Postings

2021

• Improve Your Church’s Missions Health / July ’21: 8 assessment areas and a realistic plan to growth
• 5 Critical Times / June ’21: When your missionary needs your church’s care
• Leading While Busy / May ’21: Four church missions leaders discuss how they do it
• Pack an Online Missions Punch / Apr. ’21: Learn from the missions pages of these four church websites
• Caring for National Partners / Mar. ’21: How Western churches can help them flourish
• Wise Accountability / Feb. ’21: Assessments that help missionary and ministry thrive
• Don’t Get On The Plane Until/ Jan. ’21: Benefiting from the short-term trip pause

2020

• Best Missions Books of 2020 / Dec. ’20: Readers recommend this year’s “must reads”
• Because Of, Not In Spite Of / Nov. ’20: Missions gifting may come wrapped in disability
• Wise Missions Stewardship / Oct. ’20: How 3 churches approach global ministry funding
• Increase Your Impact / Sept. ’20: Power up your focus by tapping more of your church’s God-given potential
• Maintain Your Momentum / Aug. ’20: 25 ways to move church missions forward during COVID…and 8 types of people who might do it
• Start Learning Here / July ’20: A missions 101 resource list for churches’ global outreach leaders
• Transforming Friendships / June ’20: How one church’s international relationships taught them to be faithful friends
• Extracting Pandemic Value / May ’20: Church leaders uncover some initial COVID-19 benefits
• Missionary Retirees / Apr. ’20: How churches help them retire well
• Missions Distractions / Mar. ’20: Don’t let your leadership team get sidetracked and miss high-impact priorities
• Discontinuing Missionary Support / Feb. ’20: Making tough decisions for wise stewardship
• The Special Role of a Missionary’s Friend / Jan. ’20: Don’t underestimate this behind-the-scenes-service

2019

• Best Missions Books of 2019 / Dec. ’19: Readers recommend this year’s “must reads”
• Hindus / Nov. ’19: Has God put an unreached people group literally next door?
• Deeper-Impact Dialogs / Oct. ’19: Essential post-missions-trip conversations
• Parents of Missionaries / Sept. ’19: Serving missionaries by caring for their parents
• Beating the Elijah Syndrome / Aug. ’19: Antidotes for discouragement in church missions leadership
• Senior Pastor Perspective / July ’19: What does global passion look like from the leader’s chair?
• Church/Agency Marriages / June ’19: Rethinking how to work together well
• Sending Harmony / May ’19: Merging missionary and sending-church expectations
• Life Stages and Missions / April ’19: A tool to engage every decade’s global potential
• Disrupt Your Missions Budget Thinking / March ’19: How to approach your missions budgeting with fresh perspective
• New Neighbors / Feb. ’19: Two churches’ hard work serves the strangers among us
• Afterglow or Transformation? / Jan. ’19: Churches extend the impact of conferences like Urbana and Cross

2018

• Best Missions Books of 2018 / Dec. ’18: Readers recommend the year’s “must reads”
• Serving Our Missionaries / Nov. ’18: Providing the excellence our workers deserve
• Are We Serving Orphans? / Sept. ’18: How churches are transitioning to best-practice care
• Trust God for More / Aug. ’18: Setting goals to expand your church’s global impact
• Beyond! / July ’18: One Church’s Strategic Global Plan
• Missions Essentials / June ’18: Do you have a core missions message for your church?
• Worker Transitions / May ’18: Best practices for agencies, churches, and missionaries
• …And then God Created Businesspeople / April ’18: An interview with Greg Fritz on why honoring businesspeople will change missions
• A New Kind of Missionary / March ’18: Releasing your church’s global Influencers
• Reframing our View of Poverty / Feb. ’18: For local and global impact
• Bridging the Vision Gaps / Jan. ’18: Connecting the church to passion and purpose

