The Missions Show

What are the non-negotiables of how we do missions? Is it possible to reverse-engineer what’s “working” on the field to build our methodology, or are we locked in to a finite set of prescriptions from Scripture about how to do ministry—thinks like preaching the word training elders? Andy Johnson (Ph. D., Texas A&M), Associate Pastor at Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington, D.C. and contri...

What is it like for a Christian living in the Middle East? What do believers usually get wrong about Islam and how to share Christ with Muslims? These questions are especially pressing during the month of Ramadan. This week Fouad Masri shares his personal conversion account and weighs in on these issues. Author and lecturer Fouad Masri was born and raised in the war zone of Beirut, Lebanon. As a t...

Radical. Transformative. Impact. Crazy, even. These words fill the atmosphere when Christians discuss the sacrifice and risk involved in missions. But has all this talk of “radical” living left us unable to cope with regular life, ordinariness, boredom, and God’s normal means of grace? This week we talked with Dr. Michael Horton , professor, author, and nationally-syndicated radio host, regarding...

The social justice controversy echoing across conservative evangelicalism has brought terms like “privilege” into the Christian vernacular, but in all the discussion of rights, equity, and cultural engagement, we’ve missed a critical category: gospel privilege . Chad Vegas , founding board member of Radius International and lead pastor of Sovereign Grace Church , joins the show this week to discus...

Christmas-and-Easter Christians. Mainline Protestants. Nominal Catholics. Bible-Belt believers. Let’s face it—cultural Christians are everywhere. And the problem is that we see cultural Christianity as a discipleship issue rather than an evangelistic field. In this enriching conversation, Dean Inserra expounds on his book The Unsaved Christian and the eight types of cultural Christians he identifi...

Everybody talks about “engaging culture.” Culture is a slippery concept. When should missionaries break from their host culture, and when should they bend with it? Is missions mainly about creating countless contextualized Christianities across various cultures, or is it also about assimilating believers into one overarching Christian culture? We discussed these issues with Dr. Kenneth Nehrbass of...

For decades, missiologists have assumed the priority of the “unreached”—and for good reason—building entire organizational strategies around it. But do we need to redefine this term? Matthew Bennett , Ph. D., former IMB missionary and current Assistant Professor of Missions and Theology at Cedarville University, weighs in. In a recent article , Matthew argues that we’ve taken the arbitrary 2-perce...

Lament—though it litters the psalter—is a lost art form in modern evangelicalism. In a culture as torn-apart as ours, it makes sense that engaging grief biblically can open spiritual doors previously shut. Not only that, but embracing the grace of lament can also prepare missionaries and pastors for the pains and losses that often mark the suffering, missional life. Mark Vroegop, lead pastor of Co...

Are all the accounts of miraculous conversions among Muslim refugees true? What is unique about Athens, Greece amidst the ongoing people displacements in the Middle East? And what can U.S. churches learn from the hospitality and evangelistic zeal of Greek Christians? In this episode, Scott and Alex invited Darren Carlson to weigh in and take us on a journey through the planning and creation of his...

Reading well in Scripture, theology, culture, and literature in general is key to preaching and teaching that connects—especially for the cross-cultural worker. What should we be reading? Why does it matter? And how can we who are busy working and doing ministry have time to cultivate the life of the mind as we constantly prepare to minister God’s word? In this episode, Scott and Alex talk about b...

Is preaching essential to missions, or is it a Western tradition that can be sacrificed for the sake of contextualization? Some advocates of disciple-making movements (DMM’s) claim the latter. In this interview, Tom Ascol and Jared Longshore of Founders Ministries explain why authoritative proclamation is indispensable to ministry in any culture. Later in the episode, we address whether or not Ref...

The average college student in the U.S. leaves with about $30,000 in educational debt. At what point do we stop sending missionaries to the field with students loans? Is it immoral to send expensive Western missionaries to serve where national partners could do the work of ministry much more affordably? Luke Womack , executive director of The Go Fund , weighs in. The Go Fund specializes in student...

