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Supporting Missionaries Takes More Than a Check · Reformed Thinking

0:00
Welcome back to the show. We are calling this session,
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Reformed Thinking. And if you're listening, you
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probably already get that ideas have consequences.
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Theology isn't just, you know, for arguing about online.
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It actually shapes how you live, how you worship, and for our
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topic today, how you spend your money and your life.
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That's right. And today we're tackling a
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subject that I think a lot of us feel like we have a handle on,
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but our view is, well, it's pretty 2 dimensional.
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We're talking about missions. And I can almost hear the
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listeners brain starting to switch off missions.
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It can sound like a line item in a budget meeting, right?
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Or it's that one Sunday a year where there are flags in the
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sanctuary, you eat some food in the fellowship hall you can't
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pronounce, and you clap for a slideshow.
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You've just hit on the core of the problem.
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It's what some people call the pay and pray model.
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Pay and pray. You write the check.
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You put the prayer card on the fridge, which you know
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eventually gets buried under wedding invitations and pizza
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coupons, and you feel like you've done your job.
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You've supported missions. But the source material we're
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digging into today just completely dismantles that view.
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We're looking at a book called Biblical Missions, Principles,
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Priorities and Practices, and we're really focused on one
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chapter by Mark Tatlock and Clint Burnett called It's More
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Than Money. And we're also pulling in some
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some really practical insights from Tom Pennington and Rodney
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Anderson. That chapter title, It's More
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than Money is really the whole thesis for our conversation
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today. The central tension is this.
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Financial giving is absolutely essential.
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We are not saying stop giving, of course not.
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But in the New Testament model, writing a check isn't the end of
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the partnership. It's, well, it's barely the
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beginning. It's the entry fee, not the
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actual relationship. That's a great way to put it
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precisely. If your engagement with a
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missionary ends the moment the check clears, you haven't
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actually fulfilled the New Testament mandate.
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You've engaged in commerce, not Koinonia.
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You've hired a contractor. You haven't gained a partner.
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So our mission for this deep dive is to try and move the
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needle from that transactional view, money for ministry reports
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to something more like a covenantal model.
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We're going to be talking about shepherding, about some of the
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hidden sorrows of missionary life that nobody ever puts in a
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newsletter, and the real nitty gritty logistics of how a local
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church actually cares for its people when they're on the other
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side of the world. And because this is Reformed
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thinking, we have to ground all of this in the centrality of the
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local church. We aren't just talking about
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what some big agency does. We're talking about what your
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church, and specifically your elders and even you in the Pew,
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are supposed to be doing. All right, so let's start where
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we should always start the biblical text.
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The authors argue that a lot of our modern confusion comes from
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just ignoring the model Paul laid out in his letter to the
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Philippians. Rodney Anderson does a really
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masterful job analyzing Philippians here.
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If you look at Philippians chapter one, verse 5, and then
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you jump over to chapter 4, verses 10 to 20, you see Paul
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using some very, very specific language.
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He describes his relationship with that church, and he calls
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them participants in the gospel. Participants.
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That's the Greek word Koinonia, isn't it?
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It is, and in modern church culture, we've watered that word
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down so much. It just means, you know, coffee
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and doughnuts. After the service we say, oh, we
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had great fellowship. Yeah, good Cornonia.
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But in the 1st century, quinonia had these commercial undertones.
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It meant a partnership. It meant shared risk.
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It meant if this ship sinks, we both lose our investment.
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So when Paul says they're participants, he's not just
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sending a thank you note for the cash.
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Not at all. He saw them as Co laborers.
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They were in the trenches right there with him even though they
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were hundreds of miles away. And here is the part that really
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flips the script. In chapter 4, he talks about
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their financial gift. He says he rejoiced in it, but
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you have to listen to why he rejoiced.
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It wasn't just because his stomach was rumbling.
