{"id":4976,"date":"2014-09-10T06:01:28","date_gmt":"2014-09-10T13:01:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=4976"},"modified":"2014-09-09T17:55:12","modified_gmt":"2014-09-10T00:55:12","slug":"how-to-be-sure-youll-never-mobilize-your-pastor-for-missions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/?p=4976","title":{"rendered":"How to Be Sure You\u2019ll Never Mobilize Your Pastor for Missions"},"content":{"rendered":"

By <\/a>Shane Bennett<\/a><\/p>\n

\"8797472651_c80175345a_b\"<\/a>Dear Missions Guy and Gal,<\/strong><\/p>\n

I know you mean well and I love your passion, I really do. But I\u2019ve got to tell you I\u2019m starting to scan the crowd and drift left when I see you coming from the right. I like you and all. It\u2019s just that your advocacy for the world is becoming a little strident. Your zeal\u2019s starting to make me daydream of making you a missionary to a galaxy far, far away.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t want to be too harsh here. But it\u2019s late on Sunday, my football team lost today and I\u2019m not happy with my sermon this morning. So I might use my current mood to get a few things off my chest. You may want take a couple aspirin right now and put on pads and a helmet.<\/p>\n

Here goes… Here\u2019s how you can be sure I\u2019m never going to be mobilized for missions:<\/p>\n

1. Present all your requests as though they were crises. Emergencies happen. I get it. But sometimes I think maybe you just didn\u2019t think ahead. Or when your emergency 8500 miles away is competing with eight other emergencies within a stone\u2019s throw of the church door, it\u2019s hard for me to prioritize yours. Heck, it\u2019s kind of tough just to listen to it. For added anti-impact, corner me with your crisis just before the service on Sunday morning!<\/p>\n

2. Use jargon that I should probably know, but don\u2019t. This makes me feel dumb. Which makes me get defensive. Which leads to saying snarky stuff I later regret. Yeah, and refer to people I don\u2019t know, but don\u2019t explain who they are.<\/p>\n

3. By all means, go to my wife if you\u2019re disappointed in how I\u2019m responding to your requests.<\/p>\n

4. Give me books I don\u2019t ask for, the context for which I lack, and the content I\u2019m not interested in. Do this monthly. Then ask me if I\u2019ve read them. Heads up: If you ask me twice, I\u2019ll give the books back to you. That way you\u2019ll have them to give to your new pastor.<\/p>\n

5. Leave me out of the process. Send me a support letter that you haven\u2019t even signed, telling me you\u2019re off to do something the Lord\u2019s led you to do with another organization, when we haven\u2019t even had one conversation with each other! When you\u2019re actually in the decision process, keep it between you and your college crew.<\/p>\n

6. Don\u2019t pray for me, just give me more work to do. And if you do pray, really give it to God on my behalf. Ask him to change me or re-locate me.<\/p>\n

7. Inundate me with information, but don\u2019t ask me questions. Don\u2019t ask how I\u2019m holding up or what God\u2019s saying to me lately. Let me pull back the curtain just a bit: I\u2019ve got all the normal family issues anyone else has. And maybe a few more \u201cpastor family\u201d issues, I don\u2019t know. Plus I\u2019m juggling the good, the bad, and the ugly at church. This week that includes the death of a child \u2013 unexpected (aren’t they always?), two dear saints going into hospice, the unplanned pregnancy of an elder\u2019s high school daughter, the need to terminate a staff member, a decision to repair or replace the roof, and preparing a sermon on trusting God. (I\u2019m wondering if I can live it enough to preach it.) So I feel for the persecuted church in the horn of Africa, I really do. I cry for a million displaced Syrians. I just struggle to find the energy and focus to take action.<\/p>\n

8. Don\u2019t serve what we\u2019re currently doing; just tell me how our church isn\u2019t doing all it could. It\u2019s hard for me to believe you\u2019re willing to bleed on the foreign mission field when you won\u2019t even get up 30 minutes early to help us set up chairs. And honestly, how familiar with our present ministry are you? God has opened amazing doors here in our community. I\u2019m sure it\u2019s not all he has in mind for us. At the same time, I don\u2019t accept the feeling I get from you sometimes that ministry doesn\u2019t count unless it\u2019s a certain number of miles away from home.<\/p>\n

9. Ask me if your missionary friend can speak to whole church. Then get that hurt look on your face when I question if he\u2019s really qualified for that!<\/p>\n

10. Ask me to go with you on a three-week-trip to the craziest parts of the world. (Me paying, of course!) Then that hurt look on your face again when I hesitate!<\/p>\n

11. When you email me about the cool thing you\u2019d like us to invest in, be sure to bad-mouth eight other similar things. This will feed my insecurity and make me wonder how you speak about me to your missions friends.<\/p>\n

12. Tell me missions is what\u2019s really on the heart of God. You and I both know I haven\u2019t preached a missions series in two or three years. The implied distance between God\u2019s heart and mine will be clear.<\/p>\n

One last thing: Some of us see the giving records, you know. Are you really asking me to allocate church funds to missions when, as far as I can tell, you\u2019re doing nothing to fund the church?<\/p>\n

OK, this is more direct honesty than you usually get from me, but I thought you should know. And you should know this as well: None of these issues is forever. Any of them, in fact all of them, can start being different tomorrow morning. I hope they will.<\/p>\n

Sincerely, hopefully,<\/strong><\/p>\n

Your pastor<\/strong><\/p>\n

P.S. If you really want to get me connected to the Muslim world, do this: Fly my wife and me to Turkey<\/a> for a week\u2019s vacation. Include a day and a half kicking around with your missionary friend there. Just a day and a half.<\/p>\n

\u00bb Comment on this article on our website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Photo: Creative Commons image from State Library of Victoria<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Shane\"<\/a>About Shane Bennett<\/strong><\/p>\n

Shane has been loving Muslims and connecting people who love Jesus with Muslims for more than 20 years. He speaks like he writes \u2013 in a practical, humorous, and easy-to-relate-to way \u2013 about God\u2019s passion to bring all peoples into his kingdom. Contact Shane to speak to your people<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Shane Bennett Dear Missions Guy and Gal, I know you mean well and I love your passion, I really do. But I\u2019ve got to tell you I\u2019m starting to scan the crowd and drift left when I see you coming from the right. I like you and all. It\u2019s just that your advocacy for … Continue reading How to Be Sure You\u2019ll Never Mobilize Your Pastor for Missions<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-practical-mobilization"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4976"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4976\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4988,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4976\/revisions\/4988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/missionscatalyst.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}