2017

• Best Missions Books of 2017 / Dec. ’17: Mobilizers recommend this year’s “must reads”
• Sending-Church Dilemmas / Nov. ’17: Churches and global workers wrestle with sending issues
• Build Prayer Power! / Oct. ’17: Action steps for a 21st century praying church
• Your Partnership Coupler / Sept. ’17: Every global partnership needs an excellent field facilitator
• Dangerous Shortcuts / Aug. ’17: Beware of hazardous missions temptations
• In-Person Care–Part 2 / July ’17: Field Retreats and Crisis Care
• In-Person Care–Part 1 / June ’17: Regular, on-field worker support
• Start Here / May ’17: First steps to ministry with least-reached peoples
• Filling Global Gaps / Apr. ’17: A targeted approach to finding global workers
• Story Force / Mar. ’17: Two churches employ the power of global narratives
• Stuck / Feb. ’17: How to overcome five church missions impasses
• Successfully Riding Change / Jan. ’17: How global waves are reshaping church missions

2016

• Best Missions Books of 2016 / Dec. ’16: Mobilizers recommend this year’s “must reads”
• Stop Doing Children’s Ministry? / Nov. ’16: Rethinking how churches reach global children
• 5 Marks of a Missions-Healthy Church / Oct. ’16: Shaping and measuring your global impact
• The Missionary Preparation Triangle / Sept. ’16: Meshing the efforts of church, school, & agency to ready workers
• Handling Information Wisely / Aug. ’16: Security guidelines in an open-network world
• Millennials and Money / July ’16: Three young-adult leaders share their perspectives
• Take Time to Refresh Your Missions Team / June ’16: A dozen ideas to reinvigorate your leaders
• What’s Your Missions Pastor Profile? / May ’16: Gifts and passions that shape the role
• Reimagine Your Missions Team / Ap. ’16: Building a Dynamic Global-Engagement Team
• Expand Your Missions Capacity / Mar. ’16: 5 church leaders share how they create margin for breakthrough opportunities
• Breakthrough Opportunities / Feb. ’16: 6 proposals to powerfully engage church potential
• A Supporting-Sending-Partnering Continuum / Jan. ’16: Stages of missions ownership

2015

• Best Missions Books of 2015 / Dec. ’15: Mobilizers recommend this year’s “must reads”
• Three Blind Spots of Mission / Nov. ’15: And a missions pastor’s ‘wiser way’ solutions
• Igniting Pastors’ Missions Fire / Oct. ’15: Pastors recommend ways to build pastoral vision
• How Can We Help? / Sept. ’15: Church strategies for responding to global crises
• I Wish My Church Understood / Aug ’15: Addressing often unspoken missionary struggles
• Motivate Your Congregation / July ’15: 5 ways to move them to give, go, or act
• Women and the World / June ’15: Churches engaging women for global impact
• Reaching Strangers among Us / May ’15: Ideas for beginning diaspora ministry in your church
• When Missionaries Come to Town / April ’15: How to make the most of home-assignment visits
• Exit Strategy / Mar. ’15: How can a church end a global initiative well?
• Better Together? / Feb. ’15: The mutual benefit between churches and networks
• Where Do We Start? / Jan. ’15: Steps forward at five ministry crossroads

2014

• Best Missions Books 2014 / Dec. ’14: Mobilizers vote for this year’s “must reads”
• Sending Kingdom Professionals / Nov. ’14: A tool for churches’ assessment process
• Global Missions in Smaller Church Contexts / Oct. ’14: Four very different churches tell their stories
• Discernment and Development / Sept. ’14: How one church helps guide present and future workers
• Avoiding Duplication /Aug. ’14: How Western churches can avoid redundancy, especially in leadership training
• Evaluating ST Team Impact / July ’14: A tool to analyze strategic results
• Engage the Professionals in Your Church:  / June ’14: 10 keys to involving leader-level adults in missions
• Using Your Church’s Global DNA / May ’14: Seven churches share how they use their unique traits
• The Generosity Movement / April ’14: Can it really benefit world missions?
• Missionary Care / Mar. ’14: Where does a church begin?
• Supporting Home Staff  / Feb. ’14: Should churches fund headquarters personnel?
• Charting the Path / Jan. ’14: Guiding future workers toward global engagement

