Discouragement is not, in itself, a problem. Anyone who engages in challenging work will become discouraged from time to time. Discouragement becomes a problem, however, when it blurs vision for ministry.
—Myron Augsburger
D. L. Moody, the great evangelist, was said to have prayed often that the Lord would “keep him from ever losing the wonder.”
Anyone who ministers for Christ knows that wonder, as did Moody. We are filled with it when people we serve respond with joy to Christ’s love. But the same ministry that fills us with wonder sometimes makes us wonder. Enlivening the souls of others often tries our own. We can become disheartened, and ministry gets mired.
There are a number of things that can stall outreach ministry—fatigue, boredom, a change of priorities, church squabbles, to name a few. But perhaps the most significant is discouragement that accompanies the loss of purpose.
Throughout my ministry, I’ve tried to sustain not only my own momentum, but also that of people I’ve walked with, led, or pastored. Here are a few things I have learned.
What Brakes Momentum
Since Christians are in the business of spirituality, so to speak, we are apt to blame a slowdown of momentum on lack of devotion, some moral lapse, or, perhaps, the Devil. Such things can and often do discourage us from reaching out. Naturally, in such cases, prayer and spiritual renewal go a long way toward building momentum again.
On the other hand, we’ve learned that physical factors also play a role. If I’ve been up until midnight three nights in a row and then have to get up for a six o’clock appointment, it affects my mood. I become more clipped with others, work seems an effort, and the slightest problem can demoralize me. To put it another way, ministry bogs down when I don’t lie down enough.
Aside from spiritual and physical factors, however, I’ve found people are unusually discouraged from reaching out by one of four factors:
• Unrealistic goals. In their yearning to be faithful to Christ, churches often set goals they cannot possibly meet. We think we are being faithful to the upward call, when all we are doing is making the call impossible. If we vow to eradicate poverty in our area of the city, discouragement is inevitable. Better to say, “We will help families in poverty with the means we have available.” That is hard enough, but it is something we can do.
Goals also become unrealistic when we insist on perfection: we will help every family in our area, at every opportunity, using adequately all our resources. We cannot do that. We’re going to overlook some needs. We’re going to waste some of our resources. We will have to turn away some needy people. We might as well admit it up front and save ourselves some discouragement.
Also, some goals prove inaccurate measures of the success of ministry. To aim to give a bag of groceries to every family that asks will dishearten us if we see the same people coming to us month after month for more food. We may have succeeded at giving out groceries, but we will not have succeeded at helping people feed themselves without our aid.
In short, unrealistic goals will discourage us, and that will stall our outreach.
• Unmeasurable ministries. Only a few things can be measured in Christian ministry—attendance at meetings, dollars raised, dollars spent. Often the most important things cannot be measured.
Washington, D. C., has one of the highest murder rates in the United States. Naturally, we would like to lower the number of murders in our area of the city, but how do we measure success? Even if the murder rate goes up, we may, nonetheless, have been instrumental in stopping another dozen murders, which would have made the rate even higher.
The same is true of other goals we might set. How do we know how many people we’ve kept from suicide? How many teenage pregnancies have we prevented? How many people have not started drugs because of our ministry? The list goes on. There are many aspects of ministry that cannot be measured, for which number goals cannot be set. But sometimes when people cannot measure the effect of their work, they get discouraged.
Ministry, of course, is sometimes noticeably successful. Attendance at services is one of the easily measured achievements. But frequently the success is subtle, like salt that seasons food: You can’t see it. You cannot measure with the naked eye. But it makes a difference.
Most of the friends of one teenage girl in our church either are or have been pregnant. But not her. She says her lifestyle is different; she is not going to live that way. Where did she get those convictions? Not from her neighborhood, which inadvertently conspires to undermine them. Her convictions have been molded and reinforced by her mother and the Christian community. That is success, but it can’t be put on a graph.
• Inflexible temperaments. Some people claim that overwork brings discouragement in ministry. That is true to some degree, and we try to deal with that problem when it arises. But it is also true that hard work, in itself, never discouraged anybody; it’s the sense of worry, futility, isolation, or lack of appreciation accompanying hard work that will bring discouragement. The deeper issue, then, is not that people are busy, but how they handle their busyness.
