How We Love Missionaries
The goal of the ABWE Training Department is to send the best-trained missionaries in the world, to the world. We strive in this direction not as a badge to be worn with pride, but because it would be sinfully laggard to strive for less.
I’m currently focussing on how we approach the personal development of our missionaries. While much missionary training happens on the front end and in the first season of ministry, how are missionaries growing as their ministry progresses? Are they acquiring new skills and improving in their areas of giftedness? By virtue of their experience, we can assume that they are to varying degrees, but wouldn’t some intentionality accelerate and improve their improvement? Of course, but how do we convince some of the most hard-working, over-extended, and self-sacrificial people in God’s Kingdom to set aside time and energy to invest in their own development?
I believe there are 3 key factors that need to be addressed in order for missionaries to engage with personal development:
Aspiration- First and foremost, growth cannot be forced. How do we motivate people to engage intentionally with their own personal development and growth? The way that this question has been answered in times past, is unfortunately, the very reason many people across vocations struggle to engage with ongoing training. Implementing training requirements rapidly disenfranchises individuals from the training process. Think about the last time you were informed of a required training at your workplace and the immediate reaction you had to this news. Most commonly, a feeling of irritation or dread accompanies such announcements. Even when we know that the training might be useful, the notion of forced growth is one few respond to well. Often, trainings are not perceived as useful, but rather a list of checkboxes that needed to be ticked by an administrator somewhere up the organizational chain. Nevertheless, training requirements are an unavoidable reality in nearly every vocation, including ministry. Helping missionaries form their own aspirations for training and personal development means creating a culture of open communication and trust. It means communicating the ‘why’ of required trainings while establishing trust by exceeding expectations and actually delivering on the premise and promise of these trainings. It means not wasting people’s time. Yet, required trainings are the deficit to be overcome. In order to establish a culture of personal development, missionaries need to have the ability to choose and direct their own development pathways and be empowered in doing so. It means that for the majority of our role as trainers, we loosen our grip on required training, and instead come alongside missionaries and assist them in accomplishing their training and development goals. It means leading from the rear, so we can enable and encourage development vision, rather than blocking the view.
Accessibility- People desire to grow. I’ve never met a person that didn’t envision that they would be a better version of their current self in 5, 10 and 20 years rather than a regressed one. However, in setting about to intentionally pursue growth we face numerous obstacles. We have limitations of finances, time, and copious commitments already absorbing the bulk of our attention and energy. This is the part of our new role at ABWE that I get excited about: How can we come alongside our colleagues and remove the obstacles to personal development? How can we make training and development a blessing and encouragement that is enriching missionaries’ lives and ministries rather than encumbering them? We love facing these challenges because we love missionaries. If there are ways that we can absorb part of the load of personal development, we are eager to shoulder these burdens. By example, one such way is streamlining the trainings we currently offer. We can reduce the time investment required for many trainings by trimming them to their most essential components. We can also accomplish a great many training sessions online now, which allows missionaries to be effectively trained while on their field of service. These are just two of the most basic and obvious approaches. We are living in a time of great potential for developing missionaries with minimal interruptions to their ministries if we can approach the obstacles to training with some humility and creativity.
Accountability- It’s perhaps one of the most dreary and burdened words in both our Christian and vocational vocabularies. Maybe we can find ways to effect accountability minus blunt force demands and awkward inquisitions. Accountability ought to amount to more than properly submitted paperwork and coerced confessions of inadequacy. It’s been said, if something is important to you, you’ll find a way, and if not, you’ll find an excuse. So much of the “accountability” most of us are accustomed to has been of the “don’t let them make an excuse” variety. However, healthy organizations find that accountability is actually a natural by-product of a work environment that fosters good communication, education, and encouragement. In short, when we enjoy and respect our team, we want to do our best to contribute and assume appropriate levels of responsibility to it.