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Right, he says. It's so clearly I have learned
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to be content. He didn't need their money to be
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happy. He rejoiced because, and this is
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a direct quote, he knew that the gift was accruing to their
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account. That's accounting language.
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It's an investment term. OK, that's interesting.
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Paul is saying I'm happy you gave, not just because I get to
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eat, but because you are getting spiritual dividends from this.
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That completely changes the power dynamic in the modern
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West. The donor often thinks, you
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know, I'm the benevolent rich person helping that poor
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struggling missionary. It's a downward flow.
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It is a flow of charity, but Paul is saying, yeah, you're
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actually helping yourselves. Yeah.
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It's this concept of spiritual reciprocity.
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The giver benefits spiritually just as much as the receiver
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benefits physically. It's a mutual exchange of grace.
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So it shifts from benevolence to a shared investment.
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Yes, we're both buying stock in the same Kingdom enterprise.
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The sources also make a big deal about the fact that the
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Philippians didn't just send money.
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They sent a person. They sent human capital.
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Dietus, this is a detail we just gloss over.
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In Sunday school. They didn't just wire funds,
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which they couldn't do anyway. They sent one of their best men
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to physically carry the gift and to minister to Paul.
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And look at the cost. Epifer Dietus almost died.
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It says he was ill to the point of death.
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Yeah. He risked his life to complete
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what was lacking in their service to Paul.
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I mean, that is skin in the game in the most literal sense
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possible. And beyond that, they prayed.
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But it wasn't some generic God bless Paul prayer.
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They were tracking with his imprisonment.
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They knew the details of his trial.
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They were agonizing right there with him.
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There's another another nuance the authors bring up that I
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found really fascinating. They mentioned that Paul
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sometimes flat out refused money.
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Yes, in Acts 18 and 1st Corinthians 4, Paul is a tent
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maker. There were times he explicitly
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worked with his hands and refused support from a church.
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And why? To protect the gospel.
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To protect the integrity of the gospel, he didn't want anyone
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accusing him of preaching just to get rich.
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Which proves the relationship wasn't defined by the money.
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I mean, if the relationship was just the money, then when Paul
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refused the cash the relationship should have ended.
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If I stop paying you, you stop working for me.
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That's a transaction. But Paul refused the funds and
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the bond was still there. That proves it was a partnership
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of the heart, not just the wallet.
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So if the biblical model is this deep risky reciprocal
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partnership, this participation, why do we default to just
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donation? Well, because donation is
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easier. Let's be honest, it is.
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Writing a check requires very little of our soul.
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It doesn't require us to weep with those who weep.
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It doesn't require us to, you know, smell the open sewage in a
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slum in Mumbai, right? It doesn't require us to
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understand the cross cultural conflict.
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We pay the money so we don't have to deal with a mess.
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It's. Outsourcing.
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We're outsourcing the suffering. But the sources argue that this
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finance only mindset is leaving our missionary spiritually
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malnourished. They're out there on the front
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lines and they're starving for actual care.
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We need to recover. 2 missing categories.
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Shepherding and encouraging. OK, let's break those down.
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Let's start with shepherding. This seems to be aimed squarely
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at the leadership of the church, the elders.
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The argument here is stark, and it might ruffle some feathers.
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It's this. The sending church, specifically
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it's elders, bears the primary burden for shepherding the
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missionary. Not the agency.
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Not the mission agency, not the other supporting churches, the
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sending church. I can hear a pastor listening to
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this right now saying hang on a second.
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We send them with a big agency specifically so the agency can
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take care of them. They have a member care
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department. Why is this on me?
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And it's a fair question. But think about the
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ecclesiology, the doctrine of the Church Who commissioned this
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person, who laid hands on them, who evaluated their character
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before they ever left. The home.
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Church. The elders of the sending Church
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know that missionary spiritual baseline.
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They know their history. They know the husband struggles
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with anger when he gets stressed.
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They know the wife struggles with anxiety.
