Our missionaries with the Genesis initiative are nearing a year of service in Chihuahua, Mexico. We have already heard great reports from them and the district leaders about what God is accomplishing in that city.
We have now sent out teams to 14 strategic urban sites in the last decade. Some patterns have emerged, one of which is that, after 12-16 months, our missionaries tend to start asking important questions about how to transition all the relationships they have formed into a thriving, organized Church of the Nazarene within the next year. For some, this seems like a daunting and almost overwhelming task as they think of the limited time left in their host culture. For others, it serves as a time to re-focus energies and start to dedicate more time to intentional discipleship and leadership development.
I recently came across an email I wrote to two of our missionary teams who were planting churches during the pandemic. The effects of their great work in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala and Monterrey, Mexico can still be seen years later. I thought it would be good to reproduce that email here for a wider audience. There is much that I left unsaid, or that we dealt with through online conversations in the months after this. But it gives an idea of the missionary and church planting privilege that we have all been given.
What jumps out to you? What should I have said that isn’t there? If you have been involved in these early stages of starting a congregation, what advice would you give to current and future missionaries?
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Hello missionaries,
Congratulations – in the midst of a pandemic we have never seen in our lifetimes, you keep going. You have found creative ways to minister and have adapted to new technologies and methods of evangelism and discipleship. We are proud of you, and we thank God for your lives.
It’s incredible, but you have already completed 16 months in Monterrey and Quetzaltenango, that is, 2/3 of your total time. As the Genesis office, we are praying for you in these days, and for the churches that are being planted, new converts and leaders, etc. The pandemic has changed a lot, but our mission and objectives still continue. Remember to prioritize the following things urgently to ensure that “your fruit remains.”
1. Don’t stop sowing seeds or casting the net. By this date you should have hundreds of contacts and relationships you have made in the communities, and many have become Christians. But do not forget to have an evangelistic emphasis even in these last eight months. If you stop evangelizing, your new leaders will sense it and will likely forget to do it, too.
2. That said, more time than ever should be spent discipling new converts. This discipleship should be intentional and focused. It must produce discipling disciples, not just spiritually fed converts who produce little themselves.
3. From disciples, they must move to members. I have seen that some of you have received members in the past months. GLORY TO GOD. Just as you should be scheduling dates on the calendar to celebrate baptisms, you should also put dates on the agenda to receive members. These future appointments will produce a healthy urgency and will serve as a reminder for you to proceed in the steps necessary to organize a church.
4. Members must know early on (even before they become members) what it means to serve. In other words, you should be developing leaders. Who can learn to serve in missions, with youth, or teach a Sunday School class? Even in a pandemic, how can they be invested in so that the church and community are “rooted and grounded in love” and mission?
5. Work more than ever with the district, the Site Coordinator, and the brothers and sisters who will stay after you leave. Everything you build is beautiful, but it is built on sand and not rock if you are not intentionally involving others and equipping them to keep going with an urban, healthy, and missionary mentality.
From contacts to converts. From converts to disciples. From disciples to members. From members to leaders. This is how we end up organizing a church. I just sent in another email the parameters established by our region and denomination so that you can use them as a rule to measure how you are doing. But we also know that you aren’t factories that mass produce spirituality. All of this requires that the Holy Spirit be manifest in your communities and in the lives of your members and believers. HE produces the harvest. Therefore, depend on him in prayer more than ever. Work as a team and seek unity in the midst of conflict. We are with you and are doing the same. Move forward, servants of God. We love you and thank you for your work.
Scott Armstrong
Genesis Coordinator
Mesoamerica Region
Transform the Globe 
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