Tag: Serve

If Not Us, Then Who?

Posted on by Emily Belvery

(From Melissa, former MCN mission partner to Hungary and Ethiopia)

“I really first knew I was going to be a missionary when I was in college and returning home from my first short-term trip, and I had the thought, ‘If I don’t tell these people that they’re saved through Jesus, then who will?’ I knew the number of people who had any kind of active faith was limited, leaving a gap between the people who really needed this message and those who even had the ability to share it, and I felt so deeply that these people needed this message because it’s the message that literally makes the difference between life and death. And who else was there to tell them?

“What if I’m the closest chance this person ever has to meet Jesus? It’s when I keep that thought in mind that it makes it more clear about what I’m doing here, why and how I need to live my life. There’s a sense of urgency in that.

“As an ambassador of Christ, we represent Him, we follow His direction for us, and that means living our lives in a way that may cause questions among those around us because it’s against the cultural norms. And that’s challenging, it’s uncomfortable, it’s even painful. As a missionary abroad, I feel this all the time, knowing that I’m constantly making some sort of faux pas that I didn’t even realize was a thing, and it’s so often in these moments that I’m reminded that this place isn’t my home.

“We have to engage the world around us. Wherever it is doesn’t matter because ultimately this world is not our home. Having faith in Jesus automatically signs us up for a ‘leaving home assignment.’ God has appointed us to bring His message to the world, and if not us, who else is going to do it?”

Click here to listen to Melissa tell her story.

Explore God’s Calling as a Mission Explorer

Posted on by Emily Belvery

It is an encouragement to be surrounded by people invested in the same vocation; each in a unique way that utilizes their gifts and talents. I would definitely recommend CMI to anyone even a little interested in exploring where God is calling them at any point in their life! 

  • Grace, 2024 Mission Explorer

This is a gracious, inviting, enjoyable introduction to a kaleidoscope of opportunities for living out the Gospel on the paths God is calling us. 

  • David, 2025 Mission Explorer

Are you considering mission work? Join us as a Mission Explorer! Every year in July, MCN co-hosts the Concordia Mission Institute (CMI) as training for our Mission Partners. By becoming a Mission Explorer, you are able to participate in the conference, receive mission training,  and meet missionaries and MCN Staff together with a group of like-minded Explorers. Mission Explorers is a great place to explore what it might look like for you to serve, while hearing the stories of those who are on the field right now. 

Read what a former Mission Explorer, has to say about his experience:

What led you to decide to be a Mission Explorer? 

When I signed up for CMI, I had a strong sense that God was leading me into international mission work, but I didn’t know where I should serve or what I should do. I liked that at CMI, I would meet missionaries and learn about living missionally. I hoped the conference would be a part of discerning how and where God wanted me to serve.

How would you describe your experience as a Mission Explorer?

It was a formative week of meaningful conversations, interesting sessions, and fun activities! It was amazing to meet people serving in different locations and roles but all united in faith and purpose.

What did you take with you when you left the Concordia Mission Institute (CMI)?

I left CMI spiritually equipped and encouraged, with a new understanding of God’s Mission, and as part of the MCN family!

What role did your experience as a Mission Explorer play in discerning your place in God’s mission? 

I left the conference better equipped to live missionally immediately and hoping I could serve with MCN in the future. In time, God pulled together the details of how this would happen and where I would go.

Who should be a Mission Explorer and why?  

Anyone who loves Jesus and wants to share about Him can be a Mission Explorer, but the Mission Explorer experience is especially great for those who feel God is leading them toward cross-cultural ministry. The conference is wonderful preparation for living missionally in any context.

What recommendations do you have for Mission Explorers to make the most of their time at CMI? 

As a Mission Explorer, you are a full participant in the conference, not just an observer. Meals are wonderful connecting times, and don’t ever be afraid to strike up a conversation with someone you don’t know. The conference can also be overwhelming (in a good way), so feel free to take some extra time to rest or reflect. I skipped a session to nap under a tree. Make sure to get ice cream at Cree-Mee Freeze sometime! 🙂  

How might being a Mission Explorer help you discern God’s leading in your life? Reach out to Mission Mobilizers Emily Belvery or Kayla Gundermann for more information about joining us at CMI as a Mission Explorer.

