Mission Agencies:Mobilization:Overview
Mission Mobilization Agencies by Region--focusing on raising mission awareness and recruiting missionaries within the church.
AN INTRODUCTION FOR MISSION MOBILIZERS-SOURCES
I'm not sure who coined the term "mission mobilizer," but I'd be willing to bet that it was Dr. Ralph Winter of the U.S. Center for World Mission in the 1970's. Anyway, it has become a generic term for anyone who mobilizes people and resources toward the work of world mission. It was borrowed from military terminology--mobilizing a country for a military war involves similar things to mobilizing the church for its spiritual war: informing the people about the conflict, getting them psyched up for the battle, recruiting soldiers/ missionaries, gathering supplies for the troops, setting up new manufacturing plants, setting up supply lines, setting up communication, etc.
So you could be considered a mission mobilizer yourself because you are wanting to involve your church congregation or student group to a deeper level of involvement in missions. There are a few specific organizations which can provide "generic" (not recruiting for a particular agency) RESOURCES to mission mobilizers. Here are most of them:
CALEB PROJECT, 10 West Dry Creek Cir., Littleton, CO 80120
(I'll start with my own organization) has a bunch of user-friendly information on unevangelized people in Central and Southeast Asia as well as North Africa and the Mid-East--mostly short videos and booklets. We also have a department of ADVOCATES who focus specifically on mobilizing Christians to reach one particular group of unevangelized people. Currently, there are advocates at Caleb Project who focus on Mongols, Yemeni, Malaysians, Kazakhs, Turkmen, Uzbeks, and Uighers. Caleb Project also has itenerating speakers who can help local churches with mission conference presentations. (One of these speakers focuses particularly on college-age students.) Caleb Project also has developed excellent training for short-term missions among unreached people groups. <
The U.S. CENTER FOR WORLD MISSION, 1605 Elizabeth St., Pasadena CA 91104
Has a free monthly newspaper, "Mission Frontiers," that is packed with general news on missions. Is academically oriented--has a tremendous course called "Perspectives" which introduces people to missions in a very comprehensive way. This college-level course can be set up in any location. They also have a Chrisitian university, a Master's Degree-by extension program in missions, and study centers on Hinduism, Islam, Bhuddism, China, etc. They also produce a monthly prayer booklet with short stories on unreached people called "Global Prayer Digest." In addition, the USCWM has the finest mission-oriented bookstore (William Carey Library; call 1-800-MISSION for a catalogue) and resources to assist a church in "Adopting" and unreached people group. <
ACMC--P.O.Box ACMC, Wheaton, IL 60189
"Advancing Churches in Mission Commitment" is a great resource for developing a mission program and plan for a local church. Their professional mission consultants provide written material and local seminars for training mission committee members. ACMC's consulting is not limited to mission committees in traditional churches, but includes "pastors and whole churches, independent agencies, denominations, etc." and also works with "contemporary and innovative churches in the country" such as Willowcreek.
AIMS--P.O.Box 64534, Virginia Beach, VA 23464
"Association of International Mission Services" is similar to ACMC, but focuses more on independent and Charismatic types of churches, whereas ACMC tends to focus more on traditional and denominational groups. AIMS has local rep's to help churches work together to create great mission projects.
WORLD THRUST, P.O. Box 1099, Acworth, GA 30101-1099
Their seminar has proven very effective in training leaders of a local church how to engage their congregation in missions. They work with you to mobilize your entire church and help you set up your own short-term mission trip overseas, too.
AD2000 & BEYOND, 2860 S. Circle Dr., Suite 2112, Colorado Springs, CO 80906
This is a "big-picture" organization working to mobilize the church world-wide to try to reach the entire world by the year 2000 or soon thereafter. Their first step was to identify the major people groups yet to be reached with the Gospel, now they are executing the second step of researching each of these people groups. Next will come actually engaging the groups with the Gospel. They are not doing this with their own staff; they are simply organizing other people and organizations and denominations which are volunteering to work together to carry it out.
HEART OF GOD MINISTRIES, P.O.Box 7205, Moore, OK 73153
This group is new on the scene, but I'm very impressed with them. Not only do they do the mission thing, but they start a step behind that and call for a believers to be revived before they can truly care about missions. They have some good itenerating speakers, a magazine, and a unique missionary training program.
