EMQ » October–December 2021 » Volume 57 Issue 4
[memberonly folder=”Members, EMQ2YearFolder, EMQ1YearFolder, EMQLibraryInstitution”]By Ian Prescott
The gospel is not a pizza. It is not a question of making the right selection of ingredients to suit the customer, putting them together in an attractive and tasty way, and then delivering it. The essence of bringing the gospel to people is that it is incarnated. God sent his son both to deliver the message and as the message. God continues to send out his people with his message but also as his message, no matter what the platform.
Key things to keep in mind in evaluating any potential platform or vehicle are the quality of the contact that it gives you with the focus people, the opportunity for ministry that it affords, and the impact of the platform on the ministry. In addition, it is important to consider how much time and effort is required to create and maintain the platform and how sustainable it is. However, this whole discussion on selecting a platform or profession based on the advantages and disadvantages of that particular platform or profession presumes that we are not already committed to a particular profession. This takes us to the question of calling.
Missionary Calling and Professional Vocation
I have found it helpful to recognize two different kinds of callings. I have called these the missionary calling and the professional vocation, realizing that vocation and calling are really just two words for the same thing. However, many have found distinguishing these two kinds of calling helpful.
By the missionary calling,[1] I mean those whose vocation is getting the good news to people who haven’t heard it. They want to know how they can best do that. By separating them out, my intention is not to put them on a missionary pedestal but to recognize that their calling is to make their major life choices around the question of “how will they hear?” Mission organizations exist to support those with such a calling, help them get trained and equipped, team them with others where possible, and support them in practical and strategic ways, so that their faithfulness to God’s calling results in effective ministry.
By professional vocation, on the other hand, I mean a calling to practice a particular profession.[2] I would not necessarily say a secular profession because the sacred-secular divide is both unbiblical and unhelpful, and the profession could actually be that of a religious professional, such as pastor or a theological educator. For many cross-cultural workers, it is not one or the other but both together. They feel both a calling to mission and a calling to a profession. Both callings are from God.
Several years ago, after spending many hours relating to a variety of people wrestling with this, I put together the following scale, which attempts to capture some of the issues in how these two callings intersect for different Christ followers. All those in this table are assumed to be committed Christians, wholeheartedly devoted to the Lord, and to pursuing His will and calling. No position on the scale is assumed to be superior to another. It just represents a different balance of callings. At one end are those whose primary sense of calling is a missionary calling – to devote themselves to reaching the people in a particular place or people group with the good news of Jesus Christ. At the other end are those whose primary sense of calling is a professional calling – to serve God faithfully through the practice of their profession. In the middle are those who sense a dual calling: to serve God in their profession and to be personally involved in reaching lost peoples.
| Type | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| Calling | Missionary | Missionary (Professional) | Professional (Missionary) | Professional | Professional |
| Self-identity is | Missionary calling | Missionary calling | Professional calling | Professional calling | Professional calling |
| Sense of vocation | Reach a people, but no professional skills, or no sense of calling to use their professional skills, so seek a way to reach people without using professional skills. | Reach a people and use their professional skills to help reach a people if their professional skills can be used. If not, find another way. | Serve in their profession and use their professional skills to help reach a people if their skills can be used. If not, find another place. | Serve in their profession, witness wherever they end up, serve outside of home country. | Serve in their profession, witness wherever they end up, remain in home country. |
| Relation-ship to Agency | Missionary | Tentmaker | Tentmaker | Field Friend | Supporter |
| Issues | Can’t get into creative access situations | Often regard Type 3s as uncommitted, unfocussed, lacking zeal | Often regard Type 2s as unprofessional, lacking integrity |
Bi-Vocational Workers: The Type 2s and 3s
In the chart above, Type 1s are the traditional, straightforward church-planting missionaries. They have been the core of many mission agencies until closed countries began opening up and have now become creative access countries. To serve in these contexts, we need people with the professional skills that these countries welcome. In the wider missions world, these people are often called tentmakers. In this discussion, I will refer to Types 2 and 3 as bi-vocational workers.
For the Type 2s, their missionary calling is primary. They regard their professional skills as a tool that they use to open doors for ministry. However, their skills are only tools, and if these tools are not useful to the task of reaching a people, they will set them down, find other tools, and try another way. For example, I have known someone who over the course of several years taught as an English teacher, then ran a business, afterwards became a farmer, and finally ran a processing plant. All of these positions served the goal of effectively reaching his focus people. Changing professional roles like this is not unusual. One of my team recently commented that he feels like a chameleon as he has sought to reinvent himself several times over the last few years as he figures out the best identity and platform for ministry in his context. These workers do not do this in a spirit of deception but in the spirit of Paul who said, “I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some” (1 Corinthians 9:19–22).