Things We Leave Behind

Posted on by Emily Belvery

(From Emily Belvery during her time as a mission partner in Taiwan)

I know giving up a food or activity for Lent can be a great spiritual encouragement to some Christians (and I have recently come to appreciate the blessings of practicing seasonal times of fasting and prayer), but this Lent I’ve been thinking about some different things to give up.

I was warned about the sacrifices of serving overseas, the grieving process that is culture shock with all its elements of discomfort and frustration and longing for home. But in many ways this setting has proven to be an easy transition into mission work.

I live in a first world country with a very high standard of living and a lower poverty rate than the US. I live and teach with other Americans. I can come home every night and speak English with people who share my cultural perspective and assumptions. There is KFC, McDonalds, Starbucks, Costco, Domino’s, and Carrefour within five miles of my house. I get to Skype my family at least once a week (which is probably more than we talked while I was in college), and instead of impersonal texts or audio-only phone calls, I get to spend wonderful time talking face to face with my parents, siblings, and friends for free.

Yes, there are things I miss about living in the States, and I have missed time and events with family and friends. But I have also been abundantly blessed by a smooth transition into life overseas.

Yet I’m realizing that there might be other things God’s calling me to give up as part of serving here.

I don’t have to give up relationships with family and friends, but I do have to give up relying on them before I rely on God. When time zones and schedules mean I can’t just talk to someone the moment I experience a struggle, I’m pointedly reminded that prayer is not a last resort but the only true answer – an incredible opportunity to approach the throne of God with confidence! (And even my mom and my best friend can’t quite match that listening ear.)

I’m learning to give up my ideals about teaching and ministry. Somehow conversations about theology and educational theory that seemed so neat and tidy in a college classroom are a lot more messy now that I’m face-to-face with real students, real colleagues, and real administration – and it’s even more jarring in a situation where the school culture is so antithetical to an American understanding of education.

I’m being called to give up the academic theological vocabulary that feels so comfortable on my tongue and lets me tie up God-sized realities into tidy linguistic packages – as if I can get a firm grasp on divine realities by boxing God up inside the English language. Somehow it’s more uncomfortable to talk about the paradoxes and mysteries of faith without words like “paradox” that offer an erudite, Latinate alternative to “I can’t understand it.” But when I talk with people about God in simple English (and hopefully someday even simpler Chinese!) I have to trust that the reality of God’s grace and mercy is so much greater than my ability to articulate it. I’m reminded of Paul who told the church at Corinth, “I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.” (1 Corinthians 2:1-2) For truly the cross of Christ is all we need know.

I have to give up trusting in my own ability to schedule and accomplish goals or plan ministry opportunities, as I recognize that more and more this cultural environment calls for constant flexibility and requires living with a fair amount of uncertainty. Neither of those things come easily to me, but I know my times are much better off in God’s hands than in my own.

But the paradox (the part I don’t understand) in all this giving up is that sacrificing the things I like to prop myself up on really means gaining incredible security and freedom in Christ. As Michael Card sings, “It’s hard to imagine the freedom we find from the things we leave behind.”

“Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me His own.” (Philippians 3:12)

And that is of course where the real sacrificial message of Lent lies – “because Christ Jesus has already made me His own.”

So as we press toward Good Friday, the moment where God gave up everything to make us His own, we are also compelled by the love of Christ to give up the sins and self-reliance that so easily entangle in order to run with jubilant freedom the race God has laid out for us. (Hebrews 12:1)

Michael Card also sings, “The greatest gamble is to act on the belief that only the slave who leaves it all is truly free.” But “what is my petty offering to Christ’s sacrifice? I left my home; He gave up paradise. And what He calls me to offer has really set me free. He left everything to be with me.”

And you.

10:02 Prayer Pause

Posted on by Emily Belvery

Luke 10:2 says, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”

We can see that the harvest is plentiful. Each day around the world, people living in darkness see the light of Christ and come to faith! Our mission partners share the Gospel with an average of 2,000 people each week! And here around us in the US, too, people are asking questions, curious about faith in an age of anxiety and uncertainty.

