Indigenous Missionaries/Pastors

[Debp]

7 hours ago, Fidei Defensor said:

It is curious though how missions usually gets fervor when it’s to a culture and country other than our own. For instance if a person who lives in England seeks to raise funds to do mission work in England there it very little response, but if they mention Africa, India, or Syria, suddenly there is donations. 

Indigenous missions can be very difficult because the benefactors often sadly, want the novelty of helping orphans in Ukraine than in their own backyard. There is now Asia and Africa is sending missionaries to America; which kinds proves my suspicion; missions are easier to raise support for if it’s to another culture and people. 

I guess God lays certain areas or people on our hearts.  For instance I have a great interest in those working to reach Muslims.

6 hours ago, just_abc said:

um.. It is from an old script of an asian language.  That language script likely originated from arabic script though.. so many letters of the alphabet might be the same or similar to arabic letters.. but not all.... The language itself is a different language.  

 

I know very little regarding mission work.. so this is just my personal opinion perhaps.. and maybe I am mistaken..

But to me I think it can often be a very good thing for the Christians of a country to help each other.... However with regards to accepting financial help from outside the country.. unless it was a dire situation such as to save lives after a natural disaster or medical missions etc. (as well as some other types of situations..)..  I think it might depend on a particular situation as well as what the help is for.. whether or not accepting financial help from outside the country would be a very good thing.. or if it is something that might also have drawbacks or cause problems for Christians or churches in the country..

For example.. if some churches or pastors recieved financial help from foreign sources.. and some didn't and had to raise money themselves.. would that cause any friction between the churches?

Or would some churches become overly dependant on foreign help rather than more independant? etc

However that said I think there are some situations where outside help might be much much needed and could be a very good thing indeed.. and help a lot of people..

It just depends on what the particular situation is perhaps?  

Sorry not meaning to be negative.  Just some thoughts thats all.  And as I mentioned earlier I know very little about mission work so maybe I could be mistaken.

Thanks again.

 

The mission Christian Aid is helping these poor indigenous pastors and missionaries because their own congregations are too poor to support a pastor or any other outreach, etc.   If these pastors/missionaries didn't get financial help from us, they would have to do full time regular work, and that wouldn't allow much time to do ministry.   If some indigenous churches become more stable financially, then they do contribute.

Any indigenous ministry is welcome to apply to Christian Aid Mission to have their needs be made known to the Western world.   They will be thoroughly checked out for sound doctrine and reputable handling of finances first.   Christian Aid has operated for about 60 years and was founded by a former American missionary who saw the native people could reach their own people better and much more cheaply.

2 hours ago, Fidei Defensor said:

True, but England and Europe need Christ badly. They are a “dry and thirsty land.” Perhaps this is why Asia and Africa are sending missionaries to the West, to stoke the zeal for the Lord that has gone cold, especially in Europe. 

It's good some missionaries from those countries are trying to reach Westerners.   However, Christian Aid Mission wants to concentrate on countries and areas where Christ has never been preached or very little is known of Christ, and in lands of great persecution including Muslim countries.   They do not help in areas where the Gospel has already been preached many times over and over.

[Debp]

5 hours ago, Yowm said:

No wonder we are still waiting...

Matthew 24:14 NASBS
[14] This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come.

 

This is why it's important to reach the people groups who have never heard the good news of Christ at all...or groups that have heard so little of it that they do not even understand the simple Gospel message.

Too much money is spent in areas where people have heard of Christ over and over...and aren't interested in Him.  Perhaps this is the case of where one shakes the dust off and moves on?  Move on to those who have never heard via our support.

Edited September 14, 2018 by Debp
Added thought.

[Fidei Defensor]

6 hours ago, Yowm said:

No wonder we are still waiting...

Matthew 24:14 NASBS
[14] This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come.

 

Indeed. Just when evangelion seems to have taken root, a new generation sprouts up that hasn’t heard it or worse the Gospel gets misrepresented by false apostles (2 Corinthians 11:14-15) who teach a false gospel (Galatians 1:7-9) and false christs (Matthew 24:24). 

We must stand firm (Matthew 10:22) and preach the gospel and make disciples (Matthew 28:19). “Never give up, never surrender.” 

