Be A Missionary: What It Means To Be One

From Local Trailblazer to Global Storyteller: A Missionary’s Journey Within Australia

It is funny really when I first arrived at Bible College, many years ago now, the first question that fellow students asked was, “Where do you intend to serve?” They immediately assumed that I would be a missionary somewhere overseas. It was always amusing to see the look of confusion on their faces when I said that I was planning on serving locally in Australia.

Missionary

Of course, times have changed now, but back then I was, apparently a little unusual, in that nobody went to Bible college to be a missionary in Australia. Not unless it was to the Aboriginals but even back then, being a missionary to the Aboriginals is a little frowned upon today. But they heard me say, “locally” and that was the confusing part. How do you be a missionary locally?

Unexpected Paths at Bible College

It wasn’t just those in college that were confused. When I said to other Christians outside of college, that I intended to be a missionary in the local churches as a church leader or whatever came along. The immediate response was “That’s not being a missionary”. To which I replied, “How so”? Of course, they never had an answer.

How times have changed, now the vast majority of students that go to Bible college are preparing to go into local ministry. Or at least that’s the way it seems. But it is nice to think of myself as a trailblazer.

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Defying Missionary Norms

I saw a cartoon in our denomination newspaper, that kind of summed up where my head was back then.

Two people were talking to each other and one said to the other:

” What do you mean you are going to be a missionary in Australia?” ” I thought missionaries were people who went to places where there were people of different cultures dressing differently and speaking other languages etc, etc all around you.”

To which the other person replied, ” Yes that’s right ?”

Where I live there are times that you would think that we live in a Muslim country, if you looked at the local shops and the dress people are wearing.

But it wasn’t like that when I left college. They were not the people I was intending to reach. I needed a good Biblical grounding to reach those within my own culture that were disconnected from the rest of society. Only local church to do that.

Embracing Local Mission in Australia

Ironically I did even join a missionary organisation, That’s right I became officially a missionary. I was accepted by Global Recording Networks (GRN) as a full-time member. You can check out my GRN Blog from then. Intriguingly, this also meant that I was kind of a missionary to the Aboriginals. GRN records and distributes languages and has thousands of Bible messages in thousands of different languages. At the time of writing, they were pushing close to 7000.

So why would I join an organization like GRN?

Well, there are many reasons:

I have a technical background and being a member of GRN allowed me to use this.

The society I live in has changed and more and more we are surrounded by many different cultures and languages and this requires a different approach to telling the Good news.

But most of all, GRN allows me to tell the story of Jesus without the constraints and politics of a church congregation, without abandoning the local church. Not that, apart from aboriginal communities, that was GRN’s target audience. Their primary target audience was overseas. But that did not stop anybody from using their material that way.

More than this I still never left the shores of Australia to do it.

Missions and Fundraising

I am no longer with GRN. I never actually managed to go full-time. Instead, I worked for them for a long time voluntarily. Funding became the issue.

Unlike many other missions, GRN does pay a kind of wage. But it is subsistence level and there is a need to raise extra funds. It turns out that, even though I am a relatively good salesman, I am not very good at this sort of fundraising. Even though I have always believed that a good missionary is worthy of being supported and I have been a supporter of missionary societies, the idea of having to ask for funds for myself for missionary work is something that I struggled with.

While some missionaries may have undergone specific training or had mentors with prior missionary experience, others, like myself, found themselves navigating the intricate aspects of missionary life independently. This lack of standardized guidance raised questions about my preparedness to enter missionary work.

Missions And Unspoken Assumptions

There is a whole element of missionary work that is a bit like unspoken Christian jargon. In that, there are a lot of assumptions made about people entering the work. It is assumed that workers will either be experienced or trained in things such as fundraising and it is confusing to both the existing mission workers and the new workers when there is little or no understanding of what is expected.

It wasn’t until I read a book called Friend Raising: Building a Missionary Support Team That Lasts by Betty J. Barnett, that I was able to see that being supported by others is not just about asking people for money.

I also found a course and book called “Funding the Family Business: The Handbook for Raising Personal Support” to be very helpful.

Still, two problems persisted:

1. I have never been good at being informative to others about my activities. Seeking out people to support me meant that had to change and I was never been able to overcome that.
2. I could never work out who to ask. The people who are often the most willing to give that I knew were already committed to other missions. How could I justify asking them for more? This was certainly the case in my local church. They could just not see their way clear to add another missionary to their budget. Although they were happy to give the occasional gift. But this is not reliable support.

Embarking On This Missionary Journey Proved Transformative

I have to wonder if the models for mission support should not be reviewed. For example, lots of missions now are operating on crowdfunding. Are we limiting the number of people God can send to do mission work to pushy salespeople?

Of course, some would say that the above is an indication that God did not want me to go full time and that may be true too.

However, embarking on this missionary journey proved to be a transformative experience. Shaped by the joy of getting the Good news out to everyone in every language.  Add to this the encounters with, not just GRN but various missionary organizations and I was very happy in the work I did. Not to mention I got to continue to work locally the whole time I was with them. I learned many lessons, gained a lot of friends and would not have wished to pass up the experience. The one thing that has never changed is that being a missionary is not about where we go but where we are.

Enjoy     
Richard

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Speaking in Tongues & Global Recordings Network

Has Global Recordings Network (GRN) been secretly promoting Glossolalia, the gift of speaking in tongues, since it started?

