In This Issue: Missionary Prep, Care, Reentry, and More
- Web Site Serves as Mission Preparation Toolkit
- New Book on Reentry and Reverse Culture Shock
- Free Online Resources for Missionary Care
- How Do You Start a Church Aboard a Ship?
- All-Star Missions Churches
Missions Catalyst is a free, weekly electronic digest of mission news and resources designed to inspire and equip Christians worldwide for global ministry. Use it to fuel your prayers, find tips and opportunities, and stay in touch with how God is building his kingdom all over the world. Please forward it freely!
Resource Reviews, edited by Marti Smith, are published once a month.
Dear Readers,
In the hemisphere where most of our readers live it’s summer, and that may mean many of us are traveling: School holidays, family vacations, short-term mission trips, and ministry furloughs have us on the road. My prayer for you is that wherever you are and whatever you’re doing – close to home or far away – these months would refresh, renew, and equip you to better see and serve God’s kingdom.
Several of the resources we’re including this month may help. MissionEquip can make last-minute travel details just a bit easier to manage. If you face the stress of a more significant ministry transition, Marion Knell’s new book on reentry and the resources from missionarycare.com may also be of help.
If you are already thinking about and preparing for mission conferences and events in the fall, may I encourage you to look at the DVDs, photo CDs, posters, and prayer cards at the Caleb Resources store?
Also, please let me know what other resources you are finding useful, including any you might be involved in producing or distributing. We were very pleased to hear from reader Martin Otto last month and are promoting his new book below. If you have other suggestions or submissions for our resource reviews in months to come, please feel free to contact us.
Warmly,
Marti Smith
Managing Editor
WEB SITE – MissionEquip, One-Stop Missions Travel Resource
Source: MissionEquip
You have a heart for missions, but you’re not sure where to begin. Or you are part of a short-term missions team that will soon be traveling overseas to play a part in building God’s kingdom, but you’re not certain what you will need for your trip. Perhaps you are a long-term missionary in need of information about various resources. You might be a missions pastor trying to organize an overseas trip, and you’re looking for an easy way to gather all of the data you need.
MissionEquip.com [long-time in the building, but formally launched in May] was established to provide resources to missionaries and short-term missions teams traveling worldwide. Through partnerships with a variety of organizations, they provide solutions for missionaries all over the globe ranging from a wide variety of insurance products for missionaries to a helpful travel checklist to make mission trip planning easier. Check out the world missions bookstore, find affordable telecommunications options, and more.
BOOK – Burn-Up or Splash Down
Source: David Mays, EFMA – Book Notes June 7, 2007
Burn-Up or Splash Down: Surviving the Culture Shock of Re-Entry, by Marion Knell. 2007, 184 pages, paperback. US$11.99 from Authentic.
The author is a family cross-cultural consultant with business, humanitarian, and Christian organizations. She lives in the UK. This work deals with the struggle of reentering one’s own country and culture after having been gone. Although people expect difficulties in moving into a new culture, they often do not anticipate the struggles of returning home.
[Missionary care specialist] David Pollock has described the reentry stages as leaving, transition, entering, and reengagement. This takes a minimum of a year. Many variables affect a person’s ability to cope, such as the timing of the leave, reasons for the leave, degree of change of economic standards, and support systems. Six months of preparation for leaving is ideal.
Reentry feelings typically include loss, grief, bereavement, depression, and loneliness. It’s not simply that everything is different but that you feel like a stranger or alien. People are characterized by values, goals, and perspectives that are totally different from yours.
People who have been away as little as two years may expect the familiar only to discover that there is nothing familiar. They are not reentering the old world but a new one! Things have changed while they were gone and they have changed by living in another culture. The gaps they left in other people’s lives have been filled in by others.
“It is important to find someone you can talk to frankly and who has the time to listen and the ability to empathize with your feelings.” (page 32)
One whole section is especially written to help young people survive and thrive. Helpful web sites for missionary / ‘third-culture’ kids (TCKs): TCKWorld, Transition Dynamics , Families in Global Transition, Overseas Brats, Xenos, and MKPlanet.
Full review of Burn-Up or Splash Down with more excerpts here. Subscribe to David Mays’ periodic “Book Notes” emails or read book reviews here.
FREE ONLINE RESOURCES – Books, Brochures for Missionary Care
Source: missionarycare.com – Resources for Missions and Mental Health
Having completed a career in teaching at Asbury College, Dr. Ron Koteskey is a Member Care Consultant for New Hope International Ministries (Tel: 859.858.3436). Through New Hope, Ron and his wife, Bonnie, offer on-field help to independent missionaries, to missionaries whose agencies have no one designated for missionary care, and to missionaries who would prefer talking with someone outside their agencies.
