• Our hope-filled future is bound up in sharing the story of Jesus, in discipling others, in bringing those disciples together into communities of believers, and in developing and releasing those believers to create other communities... till Jesus the King comes again!

What do we long for?

Posted on May 4, 2021 by wtdavid

In our work as cross-cultural church planters, we are committed to being “incarnational”.  This is one of our guiding principles as World Team workers, and can be found in the WT Ministry Framework.

We describe what it means to be incarnational in this way: “As cross-cultural workers, we intentionally surrender our rights to our home culture, language, and ways and embrace those of the host culture. By this, we seek to model Christ, who emptied himself of the privileges and powers of divinity, taking on human form, in order to carry out his mission.”

How does this biblical principle, exemplified by Jesus Christ, work itself out in our daily life and ministry?  What is its relevance and impact?

There are at least four (4) applications of an incarnational lifestyle for us as cross-cultural workers.

  • We invest significant time in understanding the local culture in which we live and work at mastering the heart language of the people we serve.
  • Disciples and communities are trained to critically contextualize the gospel in a way that preserves the integrity of the gospel as it engages one’s local context.
  • We are not satisfied until we see the gospel multiplied by disciples making disciples, and communities multiplying themselves in other communities.
  • We are not the centre nor the ultimate motor of all this work.

In my recent reading, I ran across this quote: “… missionaries tend to be self-sufficient. It’s hard for the to be needy.  But not to receive from others make them look superior.”   The writer was speaking of a specific group of missionaries, but I think it applies to all of us in general.  None of the applications above could take root in our lives if we are not dependent on God for His grace and strength to learn one more phrase today in Tagalog, Khmer, Spanish or Portuguese.  None of the applications above could produce any fruit if we are not dependent on those we serve to carry the work of the gospel forward in their culture and context.

So, which one of the four applications is the hardest for you?  What small step might you take today to begin to work that application into your life and ministry this week?

Filed under: Contextualization, Dependency, Incarnational living | Leave a comment »

Dependency is where it all starts

Posted on November 4, 2020 by wtdavid

The Pray Big Initiative is meant to challenge each of us in the WT Global community to increased prayer for new workers.  We know, and we believe that it is ultimately God who raises up new workers.  He may use us in that process, but we are a dependent people.

I love the very first chapter title: Prayer is dependent, and Begg’s very first statement: “To pray is an admission and an expression of dependence.”  Dependency is where it all starts.

However, that’s where our struggle also starts.  In our devotional reading this morning, Rebecca and I came across this comment: “The thought that any fallen human being would be able to perform his or her way into acceptance with God has to be the most insane of all delusions. Yet we all tend to think that we are more righteous than we are, and when we think this, we have taken the first step to embracing the delusion that maybe we’re not so bad in God’s eyes after all.” 

Dependency strikes deep to our sense of self-sufficiency, our ‘competency’ to do the work to which the Lord has called us.  It’s not through mustering more prayer that more workers will join us.  Though, yes, we do need to pray more to the God of the harvest.  Our hope is in Him, and all our prayers are a humble expression of our worship and thanks, pleading with Him to be faithful to His promises.

Let’s pray together the prayer that Alistair Begg wrote at the end of that first chapter of Pray Big:

“Father, thank you for the privilege of addressing you in this way.  Help me to remember that the Lord Jesus obtained this access for me through his death on the cross.  Please help me to remember that I am entirely dependent on the work of the Holy Spirit as I pray, and entirely dependent on you in my life in every way. Help me to learn to pray as I pray for Jesus’ sake. Amen.”

Filed under: Dependency, Mobilization, Prayer | 2 Comments »

Dependent

Posted on July 11, 2019 by wtdavid

“You know you’ve become the missionary you were meant to be the day you become dependent on the people you were sent to serve.”

I had to read that statement twice before I began to seize its full significance.  Why?  Because my natural tendency, as well as yours I would imagine, is to believe ministry is more about others becoming dependent on me as ‘full-time worker’ than on me becoming dependent on them.

In the book, The Ideal Team Player, Patrick Lencioni argues that there are three core qualities to an ideal team player. They are hungry, they are smart, and they are humble.  The hardest to measure and assess, he said, is humility. 

Pride is probably our default mode in most ministry efforts.  We want to do the job well, and we enjoy when others notice the good job that we are doing.  Appearing dependent on others makes us look weak, less capable than we thought, lacking the necessary skills to do the job, or not “leading” as we should.  Pride is one of those root sins that keeps us from admitting (or asking for) our need for others help and for God’s help.

So, maybe one indicator of a heart that is learning humility is to assess its ‘dependence factor’; that is, how much does that person demonstrate real need of others, real need of God in the culture in which they find themselves? 

“You know you’ve become the missionary you were meant to be the day you become dependent on the people you were sent to serve.”

By the way, I pulled the quote at the beginning of this blog from another blog by Jonathan (http://leadbysoul.com/leadership/the-quiet-leader/). The quote is from a documentary interview of his father, John W (WT Papua alum).

Filed under: Crossing cultures, Dependency, Humility | 2 Comments »

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