July 26, 2026

The SEND U Blog

Reflections and Resources for Lifelong Learning for Missionaries

Category: Hardship

Book review: Stubborn Perseverance
Islam, Training, Book Reviews, Books, Church Planting, DMM, Hardship

Book review: Stubborn Perseverance

Stubborn Perseverance: How to launch multiplying movements of disciples and churches among Muslims and others (a story based on real events) by James Nyman with Robby Butler. How-to manuals are generally difficult to read, and those who purchase them are not often motivated to read them from start to finish. Stubborn Perseverance is a different sort of how-to manual. Now in a second edition, the book explains a step-by-step process of starting a church planting movement among an unreached Muslim people group. But it is presented as a story, a novel that walks through the experience of a small group of Indonesian believers who work together to start such a movement among their own people group. The story is based on real events.  The characters and their experiences were created by combining various people and their situations, both to protect their identity and to better illustrate a number of principles… Read the whole post
Ken Guenther2 mins read
Tanks and Training for Missions
Books, Hardship, Training, Book Reviews, Pre-field Training

Tanks and Training for Missions

God can transform the most painful experiences of our childhood into preparation to bless others.  Joseph told his brothers many years after they sold him into slavery, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” (Gen 50:20). I just finished listening to a similar story. In The Tank Man’s Son: A Memoir, Mark Bouman shares his gut-wrenching account of pain and misery, while growing up in rural Michigan. He was the son of an abusive man who owned a tank and ran a gun range near his home where military weapons of various kinds were regularly (and illegally) fired. His memories are terrifying – and at times comical – but always highly unusual. As a young boy, he suffered shrapnel wounds while helping his dad with the shooting range.  He found a huge tree root… Read the whole post
Ken Guenther2 mins read
Character, Hardship, Spiritual Formation, Christ

Christ Went Through the Crucible Before Us

In the preparation of his servants, God uses crucible experiences that test and purify us.   This is no less true of missionaries than of any other servants of God.   In a previous post in this blog, I looked at Scripture verses that speak of crucibles and noted some different types of crucible experiences.   I emphasized that our response to these crucible experiences is critical.  If they are to be transformative, we need to identify and extract from these difficult and often painful experiences that which God has intended that we learn from it. How do we do that?  How do we mine crucibles? I think we need to begin by learning from Jesus.   He not only went through the crucible in order to purchase our redemption, but he shows us how to persevere and learn from these experiences.… Read the whole post
Ken Guenther1 min read
Leadership Training, Hardship, Leadership, Spiritual Formation

Crucibles

When God prepares a person to serve him in a leadership or other significant ministry role, he often chooses to use crucibles. Crucibles are small pots used in chemistry labs in which metals or other substances are heated to a very high temperature. In the middle ages, alchemists used crucibles in their various attempts to forge gold out of base metals and various strange ingredients. But Webster also defines a crucible as a difficult test or challenge or a place or situation that forces people to change or make difficult decisions. The Scriptures speak of the crucible as an instrument for purifying silver, but always in the context of some type of testing for the purpose of refining.  … Read the whole post
Ken Guenther1 min read
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