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There’s Nothing I Would Rather Do, Even When It’s Hard · The Ethnos360 Podcast

• speaker-0: I I love being part of this and love the role. Right. And then there's some days where I wish anybody in the world but me was doing this. And in those days, I think what I fall back on is my Lord said, go and make disciples of every it's every people group. It's what we've been talking about. That's what he said to do as he was leaving. And I want to be part of that. I just want to be part of that with every day that the Lord gives me on this earth. speaker-1: Welcome, friends, to the Ethnos 360 Podcast, where we talk about vital topics, have honest conversations, and unpack the Great Commission. This episode is part of the series we call Rooted and Mature. We hope you come away with greater understanding of how God will accomplish his work through us as we work together toward the goal of seeing every people group reached. Okay, we are back. We're ⁓ we're gonna continue this conversation about agencies, and ⁓ we've shifted From we're we're moving from Steve telling us a little bit about himself. We have him here with us again, Steve Sanford, the CEO of Ethnos 360. If you if you haven't heard his story, listen to the previous ⁓ podcast so you can catch up with what we're talking about here. But we've talked about Steve's history, we've talked about the history of Ethnos 360 and where they're at today. Now I want to switch gears just a little bit, Steve, and I want to dig into the concept of an agency, sending agency or a mission agency, you know, this is this is one of those things where it's somewhat controversial in some people's minds, but in in other minds, ⁓ I think people see that actually they're super helpful and they can bring a lot of benefit and a lot of structure to ⁓ to reaching your goals and objective as an individual and as a church ⁓ in in sending somebody out. So tell me a little bit about what agencies do and why are they needed. speaker-0: Yeah, that's good. And you you mentioned the controversial part. I I think what's controversial is the notion that agencies would think that what they do is to replace the local church in carrying out the Great Commission. And if I'll do that as a perspective, yeah, that's controversial to me too, because that is not what we exist for. We see ourselves as a part of the body of Christ. That wants to not work separate from a local church, the local church, but a partner with the local church. So the local church raises up some young couple or some young per single gal or guy that wants to serve God and we want to partner with them. We want to help equip their sent one, you might say, in the areas that we can equip them for just because of the You know, the things that we've learned over the years in these ⁓ unreached people group areas, how to learn a language, how to learn a worldview, how to, you know, communicate across cultures, though ki those kinds of things that that really the local church not to their this is not to their shame, they just don't have that experience to be able to pass on to those young people. So yeah, we want to come alongside, partner with them and see these unreached people groups reached. speaker-1: So why do you see I mean in this day and age, are our agencies still needed? Do you believe an agency is still needed to send people out? speaker-0: I think the answer to me is definitely yes. I do recognize that there may be contexts in the world where a a a US believer, a Western believer could go and they might be able to live in a context that's very familiar to their, you know, ho ⁓ home here. Maybe they have to learn French or German or Spanish or something. And they could fit into a community and and do that kind of work. Kate, maybe an agency isn't so important in that kind of a context, but if we're talking about going to unreached people groups, these are people groups that for the most part are living in contexts that are either difficult to get to or difficult to live in, learn the language, learn the culture. And we feel like without without adequate training, That the agency can provide. I'm not talking just about theological training because I know the church can provide that. But the logistical training, the how-to training, and the logistical support, you know, that's involved in this. There's there's there's government paperwork, there's logistical support even on the home end, you know, processing of of funds and insurance and taxes, and and then you get over to the to the receiving country and They have to have visas and ⁓ access to unreached people groups that's acquired through the government and they have to know how to learn this unwritten language and I I just believe that's stuff that if we as the body work together and we all contribute what we each have to contribute, it just works so much better. speaker-1: So you've got you've got the logistical side. I I think you make a great argument for the need for that. Tell me a little bit about the equipping. Does that equipping just happen on this side of the ocean or in here and then we send them out? Or is there something that the agency can offer that continues on? speaker-0: Yeah, that's a excellent point. And of course, you know you're touching on a core value of ours. I