God's Mission Matters
What is a God's Mission Matters Podcast?
God's Mission Matters is a series of twelve podcasts of Presbyterian World Mission that aim to help you learn how to engage more faithfully and effectively in God’s mission. The podcast is recorded with an educational purpose – it is broken into short, digestible parts for use as part of a Sunday school or study group environment. It comes with transcripts of the conversations and a study guide, complete with devotions and activities to accompany that podcast's theme. God’s Mission Matters is an interactive tool for Christian educators looking for materials and ideas for how to connect with Presbyterian World Mission.
Listen up!
Listening to and learning from our partners
In an empty church in the Philippines, through partnership with “humble peasants” in Nicaragua, and along Jesus’ walk to Emmaus, we find rich lessons in listening and learning in mission.
Just be there!
Being, not doing: do we have to “accomplish” anything?
Through Jesus’ example of being with people for 30 years before engaging in a “doing” kind of ministry, in learning a new verb for simply being present, and by letting go of the need for measurable results, we catch glimpses of God’s mission often being more about relationships than tangible achievements.
Check your bags!
Cultural baggage: what we bring with us as we engage in mission
By pausing to try to see another’s perspective, in seeing how Jewish Christians in the first century dealt with new converts, and through observations of our own culture we gain insights into the ways culture both defines us and limits us when we engage in God’s mission.
Open your eyes!
Faith stories: Encountering Jesus with new eyes
Stories about a Guatemalan woman struggling courageously against violence, a North American woman being accompanied by a humble Filipino farmer, and Jesus bringing new vision in myriad ways give us the gift of “open eyes” when we engage in God’s mission with people from other cultures and faith experiences.
Ask and tell!
Building mutual accountability into your partnership
Unsought and now silt-filled wells in Ghana, contrasting Gospel stories about faithfulness in community versus greed and self-service, and mutual sharing of faith and companionship between Presbyterians in Guatemala and in the United States show us how “asking and telling” (mutual accountability) in our resources and relationships is vital to healthy mission relationships
Stand by me!
Dependency to independence to interdependence
By sharing who we are across cultures, through recounting how Moses and Hobab recognized their need for each other, and in an eloquent eulogy to a woman who had become like a sister to a foreigner, we learn that God calls us to “stand by” others in mission in interdependent ways.
Perceive the power!
Power dynamics-understanding racial and social privilege
Through church culture dynamics in India, reflections from Paul’s letters to the Romans in relation to inadvertent motivations underlying good intentions, and the breaking of gift-giving patterns in a Philippine village, we learn how God calls us to be aware of power issues in mission relationships.
Hit the brakes!
Moving away from a problem-solving approach to mission
Through a mission worker in Sudan embracing partnership rather than “being the boss,” from Job’s exasperation with friends who want to “help” on their own terms, and through a teenager’s revelation that presence is more important than getting the job done, we discover the importance of accompaniment in God’s mission.
Bridge the gap!
Improving communications between here and there
Through reflections on communicating between partners in the Dominican Republic and in the United States, God’s incarnational ministry through Christ – and lessons for cross-cultural understanding – and a Kenyan church partner’s struggles to communicate well with a local project, we gain insights on how to “bridge the gap” and build partnerships. Toolkit.
Pray the way!
The power of prayer in mission
A community in the Philippines prays their way through an extraordinary test, Mexican churches grow through constant prayer for their children, and a pastor in China shows a Mission Network leader what heroism really is. This month we ask ourselves what it means to “Pray without ceasing.”
Be Different!
Bringing the mission experience into everyday life
Learning how to be different takes patience, time, and discernment. In Northern Ireland we learn about the gradual growth of relationships, in Nicaragua we learn how to really take the experience home, and in Sudan we learn how our perception and our new experiences can help us change direction.
Take Stock!
Small churches engaging in mission
Luke tells us that our souls magnify the Lord, and our spirits rejoice in God. In this podcast we talk about how our churches take on the task of our souls, to magnify and glorify, to represent and to learn. To be good stewards, to be positive agents of change, we need to stop and take stock – so that as we amplify and magnify the message we believe, we do so with discernment and humility.