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An agency representative might see them once a year, but they
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don't have a covenantal responsibility to watch over
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their soul. Hebrews 13.17 says leaders will
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give an account for souls. It doesn't say agencies will
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give an account. So this brings up a really
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common point of friction that the sources go into this, this
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clash between the agency and the church.
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It sounds like a classic. Who's the boss?
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Problem it is, and agencies are wonderful tools.
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They handle logistics, visas, housing, team dynamics on the
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field, legal status in hospital countries.
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But because they're handling the daily grind, they naturally
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drift into shepherding. And that's where the conflict
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starts. Sometimes, yeah, the council and
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agency gives might imply a different set of priorities and
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the church would give. Can you walk us through a
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hypothetical? What does this actually look
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like in the real world? Sure.
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Let's imagine a missionary family is on the field.
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The husband is incredibly fruitful.
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He's planting churches. He's learning the language.
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But back at home, his marriage is falling apart.
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Or maybe one of his children is in full blown rebellion.
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An agency which is often focused on the strategy and the work
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might say, look, we can't lose you from the field right now.
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The work is too vital. Maybe send the child to a
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boarding school. Maybe you just need a short
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break. They prioritize the mission.
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And the church's response? The sending church elders, if
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they're being biblical, should be looking at First Timothy 3.
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They care first and foremost about the man's holiness and his
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biblical qualification. They might have to say, brother,
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if you cannot manage your own household, you are disqualified
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from ministry. You need to come home.
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The work can wait. Your soul and your family
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cannot. Wow that is a massive
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difference. One is saying stay and manage it
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and the other is saying leave and fix it.
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That's why the sources recommend a written agreement before the
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missionary ever leaves a document that clarifies the
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roles. It's not about being legalistic,
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it's just about clarity. So the church handles character.
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The Church's domain is character, doctrinal fidelity,
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personal holiness. The agency's domain is
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logistics, field strategy and legal status.
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But there is a caveat. There isn't there.
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The church can't just totally ignore the strategy.
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Right. You cannot outsource your
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doctrinal integrity. If the agency starts pushing a
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ministry philosophy, say a church planting movement
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strategy that emphasizes speed over biblical fidelity, the
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elders have to step in. Because the missionary is an
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extension of that church. They are an extension of the
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church's theology, and if the theology on the field
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contradicts the theology in the pulpit back home, you have a
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broken partnership. So practically speaking, how
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does a church shepherd someone across an ocean?
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We have Zoom, we have WhatsApp. Is that really enough?
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Well, technology helps. Regular contact has to mean more
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than just reading a generic newsletter.
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Elders should be using video calls to look the missionary in
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the eye. But the sources are adamant on
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this point. Technology is not enough.
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You need physical presence. They talk very specifically
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about the first year visit. Why the first year?
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Usually it seems like churches wait until the missionary has
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been there for a while, maybe 3 or 4 years before they send
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someone out. And that is a huge mistake.
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The first year is what some call the Valley of Death.
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It's the period of maximum culture talk.
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Think about it. You're a competent adult in
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America. You get on a plane, you land in
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a new country and suddenly you're a toddler again.
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You can't speak, you can't read the signs.
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You don't know how to pay the electric bill.
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You don't know the social cues. It is incredibly humiliating and
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lonely. You go from being respected
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leader in your church to being like the village idiot.
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That breeds depression, it really does.
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So the sources argue that an elder needs to visit during that
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first year, not to inspect with the work because it won't be any
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work yet, but to refresh the Spirit as Paul says in First
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Corinthians 16. It's a pastoral visit, not an
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inspection. It's a rescue mission.
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It's an elder showing up and saying we have not forgotten
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you, we love you. And there's a diagnostic
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benefit, too. When an elder visits, he sees
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the reality. He smells the open sewers.
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He feels the oppressive heat. He sees the mold on the
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apartment walls. He sees what you can't put in a
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newsletter. Exactly.
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We call it sanitized reporting. Missionaries are often afraid to
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be honest. They think if I tell my
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supporters I'm miserable, they'll think I'm not spiritual
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enough and they'll cut my funding.
