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In our years of missions work, one question has kept popping up: “What kind of missionaries are most urgently needed?” Gifted missionary candidates often approach churches who must select whom to support. Mission boards must make tough decisions about who they’ll send. Is it more important to accept a church planter or a teacher for missionary children? Is an effective evangelist more needed than a field treasurer?

So who are the most needed missionaries? Maybe that’s the wrong question. Suppose sports fans could designate the money paid for their ticket to any player they choose. Football fans would likely opt for the salary of a famous quarterback. Soccer fans would fund the high-scoring forwards, while baseball fans would put their money on the home-run champ. But tackles, defensive backs and right fielders would get paid little.

The obvious problem with such a plan is that the quarterback would get sacked in every play without strong guards and tackles. The home-run champion would never be part of a winning team without strong pitching and fielding. Coaches and trainers would likely starve. In team sports, everyone plays a significant role?not just the superstars.

World missions is a team effort. In Acts, missionaries were sent together. Paul went out with Barnabas. The team evolved as needs and opportunities changed. Paul took Timothy and Titus on some missionary journeys, and Doctor Luke often joined Paul’s team.

Missionary heros who can preach powerfully or successfully plant churches may seem the most obvious people to send. Thus, the quiet computer technician, the studious accountant or the capable veterinarian don’t consider themselves as needed candidates for missions. But a high-performance team has no insignificant players.

Effective missionaries belong to a team that has a strategic ministry. The key question is not an individual’s skill, but the value of the team ministry. It’s not appropriate to ask if the quarterback is more important than the right guard because both perform interdependent functions. The team would fail if either missed his assigned task. In missions as in sports, effectiveness is based on the team?s success.

Effective missionaries have spiritual gifts and skills the team needs. A team isn’t merely a collection of gifted people, but a combination of people with complementary gifts who are able to work together. In Nigeria we saw the effective team effort of two medical doctors working hand-in-hand with a Nigerian evangelist to reach a resistant Fulani group. Each person was equally important.

Effective missionaries have the ability to work on a team. Today, many missionary teams are multicultural. For example, missionaries in Ghana might work side-by-side with missionaries from Korea, Switzerland, South Africa and the US. Each multicultural team must closely partner with nationals from the host country. The most important skill for modern missionaries may be the ability to work on a multicultural team.

To answer the question about the kinds of missionaries most needed today, it?s missionaries with the gifts and the fruit of the Spirit that equip them to work on a vision-driven team.

 

Carol Plueddemann is the minister of congregational life and outreach at Immanuel Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Warrenville, Illinois. Jim Plueddemann is professor of missions at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois.