September 20, 2024

The SEND U Blog

Reflections and Resources for Lifelong Learning for Missionaries

Category: Church Planting

Finishing Well: Ministry as a Relay Race
Photo by Roman Boed PXHere
Gospel, Church Planting, Finishing Well

Finishing Well: Ministry as a Relay Race

This entry is part 1 of 11 in the series "Finishing well". I have been doing a lot of thinking and reading about finishing well in the past several months. In part, this is because I turn 70 in November and will retire at the end of 2021. But I am also interested in this subject because SEND U has been asked to develop and find resources to help SEND missionaries finish well whether in a ministry assignment or at the end of a career. When reflecting on finishing well, I find it helpful to view ministry as a relay race. 1Tom Steffen’s book, Passing the Baton: Church Planting That Empowers also uses this analogy. Over the next few months, I will be writing a series of blog posts on finishing well in ministry assignments as a leg in a relay race. In this series, I will be applying the… Read the whole post
Gary Ridley2 mins read
Preparing to Preach as a Missionary
Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash
Church Planting, Training, Self-Feeding, Church, Preaching

Preparing to Preach as a Missionary

This entry is part 1 of 5 in the series "Preparing to preach". “Missionaries need to be ready to preach, pray, or die at a moment’s notice.” Or so I’ve heard all my life. Though this is often said jokingly, there is a ring of truth to it. In this new blog series, I am focusing on how to prepare a sermon. Missionaries often have opportunity to preach both in their home country and in their host country. Yet, many missionaries do not have formal training in preaching. In this post and four additional posts, I will share my perspective on preparing expository sermons gleaned from teaching homiletics (the art of preaching) at Alaska Bible College for 35 years. In this introductory post, I will define expository preaching, and focus on the preacher’s relationship with the Word and the audience. I will also list the topics for the next four… Read the whole post
Gary Ridley1 min read
Avoiding Mission Drift – part two
Rumble strips Flickr
Church Planting, Missiology

Avoiding Mission Drift – part two

I have been looking at how a non-profit organization can avoid mission drift. You can find Part One of this series at this link. My mission organization, SEND International, says our mission is “to mobilize God’s people and engage the unreached in order to establish reproducing churches.” Recently, we have adopted the theme of “kingdom transformation.” We want to broaden our ministries to more than just spiritual needs. In so doing, we want to strengthen our evangelism and church planting among the unreached. We are not in any way changing our mission statement. Historical examples of mission drift Nevertheless, as I noted in my previous blog post, this new theme raises the danger of mission drift. This has happened many times in the past. Organizations that were focused on one thing gradually changed until their work in no way matched what they originally set out to do. For example,… Read the whole post
Ken Guenther1 min read
Avoiding Mission Drift
Photo by Mark Duffel on Unsplash
Church Planting, Missiology

Avoiding Mission Drift

It happens every day. I have a project or task in mind, put it on my schedule, get started on it, but then get distracted. My thoughts and then my actions drift off in another direction and I begin to work on another project instead. The same thing can happen to organizations. We call it “mission drift.” We have a stated purpose, but we are no longer doing what we said we are going to be doing. Boundary markers Over the years, I have adopted a few tools to get me back on track through the course of the workday. Keeping track of how I use my time on Toggl is one such tool. See also my blog post on “Deep Work.” I have also developed a few warning signs or boundary markers to prevent me from permanently drifting off course. My personal mission statement and my job description are… Read the whole post
Ken Guenther1 min read
Follow-Up: Partnership in the Gospel
Cytonn Photography on Unsplash
Church Planting, Church, Follow-up, Gospel

Follow-Up: Partnership in the Gospel

This entry is part 8 of 13 in the series "Follow-up".How does Paul follow-up with the church at Philippi? We have been asking this question in previous posts about Galatia, Thessalonica, and Corinth. Our source of information has been Paul’s letters to these churches. Today we will look at his letter to Philippi. Philippians, a Friendship Letter Many commentators have noted that Philippians has features common to friendship letters in the Greco-Roman world. For instance, expressions of affection and terminology like “yoke-fellow” (Phil. 4:3) were common in letters between friends at that time. Yet the letter is more than just communication between friends. Gordon Fee writes: But “hortatory letter of friendship” is only part of the story, and in many ways the least significant part of that. For in Paul’s hands everything turns into gospel, including both formal and material aspects of such a letter. Most significantly, friendship in particular… Read the whole post
Gary Ridley2 mins read
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