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So they just write, everything is great, praise the Lord.
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Meanwhile, they're drowning. But when an elder sits in their
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living room, eats their food and watches them interact with their
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spouse, he can spot the tension. He can say, hey, you guys seem
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on edge, let's talk about it. That is shepherding.
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You cannot do that over e-mail. Now there's a specific section
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in the source material about caring for missionary women, and
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I think this is a massive blind spot for a lot of all male elder
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boards. It is huge.
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The reality is, missionary wives often carry a heavier burden of
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cultural adaptation than their husbands.
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The husband has a job. He goes to the seminary or the
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job site. He has a defined role.
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The wife is often left to navigate the market, deal with
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the landlord, manage the kids schooling and run a household in
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a place where simple tasks take three times as long.
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And often in cultures where women are not treated with the
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same respect they might be used to.
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Yes, and she is doing all of this without her mom, without
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her sisters, without her network of girlfriends.
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She is so isolated. And if the only person from the
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church checking in on them is a male elder.
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That is insufficient, and it's potentially dangerous.
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A male elder cannot adequately shepherd a missionary wife
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regarding her unique emotional and, you know, physiological
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struggles. It's just not appropriate.
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Yeah. So what's the solution?
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The practical solution the sources offer is simple, but it
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is costly. When elders visit, they should
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bring their wives. OK, that double S the cost of
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the trip right there. I can hear the Budget Committee
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groaning. It's non negotiable if you want
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to care for the whole family. The elder's wife can sit with
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the missionary wife, listen to her, pray with her, and offer
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counsel in a way a man simply cannot.
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The same goes for single female missionaries.
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They need that Titus two woman to woman encouragement.
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If you're not sending women to care for your women, you are
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leaving half your team completely vulnerable.
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That is a really powerful point. We invest thousands of dollars
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to get them to the field. We should invest a little more
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to keep them sane. It's just maintenance.
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You change the oil in your car, you have to invest in the souls
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of your workers. OK, let's pivot a bit.
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We've talked about the elder shepherding, Now let's talk
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about the congregation's mandate.
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Encouraging, because you know the average person in the Pew
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can't just fly to Southeast Asia next week.
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No, but the congregation's role is absolutely vital.
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The source material makes a great point about what it calls
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leadership Trickle down. OK, if the elders don't talk
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about missions, the church will not care about missions.
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It has to appear in sermons, it has to be in the corporate
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prayer. It even affects the worship
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songs we choose. So it can't just be the
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Missionary of the Week slide that flashes on the screen while
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everyone is still finding their seat and checking their phone.
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It has to be woven into the very culture of the church and beyond
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that there are some really specific strategies.
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Let's talk about short term ministry trips or STMS.
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These often get a bad rap as you know, religious tourism.
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Yeah, the Christian Safari. You go, you take selfies with
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some poor kids, you paint a wall that didn't need painting, and
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you come back saying I am so blessed.
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Right. And often the missionary on the
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field is left cleaning up the mess.
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They have to host this team, drive them all over, translate
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for them. It's exhausting, but the sources
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reframe STMS entirely. The goal should not be the
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experience of the person who goes, it should be the
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refreshment of the long term worker.
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OK, So what does a refresher STM look like it.
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Looks like servant logistics. It looks like bringing a
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suitcase that's full of cheddar cheese, peanut butter and home
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schooling books. Things they just can't get over
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there, practical stuff. The practical stuff.
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It looks like a team coming in to run a vacation Bible school,
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not just to do ministry, but so the missionary parents could
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have a week off. So the team watches the kids and
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the missionary couple can actually go on a date.
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Yes, or the team fixes the leaky roof so the missionary doesn't
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have to spend 3 weeks dealing with local contractors.
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It's practical service. It's basically saying we are
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here to be your servants for a week.