I’ve found some of the most discouraged people tend to be inflexible. The people who get the most accomplished, and find the greatest satisfaction in it, tend to be flexible people.
Why are we told that if we want to get something done, we should ask a busy person to do it? Because they are flexible; they know how to adjust their schedules to meet new demands.
The unbusy person, on the other hand, often is inflexible. Such people live by routine: they rise, take a shower, eat breakfast, read the paper, go to work, have lunch, come home, eat dinner, watch TV, and go to bed, all at appointed hours. If their routine is interrupted, they become flustered. If given an extra task, they can’t figure out how to change their schedules to accommodate it.
This, of course, is a caricature. But if we can model flexibility and encourage that trait in others, we will help defeat discouragement.
• Inappropriate jobs. If you put a multitalented person in a job for which he has no talents, you’re looking for discouragement. Conversely, if you put a single-talented person in the one job that will use his talents, you’ll see motivation for years to come.
One young man connected with the college where I was president taught chemistry, but he was not succeeding. He was a good chemist, but he didn’t do the one thing teachers need to do: get his students excited about learning. Naturally, his teaching meandered along.
However, he was a gifted researcher, and his ability to analyze and sift through information to find the most relevant data was outstanding. So, the dean and I negotiated with him and moved him from teacher to director of institutional research. He not only worked with enthusiasm, but his work became recognized widely among small liberal arts colleges.
Spotting Burnout Is a Community Concern
Actually, discouragement is not, in itself, a problem. Anyone who engages in challenging work will become discouraged from time to time. Discouragement becomes a problem, however, when it blurs vision for ministry. That’s when it can lead to burnout. When people are so discouraged they’re ready to quit, outreach ministry will limp along.
Signs of burnout are many: Physically, people often experience more headaches and are lethargic about work. Mentally, they lack creativity, become easily impatient with co-workers, forget to do jobs or meet appointments, and find it difficult to follow through on projects.
However, although it’s easy to list signs of burnout on the printed page, it’s often difficult—in the scurrying about of weekly activities—to notice the signs in others. That’s why in our church, spotting burnout is a community affair. We use our small groups to determine when someone is on the edge.
Our elders have long met every other Wednesday morning for an hour of prayer for the congregation—only that. The other Wednesday we meet in the evening, mostly for business. But we begin with a devotional and then share concerns for the church.
Each week, then, elders have an opportunity to share what they have sensed and seen, and others will either confirm it or mention extenuating circumstances (perhaps the person under discussion simply has been up for two nights with sick children—not a long-term problem). If we agree that someone is under undue stress, after we’ve shared and prayed about it, we designate a couple of people to spend time with that individual. They will, in turn, offer any help that will better the situation, like arranging a break in the person’s church duties.
Three Ways to Maximize Motivation
Naturally, we want to do more than respond to discouragement and burnout. We want to avoid it, or at least minimize it. Our goal is to make the most of people’s motivation, to build healthy momentum for outreach.
We have three strategies to do that: spread the load, help people help themselves, and model dependence.
1. Spread the load. If overwork or mismanaged work is causing discouragement, then spreading the work load becomes a logical way to overcome discouragement. Specifically, that means:
• Diversify. Like most churches, we have a number of commissions that do the work of the church. For us, it’s five: worship, Christian nurture, fellowship, stewardship, and mission. Our very structure then, assumes that about one-fifth of our time and energy is spent on outreach.
It’s easy to understand one of the reasons most churches organize themselves in this way: not everybody can sustain momentum in outreach year after year. Some are not yet ready to do it at all. To give members a variety of avenues of service insures that outreach doesn’t overwhelm any individual.
• Give them a break. We not only spread the work load, but also the time load. We’ll give people permission to take a break from a ministry, perhaps a year or two, to spend more time with family or to recharge spiritual batteries. The attitude we set is not “This person just couldn’t handle the job,” but “People have the right and freedom to take a Sabbath rest in ministry.” That way people can exit a job without feeling they have to exit the church.
That is easier said than done, of course. About three years ago a young woman bowed out of work because of a health problem. A number of people from the congregation had to encourage her regularly afterward, reminding her that she didn’t have to feel guilty about it. If they hadn’t done that, she might have quit sharing altogether.
