Recently, I asked Pastor Eric Nygren, the associate pastor at Bemidji EFC, to answer a few questions on the importance of having a mission strategy for his church. We led a missions strategy weekend at his church a few years ago and here is his response:
What did you learn at the mission strategy seminar?
Our Global Connections (missions) Team learned the value of concentrating on a few specific areas of focus. Like many churches, our missions focus was too broad. We were able to identify our highest missions’ priorities and develop a strategy to engage our whole church in these areas.
Who should come to a mission training event?
We not only had pastoral staff and members of our Global Connections Team at the event, but we also opened it up to anyone in our church interested in missions. This provided us with a variety of voices to help us discern and evaluate our church’s missions’ strategy.
How has your mission program changed since doing this seminar?
We frequently return to the decisions we made at the seminar. This has helped guide our decisions when we’ve considered new missionary partners. It has also helped guide our budgeting process with respect to financial support.
Why was this seminar important for your church?
This seminar gave us the opportunity to stop and think together about what our missions’ priorities really are and why our church does what it does in the area of missions. For our Global Connections Team, it helped to provide alignment and unity.
What about your church? Does your church have a focus or a mission strategy? Maybe, you don’t know where to begin or you have too many areas already. A missions strategy weekend could be helpful for your church! In a sense we lay down tracks for your church mission team to run on. Questions like, what shapes your mission ministry? What is your definition of missions? What big mission challenges do you have? What are key factors for setting mission priorities? Who should you support? How do you budget your mission funds? These questions will also help you write or update your mission policy.
We’d love to come for a weekend to help you answer these and other questions!
Blessings,
Steve Austvold