Where is the mission field...I mean really?

So it was an interesting morning here in Ensenada. I felt a little disoriented in the morning really not sure what to expect as far as how things would go during the day which is unlike me to be worried about how things are going to go. I think it was great to start the day with time before God. I needed it badly. To quiet my life and let my Father bring peace and assurance into my life.

I started writing the above but since then I stopped to go into our evening de-briefing session. Rick, the short term missions director here in Ensenada told us that the house our team is building is of a family in the community that a local pastor is trying to reach out to. They aren't members of the local church which I found wild. This is totally an effort to reach out to a local families needs and hopefully evangelize to them. I'm totally excited to see how this week progresses with them and us as a team hopefully being Jesus to them and giving to them what we can.

It really comes back to something I've been talking about in the past few blogs. It's about having a missional mindset, it doesn't matter whether its here in Ensenada or in Morristown, NJ. Being Jesus to the local community is what it is all about. I think it's something that becomes over looked all too often. To be a missionary, to serve in a "Mission Field" doesn't mean you pack up and leave your surroundings and move to a foreign land. Quiet the contrary. The more I've been living in Morristown the more I'm seeing it as just another place that needs missionaries to go out into and bring the light of Jesus into the darkness. Just as we are doing it for a short time here, I'm doing it every day in different ways in New Jersey.

It requires a paradigm shift. Its a new way of thinking. We don't just live wherever we live, we are place there strategically by our Father to spread the light!

-AM

The Next Step in a Journey...

I started realizing the inconstancies sometimes of blogging about my travels when, for right now, they aren't happening all of the time. However, here are some things that have been rolling over in my head and are looking to possibly happen for the future...

Ensenada, Mexico 2009! I'm headed down to Ensenada with my church for a week long missions trip to build houses and help be Jesus to the people of that city. It will be really exciting to see my friend Greg who has been following God's call down in Louisiana, but will be joining us in Mexico for the week trip. I've been to Mexico one other time in the past but I feel this is a time when I have started to understand my calling better. To a point where I know a little better about what it means to be missional with people and be Jesus to them.

Missional may sound kind of complex, but it's really just a buzz word that a lot of emerging churches are using to describe how we do ministry and church in the world. It is an approach the means more than just going up to someone and telling them they need Jesus. It's about showing a genuine interest in a persons well being. It's about building relationships with people and helping them with not just spiritual needs, but emotional and physical ones as well. It's about loving people period no matter where they are.

So when I say I'm going to be missional with the people of Ensenada, Mexico that's basically what I mean. It's a new place for me personally to be at. I'm not just going on a missions trip for the sake of going on a missions trip. I'm going because as Jesus said: "Since the days of John the Baptist, the Kingdom of God has been forcefully advancing." I have been called by God to go and preach the Kingdom of God to the world. To bring hope to all people that Jesus saves. So I'm excited to go!

I'm in Ohio right now on spring break visiting friends. I will definitely have some time this week to write some more about being missional and all that jazz. Looking forward to it.

-AM