We can also see that the laborers are few. In many countries, MCN’s partner organizations are asking for more workers, and we estimate we could place 30 more mission partners in addition to the 50 we have in the field this school year. Here in the US, our churches and schools are facing vacancies and calling for more Gospel workers.

So, what does Jesus tell us to do? He could command his disciples to give or to go or to recruit. (And all of these are good things!) But instead Jesus’s exhortation is to pray. God is the Lord of the harvest. Every person who comes to faith does so by His work, and every worker who goes out to share the Gospel does so by His call and in His power.

Would you join us in praying at 10:02 each day for God to send out more workers for His harvest? Set an alarm and pray expectantly to God who is faithful to answer!

What can you pray for?

  • Pray for more cross-cultural missionaries to go where few people know Jesus.
  • Pray for more pastors, teachers, DCE’s, and other church workers to serve our churches in the US.
  • Pray for every Christian (including you!) to have and take opportunities to share the Gospel today.
  • Pray for young children who will be missionaries in the future, that God would be equipping and preparing them for this call.
  • Pray for retirees to be willing to use their retirement years for sharing the Gospel both in the US and overseas.
  • Pray for people currently considering or applying for missionary service that God would give them clarity and support.

How can you pray?

  • Are you a stay-at-home mom? Pray aloud with your kids each day.
  • Are you a classroom teacher? Take a moment out of your lesson to pray with your class.
  • Are you an office worker? Let your alarm go off, pray quietly, and see what conversations God might create through this daily practice.
  • Are you a church worker? Let a daily alarm remind you to pause from work and pray to the God who does all the work of His Church.
  • If you work in a place where an audible alarm isn’t an option, simply set a phone reminder and pray when you are able.

God of the Harvest,

Open our eyes to see the ripe harvest fields around us and throughout the world (Jn 4:35). Give us joyful expectation as we participate in your harvest, sharing the Gospel with those you’ve placed around us and trusting Your Spirit to work faith in those who don’t yet know You. Raise up more laborers to serve in the harvest fields of our country and to proclaim the Gospel across the world (Lk 10:2). Send out global missionaries to share the Good News of Jesus in places where there are few believers. And show each of us today what our role is in the Great Commission that we might together give, pray, send, or go so that people of all nations may hear and believe the Gospel.

Amen!

Christmas as a Missionary

Posted on by Emily Belvery

(From Kourtnie Watt, MCN Mobilizer and former Asia Mission Partner)

Do you put up your Christmas decorations before or after Thanksgiving? What if there wasn’t Thanksgiving? What if the county you lived in didn’t celebrate or recognize Christmas as a holiday at all?  

Christmas is such an important holiday in the church calendar. The birth of Jesus marks the fulfillment of so many Old Testament prophecies and is the beginning of the story of our hope for salvation. While not all Americans celebrate Christmas as Christ’s birth, it is still widely common to do so. Many people who never attend church the rest of the year attend services on Christmas.  

This is not the case, however, in other countries. In many countries, there is no debate about Christmas decorations because there is no Thanksgiving holiday. (In the Philippines, they start decorating in September!) Some places there is no recognition of the birth of Jesus or even Christmas Eve service to attend. December 25th is a work day like any other. In other countries there might be Christmas celebrations, but people feel it’s archaic and overly traditional to consider Christmas primarily a celebration of Jesus’s birth. And Ethiopian Christmas is celebrated in early January!

Each of our Mission Partners experiences Christmastime differently, yet there is a common theme – building relationships to share Jesus. This might look like hosting a Christmas party at your home in Montreal that helps people better understand why Christians celebrate Christmas and how the hope of Jesus permeates the longest and darkest winters. It might be helping your students practice songs for their Christmas program at a Lutheran school in Hungary that will reach their unbelieving family members. Or it could be dancing in a mall in Hong Kong with a local Sunday School group to invite people to church on Christmas. 

Christmas overseas doesn’t look the same as what our Mission Partners experience in the States, but it holds tremendous opportunity for telling others about the salvation we have in Jesus. And many Mission Partners find great joy in discovering new Christmas traditions from another culture – or creating their own! After all, Jesus wasn’t home for Christmas and that’s kind of the point.