Then again, sometimes the process works cleanly. Recently, a young man released from a responsibility eight months earlier told me how good he felt about it. Once rested, he was anxious to get back to work.
• Know when to say when. Another key to spreading the load is limiting the number of tasks members take on. We don’t like to see an average member take on more than two significant jobs at a time. For most people, one is enough.
We have some people, for instance, who participate in our Praise Band. That involves a weekly practice and playing during our Sunday service. Most of these people are also members of a commission, and one or two sit on a board. If they should announce that they want to start an outreach ministry, we’d likely discourage them—unless, of course, they give up another responsibility.
2. Help people help themselves. Since a minister can’t be with people in their every ministry situation, it only makes sense to help people help themselves in ministry. In this respect, we do the following.
• Let members do the talking. Members need encouragement not just from their pastor, but from their peers. We let that happen during a time called “Windows of Service.” Once a month in worship, we have different individuals talk about how they are sharing Christ’s love in their workplace or neighborhood.
About a year ago, the learning center lacked sufficient volunteers. But after a member of the congregation mentioned this during Windows of Service, things were turned around. Since then, the learning center has been owned increasingly by the congregation.
• Enable laity to minister. One of my former associates has been impressed continually at how people stay motivated in our church. I once asked him, “What would you say has been the key to maintaining momentum?”
“More than anything else,” he said, “the leadership has been committed to enabling others rather than controlling them.” Enabling has, of course, become a buzzword in church circles in the last two decades. Let me clarify what I mean by it.
First, it means encouraging others to reach out and evangelize instead of doing it all myself. Not only does this get more ministry done, it also lets members enjoy the wonder of ministry.
Second, enabling means teaming people in the congregation. Experienced people work with those less experienced, but no one is sent out as a lone ranger. Our pastoral team of three is committed to modeling this pattern.
Third, enabling means training people. For example, we run seminars for people who want to help lead worship services. We teach them our theology of worship and how to use language and mannerisms appropriately. We also hold seminars on discipleship in daily life. The point is we try to offer training in areas where our people want and need training to do effective ministry both in and outside the church.
• Support small support groups. Every person needs a sense of achievement, worth, and fulfillment. When people in ministry become independent and cut themselves off from close relationships, they become susceptible to discouragement. They don’t have people who can regularly give them encouragement and guidance.
Esther and I belong to a covenant group of thirteen that meets every Thursday evening. Over a six-month period, we take turns sharing with the group our schedules and priorities for the coming months. For instance, when it’s my turn, the group discusses how I’m using my time and energy, and how that accords with my gifts. In some areas they encourage me to move ahead, in others, they prompt me to slow down. This group counsel has helped me sort my priorities and it has given me a tremendous sense of freedom to say no to people: “My friends tell me that I’m doing too much and should cut back.”
Furthermore, we encourage people to get support from others who participate in similar ministries. For a number of years I have attended three prayer meetings: one with people who minister in the inner city, one with my denominational brothers and sisters, and one composed mostly of suburban pastors. Naturally, there is an altogether different feel and perspective in each group. It’s not surprising that the inner-city prayer meeting nourishes me most.
3. Model dependence on God and others. We can prevent discouragement from becoming burnout, but, as I mentioned, we cannot eliminate discouragement. It comes with the territory of a challenging ministry. But we can help people maintain momentum in ministry in the midst of discouragement if we, ourselves, model for them how it is handled. I do that in two settings.
• In small groups. There are some things that pastors need to talk about freely without feeling it’s going to be misread or misused in the church. These I don’t mention in settings where members are present. Yet I still can talk about a number of things in small-group settings that show people I’m struggling and need their encouragement and prayers.
Esther and I were torn inside when one of our children went through a divorce. During that time, as I sat on the front pew in worship, tears often would run down my cheeks as I asked God for strength to stand up and preach. Of course, our congregation knew what we were going through.
One evening, three people from our congregation came to us and said, “We want to pray with you.” We went into my study at the church and prayed. Then they said, “You are carrying all this burden by yourself. We would like you to disengage emotionally for a while. We don’t want you even to talk, think, or pray about it for several weeks. We promise you we will do the praying in your place. While we pray daily about this, you unhook.”
