Great Commission responsibility by funding
Shattering the Stereotypes
world missions. From that date until now,
each local church has been asked to send 2.5
IN A RECENT CONVERSATION, a pastor said to me, “World Missions needs to move into the
percent of its monthly tithe income for mis-
twenty-first century and learn to do things in an up-to-date way.” I asked him to point out
sionary purposes. Some churches have given
what we might do differently, but as the conversation continued, it became apparent to me
much more. At the last General Assembly, a
that he was not acquainted with how World Missions operates; he was merely repeating ste-
majority of pastors voted to keep part of that
reotypes that now have little connection with reality, if they ever did.
money for local ministries, so the financial
That conversation led to further discussions revealing that many church members have not
commitment will gradually be reduced by 50
taken advantage of opportunities to learn about the ground-breaking, effective ministry of the
percent over the next five years, beginning
Great Commission ministry of the Church of God. It’s almost as if they think, Well, it’s Church
this September.
of God, so it can’t be very good. What?
The two primary emphases in each coun-
try where missionary work has been initiated
Here are a dozen facts you may not know about Church of God World Missions:
during the past 100 years are evangelism
• We have a media ministry and a follow-up Bible study program that reaches into dozens of
and training. As soon as a number of people
Muslim nations and touches the lives of thousands of spiritually hungry followers of Islam.
have been attracted to the message and the
• We sponsor 74 homes for children around the globe, feeding and educating hundreds of
group reaches appropriate size, a training
homeless children. These ministries are funded primarily by churches in the sponsoring
program is usually begun, which eventually
nations.
takes the shape of a Bible college for prepar- • We have targeted 70 unreached people groups for evangelization and church planting, con-
ing national workers. This places ministry in centrating on particular groups in each Assembly period. We currently have churches minis-
the hands of nationals and obviates the need tering in all 10 of the original groups targeted in 2004.
for a heavy missionary presence.
• While the Church of God in the United States has reached a membership of one million, the
Three sizeable amalgamations brought
church outside the U.S. has 6 million members, even though membership in most fields has
new members into the Church of God in
more stringent requirements than the U.S.
South Africa, Romania, and Indonesia. Finan-
• The Church of God operates 117 Bible schools at various culturally-appropriate levels, enroll-
cial undergirding from the U.S. church to the
ing nearly 30,000 students each year. In many countries, other denominations prefer to send
churches in these three nations helped build
their students to our schools because of superior programs.
strong ties in the beginning years of the part-
• In addition to well-publicized and mature works in traditional mission fields, we have mission-
nerships. All three have shown extraordinary
aries in 17 “closed” countries, where ministry is dangerous but often incredibly productive.
membership growth.
• World Missions communicates with a new generation by means of Internet sites such as
The most recent innovation in missions
MySpace, Facebook, YouTube and other popular venues.
has been the adoption of an Unreached
People Groups emphasis. Since 2004, World
• The Church of God Web site (www.cogwm.org) offers hundreds of pages of information
Missions has targeted groups of people who
about all aspects of our work, offering a full-fledged orientation to our ministries, budget
have a common language and culture but
expenditures, personnel and more.
not enough of a Christian presence to evan-
• Approaches to evangelism often begin with teaching English, providing job training, feeding
gelize the group. New churches have been
the hungry, operating clinics and hospitals, media outreach and many other ways, but the
established in 12 such groups. This emphasis
ultimate goal is spiritual redemption.
continues, with some 70 groups identified as
• Leaders of other mission agencies, aware of our effectiveness, have visited our leaders to
evangelism objectives.
study our methodologies.
The Church of God believes the last • Church of God leaders serve on interdenominational boards and give leadership to globe-
command of Christ—the Great Commis- touching efforts, such as the current Second Billion initiative (billionsoul.org).
sion—is the first obligation of His people. • A popular non-Church of God minister who has donated heavily to World Missions told us,
In obedience to His mandate, the Church “I travel around the world and see what many denominations do, but I can tell you that
of God has been faithful for 100 years to your church makes a dollar go farther than anyone I know.”
put the evangelization of the world as
My pastor friend and I continued our discussion for a couple of hours, and I kept hearing him
the first priority. We look forward to the
say, “I didn’t know. I didn’t know.”
remaining days of opportunity, until He
If you think our denomination has a missions “inferiority complex,” talk with missions leaders
comes again.
or to someone who has been on a missions trip. Better yet, plan to go on a missions trip yourself.
We are not perfect and don’t do everything exactly right. We have room to improve. We’re
Bill George is coordinator of
still learning. Some of our fields are more effective than others. But, boasting aside, we’re doing
education and publications for
a pretty good job. The Church of God is winning souls around the world! —Bill George
Church of God World Missions.
EVANGEL • JAN 2010 9
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