Would you like to hear stories from our Mission Partners about their Christmas experiences? Email recruiting@missionofchrist.org and we’ll help you sign up for a newsletter or two to get personal stories from the mission field.

What Is a Mobilizer?

Posted on by Emily Belvery

On MCN’s team, we currently have three mission mobilizers. If you’re like many people, you might look at that job title and think, “What does that mean?”

Steve Hawthorne (who co-edited the Perspectives missions course) defines mobilization as “helping God’s people to move with God in His Mission.”

While a recruiter tries to get people to fill specific positions, meeting quotas and matching job requirements, as mission mobilizers we realize only God can call people into missions. What we want is to help people follow His lead. You can think of mobilizers as coaches or guides.

How can a mobilizer help? We are here to listen, talk, and pray with people about missions. We have served in global missions ourselves and have worked with missionary candidates and missionaries on the field all over the world. We can share information and our own experiences, listen and help people process their own gifts and calling, and pray with and for them as they follow God’s lead.

What is a call with a mobilizer like? A call with a mobilizer could look like a lot of different things depending on what stage a person is at and what they are looking for. We love to hear about a person’s experiences with missions and how Christ is growing them and ask questions to draw out some of these motivators and fears or barriers to missions. We can share ideas about how particular experiences, gifts, and talents might fill a need on the field. Maybe someone is curious about what life on the mission field is really like, and we can share our stories from the field as well as the stories of other MCN mission partners. A person might have questions about the application process, requirements, or skills needed as a missionary. We have answers and resources about this that we can walk through. Maybe family is not as open to cross-cultural missions as the candidate is. We would love to talk and pray about that. We can make connections to a mission partner or overseas field. Or maybe a person just wants someone to pray for and with them as they take the first step in exploring missions or discerning Christ’s call. Each call will sound different as we meet people where they are.

How do I know if I’m ready to talk with a mobilizer? If you’re interested in missions and want to talk about it, we want to have that conversation. There’s no commitment in talking and no threshold of interest or readiness you have to reach before you reach out. Talking to us isn’t a commitment to go overseas. It’s just a way to invite another voice into the conversation. (And don’t worry about “taking up our time.” Talking with you makes our day every time!)

How does a mobilizer walk with you through the discernment and application process? Again this is different in the details for each person. It typically starts with conversations about where God is moving you and what he is pointing out in your life. Those conversations help mobilizers give you information about possible fits, and also help us pray for you. If you decide to consider serving overseas with MCN, we will walk you through every step of the application process, from the application itself to the interview to onboarding and training. Throughout the process, we are there to talk, pray, and guide – trusting that however God leads will be good.

What is a mobilizer’s goal? We want to see you engage in God’s mission in the way He has called you to do. If this is overseas with MCN, awesome! If this is overseas with another organization, awesome! If this is praying for missions, supporting a missionary financially, encouraging a friend to go, connecting your church or classroom with missionaries, or educating others about God’s mission, awesome!

We’re all on the same team and on the same Mission – and that mission is God’s. If there’s any way we can help you engage with missions, we are excited to be there. Just reach out!

As the book The COACH Model reminds us, “Spiritual discernment is a social, not individualistic process.”

You’re not alone in this.

Together in HIS Mission,

Emily, Kourtnie, and Kayla

Hey, Teachers!

Posted on by Emily Belvery

When I was a language student in Taiwan, I remember a Japanese classmate telling me, “When people hear you’re a teacher, don’t they bow a little?” I laughed and said, “When Americans hear I’m a teacher, they say, ‘Why??’”

What is your why for going into education? Is it a favorite teacher who made you want to have the same impact on students? Is it a subject matter that you love and want to inspire students to love, too? Is teaching the family job, the natural choice when you come from a long line of Lutheran educators? Or is it a complete surprise to you and others that you’ve ended up a teacher?

Whether you’ve wanted to teach since you were a kid or are surprised to find yourself here, it is not an accident you ended up in education. Could it be God put you in this career so that you would be equipped to share the Gospel with students who every day walk into a Christian school somewhere around the world and hear about Jesus for the very first time?

What if this is why you’re a teacher?

