Reflections and resources for lifelong learning for missionaries

Tag: goals

deadlines
Photo by Andrea Piacquadio

Dealing with Deadlines

As we approach the end of a year, we face approaching deadlines, often coming more quickly than we had hoped. Many of our goals in our Annual Ministry Plan Season are due at the end of this year. Back in January, we identified some projects we wanted to complete in 2022, and now we just have a few more weeks to do so. I already know that my team and I will not complete some of these goals this year. Hopefully next year, we can finish them.

We also face deadlines in more personal areas. Christmas is just two weeks away, and we still have gifts to purchase and wrap before then. The deadline set by Canada Post for sending Christmas cards within Canada is December 16. To send cards to the USA, our deadline is even earlier – December 12. For sending to most of the rest of the world, the deadline has already passed.

Why do we call it a “deadline”?

The word “deadline” is a strange and sobering word, is it not? Our deadlines may have consequences for failing to meet them. But thankfully, none of my deadlines have ever threatened me with execution! Apparently the word “deadline” comes from the American Civil War. A Confederate prison in Georgia was notorious for shooting POWs who crossed a line within or around the prison. So this “deadline” was a literal line with deadly consequences for those who dared cross it. Since the Civil War, the figurative meaning of the word has totally overshadowed the original meaning. But the word still implies how important it is to stay within the set time limits, although most of us do not think about deadlines in this way.

Missionaries and deadlines

Maybe I am wrong but I think that we as missionaries are less concerned about deadlines than most people. Those of us who have lived and worked in cultures without a strong time-orientation have seen ample proof that the world works quite well even if events do not start on time.

running well
Photo by Jenny Hill on Unsplash

Finishing Well: Running Your Leg of the Race

Let’s continue thinking about finishing well in a ministry assignment. In our last blog post, we talked about receiving the baton well. So now we are running our leg of the race. We are now fully engaged in our ministry assignment. Furthermore, we have a working knowledge of our host language and culture. Yes, we will want to continue to grow in these areas as we serve. But it is now our turn to run well with the baton we have been given.

How we run our leg of the race will significantly impact finishing well. Of course, we want our ministry to further the progress of the gospel. We want to make a contribution to the contextualization of the gospel in our host culture, building on the progress of those who served before us. In the New Testament, Paul and the author of Hebrews use the race analogy to describe ministry and the Christian life. At the end of Paul’s life, he writes, “I have finished the race” (2 Timothy 4:7). So, what gave him a sense of finishing well? I see four ways we can run like Paul to finish well.

We Run with a Clear Purpose

Paul’s life was guided by a clear purpose. We see this in passages such as Acts 20:24, 1 Corinthians 9:23, and Philippians 3:14. In Acts 20:24 he describes his life as “my course” (the same word translated in 2 Timothy 4:7 as “race”). Notably, Paul identifies his purpose as completing his God-given work of faithfully “testifying to the gospel of the grace of God.” This goal drives him forward.1 1 Cor 9:23, Phil 3:14 He is focused on the prize awaiting him at the finish line. Eckhard Schnabel writes in his commentary on Acts,

Building teams that work

These days, one of the projects that I am working on is developing a “Team Launch Toolkit”. One of our regional directors has asked for a teaching plan, visual aids, assessment tools and the handouts that he or another mission leader would need to facilitate a two- to three-day team building workshop for a brand new ministry team, ready to be launched. This workshop would focus on helping the team answer some foundational questions related to their identity and work as a team. The toolkit would also include a list of supplementary resources for deeper study for team members who are interested in doing so.

We do not intend or expect that this training will provide all the training the team will need during the course of its life but rather just lay a foundation on which to build other training and developmental skills.

Plans that seem like nothing

It is that time of year again, when we are asked to develop annual ministry plans for the coming year. We dream about what we would like to see happen in 2017 – and then we face the reality of our limited financial and people resources.  We do not want to discount what God can do, and so we seek to set goals that call for faith and utter dependence upon God.

But we are also told to make sure that our annual goals are SMART:

  • S – Strategic (How clearly does it propel our vision forward?)
  • M – Measurable (How will we know when we have completed the goal?)
  • A – Ambitious (a faith-stretch) (Does it require us to depend on God?)
  • R – Realistic (Do we have at least a rough idea for how we could work towards accomplishing it?)
  • T – Time-bound (Have we determined a deadline for completing the goal?)

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