. Through this ministry, he has planted house churches in a 99 percent Muslim area."
The idea to work in surf tourism, was the missionary's idea and PIONEERS helped facilitate that vision, Wiesner said. PIONEERS specializes with churches and missionaries, helping them align their visions and dreams with what they can do in the mission field.
Many missionaries from different organizations are approaching the mission field in a different ways, yet still preserving similar values.
Soard recently spent two years in South Asia as a storying facilitator for Wycliffe, a Bible translating organization.
"A storying facilitator works with a national and teaches the national the Bible story. They ensure that the story is Biblically accurate and culturally relevant (i.e. the story is told in a style similar to the cultural stories of that people group)," Soard said in an e-mail. "They also record the Bible story (using an MP3 player or other recording technology)."
In response, Wycliffe and other organizations, including International Mission Board, Campus Crusade for Christ and Youth With a Mission, got together and formed OneStory, which strives to create oral versions of the Bible.
Soard said according to OneStory, training sessions she attended and observations during her mission work in Asia, two-thirds of the world's population are from oral cultures. In an oral culture, people communicate, share ideas, history and religion through speaking rather than through reading and writing.
"OneStory works with mother-tongue speakers to develop and record worldview-sensitive, chronological Bible 'story sets' for each specific group," according to onestory.org.
Despite all the different roles a missionary can fill, there are some common elements of missionary work.
There is a difference between a witness and a missionary, Wiesner of PIONEERS said. A missionary has a cross-cultural component: culture, language and geography; a witness can be telling someone of shared culture and language about your faith who lives across the block.
Marvin said in North Africa, the native people view a "missionary" as someone who invaded their territory, forcing foreign laws on them and drew borders to divide their people. In Islam, a missionary is viewed as a crusader, Marvin said.
Marvin said he doesn't identify with those images and instead views himself as a follower of Jesus Christ and a Christian worker.
"I don't use the term missionary," Marvin said. "I just say worker. I haven't really found a term that I really like."
Both Marvin and Soard, discovered their interest for missions during their young adult life and are both fairly new to the mission field.
Many missionaries, beginners, find it difficult to adjust to the new lifestyle.
"A lot of people go home because of the struggles of being in a foreign country, culture and language," Wiesner said. "Many missionaries have breakdowns."
Marvin said he and his wife have spent some time just crying together in North Africa.
"We were wrestling [with] so many different stresses that were going in our minds all at one time, the thought of leaving our family and being there full time," Marvin said.
Marvin said he and his wife were comforted by a Bible verse in 2 Corinthians 12:9, which says God's grace and strength is sufficient in weakness.
In the discussion, most missionaries said missions work is a test of personal faith. Many missionaries struggle with financial needs for what they need to do.
Several missionaries at the discussion shared personal experiences that reinforce the idea that if God really wants you do go into the missions field, he'll provide a way.
But do all Christians need to be involved in the mission field? Not so, said many of the missionaries.
"I believe every Christian is called to follow Jesus but not every Christian needs to be serving overseas," Soard said.
Not every Christian should go out to foreign countries. But everyone should be involved in some way, Marvin said.
"Get to a place in the world that is going to stretch you and go against the status quo. Do it. Do it in a heartbeat," Marvin said. "God is a God of diversity. We all have a role in the worldwide body of Christ."
There is a lot of preparation needed to become a missionary. Soard said good advice for those pursuing missions as a possible avenue is to start taking short term mission trips to places of interest. It would also be easy to find pockets of communities of the target country in America.
Know what God is calling you to do and find a missions agency that can facilitate your passion and vision, Wiesner said. Not all agencies are built for all missionaries, he said.
Contact Yong Kim at yong.kim@whitworthian.com.
*PHOTO CORRECTION: In the original posting, the caption incorrectly labeled the location of Robin Soard in the photograph. Soard appears center.
**The exact location of Wiesner's mission work has been edited to protect his ministry.
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