On Fish Island in Cambodia – in the midst of a country that’s only 3% Christian – you can drive up to a beautiful property called Stronghold Cambodia and hear 50+ young children singing praise to Jesus, dozens who will come back for Sunday worship and many who are sharing Jesus with their families and having hard conversations with their parents about being baptized.

And yet – one of their classrooms stands empty and local children sit on a waiting list because they are short a missionary teacher.

In Taiwan, one of the biggest Lutheran schools in the world sits in the middle of a rural county with more gods than people. Every day 2000 middle and high schoolers – not to mention the kindergarten and elementary students who meet on another part of the campus (pictured above) – hear about a God who loves them and came to serve them, a God who doesn’t demand offerings and inspire fear like the idols that surround them, but a God who took on flesh for their salvation. Only perhaps 2% of these students are Christian coming into the school, but 10% are believers when they leave, and each year many more students come back to campus, 5 or 10 years removed from graduation, eager to tell their high school Bible teachers that they have now been baptized!

And yet – this year there was talk of staffing religion classes with non-Christians because they don’t have enough missionary teachers.

In Hong Kong, 22,000 students attend Lutheran schools, a group of students who are only perhaps 10% Christian but who know that in Lutheran schools they will receive a good education and perhaps get to learn English from a native speaker. These students learn in school that their worth does not come from the achievement or earning potential that define so much of this global financial hub but instead from Christ Jesus who gave His life for their salvation.

And yet – many of these schools are lacking missionary teachers to share the Gospel with students and other teachers who don’t yet know Jesus.

Is this why God called you into teaching? I don’t know for sure. But it might be… Why don’t you ask Him?

Why Not Now?

Posted on by Emily Belvery

(From Kourtnie Watt, MCN Mobilizer and former Asia mission partner)

Am I called to overseas mission work? Is now the right time to go? What does God want me to do with my future? Am I the right person for being a missionary?

Questions – we all have them. I know I did before I went overseas! Overseas mission work was not something I had considered as a full-time position until I was asked to join Mission of Christ Network and serve in Hong Kong. It seemed like a gamble, and I had so many questions. 

Why Hong Kong? Why now? How would I fundraise? Where would I live? What would it look like when I came back? What if I don’t like it? Why can’t I go somewhere that speaks Spanish? (I had a Spanish minor.)

However, one question changed things: Why not now?

I certainly felt God tugging my heart to serve Him overseas despite my questions. If I did feel God calling me, why not now? For me, there was not a good answer to that question. There was nothing (other than the plan I had deemed to be what God wanted for me) standing in the way of serving him overseas. So I had to wrestle with Him about that. 

After long talks and prayers, I had even less of a reason for why I couldn’t go now. When I said, “Ok, Lord, I will go now,”  He started to answer those other questions. Before I even stepped into the mission field, I had to learn to rely on God’s plan and provision for me and all my questions. 

Maybe you have been considering overseas mission work and have questions. Our great God works through questioning. Maybe you do have a very good answer to “Why not now?” God gives those, too. I hope my story can be evidence that it is okay to have questions and that God uses those questions to create dependency on Him. One of my favorite parts of my job as an MCN mobilizer is hearing questions about mission work because I get to see God at work in those questions. 

The offer is there. If you have questions like mine, reach out! I would love to walk with you in those questions and see where Christ is leading you.  – Kourtnie Watt

We Can Tell He Really Loves Jesus

Posted on by Emily Belvery

(From a former mission partner to Central Asia)

“A few short weeks after I first moved to Central Asia, I had an opportunity to attend a cultural festival. I didn’t know anybody, I didn’t speak any languages common here, and I found myself traveling across vast stretches of wilderness a thousand kilometers from anybody I knew, with no idea where we were going, and there wasn’t even really a road we were driving on. And I couldn’t talk to anybody …

And after we returned to the  big city from our trip, some of the people I  traveled with were speaking with our pastor, and they were telling Him, ‘This volunteer is really something. He has a great servant heart for  the Lord, and we can tell he really loves Jesus.’  

