How to Pray for Your Missionaries

If you partner with Jenn and I you will more than likely have heard us say how important prayer is for us as missionaries. We most definitely need your financial support but we also need your prayer support. Without a solid prayer backing we or any other missionaries going out are missing a crucial part in Stateside support. With this in mind I wanted to share with you 10 ways that you can pray for the missionaries you support. This list is from Pastor Dennis Leatherman, but I thought it would be good to share.

 1. Pray that they will have boldness.

This was the prayer of the N.T. church (Acts4:29-31). The world is increasingly more hostile to Biblical Christianity and boldness is a must in all missionaries.

2. Pray for their marriages & families.

  Satan attacks the missionary's home and marriage. If the marriage fails, the ministry fails. Many missionaries have had to come off the field because of the breakdown of their marriage. Pray that they stay close to each other in their financial and ministry struggles.

3. Pray for their health.

On the foreign field there are many health hazards; the strain of travel, long days and exposure to different parts of the country an breakdown their health.

4. Pray for their safety.

The highways in the USA & around the world can be dangerous places. Some mission fields have their own unique dangers, such as excessively high crime, war, poor law enforcement, etc.

5. Pray for open doors of ministry.

Christian service is a spiritual warfare, and no where is this more evident than on the mission field. All the money, organization, and boldness in the world cannot breakdown spiritual strongholds in the nations of the world. We need God to open doors to closed countries and new ministries.

6. Pray for co-laborers for your missionaries.

Our Lord stated very clearly "the harvest is great, but the laborers are few." His immediate solution to the need of laborers was, "pray ye the Lord of the harvest that He will send forth laborers into the harvest." Your missionaries need helpers. Helpers from the States to join them and national helpers to be raised up and trained on the field. Along these lines, pray for a kindred spirit to be developed within the team on the field, that they can work together with united hearts and minds.

7. Pray for the spiritual well being of your missionaries.

Pray they maintain intimate daily devotions with the Lord, that their prayer life remains vibrant, that the world will lose it's attraction to their flesh, and that they stay strongly in love with their Lord.

8. Pray for the financial needs of your missionaries.

Fluctuating  exchange rates and churches changing leadership or philosophy & dropping missionaries can have a devastating effect on their finances. Not to mention additional children being born into the family, and the continual cost of living increases.

9. Pray for souls to be saved,  self-sustaining churches to be established, Scriptures to be translated into native tongues, and nationals to be trained.

To see these results, it requires earnest, diligent prayers of righteous men and women, here at home and on the field.

10. Pray for the missionaries faithfulness.

The ministry can be very difficult, especially on certain mission fields. The temptation to quit can be very real. Sometimes, with few other Christians near and a lack of accountability, it may be tempting to just "coast" in the work. But it is required of stewards that they be faithful. Though often their reasons are legitimate, there are too many missionaries that surrender then quit before they ever get to the field, or get to the field and then return home shortly thereafter. They need your earnest and sincere prayers.

Often times people find it hard to pray for their missionaries, and one of the main reasons is because they don't know what to pray about. We hope this list gives you a starting point to pray, and sparks other ideas of what to pray for your missionaries.

Q&A with a Missionary

Often we get asked questions about being missionaries and we thought we would share with you those questions and the answers we give.

 Q.  Do you miss home?

A.  No, we definitely miss the people but we don't miss home. For us, if we are always thinking about home we would never be able to adjust to life on the field. We live by this phrase "Home is where God calls us."

Q. What is the hardest thing about living on the mission field?

A.  The answer to this question is going to be different with every missionary but for us the hardest thing to deal with is missing out on big events like the birth of nieces/nephews, weddings, and deaths in the family. In the two and a half years on the field we've experienced all of these. We have three nieces that we have never met, and recently we had an aunt pass away. It was really hard not to be there. As a missionary you don't have the opportunity to grieve like you would if you were around. To a certain degree it doesn't feel real. So when going back for a visit, the loss becomes real and the grieving process begins. Often it's several months after others have moved on in the stages of grief.

Q. What is the best thing about being a missionary?

A. Knowing that we are exactly where God wants us to be. There is nothing better than being in the center of God's will for your life!

Q. What advice would you give someone going on a mission trip?

A.  Make the three I's of missions a part of your life now before you go. The three I's are: 1. I will be flexible 2. I will not be shocked 3. I will walk in love.

Q. What is it like to have a baby in a foreign country?

A.  Everything is different. You think things are going to be one way and then you find out that they are totally different, from doctor appointments to the drugs you are offered during labor.

These are just a few questions that we  have been asked. If you have a question that we didn't answer leave a comment below or send us a message on Facebook.

Culture Shock!

Recently a missionary friend of ours married a British man. Our friend has been to several different countries including England, several times. This time around she seemed to be getting unusually annoyed at things, and at times needed to vent. As she did we listened and finally told her that she was going through culture shock. As I was thinking about this I decided to write about it.

Culture shock is something that anyone who travels to anywhere different from their own culture will have to deal with. So just what is culture shock?

Culture Shock is the personal disorientation a person may feel when experiencing an unfamiliar way of life.

