ACTS 5

What does the term Mission means ?

The term mission has a wider connotation in understanding the real thrust of it. In general,
accomplishing God’s work would be defined as mission. In Christian arena, mission is executing
the great commission which has been listed in the bible. Many individual have understood that
the charity works are part of mission work. But Biblical speaking, “evangelism” has occupied
central focus in mission.

“Church as missionary enterprise Local church plays a major role in adhering to

the call of great commission.”
If a church is not involved in missions, then it is a dead church and it doesn’t have life in it.

No church should be satisfied with the existing size of the church.

This mission work could be done by all church going individual. Mission work is not limited to
church leader or mission worker, but it should become part of every individual responsibility.

Propagating gospel could be done in several ways like, Distributing tracts, Film shows, Street
corner preaching, Dawn preaching, Door to door evangelism, Conducting Gospel meetings,
Offering special prayers when someone is sick, etc.

Responsibility of the Local Church

Separate deacon could be assigned for missionary work just to monitor and record the growth
of mission work. This deacon could encourage the members of the congregation to actively
participate in the mission work. He could also give suggestions to overcome the hurdles which
are faced during mission work.Since local church knows the context and real life situations of
the people in that particular area, it is easy for the local church to sow the gospel easily than it
is done by an outsider.Following could be a chart which would help the local church in
executing mission in their local area.

Local church needs to be trained, disciplined, nurtured and shepherded to engage actively in
the mission of God. Mission is no more just sending or receiving funds or missionaries. But it is
partnership ministries which could result in attaining the goal. It is easy for the local church to
invite people who are talented in different aspects. This would result in gathering up of all the
resources. Using the available resources, gospel ministry could be executed successfully. Above
mentioned chart could be applicable in the local church where the congregation members
could build good rapport with the non Christians and which inturn would help in introducing
Jesus Christ to them. After having regular follow up evangelism, new souls could be harvested.
This would provide a space to plant a new church. So on the whole, local church could become
a mission enterprise in response to the great commission which has been entrusted on each
and every believer.

Paul’s missionary strategy.

There are different of opinions with regard to the strategies applied by Paul in ministry. People
like Michael Green opine that Paul did not have any particular strategy, but he was completely
relying on the power of Holy Spirit which opened the doors for propagating gospel. But on the
other hand, Donald McGavaran who is considered to be the father for church growth is of the
opinion that Paul was setting a strategy when he was in Antioch for reaching the great part of
Mediterranean world along with the dependence of Holy Spirit. J. Herbert Kane is critical about
the ecclesiastical machinery such as committees, conferences, workshops, seminars. Because
these kinds of anthropocentric images has paved less space to the divine initiatives and
Fostering relationship with people

Evangelization

Concentrating in individual conversion

Planting new churches guidance.

“Paul was the master builder of the church Paul’s strategy was very effective and it is applicable
even in the 21st century….”

Planting church

Framing a team to work on proclaim gospel (Be imitators of me 1 Cor 11.1a)

Team to have good rapport with the people (one to one i.e, life to life relationship)

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 Communication of Gospel

Creating strong faith

Leadership consecrated

Again planting churches

This Paul’s strategy is very practical and does not force the church leader to hold some
responsibilities towards his/her own side. The responsibilities are shared in contributing to the
establishment of the church. Individuality is not propagated, but the gifts of Holy Spirit have
been employed for the mission work. All the available resources have been utilized for the
development of the church.

Preaching the word of God Having some deacons to assist Being filled with Holy Spirit and
casting out demon Teaching good values to the people Preaching had made a greater impact in
the faith of an individual Multiplication of believers were present Sowing the word and making
many disciples Appointing of deacons Fasting and praying All the above mentioned aspects
were present in Paul’s work and also in today’s mission agencies. Other than these aspects,
some of the other actions like casting out demon just for publicity are taking place in the
present days. Some evangelist have even made lots of video coverage and broadcasted in
television. But during Paul’s time, there was no selfish motives attached behind ministry. In this
21st century, the attitude towards has widely varied.

