A foreign missions calling is "not" exclusively Western

“Chinese missionaries? I’m confused. They are serving in China, correct?”. I have heard this statement or similar ones on a number of occasions. It comes from the perception that Americans can be called to serve as foreign missionaries but everyone is called to stay put in their own backyard.
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This specific statement came about as I was sharing about a Chinese missionary team I recently met in the Middle East. This team is not in China. Instead, they are long-term missionaries serving in a foreign country learning Arabic. Why? To deliver the gospel to Arabic speakers.

I was also recently in McAllen, TX near the Texas-Mexico border visiting Seminario Bíblico Río Grande (Rio Grande Bible School). The majority of their students are from Latin America. One student approached me after one of my talks and said, “I’ve never been told what you shared. I didn’t know the global needs or that I could be involved. I have a lot to think about now”. This brother was told he needed to study at seminary to pastor his own people and that’s it. Today, he’s viewing his role as a future pastor as one who may be called to mobilize his own people to the nations as he pastors them, and not just to the Spanish speaking nations.

I love how God is moving His Church in every nation to go to every nation while they serve their own nation. Missions is the not the west going to the rest, as is so often implied in the west. The Great Commission is a command and calling for the whole church to fulfill, and not just in one’s own backyard. The whole Church globally, the west included, is called to be part of delivering the gospel to every nation. In fact, this is the only way the gospel will be delivered to all peoples.

As you pray for us at Silk Road Catalyst, remember to pray for our efforts to mobilize the Church in the Majority World like those in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. And, if you’d like to support our ministry to further enable us to do what God has called us to do, click here. Our partners enable us to serve by lowering us into the depths of spiritual darkness, delivering the gospel to those who live with the least access.