Church-Based Evangelism: Distinguishing the Mission Field of There

Distinguishing the mission field of there is much simpler than the mission field of here. Determining what the mission field of here comes down to whether a new believer “lands” and is being discipled in your local church. The previous article, Distinguishing the Mission Field of Here, described three factors for determining whether a place and its people are included in the mission field of here: distance, government lines, and cultural lines. If you and your church have done the hard work of knowing what the mission field of here is, then the mission field of there is already given to you, because the mission field of there is everywhere else. Anyone or anywhere that is not in the mission field of here is the mission field of there, because every church and every church member is to be a missionary both here and there. As the mission field of here is emphasized, the mission field of there ought to be emphasized as well. Emphasizing the mission field of there is a major part of creating a culture of evangelism in your church.

While the mission field of there is considerably easier to distinguish, it is harder for churches and church leaders to find it as urgent as the mission field of here, especially for a revitalizing church. As a pastor of a revitalizing church, I know the temptation (from Satan) to think that once the church is revitalized and the mission field of here is adequately handled, then the church can go to the mission field of there. If Church-Based Evangelism were a pragmatic, church-growth methodology, then those thoughts would be correct. A church, in desperate need to grow, would focus on the mission field of here if the point was to see numerical growth in that church. But that’s not the point of Church-Based Evangelism; the point is for churches to evangelize. The mission field of there is not a competing mission field to here. The mission is the same in either location; the harvesting is the same; the difference is which barn it goes into.

A similar thought is that the mission field of there is something for big churches, denominations, or conventions. Or you, as a church member, may think that the mission field of there is for the church members who are multilingual and have the budget to travel. Yet, as shown in The Need for A New Approach to Evangelism, the Great Commission is for every church and every church member. There’s not an “if” in the Great Commission. Jesus does not say that if a church is small and has a small budget, it is only expected to take the gospel to its immediate region. Jesus does not say that if a church member can only speak English or has a limited budget, they are exempt from the fullness of the Great Commission. As much as your church is responsible for taking the gospel to the house across the street from the church building, your church is also responsible for taking the gospel to the bush of Madagascar. The mission field of there is for your church.

The starting point of adopting and emphasizing the mission field of there, though, does not begin with a missions offering, a budget allocation, or even a mission trip. It starts with understanding that other New Testament (Baptistic) churches are teammates, not competitors. Another way to understand this is to see other New Testament churches as embassies of the same kingdom. Every embassy of a nation has a distinct mission and purpose, yet they all represent the interests of the same nation. Likewise, every New Testament church has a distinct mission field of here, but the work is for the same kingdom. Whenever a church enters its mission field of there, it is likely entering another church’s mission field of here. When that happens, partnership, cooperation, and teamwork ought to take place. This is true for the New Testament church in Africa and for the one that is a neighborhood over. Nothing will kill a church’s zeal for evangelism like a competitive attitude, because the reality is that if a church is evangelizing as it ought to, it will water someone else’s plant. If a church cares about the mission field of there, it will likely be through sacrifice so another church can have life. And that is a good thing.

Following this understanding, emphasizing the mission field of there does not move to giving or planning a mission trip, but rather to prayer and exposure. The mission field of here has a major advantage in the ability to emphasize over the mission field of there: exposure. Your church knows what is constantly going on in the mission field of here because it lives in that community. The mission field of there is "out of sight, out of mind." And if something is "out of sight," it is often out of prayer. For a church to care about the mission field of there, pray for that field and the harvesters in it. Since the mission field of there is literally everywhere else in the world, there are plenty of places and people to pray for. In light of understanding that other churches are teammates, not competitors, it would be wise to begin by praying specifically for other churches as a church. These can be churches in different cities, states, or even countries, or they can be churches just a short drive away. Then, pray for nations. At Range Hills Baptist Church, our missions committee tasks me with researching and reporting on a different nation each month, including how lost that nation is and the gospel witness there, so that the church can pray for that nation. Last, pray for missionaries. If you are a Southern Baptist, you can request to be put in contact with an IMB missionary, and your church can pray for that missionary by name.

Continuing to emphasize the mission field of there still does not require giving or mission trips, nor does it require learning a language or even leaving your home. This is because the mission field of there can be found on the internet. During my first semester at Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary, I needed to find opportunities to evangelize because of the practical missions requirement. As I searched for these opportunities, I found a free app that formats itself as a modern pen pal service, and I began using it to evangelize. I am unsure how many people I have evangelized on the app since downloading it, but in one week I shared the gospel with 12 people in 11 countries, many of whom are in the 10-40 window. And I did it all in English. This is just one of the ways the gospel can be taken to the nations through the internet. Affinity groups that used to be local have moved to Facebook groups, where friendships can be made, and the gospel can be shared. This does not diminish the need for missionaries and churches in the mission field of there, but the hurdle of getting the gospel to the mission field of there is not as high as it used to be. Revealing this to church members is a great way to help them envision evangelism beyond the mission field of here.

After these things, a church can then emphasize the mission field of there through mission giving and mission trips. Giving and going are massively important to the work of the kingdom. The giving and going of a church ought to be intentional, though, and ought to arise from these preceding emphases. When the mission field of there is emphasized, a natural outcome will be a greater care and evangelization of the mission field of here. Dr. Tom Hatley once told me, “If you take care of God’s kingdom, He’ll take care of your church.” When the thing a church cares about is the gospel being taken to the lost, then the Lord will give ample opportunity to evangelize so that you can bring the harvest into your own barn.

One of the best examples of a church that emphasizes the mission field of there is Immanuel Baptist Church in Rogers, Arkansas, pastored by Dr. Tom Hatley, who also serves on the Conservative Baptist Network board of directors. If you would like to be connected with Dr. Hatley and cultivate your church into being a going church, email info@conservativebaptistnetwork.com.

This article is written by Klayton Carson, pastor at Range Hills Baptist Church in Memphis, Tenn.