Their love helped us through our crises. It also helped the congregation see me distraught but accepting their help. If we can practice that type of openness and trust with each other, ministry momentum will be maintained.
• From the pulpit. I think it’s wrong for a pastor to say, “Pardon a personal illustration.” That’s the only kind he really knows. (Actually, it would be more proper to say, “Pardon my borrowing this illustration.”)
Although we should remain cautious about using ourselves as illustrations of success, I have fewer qualms about showing people my struggles and God’s faithfulness. It is another way of showing that it’s normal for people active in ministry to get discouraged, and that we need to depend on God’s strength for our momentum.
Purpose and Momentum
Before I was ordained, I volunteered to go to China after college to do relief work. That was in the late 1940s, and I didn’t know the Communists were about to take over and close the doors to missionaries. I received a letter from the secretary of missions for my denomination, who knew the situation, telling me I couldn’t go, and that surely the Lord would have something for me later in life.
He enclosed in his letter an article by Dick Hillis entitled, “I Was Never Called to China.” But Dick had, in fact, been in China for eighteen years. Curious, I read it. He believed he was called to a certain kind of ministry; the location of that ministry, however, was open. If the door closed in one place, he would practice his ministry elsewhere. His ministry wouldn’t change, only the locale.
From that day, I’ve practiced that philosophy. By remembering the purpose of my ministry is to glorify Christ and enhance his kingdom, I stay motivated whatever the place, program, or position. Through disappointments and discouragements, I have yet to lose the wonder.
The Four Spheres of Outreach
I believe Christians need to be as committed to strategic thinking as they are to prayer, Scripture, and holy living.
—Frank Tillapaugh
Some time ago, the 7-year-old son of an Australian Anglican rector, of whom I was a guest, began to quiz me in his thick “down under” accent. I asked him to repeat a query, thinking I had heard him ask if we had sex in our church. Marveling at his precocious curiosity, I was about to reply, “No, we’re Baptists,” when the light dawned. He was asking if our church had SEBS—the Anglican version of our boys’ club program.
Like that little boy, many people tend to think of the church and its ministry in terms of the programs it offers. We do this out of habit: we attend worship, sit on committees, arrange conferences, plan social events. Drifting into comfortable patterns, we give little thought to why we do what we do, let alone whether it’s getting us where we want to go.
The church, of course, is more than a set of long-standing programs, but a company of believers who reach out to the world. If the church is to succeed in reaching out, we must invigorate our habitual activities, our “event orientation,” with strategic thinking. In fact, I believe Christians need to be as committed to such thinking as they are to prayer. Scripture, and holy living.
More particularly, the kind of thinking I encourage is provoked by two questions: “Who are we trying to reach?” and “What does it take to reach them?”
Strategic Thinking
As I finished leading a seminar on strategic thinking, a businesswoman approached me and said, “We’re trying to market our company’s products in Asia. Half a day a week, everybody in the company brainstorms. We talk about Japan; we talk about marketing, packaging, advertising. Then we do the same thing with Taiwan, everybody brainstorming what will fit that market.” She paused and then asked, “Were you saying that I should be doing that here at my church?”
She had it exactly right! I told her when lay people like her begin to think strategically, then we’ll get in touch with the large segments of our culture that daily are growing more alienated from the church.
Pastors can’t do this alone. At Bear Valley Baptist Church, we’ve learned that lay people, who are already immersed in the culture every day, can think strategically about the church’s mission if they’re guided. The pastors simply instill in people a strategy orientation, give them permission to make ministry decisions, and then get out of the way.
To help us sharpen our strategic thinking, we think about what we call the Four Spheres of Outreach: four cultural categories or spheres of influence that group the unchurched according to their physical and emotional proximity to us. It’s a tool that helps us recognize we will contact people in different ways depending on which sphere they are in. Furthermore, it helps us see that each group’s lifestyle and circumstances may pose problems that require creative solutions as we reach out.
