Paul Akin | The Number One Reason Missionaries Go Home

From https://www.imb.org/2017/05/25/number-one-reason-missionaries-go-home/:

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The most common reason missionaries go home is not due to lack of money, illness, terrorism, homesickness, or even a lack of fruit or response to the gospel.

Regretfully, the number one reason is due to conflict with other missionaries.

Yes, you read that correctly.

From my own personal experience on the field and after five years training, equipping, and sending missionaries, I have witnessed this truth firsthand. In all my travels around the world, I’ve spent countless days with missionary teams of all types, sizes, and makeups and one reality remains true: none of them are perfect.

In fact, toward the end of the 20th century the World Evangelical Alliance released a significant study that found “conflict with peers” as the top reason North American missionaries leave the mission field.

Why Teams?

In light of the seemingly inevitable conflict with other missionaries, many may wonder why we emphasize teams. The simple answer is that this is the example and model we see in the Bible. Team is the predominant model we see for mission work in the New Testament. Jesus and his disciples lived together and did ministry together. Paul and Barnabas—set apart by the Holy Spirit and the church in Antioch—went out together on the first missionary journey.

We see further evidence of teams on mission in Paul’s “apostolic band.” One scholar notes that in the New Testament, at least 55 men and 17 women were associated with Paul on his missionary journeys. All this to say, there are biblical, practical, and pastoral reasons why we encourage the formation and sending of missionary teams.

Five Challenges for Missionary Teams

Conflict within missionary teams is inevitable in a fallen world. Here are five challenges that threaten all missionaries and missionary teams.

1. Unmet expectations.

Whether we realize it or not, we all arrive on the mission field with certain expectations. These expectations are shaped and formed by our previous experiences. Unmet expectations related to missionary teams are a real problem, especially for young missionaries with an idealistic perspective of the mission field.

2. Conflict equation.

Sinful people + work with other sinful people + those people trying to witness to and reach other sinful people = lots of sinful people and potential for conflict.

When you join a team on the mission field, you are stepping into this conflict equation and you must acknowledge that reality.

3. Missionary life is stressful.

Missionary life is filled with stress and pressure, and much of it is subconscious. Things that seemed so simple—like driving, grocery shopping, paying bills, or sleeping—suddenly become very challenging and stressful. It’s not always easy to articulate and identify, but subconscious stress is a reality for many missionaries and missionary teams around the world.

4. Jealousy can thrive.

We’re creatures who naturally like to compare ourselves with others. Teams often live life together and are around each other often, so there is a great tendency for envy to creep in. If we aren’t careful, we can compare, become jealous, and in the process destroy a team with our own pride.

5. Sin remains a constant reality.

The bottom line is that we’re sinful people. We’re selfish, we’re prideful, and when put in stressful situations, we’re often poor teammates and partners in the Great Commission.

What’s the Solution?

So, in light of these challenges, what are missionaries and missionary teams supposed to do?

1. Missionaries need to have a realistic perspective of team.

Missionary teams are not perfect and are made up of sinful people. Therefore, beware of going to the mission field with an idealistic and utopian perspective of team.

2. Missionaries must strive to be flexible and adaptable.

Nobody likes teaming with high maintenance people. Most missionaries are entering a culture where they have little control over most things that happen and, as a result, flexibility and adaptability are critical.

3. Missionaries ought to prepare spiritually, physically, and emotionally before going to the field.

As Mack Stiles once wrote, “There is no such thing as transformation by aviation.” Missionaries must intentionally pursue intimacy with Christ and learn to abide in him long before they ever cross geographical, cultural, and linguistic barriers.

In the end, being a good teammate is not just a matter of effort, though that’s important; it’s a matter of grace and mercy. We need God’s grace and mercy on a moment-by-moment basis. We need the gospel to change us from the inside out. We need the Holy Spirit to change our hearts, wills, desires, and affection—and in the process make us more like Jesus.

That is the only way we can be the kind of teammates who honor God and help fuel the spread of the gospel to the ends of the earth.

“Discipleship” as Key Sound Bite for Communicating Biblical Mission

As someone who is involved in missions leadership, I understand the challenges facing evangelical sending agencies today in communicating vision, purpose, branding, and management. We all want to be unique, relevant, and Biblical.

I also understand that there are certain trends that rise and fall in the missions scene.  Church planting was all the rage a few years ago. And now it’s movements. Other trends include the rise of the term ‘transformation’ and the emphasis off the church and onto the kingdom.  This is related with holistic or integrated mission and on caring for the poor. Other long-lasting trends include the unreached or least-reached, and the use of metrics to evaluate our effectiveness. Of course every trend and emphasis has a way of highlighting only part of the nature of Biblical mission.

But is there a way for sending agencies to tie all of this together in a way that is not reductionistic?

Maybe. How about “discipleship?”

I’m interested all the talk these days on disciple-making movements. It might just be trend as well, but somehow I think that, as a necessary sound bite used in communication, it comes closer to recapturing the essence of what we’re doing across ALL contexts, more than church planting or integrated development or peace-making or proclamation or compassionate evangelism.

I want to commend Melanie McNeil’s Mission Paradigms: Is Discipleship Important? to you. It’s not an eloquent article (she’s a better writer than I am!), and I don’t agree with everything the says, but she makes a case of discipleship to be a key metaphor to reclaim Biblical mission in our world today (of course, discipleship has to be properly defined!).  From the conclusion:

We have explored the way the task of mission is described today by modern mission agencies, and I have argued that the reductionism of modern missions has resulted in a narrow definition of God’s commission. I have shown that the definitions of the task being used today fail to embrace the whole of God’s vision for the world he created. Whole life discipleship, the radical journey into relationship, and maturity of relationship with God is the core of God making his name known in the nations. God invites us to participate with His mission, and this will require a radical shift in the mission paradigms of today.

I have sought to demonstrate that such a shift opens up paths of radical transformation that impact both lives and communities, but it will come at a cost. The question is whether we in missions, and the Church, are prepared to count the cost and move into new things together with God, and with each other.

The review of methods and vision and mission statements here is not a judgment on any individual agency or strategy. It is a call for all of us who are disciples of Jesus Christ to embrace whole life discipleship and the radical rule of God in our lives and organisations.

Related Post: The Purpose (Vision) and Task (Mission) of Missions

What size should a church planting team be?

From From Seed to Fruit, The Gathering of Teams of Laborers, page 141:

Fruitful Practice #2: Aiming for a Large Enough Team

This implies that team size matters, and it does. The average team size of
consultation participants was nine adults (the number being raised by a few very large teams) although the majority of teams were less than nine in size. Team size in itself is not the key to fruitfulness, but a survey of the teams represented at the Consultation indicated the following:

>> Teams with fewer than four adults showed a greater probability of
not planting even one fellowship or church.
>> Teams with eight or more adults had a greater probability of
planting at least one fellowship.
>> Teams with twelve adults showed a greater probability of planting
multiple fellowships.

It would seem, therefore, that if our desire is to see church-planting movements, we need to be aiming for larger numbers of laborers in each team, supporting the strategy of sowing widely. Research suggests that five or six team members should be the lower limit of a team size.

Thoughts? Counter evidence?

Teams and the Refining Work of God

From Appendix 3: “For Team Leaders” in Spiritual Survival Handbook for Cross-Cultural Workers:

When we begin as team leaders we believe we are on board with God’s agenda—an agenda to reach a lost people group, a lost city and to help build His church. This is indeed His agenda, but it isn’t His only one. He has another agenda. One that feels often like it is competing with the one we already own, but which in reality is there to enhance it. This agenda is to invest our lives into a group of teammates so that as a healthy team His work can be accomplished and His love shown. Sometimes this investment takes much sacrifice—a laying down of our own “work” in order that our efforts might be multiplied in others. These teammates aren’t there just as tools to be utilized in completing our vision. They are there to be loved and related to. They are there to refine us and for us to refine them. They are present not to strain us or frustrate us, but to more fully represent Jesus in our location than we could ever do by ourselves. By embracing this reality we honor God, honor our calling and are engaged in the charge given to Peter which is also given to us—“Feed my sheep.”

