House Church - Missions

The focus upon missions, both locally and globally, is something that all churches should gladly embrace. This is true for both traditional churches and simple churches. Therefore, this is an area of church life where there both can and should be much agreement.

Every follower of Jesus Christ that I have ever met has agreed that everyone needs to hear the gospel.  We may not agree on exactly how to go about "doing missions" most effectively, but we are united in understanding that every individual on this planet absolutely needs to hear the good news of Jesus Christ.

In local bodies of believers we can pray, give, and go (that may sound a bit trite, but I think it's an accurate descriptor of our involvement). These are areas where we can unite as churches regardless of the church model we follow. We can team together in praying, giving, and going. In fact, we should.

In the area of missions, there is one obvious difference between traditional and simple churches: giving.  Because of their overhead costs (building, staff, programs), traditional churches are generally handcuffed in how much they can give toward missions.  Even if they give a large sum toward missions each year, this amount is a relatively small percentage of their total giving.  Simple churches, on the other hand, are able to give the vast majority of their money toward missions and/or mercy.  Because they don't have much in the way of overhead expenses, this frees them up to give away the vast percentage of their money.

One final note on missions: I know of sincere Christians who have saved money, sacrificed vacation time, endured some level of discomfort, and traveled overseas on what they refer to as mission trips. When they arrived at location, what they did was construct church buildings. Although this may have been done with purest intentions, this is not missions.

What is missions? In the bible we see missions as the sharing of the gospel message in a manner that can be understood by the hearers. The book of Acts is extremely informative for us. For example, we see Paul repeatedly telling the account of Jesus Christ. He almost always mentions Christ's death and resurrection. The gospel is the focus of what his missions work.

My encouragement to all Christians is that we work together in missions regardless of denomination or church model.  There are far too many lost people (see here, here, here, and here) for us to get distracted by minor differences.  We must think hard about how we pray, how we give, and how we go.  We must also dare to ask how we spend the money God has made us stewards over.  Finally, may our definition of missions come in line with what we see in scripture.