Steve Van Zanen

Dear Harry,  Your concern for our missionaries, missions and the Church are deeply appreciated.  I do have to agree that you are a bit behind on this topic.  Actually, Home Missions church planters have had to raise most of the financial support for their church planting for quite some time.  World Missions career missionaries have had a goal to gather the majority of the worldwide average cost of a missionary since 1992.  At that time the Ministry Share system yielded about $5.5 million for CRWM.  Now more than twenty years later the Ministry Share system yields about $5 million.  If CRWM is going to have a growing impact on the world which needs Christ, it must seek new ways of gathering the financial resources needed.

You ask how many young people will commit themselves to mission service given the increased emphasis on developing a network of support.  I believe the answer is many more.  For the past twenty years CRWM has often had to turn aside people who have felt God's call to mission service, because there was not sufficient funding for new positions.  Meanwhile, many CRC people have gone into mission service with other organizations which require 100% support raising, plus an administrative fee of 15% or more.  Denominations which have made this shift in the past have substantially grown their mission force.  The PCA mission agency, serving a similar sized denomination, has a mission force many times our size. 

Many CRWM mission leaders did raise support for our overseas assignments.  Some served with agencies where 100% support raising was necessary.  However, CRC folk seem pretty reluctant to support office staff.  Most who had support networks overseas saw them shrivel once based in North America.  This is true even for people who spend substantial time overseas.  It seems that people want to support direct ministry.  Of course, many office staff are raising funds for ministry.  It just isn't in the name of the office staff person.

Hi Lou,

  We live in a very busy world.  The reports I get sometimes show that an article or blog post has been viewed 200 times without a single comment being left.  So the fact that there aren't a lot of posts doesn't mean that people aren't reading and thinking.  Many prefer to ponder, and we need to leave room for that.  There is more and more contact and cooperation across agency lines, but erasing those lines altogether is not quickly embraced, as you know.  There are a lot of issues.  Thanks for being engaged.  Steve 

The cost of doing all kinds of ministry has gone up.  No matter how wonderful historic methods of raising support for ministry were, or how deeply attached to them we are, we do have to address current realities and challenges.  This is what World Missions is attempting to do.  Interestingly, most of our missionaries have embraced the change as challenging but necessary. 

This video is excellent.  I'll be the first follower and say the Brian has given us a gem. 

Mariology remains a big issue.  We shouldn't dodge that reality.  So, I'm not saying that all is well.  I'm just observing that the amount of change in the last half century has been remarkable.

For more thoughts on the new Pope from retired missionary Adrian Helleman click here. 

 Here is something from Christianity Today on what can what cannot be expected from the new Pope. 

Just to clarify the Roman Catholic Church's position on this matter, the doctrine of papal infallibility only applies in very specific circumstances, and is rarely invoked.  Also, it is an innovation proclaimed by the First Vatican Council in 1870.  For a church that claims tradition as its authority, this is a big problem!  This is another important issue that remains between Catholics and everyone else, including the Eastern Orthodox, but this Pope is talking a lot about Jesus.