[Guest shiloh357]

3 hours ago, Debp said:

Too much money is spent in areas where people have heard of Christ over and over...and aren't interested in Him.  Perhaps this is the case of where one shakes the dust off and moves on?  Move on to those who have never heard via our support.

That is as false perception.  A lot of money is spent in areas that have heard of Christ, but that is a necessary expenditure.  Those areas were once areas that had not heard of Christ and money, a lot of money is spent to keep them fortified and to train indigenous missionaries and to make those missionaries reproductive, so that they will be equipped to train more missionaries.   Those areas that we spend a lot of money to do training, to build more churches and to make more disciples are worth holding on to.    

Evangelism takes on different roles.   It's about building and maintaining Christian communities and because westerners are not welcome in some parts of the world, it makes sense to set up training facilities to teach and education would-be indigenous pastors and missionaries that have the ability to go into those areas. 

[Fidei Defensor]

4 hours ago, Debp said:

This is why it's important to reach the people groups who have never heard the good news of Christ at all...or groups that have heard so little of it that they do not even understand the simple Gospel message.

Too much money is spent in areas where people have heard of Christ over and over...and aren't interested in Him.  Perhaps this is the case of where one shakes the dust off and moves on?  Move on to those who have never heard via our support.

Although we must be careful, just because people have heard of Christ doesn’t mean they know Him (Philippians 3:8). Another issue is that there are Africans converting over food; Muslims are exploiting this and sadly there are African kids becoming Christian just to get food and be wealthy. We must curb against this almost Medieval conversion. 

Edited September 14, 2018 by Fidei Defensor

[Debp]

This shows the amount spent on people that haven't yet heard....such a tiny amount:

https://www.christianaid.org/leadership/

[Guest shiloh357]

2 hours ago, Debp said:

This shows the amount spent on people that haven't yet heard....such a tiny amount:

https://www.christianaid.org/leadership/

Which really doesn't tell the whole story.  People can rattle off those facts and assign whatever value they want to them, but the truth is that money spent on training indigenous pastors and missionaries and building churches is money spent on saving the lost, even those who have not heard.   It's really simple, when reach the lost, what then? They need churches and Christian facilities in place to disciple the new believers.  Otherwise, they will return right back into the paganism they were saved out of.  

[Debp]

13 minutes ago, shiloh357 said:

Which really doesn't tell the whole story.  People can rattle off those facts and assign whatever value they want to them, but the truth is that money spent on training indigenous pastors and missionaries and building churches is money spent on saving the lost, even those who have not heard.   It's really simple, when reach the lost, what then? They need churches and Christian facilities in place to disciple the new believers.  Otherwise, they will return right back into the paganism they were saved out of.  

The native pastors/missionaries not only evangelize and do church planting, but they also disciple new converts.   Besides discipling them, some  native ministries also have Bible colleges.    There are also many other things native ministries are doing with the help of Western Christians' donations through organizations like Christian Aid Mission or Gospel For Asia.

Edited September 15, 2018 by Debp
Added thought.

[Guest shiloh357]

1 minute ago, Debp said:

The native pastors/missionaries not only evangelize and do church planting, but they also disciple new converts.   Besides discipling them, some  native ministries also have Bible colleges.    There are also many other things native ministries are doing with the help of Western Christians' donations.

Yes, but they were trained and educated to be able to do those things.  We build training facilities to make that happen.  That's my point.  Evangelism and missions has multiple component parts.   Even Paul went back to fortify existing ministries that he had started.  There are different roles in evangelism.   We are not called to make "converts;"  we are called to make disciples and that means having ongoing ministries in place to continue to build up and fortify existing ministry opportunities.   And that requires money.

When you train and make disciples, you gain inroads into unreached area that a western missionary cannot simply walk into.   So the idea that we are not spending money on simply reaching unreached people isn't really true when you look at the entire context of what is actually happening.   

[Fidei Defensor]

That is my biggest concern with modern missions. The tendecy is evangelism rather than disicpleship (Matthew 28:19). Evangelism is good, but disicpleship is better; it allows you to go beyond the fundamentals and really train up a brother and sister in Christ (2 Timothy 3:16-17).