2013

• Passing the Baton  / Dec. ’13: To a new church missions leader
• The Refugee Highway  / Nov. ’13: An interview with Brian O’Connell about this issue-focused network
• What’s Your Missions Strategy? / Oct.’13: A tool to analyze your church’s global missions approach
• Creating Missions On-Ramps / Sept. ’13: Three churches share how they create and communicate ways to serve
• City to City / Aug. ’13: Learning and benefiting from the Redeemer model
• Culture-Crossing Skills for Everyday Use / July ’13: Missionary tools that serve every church
• Is This the Team for Me?  / June ’13: Questions to help determine fit on a team
• Tap into Mobilizer Expertise  / May ’13: For diverse benefits for your church
• Tomorrow’s Global Church-2  / Apr. ’13: Strategy for reaching the 4/14 window
• Tomorrow’s Global Church-1 / Mar. ’13: Strategy for reaching the 4/14 window
• High Capacity Leaders / Feb. ’13: Coaching influencers for local & global missions
• Growing Up Church Missions / Jan. ’13: What missions maturity looks like

2012

• Church Mobilization Priorities / Dec. ’12: Suggested agenda items for 2013
• Reaching International Students / Nov. ’12: Why it’s the church’s job
• Missionary Care Services / Oct. ’12: Expanding the church’s care for workers
• Resilience / Sept. ’12: Building staying power in people & partnership
• Stay the Course / Aug. ’12: How do we minister out of brokenness?
• Identifying Cross-Cultural Gifting / July ’12: Who is God tapping for missions service?
• Choosing Sending Partners-2 / June ’12: Evaluating new options for fielding missionaries
• Choosing Sending Partners-1 / May ’12: 10 areas where agencies should provide value-added
• Young Adults’ Vision / Apr. ’12: How a challenge engaged students in missions
• Leading a Church into Missions / Mar. ’12: Insights from a pastor’s decade of experience
• Untapped Potential / Feb. ’12: 25 types of missions resources that may be hidden in your church
• 5 Steps / Jan. ’12: The basic building blocks of a church’s global involvement

2011

• Operation World / Dec. ’11: Practical suggestions for using this world-changing prayer fuel
• A Coach Approach to Missions Partnership / Nov. ’11: Powerful questions and active listening empower partners
• Developing a Vibrant Partnership Network / Oct. ’11 : Lock arms with others to multiply your impact
• Nehemiah / Sept. ’11: Practical lessons from an effective wall-building collaboration
• Perspectives  / Aug. ’11: Using the Perspectives Course to impact the whole congregation
• Radical Generosity / July ’11 : Advent Conspiracy & other ways the church can resource missions
• Financing Retiree Support / June ’11 : How churches can do right by their veteran workers
• Money Talk / May ’11 : A frank, church-agency discussion about financing missions
• Powerful Praying Churches -2 / Apr. ’11 : More models and some great resources to encourage churches in global prayer
• Powerful Praying Churches -1 / Mar. ’11: Models and ideas to involve 21st century congregations in effective global intercession
• Navigating a Strategic Missions Course / Feb. ’11: Implementing crucial change in local-church missions involvement
• A Scale of Church-Agency Relations  / Jan. ’11 : Defining 7 levels in the church-involvement spectrum

2010

• Cultural Intelligence / Dec. ’10: Building cross-cultural skills in the local church
• Missionary Accountability / Nov. ’10: Wrestling with the church’s challenge to practice it well
• Measuring Agency Partnership Potential / Oct. ’10: 10 indicators that an agency is serious about facilitating church partnerships
• Measure Church Missions Potential / Sept. ’10: 10 Indicators of churches’ potential for global involvement
• Moving Churches into an Incarnational Presence on the Field / Aug. ’10: How The Upstream Collective is channeling younger church leaders’ global involvement
• Sending New Missionaries / July ’10: Engaging your congregation in preparing and sending new workers
• Abundance and the Relationship between Scarcity and Choice / June ’10: An overview & questions on some thorny financial issues
• Mobilize the Congregation / May ’10: Excerpts from Your FOCUS on the World
• Send a Survey Team / Apr. ’10: Excerpts from Your FOCUS on the World
• Navigating the Multiple Stages of Partnership / Mar. ’10: How phases and relationships impact partnership success
• Effective Internships / Feb. ’10: Win/win internships that benefit church and prospective missionaries
• Kids Missions Camp / Jan. ’10: A life-transforming experience for children