think back to my own experience in a village setting, and I can tell you, even with the excellent, what I would call excellent training that I received before I went, if I didn't have ongoing coaching equipping throughout the whole process, so you you arrive you arrive in the receiving country. You gotta learn that language. You're gonna need some help, some coaching. You arrive out into an unreached people group, you're gonna need ongoing coaching, ongoing veteran help. And that's a core value of ours to provide that all along the way. speaker-1: No, that's that's so good. I think that ongoing that is something that a agency just has the tools and resources to do. To have I remember being in the village myself and having my my favorite day to study language was always the day after the consultant left. And it's because the consultant would come in and and give me all kinds of tips and ideas and here's your strengths, but here's your weaknesses, and here's how you can overcome those. So yeah, I think that ongoing training is something that is absolutely a value that comes from working with a a mission agency. speaker-0: And Keith, let me add let me add let me add to that. It's it's not just the ongoing coaching and consultant help, but it's the leadership. It's having it's having veteran, ⁓ godly people in that general vicinity. Like they're close. They're a they're a one hour flight away. They're not two continents away. And they're watching what we're doing and they're making sure we stay on track. And if we're having conflict on our team, they're coming in and helping work through that. Like there's there's real veteran investment into us as the young missionaries to make sure this actual not we can't make sure, but to give us the best chance of of being able to share the gospel with these people at some point. And I just think. Doing that by yourself without that kind of support, leadership, coaching, it it just usually results in a lot of frustration. speaker-1: Tell me a little bit about what you can offer as an agency in the the world of accountability, accountability for those ministers that are out there. speaker-0: I think that's a if I if I was a sending church pastor, I think that would be one of the most important components of this. Because you send somebody off to the to the foreign country, and if there's no accountability, nobody's checking in on them except for maybe me from the US calling them occasionally. I think it's very easy to Sort of give the give the impression that a lot is being accomplished when maybe a lot isn't being accomplished. But when you have veterans, people who actually know how this works, and they're coming into my station every three months or every six months, and I'm having to give reports on how I've spent my time and what progress I'm making in the language. It's not all about that. It's not all about picking up on me. It's about what we were talking about before coaching. But That's a big component of it is I'm accountable to those guys. I'm accountable to my sending church. And my sending church is coop is partnering with these veteran missionary leaders who are holding me accountable sort of on their behalf. And again, I just see that as good body function. speaker-1: Yeah, I I remember that was that was a a cool thing about a consultant or a leader, you know, because they've seen this before play out in yeah by many cross cultural ministers in many different contexts, they know the kind of milestones that you're gonna be hitting along the way. And they also recognize, Hey, Keith, you know, you're you're falling behind. What's going on? You know, what what are you doing with your time? How are you spending it? What do you what do we need to do to Get you back on track. So yeah, the the accountability piece. I had a pastor one time tell me, he says, I count on you as a mission leader. This was when I was serving in New Guinea. He said, I count on you as a mission leader to be my eyes and ears to make sure that my money's being well spent on on this minister that I'm I've sent out here. So yeah, he he definitely had the vision for all that an agency can can offer and do. speaker-0: Would you speaker-1: Let's do it first of all from the minister's point of view, and then we'll do it from the church's point of view. But first I want to talk about evaluating ⁓ an agency. As you look at agencies out there, if you were a young twenty something looking to go and and minister cross culturally, what would you be looking for in an agency as a as a young twenty something? speaker-0: Yeah, so I could think of a number of things that would be really important to me. One, I would want to know what is what is their objective? Who are they trying to reach? And for me, it would be very important that we are actually trying to reach unreached people groups. You know, Jesus said, go and make disciples of every ethnos, every ethnic group. So is is that our objective? And then Are we doctrinally compatible? Do we believe the same thing? And I'm not talking about slicing every hair exactly the same. I'm talking about do we do we preach the same gospel? Do in the in the big questions, are we in agreement? Because I I'd I'd have a hard time working in a context that wasn't that way. And then here's another, there's a couple other things I