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We are your pit crew. That really shifts the focus
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from look at me, I'm a missionary for a week to I am
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supporting the long term work. And psychologically that is huge
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for the missionary. It reminds them I am not out
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here alone, my family is with me.
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Another strategy the sources mention is this idea of
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ownership by small groups. I love this idea because in a
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big church it's just impossible to know everyone.
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It's a problem of scale. If a church supports 50
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missionaries, no single member can pray meaningfully for all
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fifty of them. It just becomes noise.
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The solution is decentralization.
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So you assign them out. You assign specific missionary
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families to specific Sunday school classes or home
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fellowship groups. So the Tuesday night Bible study
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adopts the Smith family in Brazil.
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Exactly. And suddenly, that small group
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knows the details. They know when the Smith kids
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have the flu. They know when the car breaks
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down. They're the ones sending the
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birthday cards. They're the ones organizing the
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care package. It creates high accountability
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and real intimacy. It makes the partnership real.
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You're not supporting missions as a concept, you're supporting
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The Smiths. Precisely.
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Now we have to talk about the F word of missions furlough.
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Furlough. The term actually comes from a
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Dutch word for permission or leave of absence.
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But there is a massive myth we need to bust.
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Furlough is not a vacation. I think most people in the pews
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assume it is. Oh, you're back in the States
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for six months? Must be nice to have a break.
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Enjoy the beach. And the missionary just wants to
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scream. The reality is that furlough, or
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home assignment as many call it now, is often frantic, homeless
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and incredibly exhausting. They're traveling from church to
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church, giving the same presentation 50 times, meeting
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with donors to keep their funding up, trying to squeeze in
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medical check UPS, dental work, renew visas.
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It sounds like a complete nightmare.
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You have no home base. You are living out of suitcases.
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Your kids are totally confused. So how does the congregation
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help? By solving the logistics.
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Housing and transportation are the two biggest stressors.
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OK, don't make your missionary rent a car at market rates for
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six months. That will bankrupt them.
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The church should provide a vehicle at low or no cost.
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And for housing? Provide a furnished apartment or
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a profits chamber. But here is a detail I
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absolutely love from the text. Stock the refrigerator before
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they arrive. Oh, that's such a small thing,
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but that's huge. It's huge.
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Imagine getting off a 20 hour flight with three jet lagged
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kids. You unlock the door to some
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borrowed apartment. If the fridge is empty, you now
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have to drag everyone to the grocery store.
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But if the fridge has milk, eggs, bread, fruit, and maybe a
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frozen lasagna, you can just collapse and rest.
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It signals we were expecting you.
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We care about you. And don't just say hi in the
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hallway when they visit the church on Sunday, right?
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Pick them up at the airport, invite them to dinner, and not
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to pick their brain or ask them to perform, but just to be
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friends. Offer to babysit so the couple
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can go on a date. Remember they've been living
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under a microscope. Give them some space to just be
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normal human beings. This leads us right into what
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the sources call the Hidden Sorrows.
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This part of the reading really hit me.
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We talked about the sacrifice of the missionary, but we rarely
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talk about the sacrifice of the extended family that gets left
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behind. This is the emotional cost that
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often goes unspoken when a family moves overseas.
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They are leaving behind grandparents, siblings and aging
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parents. The church has to step into that
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gap. Let's talk about that left
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behind scenario, but with the children.
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The sources talk about Third Culture Kids, or TCKS.
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This is a specific crisis point. A child grows up on the mission
20:10
field. They look American, but
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culturally they are Brazilian or Thai or Kenyan.
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And then they turn 18 and get sent back to the US for college.
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And their parents stay on the field.
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Their parents remain on the field, so they land in the
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country that it's supposed to be home, but they feel like aliens.
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I've heard stories of TCK is walking into a grocery store
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cereal aisle and just having a panic attack because there are
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fifty kinds of cereal. They don't know the slang, they
20:34
don't know how to pump gas, they don't know how to open a bank
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account, and worst of all, they're alone.
