Mission Ministry

Practically everyone in the western world has heard of the man called St. Patrick. But hardly anyone knows anything about him. About the only two things that more people "know" about Patrick is that he was Irish and Roman Catholic. In truth, he was neither. He was British, and he belonged to the autonomous Celtic church. Although Patrick is the most famous person of his age, the real man has been buried in a cloud of myths

J.D. Greear considers Jesus’ radical call to give your life away to the greatest cause of all. To view your life from the perspective of eternity. To start making decisions now that you’ll be glad you made. It’s time to put your “yes” on the table and let God put it on the map.

The lives of many believers rarely escape the tight orbits that circle around their own schedules, their own interests. The familiar gravity of familiar places. But the trajectory of our faith should be one that's continually cycling outward, fueled by a mission and message that God first brought within reach of us, so that we can now join with him in taking it within reach of others. Authors Daniel L. Akin and Bruce Riley Ashford are calling today's church members to lives of going, going out with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Evangelism and missions are parts of the Christian life often accompanied by fears, insecurities, and cultural pressures. In this addition to the Union series, Daniel Hames and Michael Reeves argue that an individual's relationship with God influences their evangelism and missions more than anything else. Scripture clearly shows that a believer's responsibility is to make God known in the world, but this cannot be done without first knowing and enjoying God.

Steve Saint was five years old when his father, missionary pilot Nate Saint, was speared to death by a primitive Ecuadorian tribe. In adulthood, Steve, having left Ecuador for a successful business career, never imagined making the jungle his home again. But when that same tribe asks him to help them, Steve, his wife, and their teenage children move back to the jungle. There, Steve learns long-buried secrets about his father's murder, confronts difficult choices, and finds himself caught between two worlds.

Matthew Ellison and Denny Spitters call us to refocus our gaze on the gospel and the Great Commission. They assert that thinking must come before doing and must shape our world mission practices and priorities. When Everything Is Missions is for church and ministry leaders and all who look to clarify their own answers to questions like these: What is the mission of God? What is the mission of the Church? Is every Christian a missionary?

We live in a multicultural society. But Christians often do not know how to engage those of other faiths. As a result, many Christians hesitate to talk about Christianity with others in any kind of evangelistic way. Jay Moon and W. Bud Simon unpack the intercultural dynamics that Christians need to understand when encountering people from different communities and cultural backgrounds.

Discover how to navigate the motivations, expectations, sacrifices, and rewards of missional living. God thinks highly of you, esteems your uniqueness, and values your individuality. Whether He uses you at home or abroad, The Mind of a Missionary gives you the keys to thriving in your heavenly calling as you join God's redemptive mission.

From every side - the internet, social media, interactions with friends, in both their public and private lives - teens are persuaded to follow the world's way over God's every day. Culture's mantra "live for today" has become the slogan of this generation! But, one thing remains true - mom and dad are still the greatest influence in the life of their child. Based on timeless biblical truths, Raising Successful Teens equips parents with positive, encouraging, and practical advice.

When it comes to sharing our faith, we can make things more complex than they need to be. Simple evangelism offers practical ways to connect people to Gods amazing love. With three decades of outreach leadership, Kevin Harney provides tools that free you to set fear aside and walk boldly into the adventure of evangelism.

I Am N reminds us that we are each “n”, or ن ― the Arabic letter radical Muslims use to identify followers of Jesus the Nazarene. Wherever we live, we have fellowship with those persecuted for their Christian witness — just like the individuals found in this book. So come meet their families. Hear their stories. And deepen your faith in a God who calls us to follow Christ's example of enduring suffering in order to fulfill God's redemptive mission.

In Thom Rainer's latest book, he sets out to discover how churches that were once healthy but had stagnated in growth have broken out to become great churches impacting lives and entire communities.

Do you wish you had more qualified, committed, and mission-oriented leaders in your church to share the ministry workload? Do you have a passion for cultivating the God-given leadership gifts in others? Most pastors say that the need to identify and develop leaders is critical to the health and growth of their church, yet most churches do not have an intentional plan for doing this.

Marxists guerillas, right-wing paramilitary, and the Colombian government each have their own agenda. Who would have guessed a meeting of the minds would take place under the helpful auspices of communist Cuba? And that these battle-scarred leaders would give reporters and missionaries the opportunity to challenge some of their core philosophies and even pray with them?

What would charity look like if we, instead, measured it by its ability to alleviate poverty and needs? That is the question at the heart of Charity Detox. Drawing on his many decades of experience, Lupton outlines how to structure programs that actually improve the quality of life of the poor and disenfranchised. He introduces many strategies that are revolutionizing what we do with our charity dollars, and offers numerous examples of organizations that have successfully adopted these groundbreaking new models.

Why I Am Catholic traces Brandon Vogt’s spiritual journey that culminated in the realization that Catholicism was right about a lot of things and serves as a compelling reproposal of the Church for former Catholics; a persuasive argument for truth and beauty to those who have become jaded and disenchanted with religion; and at the same time offers practicing Catholics a much-needed dose of confidence and clarity to affirm their faith against an increasingly skeptical culture.

This revolutionary yet practical book addresses the causes of burnout many Christians face and empowers them to join God in a joy-fueled movement of Jesus! Vibrancy and joy are what Christians are promised. Yet, many have experienced the opposite: a guilt-ridden, duty-based, judgmental culture that has left them still searching for the life Jesus promised.

Pursuing his calling with singleness of vision, John Wesley defied the strength of angry mobs and longstanding traditions to offer the hope of Christ to millions of people who were outside the influence of the churches of the day. Passionate and tireless, this Anglican clergyman rode a quarter of a million miles on horseback during his lifetime, stopping to preach more than forty thousand sermons in open fields, churches, and barns.

The primary mission of the church is to glorify God by blessing all peoples of the world through the gospel of Jesus Christ. The Great Commission’s task of global disciple-making is the most ambitious project ever undertaken. Given the scale and complexity of global missions, it’s no wonder that misconceptions abound, even among invested, godly people.

The winners of the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for international reporting tell the astonishing story of Mary Clarke. At the age of 50, Clarke left her comfortable life in suburban Los Angeles to follow a spiritual calling to care for the prisoners in one of Mexico's most notorious jails. She actually moved into a cell to live among drug kingpins and petty thieves. She has led many of them through profound spiritual transformations in which they turned away from their lives of crime, and she has deeply touched the lives of all who have witnessed the depth of her compassion.