The Relationship between Pastors and Missionaries #1 is a friendly heads up for pastors who are dealing with their missionaries. This is basically about the relationship between a supporting church/pastor and their missionary.
In this article, I am not really going to address the process of a missionary candidate looking for support from a church, but after that relationship has already been established.
I do not know of missionaries who are so deluded as to think churches will send them money without them reporting back to those churches. Maybe there are some out there like that, but I would think that they would have financial problems and have to return to the states in the near future.
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Changes of Pastor
So there is an unwritten law that missionaries have to report what is going on to their supporters. Naturally, you say. But over the 40 some years that I have been a missionary, I have had many churches (more after Covid) that simply give me no clue as to what is going on with them (the supporting church). It is an absolute law that when a church loses their pastor, that when a new pastor takes over, that new pastor should introduce himself (with his email) to all the churches missionaries.
While a missionary can understand that a church that loses its pastor may not have people knowledgeable (have the email addresses) of how to advise their missionaries, but once the new pastor comes in, he should be able to find out this information. If a church has a secretary, a single request to the secretary from the pulpit committee should get the information that “brother so-and-so has left” and then another when “brother so-and-so is the new pastor.”
But my point is, it is very discouraging to find out that you as a missionary have been writing to a pastor that left over a year back, and nobody lets you in on the new one.
Financial problems.
While many pastors think that financial problems are embarrassing, and they are alone in the world with that problem, many times missionaries know about these things simply because they communicate with several dozen different pastors over the years. They see trends from mentions by these pastors.
The first thing you have to always remember as a pastor is that the missionary is wanting money from your church. They have no right to “demand” anything. I, as a missionary, understand that a small country church with a pastor that works a secular job is strained to give anything to missions. I do not want to stress that point on them. “They missed a month” for example.
But as a matter of courtesy, a supporting pastor should be extremely clear with the missionary, “our church is giving you x amount of dollars per x period” (monthly, bimonthly, or quarterly). The missionary will basically figure it out over time, but it is a nice courtesy when the pastor clarifies that point.
Moreover, it is even more essential when the church decides to change that relationship in any manner. For example, if the church decides to raise a missionary’s support, an email is greatly appreciated. Also, if for one month, a special gift came in for the missionary, that would be nice to know. If the regular monthly support is $100, and somebody gives $25 extra to each of the missionaries, a note on the check would be wonderful “$25 of this is a special offering“.
I do not know how other missionaries finances work, because none have ever shared their finances with me, but for my part, you learn that there are “lean months” and there are “good months”. For example, one supporter may give once every 3 or 4 months, and that is a big donation. But the other months are more leaner months. So what you have to do is hold back some of that support in your bank, and spend it on the leaner months. Car repairs, tax payments, medical bills, all cause any month to be a “lean month”.
But the missionary has to do some planning, or tighten their belts on some months, and some of that can be seen ahead, while other things cannot. It is extremely helpful to the missionary if they understand what the financial situation is in their supporting churches. He does not need all the details of financial problems, but it is extremely nice and courteous when a church with financial problems simply says, “we are having some financial problems, so we will not be able to send support for the next 6 months“. When it looks like they are going to be able to send again, tell your missionary that, and if they are going to have to cut support or cut support completely for you as a missionary, it would be nice to know that. Especially nice if, say months ahead of that decision, the missionary is advised that they are dealing with it, and he possibly will be dropped.
On a business level, this is courtesy. But on another level, missionaries (at least I do) pray for their supporting churches. When I know that a church is having attendance problems and financial problems, I pray for them. My wife and I have daily prayer, sometimes various times in the same day, and we would want to pray for our supporters, because they have become family to us.
Health Issues with the Supporting Pastor
As a human, I understand that people get sick, sometimes they get well, and it was just the flu, but sometimes these sicknesses are very difficult and dangerous. It is very well received by us when pastors of our supporting churches advise us of their sicknesses (and the situation if it gets better), so we can pray for them. At times, when severe enough, I have mentioned these requests in our prayer time for our church on the field.
But the point is, prayer works, right? If we believe that, then we will want interested people in our lives to also be praying for us. We cannot do that unless we know what is going on.
Birthdays, Anniversaries, etc. (Personal stuff)
I have a life here on the mission field. I have my family, and my wife has hers. Our parents and siblings all get sick and die. We have children. Their lives are part of our life. Frankly, I do not expect that our supporting churches understand all the relationships of our lives, but occasionally things do come up. My wife’s sister had cancer and died, and my wife went to help with her sisters for a month or so. As a missionary, I mentioned that with an explanation in one of our prayer letters. It is nice when a supporting church prays for this kind of thing.
But birthday, anniversaries, high school graduation etc. are not really something that I am discouraged if my supporting churches do not remember them. It is a nice touch if they do, but it is not essential.
On this matter, I would also mention that we expect our supporters to read our prayer letters. It is hurtful if we mention a prayer request for months, and we visit a supporting church, and they know nothing about that. We have been in the states, and I have “dropped in” on one of our supporting churches, and it is very discouraging, when I tell an usher that “we are the Coxes, one of your missionaries,” and he says “who?” No name recognition at all. It is even worse when I introduce myself to the pastor (whose church has been supporting us for years), and he is clueless too.
Being Friendly
Perhaps the point should be that the relationship between pastor and missionary should be friendly. As friends, they should know a little about each other, and at least a little bit of keeping up with each other. With phones that really don’t have expensive long distance bills and email, it takes very little effort to keep in touch. A simple email, “Hi, this is happening with us, how are you?”
While on this subject, it is especially encouraging when we as missionaries have some special project going on, and mention that in a prayer letter, and a pastor of a supporting church simply takes an extra offering and sends that to us. I know that it is not always possible, and many times it may be just $20 or so, but the thought that somebody on the other end of my prayer letter is praying and reading it is very encouraging. Some churches have even mentioned to me in an email that our request or our ministry was mentioned in the Sunday AM pastoral prayer last week, and that was very encouraging to our hearts.
The Relationship between Pastors and Missionaries #1
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