What is ‘Christian Missions’?
Pt. 2, “What is calling?”
by John Ambrose
In the last article, I argued that it is helpful to have some centralized vocabulary for who exactly is and is not a missionary.
Hopefully, you are comfortable, at least for the sake of these four articles, to agree to using this definition:
A missionary is someone who takes the gospel of Jesus to a culture that is not their own, often learning a language that is not native to them to plant churches, ideally amongst an unreached people.
The Meaning of “Calling”
Now to further answer the question – “What is a missionary calling?”
If a missionary is someone who goes (in a specific way, to a specific place), then how are they called?
There is a worrisome assumption that a missionary’s calling is better and more unique than, say, the “calling” to be a gas station attendant.
As a missionary (past tense and, Lord-willing, future tense), I have gotten the question many times about how I was called to leave everything behind for a life of service to Jesus in a foreign country.
It reminds me of the story of Nik Ripken. In his books, The Insanity of God and The Insanity of Obedience, he describes a telling moment in front of the mission’s board. They ask his wife how she was called to serve in Africa. She answers about “God’s pull on her heart for the African people” (this is my summary based on how Christians tend to talk). When the same question was narrowed at him, he responds that he read these words in the New Testament:
“And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Mt. 28:18-20)
The people representing this mission’s agency thought Nik was joking. He was not.
My answer to this same question is one step removed – “I love Jesus. He said that we should pray for laborers to be sent to the harvest of souls because they are few. If I am capable, I should go.” My assumption is that all Christians ought to start from the idea that they are “called” to be cross-cultural missionaries.
A Biblical Look at “Calling”
Let’s think about the word “called”. There are two primary words in the New Testament which are translated “called”. They are very similar in the Greek (klētos and kaleō). One is used ten times and the other, which more closely matches what we would consider standard the standard definition of “call”, is used 150 times.
Though there are smarter people than me who have put more work and writing into these two words, for our purposes here, this is the summary I have come up with for the (soteriological) definition of calling – It is God’s desire that all will hear His call for salvation (e.g. Mt. 22:3,4; cf. 2 Pet. 3:9). However, He will select only some to respond and be called into eternal life (Mt. 22:14). At that point, He calls all of His people to be holy (e.g. 1 Pet. 1:15) and specifically calls some to certain tasks (eg. Mk 1:20; 1 Cor. 1:1, etc.).
The Caller Has a Voice
This is all good so far. In fact, that last line above – “calls some to certain tasks” – could be the perfect scenario for someone to be called as a missionary. Unfortunately, it seems that God’s unique calling (into the role of “Apostle,” for example) is a actual, vocal calling. Abram was called by God (Heb. 11:8). The disciples were called by Jesus (Mt. 4:21). Jesus called Paul as an Apostle (e.g. Rom. 1:1; cf. Acts 9:4) and called to be a missionary (Acts 13:2). All of these should be considered literal, audible calls from God and Jesus.
Do you see the problem? God used to speak audibly, in-person or through His prophets. Now He chooses to speak through His Word (that is, Jesus and the testimonies about Him called the New Testament; see Heb. 1:1-2).
This is not a hard-and-fast rule, but in general we should all be able to agree that God currently chooses to not audibly speak to His people. I do not believe that anything God has done should ever be considered “ended”. He gets to choose what He does, when and how. He seems (according to Heb. 1) to have chosen to speak in the definitive way that we can call the written Word.
So then, no one can be called to be a missionary of Jesus? Incorrect. In fact, even if we hold to the audibly-spoken-calling rule, I will still argue that people today are called to be missionaries.
The Voice Speaks Today
Here’s how it works. Jesus said, “I have all authority. So go and tell other people. Teach them how to follow and obey me.” That was as audible as it gets.
There was a definitive dark cloud over the first 250 years of Protestantism that said, “We will not be like the Catholics. So we will not send out people to start world-wide monasteries.” We failed. We failed to do missions for two hundred and fifty years (the Moravians are one of few exceptions)! Until William Carey stood up and said, “Hey... I think the commands of Jesus are still applicable to us today and here’s why...” (You can read his Enquiry to get the details. Also know that he was rebuked for thinking that we were responsible for the “heathens” hearing the gospel of Jesus.)
But after the Scriptures and some faithful Protestants made it clear that Jesus’ command still applies today, we can now make the argument that every individual Christian is called to obey this (think also of Paul’s command in 2 Tim. 2:2 which makes a chain that will eventually lead to us).
The question then becomes, “Why don’t all Christians go to other nations to make followers of Jesus?” In fact, I must insist that a proper view of the Christian calling is not “Am I called?” or, “Am I called to ministry?” but rather, “Am I called to ministry where I live now or in another place?” The only biblical reason a Christian has for staying where they are is that “all nations” includes the nation that a person is born into. Where you are called and what you are called to do is merely dependent on how you have been uniquely gifted to bless the Church. There is no question of “if”.
I’ll finish with a bold statement: After realizing how the Holy Spirit has gifted them, every Christian must decide where to minister based on the world’s need for the gospel.
I will explain the term “unreached” in the next section to support this conclusion – a person’s choice to stay in their native country should not be assumed, but rather be brought out by how they interpret their role in verses like Luke 10:2, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore, pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”
As the artist Andy Mineo says, “What if I’m the answer for things that I pray?” (from the song “Nobody’s Coming”).