I was talking with Rick Gerhardt yesterday and came up with a saying:
We want missionaries not crusaders.
Missionaries seek to serve, reach and and build up, while crusaders look to critique, wage war and tear down.
I have no desire for Antioch to become the biggest church around. I do, however, have the desire to be one of the most united, focused and committed churches around.
We want missionaries… not crusaders.
Two of my wandering thoughts that hopefully enrich this post – One, as someone who once spent a year under the title missionary (my passport visa proves it), missions is about supporting and enabling others, sort of the bottoms-up theory Ken likes; no crusading at all.
Two, a career missionary told me as I left the field, “We are all missionaries at all times, some of us just have to furlough to raise support.” There’s nothing special about missionaries compared with any other Christians, we all have the same commission and should all seek to serve, reach and build up.