Monthly Archives: July 2022

Care Teams for Sent-Ones

Care Teams are the most tangible expression of our church’s commitment to support our missionaries who are serving in cross-cultural environments. The team is centered around one team leader and can be made up of 3-8 individuals who provide on-going care and support. They serve as a primary link between the church as a whole and the missionary.

Simply put, a care team is a group of people who deeply love and care for their missionary unit. They communicate, pray for and stay connected to their missionary unit on a regular basis. Because of these strong personal relationships, the missionaries can be open and honest, allowing his or her team to see needs and share successes and defeats.

What Is the Vision for a Care Team?

There are two major roles of every Care Team: care and representation. The success of the care team depends on its ability to accomplish these two goals from the time that the missionary unit prepares to leave for the field until his or her return.

Care 

Many missionaries minister in physically challenging environments. Some are raising children far from extended family. Others struggle with cultural adjustments and language barriers. Most significantly, all serve on the front lines of spiritual warfare. For survival and spiritual health, every missionary unit needs the assurance that they are not alone, that there are others in the body of Christ who love them and are committed to their welfare and to the success of their work. Missionaries need empathetic listeners and caring friends who are not in a supervisory role. The Care Team can consistently provide that kind of spiritual and emotional care. Caring also involves identifying specific needs which the team can meet or organize others in the church to meet.

Representation

The Care Team also champions the missionary and his or her work to the church body and advocates for ongoing participation in their ministry even when he or she is far away. Thanks to the efforts of the Care Team, the church feels an ongoing sense of connection to our workers.

What Does a Care Team Look Like?

We have intentionally kept the structure of our Care Teams simple. The foundation of each Care Team is the team leader. He/She is the one who has the main connection with the missionary unit and leads the team in all aspects. The team leader either already knows the missionary deeply or commits to build a deep relationship. The rest of the team is built under the leadership of this committed person.

Each Care Team will look different. Some will have a team leader with 6-8 additional people on the team while others will have a leader with just one or two additional people on the team. Both types of teams can serve as great care networks for our missionaries.

Depending on the team members’ season of life, people may need to step out of their Care Team. We ask however that team leaders commit to the missionary full term (2-4 years) and/or be willing to replace themselves in this role if needed.

What Does a Care Team Do?

Meet Monthly

Teams can meet at anytime and anywhere; we just ask that each team meet once a month to fulfill their role as advocates. We suggest that you build a team around a missional group that already exist in the church. For example, Sunday School Class members, Prayer group, Life Group, Community group, etc.

Pray

The main role of a Care Team is to pray monthly as a team and on an individual basis. We also ask that you hold your missionaries accountable to regularly update their prayer requests.

Stay Connected

Ask any missionary and they will tell you that they rarely stay connected with their friends and church family back home. Part of providing care to missionaries is the commitment to stay connected. Your missionary unit should hear from you at least once a month. This can happen through emails, Zoom, handwritten letters or any number of creative ways. Make sure this is part of your team meeting.

Send Care Packages

Nothing says I love you to a missionary quite like a box full of ranch dressing mix, chocolate and a few good books! Care Teams will send at least two care packages a year to their missionary unit. Perhaps the church can help with the cost of shipping two packages each year with hopes of your team sending a few more packages using personal funds, if possible.

Help with Departure and Arrival

Some of the hardest times for your missionary unit will be preparing to leave for the field and returning home for a stateside visit. There are a thousand things that need to be done and we ask that your team jump in and help as much as possible.

How Do We Get Started?

Here are three things to do to get your Care Team started:

Email the Team

Once the team leader is in place, he/she can email others on the team or start recruiting for the team. Get everyone on an email list and start communicating with one another.

Email your Missionary

The team leader needs to email the missionary and let them know their Care Team is forming. Ask for prayer requests and invite the missionary unit to the first meeting via Zoom.

Meet as a Team

Set a date for your first meeting. Pick a home to meet in and share a meal with one another. During this meeting make sure you get to know each other, pray for the missionaries and if possible, talk to your missionary unit on Zoom. Also make sure you set up a regular time and place to meet.

It’s Christmas Backpack Time!!

It’s that time of year again – halfway to the Christmas season.  Has your church committed to fill Christmas Backpacks for needy children?  With temperatures in the 90s, it’s hard to think about Christmas, but the collection date for Christmas Backpacks is only 3 months away.     

Statistics show that only 4 states have a higher percentage of children living in poverty than Kentucky.  For these children, Christmas does not always come with gifts, like it does for others.  A Christmas backpack filled with food, clothing, hygiene items, school supplies, toys, and a Gospel witness brings a smile on a lot of children’s faces.  It will bring a smile on your face too, just knowing you have helped to provide a needy child with a special Christmas gift.     

The KBC Missions Mobilization Team has been preparing for the Christmas Backpack Initiative since January.  Applications requesting backpacks have come in from ministries across the state and many churches have committed to fill backpacks.  If your church has not already done so, it’s not too late to get on board. 

Instructions for filling the backpacks can be found at www.kybaptist.org/backpacks.  There you will find a promotional video, bulletin insert, poster, the “Christmas Story” leaflet, and the link to register your backpacks.  Be sure to print copies of the leaflet to put in each backpack. 