This is a good reminder that even though they can be difficult and frustrating sometimes, teams are God’s idea.  We mainly hurt ourselves if we think we don’t need the leadership, accountability, and sharpening that teams provide.  Of course we can always take God’s idea of “team” and mess it up (unfortunately we do this all the time), but bad examples don’t mean we can individualistically go as a “lone ranger” just “do our own thing.”  We are communal creatures made in the image of our triune God- we need each other in teams.

Related Posts:

• The Gathering of Teams of Laborers
• Top Ten Team Pitfalls, Sinclair
• Preventing Discouragement and Keeping Church Planters Productive on the Field

Spiritual Survival Handbook for Cross-Cultural Workers

The Spiritual Survival Handbook for Cross-Cultural Workers is not a great book, but it is filled with important concepts and is short (112 pages).  The intended audience is for those involved in team-based pioneer church planting.

Kingdom Worker Attrition

For those who would like to study missionary attrition, here are some helpful resources.

What is attrition?  Examining the Faces of Attrition, by William Taylor in Mission Frontiers (1999):

Acceptable Attrition

"Acceptable" attrition arises from such causes as normal retirement, issues related to children (although some issues are a cover for unresolved parental conflicts), a legitimate job change, or health problems. In North America, with an older mission force, these are the top four reasons for attrition.

Preventable Attrition

Some attrition causes could be dealt with before or during field service: lack of home support (not just financial), problems with personal concerns, lack of call (dealt with before field service), inadequate pre-field training, poor cultural adaptation, and some others. The younger mission force faces their own causes of attrition, all perhaps preventable: lack of home support, lack of call, inadequate commitment, and disagreement with the agency.

Desirable but Unrealized Attrition

No formal study that I know of documents this fact, but some missionaries stay who should leave, and they compound the tragedy, in that their staying makes some of the better people leave. It can be a healthy thing to reduce the number of missionaries allowed to stay on the field, but this requires courageous, proactive leadership from the agency or responsible church.

Attrition Among the Vulnerable

Finally, there are "those vulnerable to attrition." What factors in a particular mission society or in a subteam of that agency, perhaps different from one national context to another, cause this segment to be vulnerable to attrition? Mission leaders are wise to address this issue right away.

What are the stats? From Frontline Ministries:

1 career missionary in 20 leaves the field every year.

47% leave their work within the first 5 years!

71% of these losses are for preventable reasons.

International, long-term missionary force estimated at 150,000 (very conservative), 7,650 missionaries leave the field annually!

Over a 4-year term, this number jumps to 30,600!

Over 21,000 of these losses are PREVENTABLE!

In one study, 49% of cases caused by relationship problems.

Top five causes of preventable attrition involve issues of character and relationships.

What are some ways to prevent attrition? A report from the “Reducing Missionary Attrition Project” (2005).

 

See also Preventing Discouragement and Keeping Church Planters Productive on the Field.

Sow the Seed Widely, by A.H.

Here is a paper on broad-sowing evangelism by A.H., titled Sow the Seed Widely.  From the introduction:

Over the years as I’ve been involved in various outreach efforts, Jesus’ simple story has inspired me. In the Muslim world, I have sown seeds among many types of soil, often hard and dry. For me and many others I know outreach is not easy, but the simple challenge from this story has kept me going: We must sow our seed widely in order to see the harvest! This truth is what has inspired my thinking about our future work in North Africa, and I would like to share how the vision to sow the seed widely will play out in our team life on the field. First, I’ll discuss a method which traditionally has not been effective, and then talk about 3 practical ways our team plans to sow the seed widely in North Africa.

Here are his three practical ways:

1. Have an organized, weekly outreach for everyone on the team to participate in.
2. Each team member plans and is part of a monthly or bi-monthly (every other month) country outreach.
3. Team members intentionally spend time with one another’s friends in order to increase potential sharing opportunities and to follow the biblical model of working 2-by-2.

Read the whole thing (3 pages).

Related: A Vision for Team, by A.H.

Preventing Discouragement and Keeping Church Planters Productive on the Field

From the EMQ January 2010 issue: Preventing Discouragement and Keeping Church Planters Productive on the Field, by David A. Diaso:

The responses to a survey I conducted [of 180 workers interviewed] demonstrated that church planters are more likely to be motivated to continue if the following are in place:

• a clear definition of the criteria for success;
• a clear description of tasks required to plant a church;
• training, coaching, and mentoring in tangible church-planting principles; and  
• consistent encouragement and feedback from the mission agency and team leader/supervisor.