And I asked him (through our pastor who was translating), ‘How could you  know these things about me if we never talked at all during the trip?’ And they said, ‘You were always ready to serve. When we visited somebody at their house, you had your sleeve rolled down and were helping with the heavy, hot pot of tea. You were always ready to go on time. You were always willing to chip in and help with the luggage …  even though we considered you to be a tourist and were just along for the ride, on our treat. And all of these things spoke to us about God’s light in your life.’

And that really set the stage, I think, for how I perceive ministry. I realized that even when I feel like I’m totally out of control and have no way of communicating with people, God can still be working through me in my life. And He can still be working through all of you, as well, even when you’re unaware of it, through things you don’t even notice.”

Being a Catalyst

Posted on by Emily Belvery

Catalyst

noun
1 Chemistry. A substance that causes or accelerates a chemical reaction without itself being affected.
2 Something that causes activity between two or more persons or forces without itself being affected
3 A person of thing that precipitates an event or change
4 A person whose talk, enthusiasm, or energy causes others to be more friendly, enthusiastic, or energetic.

(Story from Iantha, mission partner in Hong Kong)

It is common as a missionary to consider ourselves and the role we play in metaphorical terms. For example, as a missionary, I could say that I am a mirror that reflects Jesus’ light into the lives of people that Jesus calls me to serve. These metaphors are useful for framing our role as redeemed members of the church and what it means to live that role in God’s mission each day.

As a cross-cultural missionary, it can be tempting to frame my role with the metaphor that I am an encyclopedia that knows all the answers and the right way to understand God’s work. Walking alongside people each day who haven’t grown up in the church and in regular Bible study, it is easy to feel like an expert and to start to act like one. I’ve found this can be magnified in a teaching environment where the people I am walking alongside are just entering their teen years. What God has taught me time and time again this year is that he doesn’t need me to be an expert. The entrance to the Gospel for most people is not knowledge, it is relationship.

In addition to realizing that my knowledge is not the key resource, God has also reminded me this year that my own relationship will often be fleeting with the people with whom I share the Gospel. Our family has been overseas long enough to experience the blessing of walking alongside people in an extended journey to faith, but there are far more people with whom we’ve only connected for a brief time. In a conversation this year, I was reminded of the web of faithful people that God activates in finding his lost sheep.

A mother stopped me to tell me about another mother at the school who shared that she is so grateful for the conversations that her son started at home after being in my class. The son’s mother is Christian, but the rest of their immediate family is not, and the mother had been hesitant to invite her son to attend church with her. However, after the conversations she had with her son about the content in my class, she was emboldened to include her son in her own faith practice and worshiping community. This introduces a new understanding of a missionary role. A catalyst, not fueled by my own energy, but by the Holy Spirit to activate the fuel that God has placed in the life of those who don’t know Him. In this case, God likely used many moments, experiences, and people in addition to me in order to activate this faithful mother in her long-term relationship for nurturing her son’s relationship with Jesus.

Last Friday after school, I had another related reminder of this metaphor. As I was wrapping up my grading and prepping my lessons for the next week, there was a hesitant knock as a young girl opened the door of my classroom. She asked if I remembered her. I sheepishly replied truthfully that I didn’t. She shared that I had also taught her mother in one of my adult English classes. I never knew she was the student of one of my adult learners! This young girl had been my student in the fall of 2022 to study the life of Jesus. She was a reserved student who did not participate actively in class discussions. However, she was a thoughtful and respectful student.

As I visited with her, I began to remember her in my class. Her family moved from Hong Kong to the U.S. after completing my class, so I haven’t seen her since 2022. She was not a Christian when she lived in Hong Kong. This young woman went on to tell me that after arriving in the U.S. she joined a Christian club at her secular school. She loves reading the Bible, and after some time she began attending church. This winter her parents began attending church with her. This week she is visiting Hong Kong she wanted to stop by my classroom to find out my favorite Bible verse. We enjoyed a few minutes of discussing meaningful verses, our favorite people in the Bible (apart from Jesus), and favorite books in the Bible. It was a delightful end to a week that had been feeling very long and tiring. And, it was yet another reminder of the unknowable ways that our conversations can be a catalyst that the Holy Spirit uses in growing the faith in the life of people.

Thanks be to God for each of you who know the grace and redemption of Jesus and are fuel in the catalyst reaction that the Holy Spirit is working in the lives of those around you!