think would be critical. What's their what's this organization's methodology? Is there a methodology? Am I just going to be sent out there and, you know, hey, we'll send you, you figure it out when you get there. And I'm not, again, trying to be critical of of anybody's methodology. I'm just saying I would want to know there's a clear plan, there's a methodology, and and that I understand it and agree with it. That would be important to me. And for for us, you and I, that would mean, okay, we're gonna we're gonna learn their language and communicate in the heart language, and we want the scriptures translated into their language, and we're gonna teach foundationally and we're gonna disciple towards maturity and and see a local church functioning there. And I think the last thing that came to my mind immediately would be the training. Am I gonna be given again and I'm not saying you can train everybody perfectly to where there'll be no failure or anything, but am I gonna be equipped to do what is going to be an incredibly difficult job? I just can't imagine being sent out without equipping and trying to figure that out for yourself. So those are a few things that would come to my mind right away. speaker-1: Yeah, it's equipping from every angle. You know, it's not only what you're doing and how you do it, but even even things like security and how do you keep yourself as safe as possible in these high risk environments and you know, all those things. Health and how can you keep yourself healthy? And yeah, those things are all ⁓ things that would be so crucial in training. I'm gonna throw one more in there. I was just thinking about that I think an agency can offer is ⁓ that support for the family in general, you know, when you think about educational support for MKs and ⁓ care when member care is needed, or, you know, you go through a a crisis event, can they can they offer you some kind of support? Can they help you ⁓ know when to, you know what, I need to I need to go home and get some rest or whatever. So I think there's some really cool things that I would be looking at as a twenty something year old. in in evaluating an agency on. Now let me ask you this. What if you were a pastor or a mission ⁓ committee at a at a home church, what would you be looking for in an agency that you're gonna use as a vehicle to send, send one of your young, your your best and brightest from your congregation? speaker-0: Yeah, I think I would probably go right back through that same list that ⁓ from a pastoral perspective, I would I would wanna know the same thing. What are we sending this couple out to do? What's the objective? Are they properly equipped? Did y you know, do they do they have a chance of actually being able to do this because they've been taught how to? Is there going to be logistical support, ongoing support? Are they just gonna be sent out there and you know sink or swim kind of thing. Right. I would also look, if I was the pastor, I would want to know how does this agency view our role as the sending agency? Do they view us as just a supplier of personnel and money? Or do they view us as a true actually I was going to say a true partner, but even more than that. Do they view us as the sending church As the sender. They're our missionary. We're the sender. We're partnering with you to provide this help, this partnership, but they're our missionary. They're not your missionary. I think that's very important. And I think that's in the last 25 to 30 years, that's a that's a philosophical shift for us as an organization to realize wait a minute, that is the truth. That is how we're supposed to be looking at this, and that is how we look at it. So What kind of communication is the organization going to provide? How how involved can we as a church be? Are we going to be included in decisions if if we want to be? If we don't want to be, that's fine. But if we want to be, are we welcomed in? What if my if this couple were sending out? What if they have problems ⁓ with coworkers? Are we going to be invited into that discussion? Are we going to be looked to to help and to shepherd our people through it? And and I would say, you know, a lot of agencies are are very clear on those things now and certainly that's ethno three sixties. ⁓ that's that's a core value for us that we want to live out. speaker-1: So so let me ask you this. Do you have do you have churches and pastors and mission committee members call you or visit you ⁓ to to check these things out or visit your training centers or how does that work? Or would you encourage that or not encourage that? speaker-0: We would definitely encourage it. And I would say, you know, as I visit around to our training centers, I definitely see that. ⁓ I don't see it as often as, you know, as often as it would be possible because we would welcome that anytime a church leader would want to come to one of our training centers and encourage their their sent out one and you know check in on how they're doing, get to know their trainers. Man, we would be so for that. We do some intentional things to make that possible. We like for for one one thing we do is we hold a forum here at the home office where I'm talking to you from. And once a year and we get we we bring in pastors of churches who are already sending workers with us. And we spend