2009

• Global Missions in New Church Starts / Dec. ’09: Why missions passion is essential at the beginning of a congregation’s life. 2010 Issues
• Second Career Workers-2 / Nov. ’09: How to help Boomers/Builders thrive in missions service
• Second Career Workers-1 / Oct. ’09: How to challenge Boomers and Builders to leave their settled lifestyle for missions service
• Swarming / Sept. ’09: Justin Long describes a new, tech-assisted approach to mobilizing volunteers
• Ministry Action Teams / Aug. ’09: How Irving Bible Church’s 14 ministry action teams engage over 100 people in their areas of global passion
• Agency Perspectives on Church Mobilization /July ’09: Three agencies describe their new ways of collaborating with churches
• Welcoming International Visitors to Your Church /June ’09: How good planning makes “reverse missions trips” mutually beneficial
• Clarify Expectations to Create Healthy Partnerships / May ’09: Identifying the hidden assumptions than can scuttle collaborative efforts
• Business as Missions:How Do Church and Agency Connect? / Apr. ’09: churches and agencies grapple with how to integrate BAM
• Global Partnering Growing Pains-3 / Mar. ’09: Challenges as the global partnership movement grows up
• Global Partnership Growing Pains-2 / Feb. ’09:Challenges as the global partnership movement grows up
• Global Partnering Growing Pains-1 / Jan. ’09: Challenges as the global partnership movement grows up

2008

• To Catch the Wind / Dec. ’08: Why Western high-control leadership styles may not fit cross-cultural partnerships
• Short-Term Team Safety Preparation / Nov. ’08: How to prepare short-term teams for potential crises in country
• Two Routes to the City in Great Need / Oct. ’08: An allegory contrasting partnerships with traditional missionary sending
• Partnership-Ready Churches- Part 2 / Sept. ’08: Preparing churches for global partnership
• Partnership-Ready Churches- Part 1 / Aug. ’08: How to assess if a church is ready to embark on global partnership
• Revisiting Advocate Teams / July ’08: Developing advocates who bridge between church and missionary
• Short-Term Ministry Ideas / June ’08: Dozens of practical services short-term mission trips can offer
• The Home Assignment Triangle / May ’08: Home-assignment responsibilities of church, agency, and missionary
• The Essential Facilitator Bridge / Apr. ’08: The crucial roles a facilitator plays in successful global partnership
• Kids with Power / Mar. ’08: Children can impact the globe by praying for the nations
• Starting out Strong / Feb. ’08: How to begin well as an agency-based mobilizer
• Rapid Response Teams / Jan. ’08: National and international disasters offer unique ministry opportunities for the well prepared church

2007

• Restructuring Local Church Missions / Dec. ’07: Options for reorganizing mission committees/teams to foster more involvement
• Missionary Communication / Nov. ’07: Helping missionaries improve their prayer letters, emails, blogs, and other communications
• Partnership Essentials / Oct. ’07: Shares the most essential elements of successful partnerships and most frequently seen partnership quagmires
• More Service Please / Sept. ’07: Emphasizes how agencies need a “no strings attached” approach to serving churches
• Let’s Partner with Networks / Aug. ’07: Identifies how agencies can collaborate with church networks focused on specific people groups
• The Church/Agency/Missionary Sending Triangle / July ’07: Clarifying sending tasks and how to best collaborate in the process
• Making Process Serve Partnership / June  ’07: Truly reciprocal partnerships require time for relationships and shared goals to emerge.
• Matchmaking / May ’07: A checklist to evaluate the compatibility of potential partners
• Financing the Task / Apr. ’07: 21st-century difficulties and possible solutions for funding God’s global mission
• Pastor’s Forums / Mar. ’07: Agency mobilizers explain the forums they host for pastors, and pastors recall the revitalizing effect of attending them
• Seasoned Advice / Feb. ’07: Experienced mobilizers share words of wisdom about connecting with churches, mobilization skills, and mistakes they’ve made
• Security-Sensitive Partnership / Jan. ’07:  One successful example of how Western churches and agencies can actively partner with nationals to reach places Westerners cannot go

2006

• Business as Mission / Nov. ’06: “BAM” basics and how God uses business to advance His kingdom globally
• Real Listening / Oct. ’06: How agencies can listen more to local churches
• Bicultural Facilitators / Sept. ’06: The value of partnership facilitators who can bridge cultures
• Building Relationships with Large Churches / Aug. ’06: Mega-church missions pastors explain how mobilizers can effectively connect with them
• Refocusing Western Missions Agencies / June ’06: Perspective-bending questions for agencies adapting to changing global realities