I think such a headline would be worthy of modern media. I thought it would be fun to write an article as though it were written by the sensationalist media of this day and age. Global Recordings Network (GRN), is of course a highly reputable well-established mission established in 1939. Its services are now used by other missions all over the world. But I tried to imagine just what an article would be like about GRN if it were written by the sensational media and the following is the result. I hope you enjoy it.

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Controversial Organisation Speaking in Tongues To The World

The roomers are that Acts chapter 2 is at play here in whole new ways. Constantly facing significant opposition to their particular stand, they still persist. Despite this opposition, this speaking in tongues still manages to fly under the radar of many.

Indeed sometimes they make considerable effort to keep it that way. Don’t be misled however, staying under the radar does not mean that they do not promote their brand of Glossolalia.

Oh no! Starting out under the guise of Gospel Recordings, one frail woman joyfully used her particular gift of persuasion, to find the most ingenious method of winning converts to the cause.

Worse, when this woman found the right tools, she dared to rejoice over subjecting others to this message, all for the cause of what she dared to call freedom.

Then when the name Gospel Recordings became too hot, they changed the name to Language Recordings. Then again to Global Recordings Network (GRN). Supposedly for political reasons and using a flimsy excuse of “it avoids confusion” this deceptively simple means of getting converts persisted.

They even try to disguise what they are doing by avoiding the word tounges. Instead, they say they are recording Languages.

But I know better. The secret is out and not even the new name of GRN will stop them from being known. I can restrain myself no longer.

Gifts of The Spirit

What am I talking about? They can call it whatever they like but I call it for what it is.

GRN promotes the very least of the gifts of the spirit.

They promote Speaking in Tongues!

It's not the mill generic brand babble either. These people have the front to promote the sort of speaking in tongues that were expounded in Acts Chapter 2. When everybody heard their own language.

But they go even further. They promote speaking in tongues of every language and I mean every language. From the most obscure to the most popular.

Not just French, German, Spanish etc. GRN promote the speaking of languages, the names of which most people have never heard. Over 6000 of them in fact. But not just languages, they even use people’s dialects.

This is diabolical! We all know how susceptible people are when they hear something in their own language and dialects.

It’s true!

Don’t just believe me. You can listen to them for yourself. Yes, that’s right, recordings of this phenomenon are made available for everyone to download. All thousands of them and the number is ever-increasing.

Book of Acts and Speaking in Tongues

They say that they use translators and scripts. But there is no denying that it is a gift of the spirit when they hear it. After all, the first record of using other languages to promote the good news of Jesus was in the book of Acts.

What is the Book of Acts called?

It is called Acts of the Holy Spirit. So no matter what technology is used to promote the good news, if it is following in the footsteps of the Acts of the Holy Spirit it must be a gift of the Spirit.

Is that not so?

Well, you wouldn’t expect it to be called anything else, would you?

Can you imagine the dangers involved if people get their hands on the story of Jesus in every language?

It might just turn the world upside down.

Be wary everyone, the GRN form of speaking in tongues is on the move.

Enjoy     
Richard

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Find all the Hidden Books of The Bible

Here is a bit of fun. This is a pretty strange story but I’m given to understand that all 66 books of the bible are in it. I have never been able to find all 66 but if you are into puzzles you may enjoy this one.

HIDDEN BOOKS OF THE BIBLE

Speaking soberly, the numbers were up in the Middle East. There was old Chief Mejud gesticulating wildly. The facts were plain – in truth, he had a narrow escape! His fez, raiment and marked face showed it. Never did you see so dismal a chief. Queer at any time, to see him now minus hose and shoes, and wearing as comic a hat as could be made, it was quite a job to suppress a laugh.

It All happened near ancient Ai. What to them made this a holy place? One thing was a mysterious letter J on a high cliff. There was little else there except a small market and a stall selling coffee, but the brew smelt vile. A fakir sat there too he pumps alms from all comers. The stall-holder, Samu elegant in a striped robe, promptly drew attention to the curious carving. “See that J? Oh, nothing in the world is more wonderful! “We asked..”What is wonderful about the J?” “O eleven centuries old it is. Sir”‘just then a toothless hag gained my ear. She, a most pitiful figure, paused to reston the parapet ere saying leeringly, “You have money?” I fluked a reply, “Not I. moth, you know, and rust corrupt earthly store.”

In Such A Jam

Being in such a jam, escape was obviously necessary, so I said to Mejud. “Excuse me, can I annex, O dusty chief, your car?” He consented, and to gain the sedan, I elbowed my way out, a man from Ghana humming a tune at side. “I am at the work: of tracing a tobacco theft”, he told me several times. It was his subject of constant complaint. “That tobacco loss”, I answered, “is of little account. It would have gone up in smoke anyway”. This man, though claiming good education had adopted the role of a tramp (rover).B.Sc. stood after his name, gained at Oxford. Two others in his family were still home in West Africa – a brother named Eugene, sister called (strangely enough) Adelphi. Lemon-growing occupied their time. He said “At home they mockingly ask, ‘Where is the prodigal at?’ ‘’ I answered that it used to be incorrect to us “at” in this manner. His general command of English was poor for an Oxford graduate. For instance, he would refer to the neuter gender as “dueter”! “O, no, my dear sir”, I frequently had to exclaim.

This is really too bad – I, a home-body, roaming the Near East with strange companions. Yet, from answers received from my superiors it will be home sweet home soon. I no longer revel at Ionian bouts as of old.

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Enjoy     
Richard