Diaso then gives 4 recommendations based on his research:

1. Mission agencies and team leaders/supervisors must provide a clear definition of the criteria for success.
2. Mission agencies need to provide for a clear description of tasks required to plant a church.
3. Mission agencies need to provide training, coaching, and mentoring in tangible church-planting principles.

4. Mission agencies and team leaders/supervisors need to provide consistent encouragement and feedback.

Read the whole thing (requires a subscription to EMQ).

The Essence of the Church, Julien

Quoted in Discovering Church Planting, pg 44:

“In his article, “The Essence of the Church,” Tom Julien discussed the fact that many church planters often define the local church in terms of their cultural preference, which can lead to problems on the field.  Julien admonished church-planting teams first to come to an agreement on what the local church is so they will know what they are planting.

Our problem is that we identify the local church by her cultural and historic expression, more than by her biblical essence. To arrive at a clear definition of the local church we must make a distinction between the two. Sluggish thinking here will lead to differing assumptions in the church-planting team that will affect the basic principles of any church-planting ministry. The more focused we are on essence, the less attachment we will have to any particular cultural expression of the church. On the other hand, if the form or cultural expression of the church becomes our reference point, adapting to different cultural situations will create tension.

The New Testament reveals the church both in her essence and expression. With regard to the essence of the church, this revelation is given in images and presented as fact; with respect to the cultural expression of the church, this revelation is given as example and is descriptive rather than prescriptive…

Let us come back to our original question: "What is a local church?" We have said that a local church is a visible manifestation of the biblical essence. Most of us, however, need something more concrete to work with. It is crucial that every church-planting team agree on a working definition, in concrete terms, that grows out of essence, and not expression. This definition must include those elements that are indispensable to the identity of a church, and omit those that are not. This definition identifies the seed for church planting.

Here is an attempt at such a definition. Members of every church-planting team need to be unified with respect to what they are planting, even if it takes months of struggle to agree.

A local church is an organized body of baptized believers, led by a spiritually qualified shepherd, affirming their relationship to the Lord and to each other by regular observance of the Lord's Supper, committed to the authority of the Word of God, gathering regularly for worship and the study of the Word, and turned outward to the world in witness.”

Taken from Tom Julien, “The Essence of the Church,” EMQ April 2008.

A Vision for Team, by A.H.

Here is one man's dream for healthy teams and effective ministry, called A Vision for Team.  His "5 Areas of Togetherness" that build or indicate health include a team that:

1. Lives together
2. Grows together
3. Works together
4. Prays together
5. Plays together

"Build a healthy team, and you will have an effective ministry."

Read the whole thing (4 pages).

Identity and Community

I have been thinking a lot about "identity" recently.  So as I was reading Total Church: A Radical Reshaping around Gospel and Community (2008), this quote jumped out at me (pg. 39):

The church lies at the very center of the eternal purpose of God.  It is not a divine afterthought.  It is not an accident of history.  On the contrary, the church is God's new community.  For his purpose conceived in a past eternity, being worked out in history, and to be perfected in a future eternity, is not just to save isolated individuals as so perpetuate our loneliness, but rather to build his church, that is, to call out of the world a people for his own glory. (Stott, The Living Church, 2007, pgs.19-20).

Here are some other quotes from the Chapter 2 "Why Community?":

An identity that I construct for myself is far removed from an identity I receive by grace (40).

The Bible shows that we are communal creatures, made to be lovers of God and of others (40).

I cannot be who I am without regard to other people (41).

If the church is the body of Christ, then we should not live as disembodied Christians (41).

The church gives us a new community and a new identity (41).

The church, then, is not something additional or optional.  It is at the very heart of God's purposes.  Jesus came to create a people who would model what it means to live under his rule.  It would be a glorious outpost of the kingdom of God, an embassy of heaven.  This is where the world can see what it means to be truely human (50).

Our identity as human beings is found in community.  Our identity as Christians is found in Christ's new community.  And our mission takes place through communities of light (50).

More on Total Church here, including 3 videos on "Community Training" and a pdf study guide of the book.

