Pre-field Training Archives

Book Review: Practicing Hope: Missions and Global Crises

On November 30, 2020

In Book Reviews, Hardship, Pre-field Training, Training

Every year the Evangelical Missiological Society publishes a monograph containing papers from the previous year’s annual meeting. This year’s title is Practicing Hope: Missions and Global Crises, edited by Jerry Ireland and Michelle Raven. Yet before we assume the book is talking about COVID-19, we need to remember that when these papers were presented, no one knew a pandemic was coming. Jerry Ireland notes:

In September 2019 almost 300 missionaries, missiologists, sociologists, theologians, anthropologists, and students gathered near Dallas for the annual meeting of the Evangelical Missiological Society. The theme was “Missions Amid Global Crises.” I do not think that any of us would have dreamed that eight months later the world would be engulfed in a global pandemic because of the Coronavirus (COVID-19).¹Jerry Ireland and Michelle Raven, eds. Practicing Hope: Missions and Global Crises. Evangelical Missiological Society, 2020, xiii.

Overview of book

Though none of the twelve chapters address the current pandemic crisis, these papers give us much to learn and apply. The chapter titles are:

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I don’t really know if the training went well

By Ken Guenther

On May 19, 2020

In Coaching, Pre-field Training, Training

How can we know if it is effective?

I have spent the last 10 years of my life in training missionaries. Training events have taken me to more than a dozen countries. Through online courses, workers from at least twice that number have participated in training that I have led. Furthermore, I head up our organization’s training department and so have the privilege of leading a great team of trainers and facilitators. But despite my experience and travels, the question does not go away. How can we know if our training is effective?

Recently I saw that the parable of the sower sheds some light on this question.

The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. – Matthew 13:20–21

Biblical understanding

Jesus’s explanation of the seed falling on the stony ground shows us that a joyful response to the hearing of truth is no indication that people have understood the Word. As is clear from Matt. 13:15, a biblical sense of understanding is to understand with the heart, resulting in a change of behavior. We can only say that there is true understanding when the person repents and turns from their previous behavior to adopt new behaviors or habits.

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Book Review: Well Sent

By Gary Ridley

On June 12, 2018

In Book Reviews, Books, Church, Pre-field Training, Resources, Training

I have frequently been asked about resources for local church missions programs. In 2015, Steve Beirn, Global Ministries Pastor at Calvary Church in Lancaster, PA, published Well Sent: Reimaging the Church’s Missionary-Sending Process. Steve served at our sending church in Holland, Michigan before going to Calvary so I know him well. He writes with passion and experience. In the introduction he writes:

This book seeks to elevate the role of the local church in the sending effort. The trend in missions today is to place the individual at the center of the sending process. Sometimes the agency is placed at the center. This book places the local church at the center of the sending process. – Well Sent, p. 17.

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Culture shock: God’s crucible?

By Ken Guenther

On May 7, 2018

In Cross-Cultural Living, Hardship, Pre-field Training

A few years ago, I wrote a number of posts on the value of crucible experiences, particularly in relation to leadership development. Crucible experiences are difficult, often painful events or losses in our lives that have the potential to refine us. But as I repeatedly said in those previous posts, difficult life experiences in themselves do not refine us. Our response to the crucible experiences of life and ministry is what allows the crucible to become transformative.

Crucible experiences often come in every-day life experiences. I just finished reading (listening to) Gary Thomas’ great book, Sacred Marriage: What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy? Repeatedly Thomas helps the reader see that marriage is in itself a crucible that has the potential to burn away some of the most basic weaknesses of our human nature. Here are a couple of quotes from the book:

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The Vine Project: A review

By Ken Guenther

On March 20, 2018

In Book Reviews, Books, Church, Disciple-making, Pre-field Training

Jesus told us to go and disciple all nations. That means that those of us who have been called and sent are to be disciplemakers who equip others to be disciplemakers as well. The question that I have been asking myself recently is, “Are the sending and training structures that we have established to help get people to the nations effective in equipping them to be disciplemakers?” We train people to raise their support, learn and adjust to a new culture, learn to speak a new language, prepare for various security risks, educate their children, and get along with their teammates – but are they learning to become disciplemakers?

I read The Trellis and the Vine a number of years ago. This short book differentiated between the work of actually discipling people from the work of creating and maintaining the structures and programs that support this disciplemaking. The former was called “vine work” and the latter “trellis work”. The authors, Colin Marshall and Tony Payne, made the sobering and accurate observation that often trellis work has taken over most of the church’s time and energy, so that very little actual disciplemaking is happening. The book called for a radical mindshift that would prioritize disciplemaking over programs and building organizations.

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A lot more preparation required

By Ken Guenther

On October 27, 2016

In Learning Attitude, Pre-field Training, Training

My wife loves to host people. She is a great cook, and will often spend most of the day preparing a meal for our dinner guests. My participation in the preparations is decidedly less. Maybe all the guests are thankful for that. Admittedly, I don’t know much about how to prepare a great meal for guests. But I have watched someone who does!

In a parable-like format, Proverbs 9 presents two different women inviting people to a meal. The same invitation rings out in both Prov. 9:4 and Prov. 9:16:

Let all who are simple come to my house!

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Tanks and training for missions

By Ken Guenther

On September 28, 2016

In Book Reviews, Books, Hardship, Pre-field Training, Training

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 sticking through the roof of their home when their father used too much dynamite to blow up a stump. He watched his father and his friends play war games in his backyard at night. His parents’ home was unfinished, marked by holes in the floors and broken fixtures, and situated on 11 acres of garbage and various items crushed by the tank or left to rust. But above all else, Mark’s childhood was ruled by fear of his father’s totally unpredictable outbursts of anger and regular physical abuse.

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Reflections and resources for lifelong learning for missionaries

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