What’s the danger in missions conferences and serial short-term missions trips? This week, we welcome back our friend Lori McDaniel , Church Initiatives Manager for IMB and also a pastor’s wife, to give her take on trends we’re seeing among Christian college students and why it’s so critical to learn to “adult”—in finances, education, career, marriage, family, and the local church—before moving ov...

Globally, 71% of missionaries who return home each year leave the field for preventable reasons . What might be the biggest factor? We believe it all comes down to team dynamics. What is it about cross-cultural ministry that is so uniquely stressful for teams? How can missionaries better handle conflict? And what does the Bible say about resolving disputes in a ministry context? Scott and Alex exp...

Among the practical topics on which missionaries receive hands-on training, spiritual warfare can sometimes fall by the wayside—but spiritual warfare is crucial for missionaries to grasp and engage effectively. How should we understand spiritual warfare in relation to pagan nations? Is exorcism normal and to be expected on the field? Do missionaries need to name territorial spirits by name and spi...

The presence of Islam in North America is still a lightning-rod issue, even 17 years after 9/11. This week we return to the topic of how Christians can engage their Muslim immigrant and refugee neighbors—and wade through the complicated waters of related political issues—in a way that is biblical and missional. We consulted a new guest, Micah Fries , Senior Pastor of Brainerd Baptist Church &...

According to some stats, Ukraine—in many ways a nominally Christian country—leads the world in per-capita abortions. One in three Ukrainian women has had an abortion, and many women have had upwards of seven abortions  each . What is the role of the local church of addressing this genocide of the unborn, both overseas and at home, and where does the gospel fit in? To answer those questions an...

Mariya Dostzadah Goodbrake comes from a Sunni Afghan background, dabbled into New Age mysticism, and found herself surrounded by Roman Catholics in Mexico—and it’s there that God brought her face-to-face with an evangelical Christian and the biblical gospel. Now, she draws on her rich cultural experiences to help Muslim refugees and expats realize that they don’t have to give up the trappings of t...

In our culture, sexual temptation is hitting the church like a tidal wave, and those serving overseas as missionaries are far from immune. Porn is a fatal undercurrent that Satan uses to eliminate gospel workers sniper-style and cripple missions efforts, and overseas workers separated from accountability and friends are particularly vulnerable. What factors drive a person in full-time ministry to...

Where are all the qualified, seminary-educated young men in the missions world? How can a Bible college or seminary maximize its potential to mobilize students for the work of the Great Commission? Where is the modern missions movement going? This week we’re joined by Dr. Danny Akin , president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, author, scholar, and passionate missions-mobilizer. Dr. Ak...

What does it mean to be “missional”? We asked David Doran Jr. , church planter in Lincoln Park, Michigan, an urban center in the Detroit metroplex, how thinking like a missionary has helped him reach with the gospel different communities just a stone’s throw from where he himself grew up. The result was a powerful chat about what it means to be on missions, whether overseas or in our own backyards...

We use the word “worldview” a lot, but what does it actually mean? Does anthropology have anything to teach missionaries—and can it give us a model for how worldviews actually change as people are converted to Christ? To help us make sense of these questions addressed in the late Dr. Paul Hiebert’s classic missiological text  Transforming Worldviews , we consulted our friend  Dr. John Ma...

How do we  really know how many unreached people groups there are—and is that the thing we should be counting, anyway? What can statistics tell us, and what can’t they? We ask these and other tough questions to expert missions researcher Justin Long,  Director of Global Research for Beyond , adept cataloguer of missions statistics and enthusiastic documenter of missions movements. This i...

In this special episode, we take a break from the normal flow as Scott Dunford shares an important update on his life and ministry. We’re also joined by Bob Bixby, lead pastor of Redeemer Church in Fremont, California, to talk about why the San Francisco Bay Area is truly a mission field—and how listeners can prayerfully engage what God is doing there in and amongst the unchurched and unreached ex...

What is the gospel? It’s a question missionaries can’t afford to take for granted. Specifically, what would a distinctly  gospel-centered approach to missions look like, and how would it differ—or not differ—from forms of mission that focus heavily on meeting physical, tangible needs? What is the relationship between gospel proclamation and cultural engagement? Scott and Alex dive into some o...