Ask a Missionary - Catch The Fire

church. Your home church needs to know how important it is for
them to stay involved and to communicate with you.
Answer from Barbara in Tulsa, who served for five years as a missionary in
Israel, Russia, and India.
A:
Because our church has learned that
missionaries need an agency.
We decided to send our missionaries directly to other countries
without the help of an agency. Looking back, we were quite naive.
We thought that sending people for longer terms would not involve
any challenges different from short terms. We were wrong.
We first sent two women to Panama. Immediately we encountered
numerous complicated background checks and bureaucratic
paperwork to acquire their visas. Then we needed to consider where
to secure medical insurance and a pension plan.
We also sent my grown son to minister in Ecuador. He coordinated
our incoming short-term teams. One day while he was
traveling on a bus, bandits hijacked the bus and forced everyone
out for a couple of hours. While we were thankful that no one was
hurt, we realized that we could encounter an even more difficult
political upheaval. We knew that if our missionaries were ever taken
hostage, we lacked the expertise to deal with foreign governments
or terrorists.
We decided that we indeed needed mission agencies through
which to send our people. Agencies offer the church wise placement
of workers, expertise on the field, and contacts in the host country.
So we earnestly began looking for agencies willing to partner with
us. We found one in particular that is proving to be an excellent fit. It
has also developed ways for missionaries to receive quality training
in shorter stints, closer to home.
I would encourage the church that is considering sending longer-term
missionaries without an agency’s help to exercise extreme
caution. Such a church is shouldering a tremendous responsibility
48 | Ask a Missionary