Sphere One: Fringe Churchgoers
On any Sunday, as many as 25 percent of those attending are what we call fringe. Not yet involved in the life of the church, Sphere One people are the unconnected visitors, the occasional churchgoers, the “church-hoppers.” A church that desires a strong outreach ministry needs to start inside its own walls by reaching these people.
We do that through an enfolding process. This involves three steps: offering a warm welcome, linking newcomers with regulars, and ensuring future contact.
1. A warm welcome. Since a strange place can bewilder a visitor, our first task is to make our church building “user friendly.” We don’t have all the parking spaces the experts say we need, but we do have well-marked restrooms and a wheel-chair ramp. Our nursery is safe (no sharp corners, carpeted), clean, and well staffed. Windows and a fresh coat of paint enliven an otherwise dark fellowship hall. Even when you don’t have spacious facilities, you can take what you have and make it look good and work well.
In addition, our pastoral staff has taken the lead at personally welcoming newcomers. Before we could do so, however, we had to change some traditional pastoral habits. For example, before the Sunday service the pastoral staff normally retreated to the pastor’s study to pray. This was by no means a trivial practice, yet strategically, we felt that it cost us our best shot at Sphere One. That fifteen minutes before the service can’t be reproduced any other time during the week. It’s the only time people come to us. Consequently, our staff agreed to pray and prepare for worship at another time.
Another example is our availability after the service. We felt that the receiving line and mechanical handshake from the preacher sent the wrong message. It encourages people to think of the pastor as the paid performer. Worse, visitors get the same attention everyone else gets. They are forced to take the initiative when what they need is someone, especially the pastor, seeking them out.
We solve these problems with two practices:
— Do the unexpected. Mickey Mouse has become my model for the pastor on Sunday morning. At Disneyland, do you ever see Mickey at the gate, greeting people when they enter or leave? Of course not.
Why? Because one of the great laws of communication is: The less anticipated the message, the greater the impact. Kids never know when he’s going to pop up; surprise is the secret of his appeal.
One Sunday a visiting seminary professor pulled up outside our church. I happened to be there, so, as I do with other visitors, I opened his car door for him and shook his hand. After that, he called me the “parking lot pastor.” He had never seen a pastor in the parking lot. It wasn’t anticipated; that’s what made an impact on him.
A group of local seminary students went to visit Saddleback Community Church in Southern California, well known for its aggressive visitor program. The students excitedly talked upon their return, not about the sermon or the style of worship, but about the fact that they had been greeted five times before they reached the front door.
— Pastor by walking around. Tom Peters, in his book. In Search of Excellence, talks about “Managing by Walking Around.” A good manager, he says, is in casual contact with those he manages. Similarly, we need to pastor by walking around on Sunday, smiling, laughing, and contacting people informally.
So our staff roams the parking lot, foyer, and pews before and after the service, looking for unfamiliar faces. We don’t worry about duplication, because it’s important that newcomers are welcomed many times. We introduce ourselves to as many people as possible: “Hi, I’m Frank. How are you doing?” (By the way, I don’t introduce myself as the senior pastor. If a newcomer bumps into a friendly character in the foyer who later turns up in the pulpit, I’ve found they’re more receptive to the preaching.)
Consequently, we hear regularly about the different feel at our church: “We met your pastor, and he seems so normal.” Their questionable judgment aside, that moment with “the guy up front” communicates warmth, an important factor in Sphere One strategy.
2. Linking people up. In my contacts, I try to say more than a casual “Hello.” I also try to be sensitive. Some people haven’t been to church for years or are shy. If I detect discomfort, I back off, tell them I’m glad they’re here, and then move on. On the other hand, if they light up at the attention, I weave four questions into our brief conversation:
Where were you born (or raised)?
Where do you live?
Where do you work?
What ages are your kids?
Answers to these help us link newcomers with some person or group in the congregation.
As the visitor answers these questions, I listen for something he or she and a regular attender might share in common. For example, if I greet a young lady who is a nurse and was raised in Texas, and I know of another Texan or a nurse nearby, then I make it a point to introduce them. If I can’t do it right then, I note where she sits or which Sunday school class she attends, and point her out to someone in the church. The visitors who feel they have made a connection their first Sunday are far more likely to return.
