Crucial Role of Volunteers and Partners in CCCi’s Mission
Hang on, don’t judge this post entirely by first glance at the title. I don’t want to give the impression that the mission field is saturated and we do not need more full time missionaries on the field. That is not the case. In fact, here where I serve, if the Lord instantly doubled the number of staff on my team we could immediately put them all to work and still have mission critical tasks that we would be stretched to accomplish. The harvest is indeed plentiful and we indeed need more workers.
However, Campus Crusade for Christ as well as many other missions groups have started to put a new philosophy into practice. This philosophy hinges off of a key idea: “For I am with you . . . I have many people in this city.” Acts 18:10 Essentially, the Lord knows all of His workers yet they may never join our group as a full time missionary.
Can we accomplish our mission without workers who report directly to us in a chain of command? Is it possible to build His Kingdom without planting ministries all over the world which have our “brand name” on them?
Probably a better question is: What is Campus Crusade uniquely qualified to do that we can give away to the body of Christ – essentially leveraging our strengths to enable others to do Kingdom work on their turf?
Recently I heard a talk by Ken Cochrum – Global VP with CCC – on this topic and it’s many implications. You can read other things he has had to say about these topics here on his blog.
Let me give you on real life example which illustrates this new philosophy and how it can truly work:
Milan is a friend of mine who is a missionary with Athlete’s in Action – Campus Crusade’s sports ministry. Milan and his family live in Slovakia where he was born and where he came to know the Lord. His heart is to give every Slovak an opportunity to know Jesus via a platform – a common avenue – of sports. Great vision. And I must say Milan is a very humble, hard worker. Now let’s deal with the numbers and do a little reality check:
Slovakia is a country of 5.4+ MILLION people and is less than 2% Evangelical Christian. Milan serves on a team of two. Milan makes one and Tomas’ makes two. Athletes in Action does not have enough missionaries to send more than a couple to any one country. AIA has missionaries in about 75 different countries yet a in large majority of these countries there are at most 2 full time AIA missionaries to cover the entire country. So how do they ever have any hope of reaching all 5 Million?
Milan and team have been very creative in finding ways to expose mass numbers to Christ through sports venues AND to help connect new converts to local churches and discipleship. In fact, for the last several years, they have conducted Sports Clinics and Sports Camps which have exposed many thousands of people to Christ and built many dozen disciples. Their secret? They don’t do it themselves! – They train volunteers and partner with others.
This summer Milan has helped organize at least 22 different Sports Camps and venues which will connect people with the gospel through sports. My estimate is that these 22 sports camps will result in a minimum of 5,000 people having an opportunity to follow Christ. That is good news but even better news is the fact that a very high percentage of these 5,000 people will have contact afterwards with believers near them who can help build into their lives.
These 22 venues will be sponsored and run by at least 15 different Christian groups and organizations. Campus Crusade for Christ is just one among 14 others on the list. The others include local churches, other missions groups such as YWAM, Youth for Christ, and even a Roman Catholic private school. Milan helps train the volunteers but he lets them run the Sports Camps. Before and afterwards Milan provides further training, discipleship resources and organizational support to connect believers in community.
Must Milan give up some aspect of control to allow these other groups to run Sports Camps and follow up using their own methods? You bet! Will there be things that Milan – in some ways an expert on running Sports Camps – would do differently if he were in charge of each venue? Yes. Will there be communication problems amongst the various groups and won’t it be “messy?” Probably so. But is this a good way that Milan and team can see the Lord accomplish their goals of reaching the entire country in their lifetime? Yes!
This is a model that can be replicated in many countries. It is difficult to give up control but volunteers and partners can bring such lift and leverage to a small team that seeking them out is a no brainer. I look forward to putting this philosophy into practice as I help provide training in technology solutions.