Top Ten Team Pitfalls, Sinclair

From Appendix 5 of the book a Vision of the Possible; Pioneer Church Planting in Teams by Dan Sinclair:

Top Ten Team Pitfalls

From my observations, it seems that these strategic issues can make a huge difference in the long run to the team's viability and impact. This is a summary of principles found elsewhere in the book. At the very least, this list of pitfalls can make for a lively team discussion!

10. Not being very clear regarding the people group and location the Lord is calling the team to work amongst.

9. Workers absorbed in high-hours jobs, even when not fully necessary.

8. Male workers trying to do everything out of their home, rather than basing ministry from an office or something. It is very common for team leaders to say they've learned this lesson about 3-year mark.

7. Allowing team misunderstandings or team leader / team member differences to fester and go on too long.

6. The team leader not building the team well. Recruiting anything with a pulse, rather than co-workers with a level of proven gifts and maturity.

5. The team leader not responding well to oversight; undervaluing the role of accountability and coaching.

4. Weak commitment to personal and corporate prayer about the work, with expectancy.

3. Not really understanding or being convinced about church planting.

2. Excess time in non-church-planting activities, such as team meetings & team activities, meetings with other workers, correspondence with folks back home, email, etc. [Of course some time spent in these areas is vital. But it can be overdone.] Getting into all forms of field activity other than language learning, evangelism and discipling. Spending too much time in front of computer screens.

1. The team leader being weak, passive, insecure or non-directive in his leadership role—usually due to insecurity and fear of rejection. Not being clear with team members concerning expectations. People begin to operate as a group of "independent contractors" rather than as a team. Team leaders must learn to stay graciously firm about team standards. Likewise there can be insufficient accountability and direction individually of team members' ministries. Weak accountability can lead to permanently weak patterns. Finally, related to this, the team leader can sometimes fail to keep people motivated, eager and expectant about their tasks and goals.

Group Discussion:

Hand out this list to everyone on the team. Take 20 minutes for each person to mark each item as to: a) whether or not they agree this is important; and b) rate it 1-to-5 (with 5 being highest) as how much of a problem it currently is to the team. Then discuss as a group.

The Gathering of Teams of Laborers

Here are my notes from Chapter 12, "The Gathering of Teams of Laborers" in From Seed to Fruit: Global Trends, Fruitful Practices, and Emerging Issues Among Muslims by Andrew and Rachel Chard who have this to say about teams involved in church planting among Muslims:

"Teams of church planters are better equipped than 'lone rangers' to reach remote people in difficult places, no matter how committed people on their own might be. The overwhelming witness of the Consultation's research is that in the bringing together of people with different gifts for the appointed task, there are numerous benefits that both bear fruit and lighten the load on individuals. In this chapter we will look at significant factors in the formation and the life of fellowship or church-planting teams amongst Muslims, keeping the goal of church-planting movements in mind."

(FP = Fruitful Practice)

FP 1: Identifying the right leadership for the team

"Across the regions represented at the Consultation, it was agreed that team leaders need to be wisely chosen, not left to fall into positions by default."

The Qualities Practitioners Said They Wanted in a Leader:
• An evangelistic heart • Experience • Vision • Passion • Faith • Ability to delegate • Prayerfulness • Servanthood • Ability to recognize gifts in others • Love of people • Praiseworthy character • Availability

FP 2: Aiming for a large enough team

"This implies that team size matters, and it does."

• Teams with fewer than four adults showed a greater probability of not planting even one fellowship or church.
• Teams with eight or more adults had a greater probability of planting at least one fellowship.
• Teams with twelve adults showed a greater probability of planting multiple fellowships.

"It would seem, therefore, that if our desire is to see church-planting movements, we need to be aiming for larger numbers of laborers in each team, supporting the strategy of sowing widely. Research suggests that five or six team members should be the lower limit of a team size."

FP 3: Having members with a variety of gifts for the task

"From the Arab World, a worker reports that a combination of spiritual and practical gifts was critical to team unity and functioning in their ministry setting. This is echoed by many presently serving in Muslim fields. Team leaders and members of church-planting teams should be prepared to embrace a wide variety of ministry within one team, freeing team members up to work where their gifts and passions lie, but keeping all that the team does connected to the vision. There needs to be recognition that working within one's skill set will energize workers, while working outside one's skill set often leads to early attrition."