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So what is the church's role in that?
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The sending church must become the surrogate family.
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You adopt them. Who helps them move into the
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dorm room? Who invites them over for
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Thanksgiving? Who disciples them when they are
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struggling with the culture shock of American hedonism?
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If the church ignores these kids, they often walk away from
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the faith because they feel abandoned by the very God their
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parents are serving. It's.
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A very sobering thought. We could be losing the next
21:06
generation because we're not caring for them when they come
21:09
back. It's a huge responsibility.
21:11
And then you flip the coin. The aging Terrence.
21:14
This is one of the biggest sources of Guild for
21:16
missionaries. They're serving God in a jungle
21:19
somewhere while their mom or dad is deteriorating in a nursing
21:23
home back in Ohio. They.
21:25
Feel like they're violating the 5th commandment.
21:27
They feel like they have abandoned them.
21:29
Yes. So what does the church do?
21:32
The church visits the parents as a proxy for the missionary.
21:36
You visit the nursing home. You mow the lawn for the elderly
21:39
mom. You sit with them in the
21:41
hospital. The source quotes 3 John verses
21:44
6 and seven about sending them on their journey in a manner
21:47
worthy of God. Part of honoring the goer is
21:51
caring for the vulnerabilities they left behind.
21:53
That's beautiful. It really gets to the heart of
21:56
us being one body. If the hand is reaching out to
21:58
the nations, the feet need to support the body back home.
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Precisely, if you want your missionary to stay on the field
22:05
long term, take care of their mom.
22:07
It really can't be that simple. OK, we've covered a lot of the
22:10
heavy emotional stuff. Let's get into the structural
22:13
solutions, because good intentions without some kind of
22:15
structure usually fail. The sources give us two major
22:19
frameworks. First Tom Pennington's care team
22:22
model. This is a brilliant, scalable
22:24
solution. Pennington suggests that for
22:26
every missionary unit, so every family or single missionary, you
22:30
form a dedicated care team. What does that look like in
22:32
practice? It's a small group, maybe 4 to 8
22:35
people. They're selected by the
22:37
missionary, but they're approved by the church leadership, and
22:40
they have a dedicated leader who reports to the church's main
22:43
missions leadership team. So this isn't just a random
22:46
group of friends, it's actually structured.
22:48
Yes, and their duties are threefold.
22:50
Advocacy, confidentiality and logistics.
22:54
First, advocacy. They represent the missionary to
22:57
the wider church. They're the ones making sure the
22:59
missionary doesn't get forgotten.
23:01
The prayer bulletin. They are the squeaky wheel.
23:04
And the second one. Confidentiality.
23:06
This is so key. They provide a safe space for
23:09
the missionary to share struggles that cannot go in a
23:12
public newsletter. That is huge.
23:14
You can't put I am depressed or I am really struggling with
23:18
anger at my team leader in a newsletter that goes out to 500
23:22
people. Exactly, if you do that you risk
23:24
losing support so you just stay silent.
23:27
But the care team is the vault. They can hear the ugly truth and
23:30
pray without gossiping. And the third one is logistics.
23:33
Yes, they handle the birthday cards, the airport pickups, the
23:36
housing search for furlough instead of the whole church
23:39
trying to do everything and, well, failing.
23:42
This small, dedicated team ensures the specific needs are
23:45
met. Yeah, it distributes the load.
23:47
It's like a pit crew for a race car driver.
23:50
That is a perfect analogy. The driver gets all the glory,
23:54
but the pit crew keeps the car running.
23:56
Without the crew, the car crashes.
23:58
The second structural framework comes from Rodney Anderson.
24:00
He lists what he calls the four PS required for the pastors or
24:04
leaders who are directing the missions efforts.
24:06
This is for the leadership side. If you're going to lead a church
24:09
in missions, you need these four things.
24:11
Number one, passion. You need a real zeal for God's
24:16
global glory, and this is fueled by theology and reading
24:19
missionary biography. The leaders and excited the
24:22
people will not be. You cannot outsource passion.