a few days just talking about All the different components of that, getting their feedback, helping them understand us, us understanding them. So yeah, there's there's ample opportunity for that and we love it when it happens. speaker-1: That's cool. If if a ⁓ person were they say, All right, I I think God has laid it on my heart that I want to reach unreached people groups, ⁓ talk to me a little bit through that process of how Ethno three sixty would take them from that point to where, you know, they they raise a hand, well, every every eye bowed, every eye closed, you know, they raise their hand and say, I wanna go, or walk the aisle or approach their pastor afterwards. Walk me through that process of how you see that going for for that person or couple, family, whatever, ⁓ with ethnos three sixty. speaker-0: Yeah, so a lot obviously a lot would depend on the on the age of that person. If we're talking about a young person, our first advice would be, you know, connect with your church leaders, your parents, start to talk to them about what you feel God leading you to do and get their advice, get their input. ⁓ as they move along through that process, and maybe they're a little older, you know, we would encourage, go find out what it's like. We we offer multiple short term trips, some of them two week long, some of them six week long. We have that facility in Pennsylvania, you don't even have to leave the the US to get a like a a a taste of what this is like. So s so learn. Go see it if possible. And then if if if you know you're feeling like the Lord's leading me into this, then w we require the equivalent of two years of Bible education. Course, depending on the stage of life and ministry experience, all that plays into that. But the average young person who doesn't have any formal Bible training, we would we would ask for two years of Bible training. We have a school that provides that, but there's a lot of good schools they could get that from. And then after their Bible training is in place, we have a a missionary training center that You know, what we've been talking about, all that equipping that goes on there, how to learn a language, how to translate the scriptures, all that stuff. So it's an extensive training process and we're hoping that the local church is engaged in all of that with this couple speaker-1: Right. So so then they're they launch out and and they're overseas and then again we're we we would be okay with churches visiting those workers or calling us, calling you. I is that all okay? speaker-0: All that is more than okay. And ⁓ you know, there are gonna be locations in the world where some workers go that hosting Westerners is probably not going to be possible, just draws too much attention. But apart from those sort of examples, my goodness, yes, ⁓ we would welcome visits from parents, visits from pastors. Not only would we welcome it, we think it's It's so encouraging to those workers when that happens. And and I as I've observed it, I I think when when parents or church leaders actually get to visit and see what their scent worker is doing, they they just go home with a renewed ⁓ appreciation for them, a renewed commitment to supporting and helping them and it's just healthy all the way around. speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah, that's good. Alrighty. So we've kind of talked that through. ⁓ I just w I just wanna run a couple more scenarios by you. We've talked about the the person who says, I want to go reach an unreached people group. I I've I'm in this, you know, this is where I'm at. I wanna do that. But I also know as an agency, there is a lot of things that go on behind the scenes that no one really thinks about that is required to to actually support those that are overseas and ministering. ⁓ What if I were what if I were a forty year old ⁓ accountant or or ⁓ programmer, computer programmer? You know, what if I was is there a spot like that for me within an agency? speaker-0: Yeah, in fact, if you go back to the beginning of our conversation, we talked about, you know, Paul Fleming's conviction that God can use any life yielded to him. And I think what we're really saying is is any gift set, any skill set yielded to the Lord can be there's a place. So we're talking right now to each other in a six story office building that is filled from top to bottom with people doing exactly what you just said. Filling behind the scene behind the scenes roles that have to be filled. We have accountants in this building. We have IT experts in this building. ⁓ we have publications people, creative creative types that are creating videos and and social media posts and magazines, getting the word out, communicating. And that's just in this in this one location. If you That's right. go to any of our partner entities overseas where where unreached people groups are, they have a whole support structure that needs to be in place in that country itself to to see people out in those people groups. So I think the ratio is really about two behind the scenes support role workers for every worker that's out there learning a language and and evangelizing and planting churches. So there's a huge need for that. fact I would say I obviously there's a huge need for both. I don't want to downplay either one, but we we really have a need for