Out of the mouth....

I heard this week of a pastor who, when introducing a foreign missionary to his congregation, (which has several local missionaries in it), said "we are privileged today to have a real "live" missionary with us today". One of the "local" missionaries was very discouraged by this. He had thought that he was a real "live" missionary. His pastor says he values local missionaries, but then makes a pronouncement that says otherwise, that speaks volumes to those other "missionaries" about their value.

This brings home to me the need for us as a church to speak clearly and often of the things we value. We need to publicly declare our values. This keeps us accountable to them because people can compare our actions and our words. We strive to be an honest church, a transparent church. My hope would be that if someone saw us giving lip-service to anything, they would point it out to us.

I want to go on record saying, The Open Door values local missionaries,... and not just because I am one, but because this is the neediest mission field in North America and it is hard. If you can do missions here, you can do it anywhere. It can be discouraging. Our job as a local church is to support , pray for and work with local missionaries to impact our community with the love of Christ.

Matt 15:18 But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart.....