Lausanne World Pulse – Learning from Ants: Missionary Teams and the Skyscraper Analogy
By Justin Long
Skyscrapers are certainly highly technological, very modern creations. Each has had a great deal of pride associated with it. For its short time in the sun, the owners have bragging rights to “the tallest building.” There have been gentle (and not so gentle) debates over which tower is highest, and what can be counted for the purpose of computing height (the general conclusion: things that are part of the architecture can be counted, but things like radio antennas or satellite dishes cannot).
Skyscrapers are also concentrated strength. Within their offices are high-value businesses with power and influence. They have a tremendous collection of intelligence, money and technology. The Burj Dubai is promoted as “a structure with the power to change history.”
Yet this means skyscrapers also tend to be elite. Only the best of the best have access. Of the Burj Dubai, it is written, “There are a select few who possess the vision, resources and opportunity to live in the world’s tallest building. If you have that opportunity, you are assured not just unparalleled luxury, but a place in history and in Dubai’s future.” A modern Babylonian tower indeed.
Ultimately, skyscrapers are self-contained units. The best cooks, shops, offices, recreational and fitness centers, theaters and so forth are found there. Those who live inside may never need to interact with anyone outside because a skyscraper has everything a person needs.
Can a mission be a skyscraper? Think of a single agency with the capacity to recruit, screen, train, commission, send, support and retire forty-three thousand mission teams or some 100,000 workers. It is safe to say such a “skyscraper” does not exist—right now. It would be the “Burj Dubai” of the Christian mission world. It would require a vast global presence, an enormous budget, a sizable administrative staff and an incredible donor base.
For an idea of the size, consider the largest mission agencies today. In order to provide for a workforce of four thousand career missionaries and one thousand short-term workers, the Southern Baptists have created a recruitment arm, the largest evangelical missionary training center in America (if not the world), a corporate structure and a well-polished fundraising campaign (the Lottie Moon Offering) that raises US$150 million over a single week.
Building a “skyscraper” capable of supporting 100,000 workers would be the equivalent of building an organization twenty times larger than the International Mission Board—both benefits and problems would be twenty times larger as well. Looking at our example of skyscrapers, we can see most buildings incrementally improve on the most recent “tallest building.” Building an organization with such a magnitude greater than any mission agency presently in existence would be a very tall task indeed.
It is not without precedent. There is a company that certainly is monolithic. The largest employer in the world, and the second largest company in terms of revenue: Wal-Mart.
Wal-Mart is an American public corporation founded by Sam Walton in 1962. It is the largest retail store chain in the world, with 6,500 stores employing 1.8 million workers in fifteen countries, having 176 million customers weekly—roughly twenty-four million per day. It is the second largest company worldwide in terms of revenue. In 2006, it had US$316 billion in sales and a net income of US$11.2 billion.
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