Another good idea is to print extra copies of the “Christmas Story” leaflet and share with girls and boys in your neighborhood, at the grocery, in your family, and even children in your church.  It is a great Gospel witness.

Let’s work together to exceed the goal of collecting 10,000 backpacks from Kentucky Baptist churches! Many of the backpacks collected will be distributed directly to children living in poverty in Kentucky, while others will go to needy children in our partner SEND City, Cincinnati.  Collection date is October 24-28 so please respond soon and join us in making a difference in a child’s life this Christmas and, very possible, for eternity.

If you have questions please email the Missions Mobilization office at [email protected] or call 606-875-3079.  Thank you for helping a child this Christmas season.

“Let’s not neglect to do good and share what we have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.” Hebrews 13:16

The Blessing of Serving

The Bible is full of illustrations of numerous people who served the Lord for the sake of the gospel. Jesus Himself came not to be served but to serve. (Luke 22:24-27). Jesus was our greatest example of servanthood, but we find many more such as: Paul, Peter, Andrew, Barnabas, Timothy, Mary, and the list goes on. Each one of these had a different personality and giftedness and expressed it in their unique way.


It reminds me of the words Peter, “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” (1 Peter 4:10-11).

As I think about the blessing of serving, four things come to mind.

Serving Requires Sacrifice.
Any time we serve others, it requires a sacrifice on our part in some way. It may be our time, our resources, our finances, our talents, our abilities, or in other ways. It will always take effort and sacrifice when serving others.

Serving Removes Self.
When we serve others, our attention shifts from self to others. Our focus is turned to the one of whom we are serving rather than on ourselves. It develops a completely different focus and purpose. Rather than always seeking to serve our own needs, we discover we find joy in serving and caring for others.

Serving Reveals the Savior.
We are no more like Christ than when we are serving others. Isn’t that what He came to do? Wasn’t that the whole focus on His ministry? And ultimately, He served us by providing our salvation through His death on the cross. He sacrificed. He focused on others. Our sacrificial serving others models the ministry of Jesus. May we serve so others will see Jesus.

Serving Releases the Spirit.
When we are willing to sacrifice in some way, focus our attention on others rather than ourselves, and truly desire to reveal the Savior, the Spirit of God is released to show us great and mighty things. How many times have we learned we are not in control, but He is? He will orchestrate things, moments, situations, conversations and more to show us more of Him. And we simply stand in awe.

As I watch the Kentucky Baptist Disaster Relief volunteers, they model the ministry of Jesus. They so often sacrifice their time, resources, abilities, vacations, and more because they love to serve. The reason they love to serve, is they have experienced the blessing of serving.

They realize when the focus is no longer on self and now focused on the Savior, the power of the Holy Spirit is released to show us amazing things. Life changing moments. Eternal differences.

Learn how you too can become a Kentucky Disaster Relief volunteer at www.kybaptist.org/dr.

The Work

The day of Stephen’s death was the day that a “great persecution began against the church in Jerusalem” (Acts 8:1).  As the first known martyr of the Christian church, God used the “blood of martyrs as the seed for the church” (Tertullian).  As persecution spread, so too, did the early church and the gospel with them. The gospel spread north and eventually west of Jerusalem, lodging powerfully in the city of Antioch (Acts 11:19-26).  It is in this city that the disciples of Jesus were first called Christians (Acts 11:26).

IMB photo.

Perhaps the second most influential church in the New Testament next to Jerusalem is Antioch, located about 300 miles north of Jerusalem near the Mediterranean Sea.  The church at Antioch was a mission-sending, mission-participating congregation.  The DNA of this first-century church flowed with making disciples of all nations.  From the outpost of Antioch, the Holy Spirit sent out Barnabas and Saul (Paul) on what we refer to as Paul’s missionary journeys (Acts 13:1-3). 

Notably, this church places a premium on worshipping and seeking the Lord (Acts 13:2).  While the church of Antioch is filled with robust leaders—Barnabas, Simeon (Niger), Lucius, Manaen, and Saul, the Holy Spirit says, “Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul to the work to which I have called them” (Acts 13:2).

But what was “the work” to which the Holy Spirit had called them?  If Acts 1:8 is the theme of the book, then our answer lies within that passage.  In short, Jesus calls the apostles to make disciples of all nations in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth.  This work of disciple making to which Jesus calls the apostles is extended to the church as we see the gospel spread from Jerusalem and beyond.

Their work is our work.  The work of all churches is to make disciples of all nations among whomever we can and wherever we are.  Some recent gospel “workers” serving in another country had to leave their place of work for another place of work.  In reflection about that move, they affirmed, “God called us for the work, not for a place or a people.  He called us for the work to ‘make disciples of all nations’ (Matthew 28:19).  Whatever changes we may experience in the world or in our life, and wherever we may find ourselves to be, may we do the work God has called us to do!”   

IMB photo

The church at Antioch understood the work God had called them to—that of making disciples locally and globally.  This work is not easy work, and at times, our location of the work and the people to whom we are working among will change, but the work remains the same.  We are to work at making disciples of all peoples wherever and to whomever God sends us.  May the DNA of the church at Antioch be in us all, until our work on earth is done.