BILL & AMY STEARNS, 1906 Overcrest St. Fayetteville, AR 72703
Are not an agency themselves, but they have invested time as staff in a number of different agencies and have written several excellent books. Look in your local Christian bookstore (or call 1-8000-MIS-SION) for a copy of "Catch The Vision," "Run With The Vision," and/or "Make A Difference." These are excellent resources that tell you all you need to know about how to do mission mobilization!
DENOMINATIONAL MISSION BOARDS--if your church is connected with a particular denomination, be sure to contact their headquarters to see what kind of resources they have for you in mission.
OTHER MISSION AGENCIES
There's hundreds of agencies sending out missionaries, and most of them have representatives who are mobilizers, recruiting missionaries. Most of them have resources a mobilizer can use. For instance, the mission board, Pioneers, has recently dedicated one of its staff, Donnie Scearce, to be "Director of Mobilization." You can call him at 407-859-3388. Another mission board, Frontiers, has a guy named Bob Sjogren who has the best Bible Basis for Mission seminar in the world (no exaggeration) that you can schedule personally or rent on video by calling 1-800-GO2-THEM, and all of these agencies will have good periodicals--usually free, quarterly publications--check out TEAM's publication "Horizons" for excellent short-stories about life on the mission field (P.O. Box 969, Wheaton, IL 60189-0969)
PROFESSIONAL MISSIONS PUBLICATIONS
The following are different from the denominational or sending-agency periodicals in that they are "generic"--not just a mouthpeice for one agency--and you have to PAY for a subscription to them: PULSE (POB 749, Wheaton, IL 60189), EMQ (Box 794, Wheaton, IL 60189), MISSION TODAY (701 Main St., Evanston, IL 60202) and IJFM (POB 40638, Pasadena, CA 91104)
REGIONAL MISSION CONFERENCES are another way to network and find resources in a generic forum. In the U.S. there is a "Heartland MissionFest" (POB 50130, Tulsa, OK 74150), and a "GO Conference" (7435 Monticello Rd., Columbia, SC 29203), a triennial "URBANA" conference (POB 7895, Madison, WI 53707), and other numerous smaller conferences--check with the mission office of a large church congrgation near you.
KINGDOM BUILDING MINISTRIES 14140 E. Evans, Ave., Denver, CO 80014
<Laborers@aol.com> Add this one to your list of "generic" mission mob. agencies in the U.S.: KBM is working to raise up more laborers of God's Kingdom worldwide through 3-month intensive training schools, itinerant speaking, workshops for itinerant speakers, a short quarterly newsletter, & Summer mission projects.
STUDENT MISSION FELLOWSHIPS IVMF, P.O. Box 7895, Madison, WI 53707
There is a loose network of over 100 student-led groups on Christian College campuses across the U.S. and CANADA, left over from the Student Foreign Mission Fellowships started over 50 years ago by Columbia and Wheaton students. InterVarsity Christian Fellowship's Mission Department has a General Secretary and some volunteers who work to maintain and provide vision and leadership training for this network. The students focus on using prayer meetings, information, mission conferences, and short-term mission projects to mobilize their peers. Check at a local Christian college to see if they have a group like this.
MOBILIZATION SOURCES IN GERMANY & CZECH REPUBLIC
From: Robert Schroeder <100714.1660@compuserve.com> Moosweg 22a, 90768 Furth, GERMANY
There is a growing network of missions mobilizers in Europe. Unfortunatey, in Germany, there is a large chasm between the evangelical and the pentecostal/charismatic groups, due to historical reasons. I have been more acquainted with the Pentecostal/ charismatic resources. I have been ministering part-time in the area of missions mobilization. I hold seminars and facilitate networking. I have been working to help KMS in the Czech Republic in the Missions mobilization project--conducting seminars there and training two of their men to carry on this work. I am in close contact with the [following] agencies...