For us this experience seemed to take a long time and be very subtle. But when it did hit us it was big. Living life as a missionary is very exciting and sometimes challenging. Here in the UK things are not done like they are in America. Over the past few years I have had to adjust my thinking on certain subjects. The shift I have experienced is that of Christians drinking. For the majority of US Christians drinking is something that you just don't do, but over here it is culturally acceptable for Christians to drink. In fact there are some preachers who share stories about drinking during their sermons.

When we first arrived this was really difficult for me to handle. In fact it almost stopped me from being an effective minister, just the thought of it stirred feelings of condemnation against the people we are here to minister too.  Everything inside me was telling me that this was wrong. But then I remembered something I learned in Bible school. During my third year missions training the teacher asked this question, "What part of your Gospel is actually the Gospel, and what part of it is cultural?". This simple questioned helped me to make the appropriate adjustments.

I came to realize what parts of my Gospel were cultural, and I was able to look past the things that I don't agree with. The point to this story is that if allowed to go unchecked culture shock can stop you from being effective, and it can completely ruin you experience on the mission field.

Should I go on a mission trip?

"This generation of Christians is responsible for this generation of souls on the earth!" — Keith Green

"This generation of Christians is responsible for this generation of souls on the earth!" — Keith Green.

I really like this quote by Keith Green because it doesn’t say the adults in the church are responsible for this generation of souls on the earth. It emphasizes generation, which includes every age.

As the youth leader I’m passionate about young people and as a missionary I’m passionate about missions. I wanted to write about mission trips and encourage you to prayerfully consider taking at least one short term mission trip in your lifetime.  God tells us in Mark 15:16 “..."Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.” This is the Great Commission not the great suggestion.

On a mission trip you are taken out of your comfort zone, you are tired, you are adjusting to different food and a different culture. Basically you are at your most vulnerable and to top it off you most likely have to minister to someone. This may sound really uncomfortable to you, but it has been my experience, that when you are at that point and still having to go and preach in a church or share God's love on the street you turn from trusting your own abilities to trusting in God completely. Mission trips are life changing, not just for the people you are serving, but for yourselves as well.

A great example of this is when the Ignite youth team was in the Philippines. We were in the middle of nowhere in a church that had 8 cement pillars, a roof, and wooden benches. We didn't count but I would say there was about 65-75 people in attendance. I was asked to deliver the message and after I was finished I asked the people to come up for prayer and almost all of them responded. We had the youth that were on the trip step into the crowd and pray. There was just one problem, the people didn't speak English and we had no interpreter. In a situation like this you can't fix it. The only thing you can do is trust God and play a little charades to try and work out what is needed. I remember clearly that a few of the boys looked at me with confusion in their faces, and said "Kenny, we don't know what to do." I showed them how to make gestures and to try and understand then told them to trust God. They did and as they prayed for individuals, the people began to cry out to God, He was clearly working something within them. That night these youth learned that even with a language barrier God is the one who does the ministering, He just needs someone willing to step out. At the end of our trip, we had feed back like "My relationship with God has gone from good/ok to AMAZING."

The next time you a short term mission trip is offered consider responding with “Here I am Lord send me” and just watch what God does in and through you. If you go with a good attitude and a heart to be used by God  you won’t be disappointed. Who knows you may even find that you have a passion for missions.

Life as a Missionary

Some people think that all a missionary does is preach and pray. To be honest there is a lot of praying and sometimes a lot of preaching as well. But a lot of missions is everyday life. We still have to cook our dinner and wash our clothes, we still have to clean the living room, and change the seemingly endless number of dirty diapers. Missions is not always glamorous. We have to do the same things that you have to do. The difference is that we do it in another country, away from our friends and family. Away from things like dryers and washing machines, oh boy do we miss dryers.

Every missionary is different and the culture in which they are living their daily lives varies, sometimes greatly from the culture in which they come from. When you move as a missionary you have to be willing to let go of some of the things that you are accustomed to, it's important no matter where you go that you make sure your attitude isn't saying "Well where I'm from we don't do it like that. We do it better." We learnt very quickly that if you have this attitude you are not going to be very effective.

For us we have found that being a missionary can be very lonely at times. Jenn and I are so thankful to have each other but sometimes you just don't want to be around the same person 24 hours a day. But when we first moved here there were few people our age, so most of the time there was no one to make friends with. We have found it to be such a blessing to receive care packages and letters from family back in the States. Sometimes it can make all the difference in the world to receive an encouraging word from someone you know.

So if you know someone who is a missionary and they are currently on the field please write them a letter, let them know you are thinking about them and praying for them. Who knows you could speak a word of life to someone who is contemplating the possibility of giving up.

Welcome

Welcome to the blog of Kenny and Jenn MacKay, missions to the UK. In these posts we endeavor to share with you the amazing experiences that come with being a missionary. God has placed it on our hearts to 'Accelerate the spreading of the Gospel bye training, equipping and mobilizing young people through world missions. Our vision comes out of Acts 1:8.

We see the youth of UK going out as witnesses for God in:

1. Jerusalem- Their City
2. All Judea- Their Nation
3. Samaria- Europe
4. To the ends of the earth- The World

If you love God and have a heart for mission this blog is for you. We hope you enjoy our posts. Along with this blog we have a monthly newsletter. We are really looking forward to what will be posted here in the future.

Kenny & Jenn