Many people are just thinking what benefit I would receive through this mission, etc. Yet
another complicated issue is in relation to appointing of deacons is that in many of the mainline
churches, democratic procedures are applied in selecting deacons. If there are any major issues
in finalizing the deacons, then the church can play a vital role in making it possible by faithfully
and prayerfully nominating some capable people. With regard to the teaching of good values, in
the recent days it is not occurring up to the mark in churches. In order to pacify some believers,
even the unaccepted norms are being tolerated. Even when some injustices are happening,
voices are not raised against those injustices.
Church should play a prophetic role in addressing the immoral issues by teaching the good
values to the congregation members. One should also appreciate the individual evangelists who
try to speak against the complications which are happening in the society.

“Following are some of the strategies of Paul which the writer of this
paper believes behave like”

Stage 1 :
 Reaching the gentiles (non Christians)
 Reaching the rulers and authority holders through church Entrusting the responsibilities
to faithful people
 Training and equipping local leaders Presbyteros Episkopos
 This goes in relation to the Pauline cycle which gradually moves from reaching the
people, communicating gospel, enabling them to have faith in God, leadership qualities
are injected, then it moves on to commending the believers to multiply.
 In all these different levels, human relationship needs to be maintained.

Stage 2:
As a result of stage 1, the following things would happen among the developing church

 Self governing
 Self supporting
 Self propagating

Since independency is given to work, there are lots of making contacts, developing friendships,
leading people to faith in Christ, instructing converts, baptizing them, beginning church
meetings with them and building them up into a functioning congregation in such a way that
the local leaders are equipped, trained and appointed. Even though the present situations are
different from Paul’s time, the nature of ministry could be the same. Even if contexts differ,
there will not be any harm in applying the same strategies which Paul utilized. It has proved to
be effective all through the centuries, therefore it could be applied with lots of perseverance
and great patience.

Since the world is keep on moving with technological advancements, it is worth to use the
media to propagate the gospel of Jesus Christ. Entrusting responsibilities should take place not
within one’s family. In other words, there should not be any favoritism or nepotism shown in
selecting the responsible people while entrusting the authorities. This kind of issue is quite
common in the modern days.
“An example contemporary missions strategy for churches”
1. Obey to the great commission of Jesus Christ.

2. Prayerfully have new vision in executing the mission of God.

3. Training Leaders to have the quality of servanthood leadership quality to empower and
motivate the church members for mission. It is evident that Jesus exhibited this servanthood
model in His mission. It was radically different type of leadership model during the time of
Jesus.

4. Church should become sensitive to its needs

5. Church should become the place for reformation in the areas like preaching, sacraments,
discipline, etc. As part of mission strategy, training programs needs to be conducted frequently.
It is prime responsibility of the church to identify “career missionaries” and “short time
missionaries” who would specifically involve during the relief and development measures,
medical camps, social work, etc.

6. Individuality: people should be motivated not to propaganda their individual talents and to
accomplish their personal needs, but to do everything as an obedience to the holy God.

7. When the churches belong to institutional model, all the programs are initiated by the
Leader.

8. Church should not adopt a “hunker-down” mentality in resisting the change

9. Mission strategy should be based on strong Christian values and should not to move
according to the structures of the modernity.

10. Be vigilant to respond positively to the ministry opportunities to work for the expansion of
God’s ministry.

11. Ministry should be done through the gifts of the spirit.

12. Visions of the mission should be constantly communicated as a central priority of the
church.

13. Church should organise programs which are community based which would motivate its
members to be always connected with the initiated programs.

14. Be cautious in using God’s money for raising leaders who would be faithful to pass on the
deposits to others.
15. Church should have the following criteria in mission..

 Supporting the mission agencies

 Sending the missionaries outside the church Proactive in bringing the resources
together
 Encourage lay initiatives

16. Local churches should adopt the Biblical Principles for its mission importance.

17. Be open minded to have partnership with the like-minded mission agencies. As it is
modelled by Paul, local church needs to give importance to the following,

 ▪ establishing churches,
 ▪ initiating growth and development of the church

18. Local churches should maintain a spirit of flexibility and do not have rigid rules. But with
regard to the discipline in mission, strong rules could be followed.

19. Organise comprehensive evaluation sequencers to evaluate the existing mission programs.

20. Analyse the work of mission agencies

-Leela Glady