Who belongs at Missions Fest?
Is the popular missions conference turning into a Christian fair?
DEBRA
FIEGUTH
CW Senior Writer
Question: Which of the following groups get to have a display booth at a conference promoting international missions?
Gospel for Asia
Christian
Aid Mission
Evangelical Fellowship of Canada
Canadian Council of Christian
Charities
Truckers for Christ
Entertainment Publications
Answer: All of the above if the conference is held in Winnipeg. But if it’s in Vancouver or Edmonton, that’s a different story.
In 1998, Missions Fest Vancouver told Gospel for Asia it would not be allowed back because of its aggressive tactics–the organization’s reps apparently gave away copies of a book that conference organizers found too strident–and emphasis on national workers instead of sent missionaries. (Rather odd, considering the concept of empowering national workers is a growing trend in missions.) A year later, Christian Aid Mission was denied access for the same reasons. Both missions had been present for many years. Edmonton followed Vancouver’s lead.
The conference planners in Winnipeg and Toronto, however, decided the two organizations were legitimate and should be included. Winnipeg even featured GFA’s founder, K.P. Yohannan, as a plenary speaker at its March 25-27 conference.
While the missions festivals in all Canadian cities focus on raising awareness of international missions and encouraging people to obey the Great Commission, they also feature numerous Christian organizations that may or may not fall into the category of missionary sending agency.
For example, the EFC and the CCCC do not recruit missionaries for local or overseas work. They are umbrella groups that include churches, denominations and some mission agencies as members. Their presence at a major missions conference is valuable for them to network with their constituency, but won’t enhance the Great Commission in any direct way.
Then there’s a whole range of organizations which, depending on your definition of mission work, might–or might not–convince a visitor that they, too, qualify. These include colleges, camps, bookstores, radio stations, radio programs, ministry to homosexuals, ministry to pregnant women, and so forth. And who would want to argue that a ministry to truckers isn’t important in the big picture of going into all the world?
Free popcorn
As for Entertainment Publications, that company’s rationale is that it raises money for missions. (They’re the people who publish coupon books, which youth groups and Christian schools often sell as a means of fundraising.) We don’t know how many people signed up for missions after visiting the Entertainment booth, but we do know the rep gave away a lot of popcorn.
Anyway, if a walk down the aisles of any city’s missions festival is a bit confusing, there’s a good reason. The original Missions Fest, held in Vancouver in 1984, involved four churches pooling their resources. Now, in order to pay their expenses at large convention centres, the organizers in all cities open the conference to all sorts of Christian groups.
And yet they maintain they don’t want to turn Missions Fest into a Christian fair or Christian trade show. But that’s exactly what it’s in danger of becoming.
Sadly, it’s the legitimate missions that are losing in an effort to keep a tight rein on who qualifies. When an agency that supports thousands of evangelists and church-planters in India and other countries in Asia is denied a presence at a renowned missions conference, you have to ask: who is a “missionary”?
Makes more sense
In a traditional North American or European sense, a missionary was someone who sailed across the ocean, learned a new language and lived in a different culture in order to bring the gospel to those who hadn’t heard. But growth of the church in South America, Asia and India, coupled with limited access by foreigners in many countries, means it now makes more sense to train local believers to plant their own churches and do their own evangelism.
That doesn’t mean they’re not missionaries. But if national workers aren’t considered missionaries, then the organizers of missions conferences will have to take a good look at other exhibitors who pay for booth space to get publicity. Is a Bible college a mission? No, but it might draw young people into training to become missionaries. Is a Christian camp a mission? No, but it provides an environment where a youngster might accept the Lord and begin a spiritual journey that could lead to missions.
Perhaps it’s time to re-evaluate the basic purposes of a Missions Fest: to raise awareness of worldwide missions; to encourage individuals–young and old–to commit themselves to missions; to encourage them to support missionaries in funding and prayer.
It’s a tough balancing act, knowing just who to include and who to keep out. But discernment on the part of the planners–plus discretion on the part of the exhibitors–should help provide for a stimulating, challenging conference that continues to offer something for everyone.