those kind of ⁓ skilled support workers. speaker-1: The other day I had a guy pop in my office. He was doing some trim work that needed ⁓ that was messed up, it needed to be fixed. And I didn't recognize him. And I said, ⁓ who are you? And you know, what are you doing? And, you know, tell me your story. And come to find out, he he's a guy who lives about a half hour or an hour from here. And he said, ⁓ my wife and I come here two days a week. ⁓ she works down in kind of in the post office area, ⁓ accounting area, opening envelopes and sorting mail and things like that. And he says, And I'm just here to help maintain the building. And I just thought, you know, there's here's a they were they were both retired, retired age. And I here's a couple who's who's caught the vision for what we're trying to accomplish, reaching unreached people groups. They recognize, okay, I c we're not at the age where we're gonna go and learn a language and do all that stuff, but we can contribute to the agency behind the scenes by maintaining ⁓ buildings and helping them with sort mail and and doing accounting things. So yeah. Lots of opportunities to serve right here in your local community. So ⁓ just something good to remember. Let me ask you this. As as CEO, we'll wrap it up here. I want to wrap it up, but I I want you to think about like as as a CEO of a a big organization, ⁓ I know that sometimes administration ⁓ can get ⁓ just kind of relentless. You know, it just seems like the the pile is never done of Administrative things that need to be done. And the challenges are always before you, and the difficulties and the things that come your way across your desk, I'm sure that you see what in the relentless monotony or in the in the difficult challenges, what do you use to encourage yourself as the leader of an agency to to stay to the task? What what are things that you pause and say, ⁓ yeah? What what are what are those things? speaker-0: It's it's come up a couple of times probably in our conversation, and that's that whole body principle. ⁓ we have a s we have a very strong sort of ⁓ culture, I would say, in this organization of teamwork. And that even includes leadership. So I'm called the CEO, but that doesn't mean I'm the boss. I'm part of a leadership team. We lead together. And that translates to the whole to the whole team in this building. And I think what motivates me the most, I'm looking out my window right now at a group of college students from our Bible college in Wisconsin that are down here visiting this, visiting our home office. And I see the interaction between them and our and our coworkers in this building, and thinking how how blessed we are with the talent the Lord has given us, the dedicated people the Lord has brought to us, how He uses different gifts and skill sets in the body. To like keep this going. And that that motivates me more than anything, I guess, on a daily basis. And then I would, I would probably wrap it with this. I would, there are times, honestly, most days, I I love being part of this and love the role. Right. And then there's some days where I wish anybody in the world but me was doing this. And in those days, I think what I fall back on is my Lord said. Go and make disciples of every and he said ethnos was that Greek word that's translated nations. It's it's every people group. It's what we've been talking about. That's what he said to do as he was leaving. And I want to be part of that. I just want to be part of that with every day that the Lord gives me on this earth. And so like when you're sort of discouraged and wishing you could be doing something else, it's what up, what else? I can't think of anything I would rather be doing ⁓ than being a part of what he said. And there's a lot of ways to be part of this, you know, senders, goers. We're just blessed to be part of a group like this that's, you know, equipping and sending. And I I find a lot of encouragement in that. speaker-1: That's good. That's good. Well, I hope you've enjoyed ⁓ the conversation today around ⁓ agencies, the need for agencies and why we have them. ⁓ thinking through the the purpose that they serve, the benefits that they give a church, and ⁓ you as a goer, ⁓ both have a huge benefit if you get the right agency to partner with. And ⁓ we would love to have you join Ethnos 360. If you are considering that, please feel free to come by or ⁓ visit one of our campuses or reach out to us via email or online and we would love to have a conversation with you about how our agency could partner with with you as a church or as an individual. I think that's all for now, Steve. Thanks for your time. I appreciate it. speaker-0: Yeah, thanks, man. This was fun conversation. speaker-1: Thank you for investing the time to listen to today's episode. It's our prayer that what you heard causes you to think more about your next step as a believer who understands the Great Commission. If this was encouraging to you, please take a moment to subscribe, rate, and review the podcast. We don't take the privilege of your time lightly, and if we can help answer any questions this episode may have raised in your minds, feel free to reach out to us at podcast at ntm.org or you can contact us via our socials. And finally, this podcast is a production of Ethnos three sixty, all rights reserved.