“In the beginning, I never understood what you meant by God being our Father. It didn’t make sense to me. But now that we’re good friends, now I understand.”
My friend Hama* said this to me one day, and it was then my turn to take a while to figure out what he was getting at. It was a quote from Tim Keller that eventually made things click for me: “The best hermeneutic for the gospel is a redeemed life.”
Turns out there are aspects of spiritual truth that are near-impossible to understand unless we see them lived out in the life of another believer. The good news itself is not something we find clear and plausible through mere information transfer. No, there is something about an embodied message that is key to the process of genuine conversion and spiritual growth. In our part of the world, the Holy Spirit uses lots of dreams about Jesus to draw people to himself. But he always, sooner or later, sends the dreamer a flesh-and-blood evangelist (which is typically the point at which they actually repent and believe).
Because of this dynamic, I conclude that long-term missionaries, on the ground, are an essential part of the gospel taking root in unreached places.
Then this week I was reminded of yet another area where living among our focus people group makes all the difference; namely, gaining a deep understanding of the culture. During a conversation about the local culture’s bent towards concrete thinking instead of abstract, a local colleague pointed out that I needed to take it one step further. He said that the local culture can and does often communicate about the abstract, but they start with the concrete, and use that concrete imagery and language in order to then think about and discuss the abstract. It’s not either/or; it’s more about the direction of things.
I’ve been living here for a decade or so, and involved in ministry with Central Asians in the diaspora even longer than that. Yet this was a brand new insight for me – one that only emerged through a long process of curious presence and a sort of marination in a foreign cultural milieu.
This is the same sort of marinating that made me eventually realize that when it came to preaching vs. participatory Bible study, we foreign missionaries had it completely backwards. We all assumed that preaching was the foreign form while group Bible study was the truly local and contextual form. It took a while, but listening to locals and observing the local culture over a number of years eventually broke through my missiological brainwashing. Local culture is full of preaching, at least in the form of non-Christian authoritative proclamation (religious, political, social, you name it). Group Bible study is the foreign, less natural form. False assumptions continue to lead most missionaries here to jettison preaching, when in fact we should be leaning into it, even while we teach the locals how to also do that weird group study of the text thing.
Therefore, I similarly conclude that long-term missionaries, on the ground, are an essential part of good contextualization.
Now consider what it takes for believers in a strongman culture to plant churches that are led by a team of humble pastors. Sure, we can fly them out to do trainings on church leadership in another country, or we could fly a trainer in. But merely understanding the concepts of the biblical model of church leadership does not typically lead to locals implementing them. No, in order to actually build a structure you’ve never seen before (never mind sustaining it in crisis), you first have to see it modeled. This is simply human nature. That means if we want locals to plant and sustain churches that are led by a plurality of qualified elders, local believers will themselves need to experience being part of churches where that kind of leadership is on display.
As with the gospel taking root and doing good contextualization, long-term missionaries, on the ground, are an essential part of planting and sustaining healthy churches.
But the Apostles were non-residential itinerants!
When it comes to the Apostles, yes, some of them moved around a lot and did a lot of ministry via shorter visits and writing (looking at you, Paul). But when we pay careful attention to their letters, it’s clear that they preferred a face-to-face ministry of example whenever possible, and would even settle in one place for extended periods.
“For I long to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you—that is, that we may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith, both yours and mine.” -Romans 1:11–12
“But since we were torn away from you, brothers, for a short time, in person not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face, because we wanted to come to you—I, Paul, again and again—but Satan hindered us.” -1 Thessalonians 2:17–18
“as we pray most earnestly night and day that we may see you face to face and supply what is lacking in your faith?” -1 Thessalonians 3:10
“Though I have much to write to you, I would rather not use paper and ink. Instead I hope to come to you and talk face to face, so that our joy may be complete.” -2 John 1:12
“Therefore be alert, remembering that for three years I did not cease night or day to admonish every one with tears.” -Acts 20:31
But many of the least reached areas do not allow residential missionaries!
This point is valid, and the strongest case for non-residential missions. However, even in places where this is the case, creative access strategies can sometimes allow for residential ministry, even if it’s only for a limited time. Many of the smaller cities and towns in our area of Central Asia are like this. Missionaries can live there for a few years. But once word gets out that a small house church is forming, typically they get run out and have to relocate to the big city.
In other cases, semi-residential ministry is still possible among displaced or diaspora populations of the focus unreached group. This can allow for many of the benefits that we’ve already mentioned that would otherwise come from living in the homeland.
For cases where residential ministry is truly not possible, I do believe that non-residential work is permissible in the “best of the bad options” kind of approach. It’s tough, but it can and has been done faithfully – although I will add that it seems to require a unique sort of gifting in order to do it well.
The problem is that many missions methodologies want to say that non-residential ministry is preferable in all kinds of places compared to the traditional model of missionaries living on the ground for the long term while they seek to make disciples and plant churches. In this view, coaches, coordinators, or trainers living outside of the target context do a better job of reaching the unreached because they don’t risk getting deported or surveilled, they don’t slow down the movement because of their paternalism, prominence, or by infusing their own culture; they can coach or train a much larger group of local leaders via social media or outside trainings; and they don’t put local believers in danger through being locally known as their friends.
Putting aside the issue of the New Testament precedent of face-to-face ministry, one of my main concerns with non-residential ministry approaches like this is how remarkably well they fit, hand in glove, with typical the blind spots and handicaps of Western missionaries.
What do I mean by this? Well, we tend to idolize safety and security, both for ourselves and for local believers. We have a bad habit of treating local believers like projects rather than true friends. We are hyper-allergic to any sense that we might be paternalistic and are deathly afraid of “contaminating” the local believers’ culture and forms with that of our own. We are jaded when it comes to institutions. We are much too excited about speed, scale, and efficiency. And we positively love roles where we can have significant influence with very little official authority or spiritual accountability.
No wonder non-residential methodologies are so popular right now. They fit us so very well. If only they served the local believers as well as they serve our current Western evangelical moment.
Add to all of this the very real danger of the foreign trainers and coaches getting played by schemers who are happy to inflate numbers and tell tall tales of how many groups or churches they’ve started – a dynamic that only gets worse when the missionaries are not going deep in the local language and culture and can’t vouch for local leaders’ character by means of long friendships in context.
No, whenever possible, we need missionaries to be residential. I know this is not, in fact, always possible. But this is one of the weird cases where the unfortunate exception has now become the preferred norm in certain circles.
Non-residential missionaries who are laboring hard to faithfully engage populations you truly can’t access, I salute you. You have a really hard and noble calling. But for all who are choosing non-residential ministry when face-to-face ministry is somehow possible, I have deep concerns about both your blind spots as well as the long-term fruitfulness of your labors.
If the internet age and the rise of AI teach us anything, it should be this: nothing replaces true, face-to-face human interaction and community. Concepts such as God as our heavenly father or what a healthy church is cannot be simply downloaded from the cloud or transferred through slides at a training seminar. They need to be embodied.
Pastors are needed for international churches in our region. If you have a good lead, shoot me a note here.
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