Naturally, for this strategy to work, I can’t spend too much time with any individual. If people seem to need to talk about a problem, I offer an office visit, but ask them to call. I tell them I want to give their problem the attention it deserves, but I can’t in a crowded foyer just before worship. And, strategically, I leave my Daytimer at home so I can honestly tell them I can’t schedule an appointment right now. The key here is to be in control of the conversation, to remember your objectives.
3. Ensuring future contact. After Sunday’s round of greeting and linking, we arrange follow-up contact. At the staff meeting, we pool our information and scheduling. A home visit or phone call is best. (We find a letter too impersonal, although it makes a good follow-up to a visit.) A pastor usually makes the first contact, although who is not as important as when—quickly after people’s first visit.
Except in a smaller church, the pastoral staff may take the lead but can’t be expected to tackle Sphere One alone. After modeling the enfolding process for a while, we began to train a supplemental group whom we call our Care Core.
On Sundays, they’re with us in the parking lot and foyer. During the service, they watch for people who raise their hands for the visitor’s brochure, and greet them afterward. Later, Care Core volunteers coordinate follow-up visits and also do hospital calls. Everything is documented and updated in a visitor file, complete with prospect ratings from “good” to “questionable.” Our staff and three or four hand-picked Care Core people are enough to handle our average service size of 250.
Sphere Two: Geographically and Relationally Near
Beyond the church doors are people who live or work near the church, have relationships with church members, but are yet to attend a service or event. Anyone in the city that your people know—the Safeway grocery clerk, the skeptical brother-in-law, a co-worker, a next-door neighbor—belong to Sphere Two.
Naturally, these people need to be reached through evangelistic efforts. That means, first, motivating and equipping members to evangelize (which we do with periodic lifestyle-evangelism film series or book studies). But it also means thinking of creative ways to evangelize these people.
The Engle Scale has helped us think about and plan evangelism more wisely. It was developed by James Engle in his book What’s Gone Wrong with the Harvest and describes thirteen stages of an individual’s spiritual development:
-7 Has no awareness of Christianity
-6 Is aware of the existence of Christianity
-5 Has some knowledge of the gospel
-4 Understands the gospel fundamentals
-3 Grasps the personal implications of the gospel
-2 Recognizes a personal need
-1 Repents and professes faith in Christ
0 Conversion
+1 Evaluates the decision for Christ
+ 2 Incorporates into a Christian fellowship
+ 3 Learns and practices the Christian lifestyle
+ 4 Communes with God
+ 5 Develops stewardship
+ 6 Reproduces
With the aid of the Engle Scale, we design our events to give our unchurched friends an appropriate exposure to the Christian faith. Reaching a person who is a -6 or -4 calls for a different tactic than reaching someone in the -3 to -2 range. Our events also lower stress in evangelists as well, because they don’t feel personally responsible to take someone from minus seven to plus one on their own. Instead, over time, their friends can sample slices of the Christian life and, when ready, get an appropriate dose of the gospel. Here, for example, are three different approaches we have tried.
In MOPS (mothers of preschoolers), non-Christian meets Christian while sharing the common joys and pains of raising young children. It’s intimate but not threatening, so Christians can invite their -6 and -5 friends. When the need arises, Bible study or a gospel presentation can be introduced. But the program’s early-childhood focus binds women together in caring fellowship that naturally results in the sharing of faith.
At Bear Valley we dropped our weekly basketball and softball leagues because they involved relatively few people. In addition, we’ve learned that it’s far easier to get someone to commit to one-day events. So now we periodically hold a sports day. Our first sports day featured multiple events: a volleyball tournament, a softball tournament, and a 10K run. During the day, people clustered around their favorite sport and came together in the evening for an awards program. The day was fun, upbeat, and capped with a local sports personality who spoke about his relationship with Christ.
Adapting Campus Crusade’s Executive Outreach program/ we staged formal dinners aimed at upscale business and professional people; one dinner was held at a country club and the other at a fine restaurant. At each, Christians sponsored tables, offering non-Christians dinner reservations to hear a notable speaker. The hook was: come hear a business or civic leader share “The Most Important Thing in My Life.”