24:24
#2. A pastor's heart.
24:26
We've touched on this already, viewing missionaries as flock
24:29
members who need sanctification and comfort, not just as
24:33
employees who are producing results.
24:34
And #3 is my favorite passport. I love this one too.
24:37
You cannot lead what you do not visit.
24:40
That is so simple. It is, and it's essential, a
24:44
missions pastor who never leaves the country.
24:47
It's like a swimming coach who never gets in the water.
24:50
You have to be willing to travel.
24:51
You have to endure the jet lag, the strange food, the
24:54
discomfort. It gives you credibility with
24:57
the missionaries, and it gives you real insight into what
24:59
they're actually facing. When you stand in the pulpit and
25:02
say pray for The Smiths and you can describe the smell of their
25:05
St. The congregation listens
25:06
differently. And in the fourth P.
25:08
Plan strategic calendaring. You have to know when your
25:12
missionaries are coming home, so you don't schedule the big
25:14
missions Sunday for the week after they leave, right?
25:17
It means budgeting properly for reimbursements.
25:20
It means intentionality. Excellence in administration
25:24
honors God. Sloppiness discourages the
25:26
missionary. This has been a really detailed
25:28
discussion. I mean, we've moved from the
25:30
Philippian model of participation, that deep
25:33
Koinonia all the way to the mandate for elders to shepherd
25:37
the soul, the mandate for the congregation to encourage
25:41
practically the care for the hidden sorrows of the family,
25:44
and finally these structural ways to actually make it happen.
25:47
It really is a comprehensive overhaul of how we typically
25:51
think about missions. It shifts the entire paradigm
25:54
from paying a bill to sharing a life.
25:57
So as as we wrap this up, let's try to summarize the key take
26:01
away for the learner who's been listening today.
26:03
The core take away is that support equals participation.
26:07
The Reformed doctrine of the Communion of the Saints is not
26:10
just some theological abstraction.
26:12
It means we are one body, geographically separated, but
26:15
spiritually united. If you are a sender, your role
26:18
is not passive. It is active, it is relational,
26:21
and it is sacrificial. Which brings us right back to
26:24
that question we posed at the very beginning.
26:26
Yes. Reflect on the Philippians
26:27
again. If a church supports A
26:29
missionary financially but completely ignores their
26:32
physical, their emotional, and their spiritual needs, are they
26:35
actually participating in the gospel?
26:38
Or are they just paying a contractor to do a job they
26:40
don't really want to think about?
26:42
That is a stinging question. Are we just paying a contractor?
26:46
Because true partnership costs more than money.
26:49
It costs the self. It costs time.
26:52
It costs emotional energy. It costs the comfort of bringing
26:56
a stranger into your home. It costs the awkwardly intimate
26:59
conversations about sin and struggle, but that's the cost of
27:03
the gospel. And as the sources reminded us,
27:05
Paul said that this kind of giving, this giving of self, is
27:08
a fragrant offering, an acceptable sacrifice pleasing to
27:12
God, and that God will supply all our needs according to his
27:15
riches in glory. Amen.
27:17
The giver is blessed in the giving.
27:18
You're not losing when you give yourself away.
27:21
You're gaining equity in the Kingdom.
27:23
Thank you for walking us through all this.
27:25
It has certainly challenged me to rethink how I engage with the
27:29
missionaries my own church supports.
27:30
I'm already thinking about who I need to e-mail right now.
27:33
It's always a good thing to align our practice with
27:35
Scripture. Let's not just be hearers of the
27:36
Word, but doers. For our listeners, we hope this
27:39
deep dive helps you move from being a donor to being a
27:42
partner. Check your church's missionary
27:44
list. Pick a name, write a note, send
27:47
some cheddar cheese. Be a partner.
27:49
Thanks for listening to Reformed Thinking.
27:50
We'll see you next time.