Working a Job Where Jesus Is Least Known

A few months ago, my wife and I met three young adult women who had taken jobs in the country where we have lived for many years. They have one-year work contracts, but hope for them to be renewed. They love and follow Jesus. They want to live their lives with gospel intentionality. They have been able to connect to local ministry with a church and a team here. 

Their story encourages me, but it also brings me sadness. Because none of these women have a church who saw what they were doing as strategic for the gospel, and so didn’t function as sending churches for them.

But I know another couple from a church in the U.S. who had a growing desire to share Jesus and work among people in a gospel-deprived nation. They began work among these people in their own city. 

They started praying about whether the Lord might be calling them to accept a job transfer that would allow them to move their family and engage with a different culture. They sought out their pastor of missions and started the conversation about what it could look like if their church sent them. 

They specifically told him: “We want to be sent by our church.” They didn’t need financial support, but they desired prayer, care and strategic direction. In a few short months, the husband was approached by his company about taking a leadership role in one of their offices in Europe. It wasn’t exactly where they thought they would go, but this was an opportunity.

He accepted the job transfer and the couple entered the sending process with their church. They were assessed and given a personal development plan to prepare for their departure. This plan included reading, being mentored, receiving cross cultural training and putting together a prayer and care team.

They’ve been in the country for over two years. Their sending church regularly connects with them for accountability and care. They are part of a congregation in their new country that is engaged with missions. 

The wife volunteers many hours with a refugee ministry working with people who have never heard the gospel in their homeland, or in even their diaspora setting. They’ve had the opportunity to lead their new church on short-term trips and disciple people who have received the gospel.

This couple not only said, “Yes we want to live missionally as expats,” but also, “We want to be sent by our church and work alongside the church on the ground in helping engage people with the gospel.” 

How could you cultivate people like this who are sitting in your own congregation?

1. TEACH YOUR PEOPLE TO LIVE SENT

Teach church members that as followers of Jesus they are a sent one no matter their address. Disciple them for life here or there. Yes, some are called to be vocational missionaries in a different location, but the reality of people working all over the world and taking the gospel with them cannot be downplayed or ignored as an important strategy.

2. OPEN A VARIETY OF PATHWAYS FOR SENDING

Think beyond short-term trips or vocational missionaries that your church sends out. Mobilize study-abroad students, teachers, remote workers, entrepreneurs, people getting a transfer or finding a job with a global company. And don’t forget people in your church that are in the retirement years. All of these are potential pathways for engagement as a sending church.

As you create and implement your sending pipeline, make necessary adjustments for preparing people on an alternative pathway. This is not a replacement strategy for sending vocational missionaries. It is a “both/and” strategy and serves to deepen your church’s impact. You may need to adjust your expectations but do not adjust the way you send them. 

Hold them accountable in learning the language and culture. Help them find a good partner on the field. Assess them for pre-field readiness. Give them a development plan to prepare to be on the field. Pray and care for them as sent-ones from your own church.

3. CULTIVATE PARTNERSHIPS OPEN TO RECEIVING MARKETPLACE WORKERS 

Look where you are already partnering and even sending short-term teams. Are they open to receiving alternative pathway workers? Get to know a missionary partner or national partner and build a deep relationship. The receiving team needs to provide community, accountability and strategic direction.

These three steps can help your church have a wider and deeper impact in taking the gospel to where it has not been heard.

The church needs more Priscillas and Aquilas. In the book of Acts, this couple who were tentmakers by trade were also vital members of Paul’s missionary endeavors and key servants in the early churches. They leveraged their work and their lives for the sake of the gospel. May the church find ways to follow their example today.