AIMS Deutschland e.V. (AIMS Germany) Postfach 450 129, 12171 Berlin Tel: (49)- (30)- 768904-45 Fax: (49)-(30)- 768904-48 Contact person: Kerstin Hack <100711.2622@compuserve.com> A European based office of AIMS. They provide materials such as seminars, prayer calendars and people profiles for use in missions mobilization. They conduct seminars to educate, motivate and mobilize churches for world missions, especially for the unreached peoples.
BURO FUR WELTMISSION (Office for World Missions) 29646 Bispingen, GERMANY Tel: (49)-( 5194)-1493 Fax: (49)-(5194)-7033 contact person: Jan Schlegel 100330.2724@compuserve.com This office is a branch of YWAM Germany and is dedicated to missions mobilization. They produce, translate and distribute materials for missions mobilization (overheads, people profiles) and conduct seminars such as "Adopt a people". Publish a quarterly bulletin with missonary breakthroughs, people profiles and other related articles.
GLOBE EUROPE Keramagstr. 47a, 46483 Wesel, GERMANY Tel: (49)-(2857)-7394 Contact person: Brad Thurston Globe Europe is a missions sending agency, which also is involved quite heavily in missions mobilization. They hold seminars and assist churches in developing missions programs and caring for missionaries.
KMS (Christian Missionary Society) Andrstova 4, 180 00 Prague 8, Czech Republic Tel: (42)-2-683 35 05 Fax: (42)-2-683 35 07 Contact person: Lubomir Ondracek This is a national organization based upon the initiative of local churches from different denominations. They carry out various national initiatives and are just beginning to get into missions mobilization. They are also presently translating and publishing missions books and materials. They have also translated a seminar from AIMS to be used for the purposes of mobilizing local Czech churches for missions.
CANADIAN MOBILIZATION AGENCIES
MISSIONSFESTS -- Vancouver MissionsFest has been around for 14 years. This year, as in the past 3 years, the Vancouver MissionsFest has attracted an aggregate weekend attendance of over 25,000. This year there was also a MissionsFest in Edmonton, Alberta which attracted an aggregate of 7,500. There were also MissionsFest events in Winnipeg, Manitoba and Toronto, Ontario.
STUDENT MISSION ADVANCE is an Ontario based organization that has focused on mobilizing college students for about 10 years. They also run conferences every couple of years that focus on helping people get to the mission field. Attendance has been in the hundreds, and sometimes thousands.
Click here for more information on SMA.However, despite these two things, much still needs to be done in Canada. Mission agencies are going through a difficult time in regard to finances, staff, etc.
Most recently, the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada has formed a Global Mission Task Force. This task force, under the leadership of Geoff Tunnicliffe (Canadian Director of International Teams) will bring together churches, denominational mission leaders, and educational institutions to discuss training, mobilization and other issues. The hope is to build a common understanding of the issues and foster cooperation between all concerned, particularily in regard to mobilization efforts.
So, here is a brief Canadian overview. I am sure I've missed a lot of things. Perhaps others living in Canada can fill in the holes. Karl H. Mueller Phone/Fax: 604-768-3707 3132 Coventry Crescent E-mail: grm@stargazer.netshop.net Westbank, BC V4T 1E8, CANADA
ACMC Contact Information
Dennis Miller, ACMC Assistant Northwest Regional Director, writes, "In reference to G.P.'s handout concerning missions involvement for local churches. The number listed for ACMC (1-800-798-ACMC) is for ordering materials from our supplier in Wheaton. If you wish to talk with the home office of ACMC in Atlanta, call 1-800-747-7346 and they can help you or refer you to the ACMC Regional Director for your area."
David Blankenship, ACMC Publications Coordinator also wrote in to let us know that ACMC has just posted its web site. <www.acmc.org> "Our site contains information about how ACMC (Advancing Churches in Missions Commitment) helps local churches to maximize their resources for effective involvement in world evangelism. Pages include upcoming conferences, missions-oriented resources, becoming a network member church or contacting one of our staff members.
The latest contact information for the national office of ACMC is as follows: Advancing Churches in Missions Commitment, PO Box 3929, Peachtree City, GA 30269-7929 Phone: (770) 631-9900 Fax:(770) 631-9470 Email: <ACMCATLANTA@compuserve.com>
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