As part of this ministry they have developed a series of brochures, a database, and six e-books: one on re-entry, one titled What Missionaries Ought to Know (freshly revised and combining the series of brochures of the same name), one on TCKs, and one on adolescence. In early 2007 Ron and Bonnie wrote a reentry book for children 6-12 years of age and an accompanying one for their parents [also available on the site]. [Note: links removed July 2009]
EDITOR’S NOTE: Team leaders and mission pastors, why not pick out a few of the brochures to print and pass along to the members of your ministry team or mission committee? They might fuel some honest, fruitful conversations about the things we struggle with and how they affect us.
BOOK – Church on the Oceans
Source: Martin Otto
Church on the Oceans: A Missionary Vision for the 21st Century, by Martin Otto. 2007, 132 pages, paperback. Price UK£7.00 or US$11.00 from Piquant Editions. For more information contact Piquant.
How does one start a church on board a ship? Is it possible for such a church to survive? How can churches on shore support churches on the sea? Martin Otto addresses these and many other practical questions in this book, drawing on his personal experience with many years in seamen’s missions. Church on the Oceans is a follow-up to his earlier title, Seafarers! A Strategic Missionary Vision.
A Filipino seafarer responded to Church on the Oceans by saying, “I have read your book Seafarers a lot of times and it is amazingly true and heart-warming. Your second book Church on the Oceans is the best idea you’ve had … I hope and pray to God that you will attain more blessings and inspiration from God fulfilling this wonderful book for the seafarers.”
Another young Christian seafarer wrote: “Through a church on board, we can grow in our faith in Christ, and our hope is renewed every time we come together.”
According to Patrick Johnstone, missions researcher and author of Operation World: Many missionaries who have served overseas could find a remarkable new outlet for using their skills and acquired language abilities to enable this vision to be a reality.”
Martin Otto has been in full-time ministry to seafarers since 1987. He and his wife Monika are based in Hamburg, where they work in association with the Seamen’s Christian Friend Society.
EDITOR’S NOTE: See previous Missions Catalyst articles on this topic –
• Book – Seafarers! A Strategic Missionary Vision (now translated into German, Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, Tagalog, and Korean)
• Seafarers Start Living Churches on the Oceans (an article Martin wrote on this topic) [Note: links removed July 2009]
Also, want to get a taste of life at sea and pursue ministry training and outreach opportunities at the same time? You might want to consider the many short-term and long-term opportunities available with Mercy Ships or OM Ships, or the up-and-coming YWAM ministry Marine Reach. (Their beautiful new ship, the Next Wave, is sailing around the coast of the UK this summer. If you’re nearby, try to visit!)
BOOK – Today’s All-Star Missions Churches
Source: Baker Books
Today’s All-Star Missions Churches: Strategies to Help Your Church Get into the Game, by Tom Telford with Lois Shaw. 2001, 176 pages, paperback. US$12.80 from Baker Books; also available from Caleb Resources.
Back cover copy: What are the best missions churches in America? Why are their missions programs so effective? How can your church learn from them? Find the answers in Today’s All-Star Missions Churches. This unique resource highlights churches throughout the country that have developed excellent missions programs using the particular gifts and abilities of their members. Through their examples and Tom Telford’s practical suggestions for implementation, your church will discover a variety of unique ideas for enhancing your missions program, improving the support of current missionaries, and working effectively with missions agencies.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Like many of the most practical resources for networking, this one includes some contact information and details which were destined to become out of date in the years since it was published. But it’s still a useful and inspiring read.
Curious who made Telford’s “all-star team”? These 11 churches are profiled, and the book includes shorter descriptions of 25 others: Bethlehem Baptist Church (Minneapolis, MN), Hershey Evangelical Free Church (Hershey, PA) Christian Stronghold Baptist Church (Philadelphia, PA), Mechanicsville Christian Center (Mechanicsville, VA), Spanish River Church (Boca Raton, FL), Park Street Church (Boston, MA), Fairhaven Church (Dayton, OH), Xenos Christian Fellowship (Columbus, OH), University Presbyterian Church (Seattle, WA), Wheaton Bible Church (Wheaton, IL), and Cedar Springs Presbyterian Church (Knoxville, TN).
Questions? Problems? Submissions? Contact publisher/managing editor Marti Smith.