We don’t pass the hat at Sphere Two events (remember, stewardship is + 5). Our only purpose is to get unchurched people to rub elbows with Christians. Gospel presentations may be direct or indirect, but long-term success is a product of the relationships that grow as lay people befriend the unchurched.
Sphere Three: Geographically Near, Relationally Distant
This sphere comprises people near the church but whom members are not likely to meet daily. Our cities teem with them: the homeless, foreign exchange students, battered children, wheel-chair bound veterans, teen-age mothers, elderly shut-ins, crack addicts—all those who can’t (or won’t) come to us.
Ours is a culture in crisis. Little needs to be done to arouse our awareness of the need; the five o’clock news reminds us about the needs every night. I’m convinced that people want to help but don’t know how to get started. Today, upwardly mobile Christians are isolated from these problems. In Sphere One and Two, contact comes easily. In this sphere, however, contact is the main problem, expertise another. We’ve tackled each problem with a different strategy.
• Going to the beach. Newly ordained and already frustrated with the traditional church, Australian pastor John Hurt founded Surf Riders for Christ in 1969. His was the first “parachurch” ministry in Australia. Naturally, the Sydney journalists wondered what prompted a clergyman to start a surfing club. He replied, “If you want to reach surfers, you have to go to the beach.” In the same spirit, our strategy is to put Christians into the Sphere Three person’s world.
In many cases, contact can be made through existing structures: the halfway house, jail, crisis hotline center, foreign student housing program at the local college. The question is, “How do we get into that system?”
We’ve found that most systems have what we call a “power broker.” In a jail, it’s the sheriff. To contact international students, you must work through the campus foreign student adviser. You access the rest home through its activity director.
Once we’ve found the power broker, we ask, “How do we convince the power broker to let us play on his team?”
A couple at our church called the foreign student adviser at a nearby college, offering to provide host families. The adviser was openly hostile. “You’re Baptists! You’re just out to evangelize our students.” In a calmer moment, she confessed that many of the school’s foreign students still were looking for host families. Finally relenting, she agreed to assign several students to us but warned that she would be watching to make sure we didn’t force them to attend church or Bible studies.
Then the Iran hostage crisis hit. Most of her sponsoring groups refused Iranian students. After an Iranian shot a teenager who had thrown a brick through his window, the adviser became desperate. At that point, we offered to sponsor her Iranian students, and later we covered their rent and groceries when they stopped getting money from home. Today, she talks about “that wonderful Baptist church” that stuck with her through a tough time. Not only did we reach out to foreign students, but the foreign student adviser, as well.
When we invited the head of Denver Social Services to speak at our evening service, we were straightforward. Our intention was not to force-feed kids on religion, but over time, our commitment to Christ would come out. Did she have a problem with that? Her answer was a striking cultural commentary: “As far as we’re concerned, if you’re not one of our clients, you’re a success. We give you a blank check to model whatever has made you successful. If it’s your Christianity, then tell them about it. We don’t care. Whatever has kept you out of the social service system will help keep them out.” Power brokers aren’t looking for Christians per se (and may resist them, at first), but they are motivated to find people who can model positive values.
• Same skills, new setting. A common misconception is that, because of the groups we seek to reach. Sphere Three ministry requires special training. On the contrary, we build ministries around the abilities people already possess. We tell people, “Do what you already do, but in a different setting.” This helps reduce anxiety, because people see that Sphere Three ministry is realistic and attainable.
People from many backgrounds have responded to the call. A woman from Bear Valley oversees the baby-sitting at our Street School so young mothers can complete their high school studies. She simply transferred her child-care expertise from the suburbs to the inner city. Families that host foreign students need only a willingness to share their home life with a stranger. A physician in our church realized he could make a good living from a half-time medical practice and gives his spare time to a free medical clinic he opened for the poor.
One attorney has taken a dramatic step into Sphere Three ministry. When clients come seeking a divorce, he offers them an intriguing choice. Holding out one hand, he says, “You can put $1000 in this hand, and I’ll get you what you’re here for.” Then he extends the other hand saying, “Or you can put nothing in this hand but your hand and listen to some things I’ll say, and I’ll do everything in my power to reconcile your marriage at no charge.” In the last year, ten couples have taken the “free” hand. Five marriages were rescued. Of each of the couples who eventually divorced, at least one partner came to know Christ.