FP 4: Recognizing that women are essential members of the team and serve effectively

"Not only do women have significant roles in the team structure, but in the Muslim world, they have access to women and children even while men are restricted in this area. Also, women team members are usually able to talk at a deeper level with Muslim women much sooner than male team members are able to with Muslim men."

FP 5: Valuing language learning proficiency and culture adaptation

"The reality is that the attrition rate in workers who do not learn the language well is faster than for those who do. One vulnerable group are mothers with young children, who frequently struggle to get out and learn language well. Having said that, those who are not good with languages should not lose heart, for within fellowship planting teams there needs to be an acceptance that different people have different aptitudes. The mutual accountability must still be there, but tempered by this understanding and driven by a strong desire for each team member to succeed by reaching their potential."

FP 6: Valuing prayer and a growing walk with God

This was expressed in various ways:

• Practicing an intimate walk with God
• Involvement in sustained prayer, fasting, and spiritual warfare
• Mobilizing extensive international, focused prayer

"Godliness is more important than striving to reach ministry goals."

FP 7: Having a vision and focused intention

"A Memorandum of Understanding or similar document lessens the myriad of potential distractions. A worker from East Africa said, "As an ongoing team, we have a Memorandum of Understanding, which states our vision and our goals. We have written down our core values and our commitment to one another as team members. All these things help us to hang together when there are struggles within the team or when there are discouragements in ministry that might otherwise entice us to give up.""

FP 8: Being flexible in strategy and willing to adapt and modify

FP 9: Surveying and assessing the needs of the people, profiling their identity and the status of the Gospel

FP 10: Building a team mentality

"Getting to know one another well and learning to care deeply for one other needs to be worked on consistently… Time needs to be invested in orientation and in learning how team members think and feel, how they express themselves (or do not), and how they react to different personalities. This will be largely the job of the team leaders who will often find their team members to be ready and willing but also sensitive to being hurt while perhaps being insensitive to hurting others, the common combination of people in culture shock."

FP 11: Demonstrating love for the people

"The team needs to be put together for love; leadership must be servant-like; all of the team's ministry must arise out of love. Our love must show the uniqueness of God's love through Christ. Showing the love of God through acts of kindness, community development projects, or in the day-to-day shared living with Muslim people does not go unnoticed."

FP 12: Partnering with others for fruitfulness:

• Partnering with Muslim leaders, such as a "man or woman of peace"

"One strategy that some see as very effective for church-planting teams involves finding a 'man or a woman of peace' (based on the principle in Matthew 10:11) or someone in the locality who might be called a 're-starter', that is, one who is well respected and has the ear of the people or one who has the ability to get things going in their communities."

"One participant wrote, "We had a Muslim man who was intensely interested in Jesus. He loved Jesus and had the respect of many people in the community. He started telling people about the Injil (Gospel). We did not seek him; God gave him to us.""

• Partnering with same-culture or near-culture evangelists who share the vision

• Partnering with other agencies

"A field worker writes that someone from each agency in his or her locality would get together and swap information and materials, bring news of projects, and give testimonies of what was happening in his or her ministry. It was a very positive relationship with encouragement for everybody involved."

• Partnering with local churches

"There is agreement that 'local' national pastors like to be involved alongside expatriate efforts, able to advise and assist where possible, but this issue is also fraught with problems and questions. Where there are big cultural differences between the believers of existing churches and the Muslims to whom a witness is occurring, a point of healthy contact can be hard to find. Unless those very churches themselves become charged with passion for Muslims, there often seems little chance of being able to integrate MBBs into the existing congregations/cell groups."

Conclusion

"We believe that after the significance of having the Word of God to teach us and being indwelt by the Spirit of God as our counselor and guide, the next greatest provision for us as 'workers in God's vineyard' is the concept of teamwork. Have we not seen in this chapter how working as a team brings strength and ability for the task? Can we not see how much good sense it makes to work in teams whenever possible? No, it will not be problem-free, and team members will not always feel that their team is the best they could have. However, what better way is there to combine strength and skills, passion and wisdom, to blend differentness with grace, in order to bring fruitfulness—in order to bring in the harvest?"


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