Sphere Three requires immersion in prayer and a group of lay people who have the freedom to fail. It can be a tough assignment and isn’t for everybody. But when lay people reach into Sphere Three, crying needs are met, and desperate people are able to meet Christ.
Sphere Four: Geographically and Relationally Distant
This sphere is the concern of what we typically call missions—people who are distant and whom we don’t know. Like many churches, we encourage our people to consider becoming missionaries in cross-cultural settings.
Bill, for instance, had little time to be involved in the ministries at the church. Having inherited his father’s business, he was consumed by the daily grind of running it. His business travels, however, took him to Hong Kong, where he happened to visit some missionaries. By the time he returned, he was transformed. He had been on the front lines of ministry and would no longer be satisfied with a middle-class, “parks and recreation” mentality. One of our leaders invited him down to the City Lights Coffee House. There he saw some of the same kind of front-line ministry he had seen in Hong Kong. So he began to work with the street people there, using some of his wealth to rent a vacant house to start our Street School.
The first step, then, is to give people Sphere Four vision. Getting people to read about mission needs goes a long way toward instilling vision. We’ve found David Bryant’s books. In the Gap and Concerts of Prayer, especially helpful. They provide a fine overview of the need for mission on our shrinking globe.
In addition, instead of letting mission exposure just happen, as with Bill, we plan short trips to the mission field, because people tend to look at the world differently after such an experience.
Once the vision is created, it’s not hard to channel people into Sphere Four ministries. A pastor need only contact a mission organization. Most of them have well-established short-term mission programs and can plug people in. And never in history has travel been easier. William Carey expended an entire year’s salary and six months’ time getting his family to India in 1793. Today, India is only hours away, and a lot cheaper.
To avoid diluting the resources that might go to the career missionary, we discourage our short-term missionaries from raising support; they usually pay their own way.
We challenge people to invest less money in things and more in experience. Practically, that means putting off the trip to Disney-land, waiting a year for the Honda Accord, postponing the house hunting.
We also have taken steps to avoid afflicting our missionaries with overly zealous but under-prepared people. Our training of short-term missionaries tries to lower short-termers’ expectations.
First, we try to instill a servant attitude. One of the problems that beset early Southern Baptist efforts was short-termer insistence on a Sunday school program in a culture where, especially for adults, the program was offensive. So we warn against setting off for the mission field with an agenda. Their hosts, in fact, likely will ask them to perform menial tasks. One man spent several weeks in Nigeria, sorting cards received from a radio station’s listeners. Whether they lay bricks, run errands, or sort cards, their work is affirmed. If they can relieve the career missionaries of tasks that take them away from their main purpose, then they are performing important mission work.
Second, we encourage short-termers to focus on what they see, not so much on what they do. Bear Valley’s young-singles group sent people to Russia and Mexico City. The choir went to Spain. Others of us traveled to the Philippines. What we saw radically altered how we prayed, used our resources, and spent our time. Cross-cultural missions got the church thinking beyond its walls. That’s what we wanted most.
Giving Birth
At Bear Valley, ministries are born, not manufactured. We have a church body that is pregnant with possibilities, and it’s the body that is primarily responsible for bringing forth ministries. Though the obstetrician often enjoys prominence, truth to tell, he has little to do with the birth process—all the exciting stuff is happening to the mother! Though our staff initiates a great deal in Sphere One and, to a lesser extent, in Sphere Four, primarily, like the good doctor, our posture is one of relaxed concern. Our job is to encourage, to educate, to assist.
For pastors ready to encourage their church to bear outreach ministries, a good beginning is a small one. We don’t recommend a churchwide program implementing the Four Spheres of Outreach. Instead, we suggest working through formal and informal power structures. Sketch it out on a napkin for some key players over breakfast. Talk with the pastoral search committee at the new church. Share one-on-one with staff, elders, and deacons. Ask how they see the church making a difference in each of the four spheres.
First get a core of strategic thinkers committed to outreach; they will eventually impact the formal decision making and can turn event-centered structures inside out.
In the end, a mission-minded church will be born out in the world again, where it belongs.
Copyright © 1990 by Christianity Today