Then there are the Type 3s, for whom their sense of professional vocation is primary. They regard the practice of their profession as a fundamental part of their God-given calling. They are willing and eager to use their profession to help reach lost people. However, if they find that they cannot contribute with their professional skills, they will usually see that as God’s direction to seek another place where they can use those skills.
A lot of tensions occur because of misunderstandings between these two groups. You can find this in the literature on tent-making, in the various pronouncements by advocates of tent-making, and among bi-vocational workers in the field. The Type 2s tend to regard the Type 3s as uncommitted, unfocused, and lacking in zeal for the mission cause, while the Type 3s tend to regard the Type 2s as unprofessional, lacking a biblical view of work, and lacking in integrity. Some writers try and tackle this by advocating a holistic balance between the two. While the concern for holism is valid, the solutions offered rarely satisfy. Holistic tends to be used to label the user’s own preferred position, thus labelling all other positions as inadequately unholistic and not always recognizing that different balances are right for different people.
The Type 2.5s and Their Schizophrenia
Of course, to divide bi-vocational workers into Type 2s and 3s is too simplistic. They are a spectrum, and most bi-vocational workers are not at the end of the scale but somewhere in the middle – around what we might call Type 2.5. These workers feel a strong sense of both missionary calling and professional vocation, and are struggling to understand what God is saying about how they should exercise their dual calling. While the Type 2s and 3s are often self-confident about the rightness of their respective positions, the Type 2.5s often feel schizophrenic[3] being torn between the two. Their feelings of schizophrenia and confusion are often exacerbated by the strong arguments of the Type 2s and 3s that they should be more focused on reaching people (Type 2s) or on pursuing professional excellence (Type 3s). Here is how they can be distinguished on the scale:
| Type | 2 | 2.5 | 3 |
| Calling | Missionary (Professional) | Missionary and Professional | Professional (Missionary) |
| Self-identity is | Missionary calling | Missionary and Professional calling | Professional calling |
| Sense of vocation | Reach a people and use their professional skills to help reach a people if their professional skills can be used. If not, find another way. | Reach people/ serve in a profession. Feel a dual calling. If there is a conflict, not sure which should take pre-eminence. | Serve in their profession and use their professional skills to help reach a people if their skills can be used. If not, find another place. |
| Relationship to agency | Tentmaking Professional | Tentmaking Professional | Tentmaking Professional |
| Issues | Often regard Type 3s as uncommitted, unfocused, lacking zeal | Often feel schizophrenic and pulled in both directions | Often regard Type 2s as unprofessional, lacking integrity |
There are other issues that are worth mentioning too:
The Type 1.5s and Issues of Integrity
There is another possible category that could be added to our scale – the Type 1.5s who use their professional qualifications to get a visa but don’t do the job that they have contracted to do. Real questions should be raised about their integrity. They have made a commitment to do something but haven’t kept their word. Questions can also be raised about the impact their behaviour has for the gospel. While they may achieve their short-term goals in evangelism, literature distribution, etc., the long-term impact is often very negative. Numerous stories, particularly from China, testify to this.
This integrity question should be distinguished from the charge that is sometimes levelled against the Type 2s – that because they have sought out their job with the intent of using it as an entry or platform for achieving their mission goals, they lack integrity. I would vigorously defend them against the charge that this posture automatically lacks integrity. As long as they do the job that they have committed to do, and do it well – not short-changing those they work for, then they have kept their word on that issue. If they have other motivations in obtaining the job, that is fine; they do not have to live for their professional work alone!
In fact, we often hear that we should be aiming to be the very best that we can possibly be as a professional (e.g., Scott praises “A young nurse in a closed country [who] seeks to be the best nurse in the hospital”[4]). Is this “be the best” focused on God or on our individual competitiveness? Is it putting work first? It seems to me that we are all given a number of callings that compete for our time, energy, and focus. These include our callings as children and parents, and husbands and wives, as well as our professional and missionary callings. Our challenge is “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters” (Colossians 3:23). We should work with an integrity that honours the Lord as well as those we work for and with. However, we must also fulfil our other God-given responsibilities and callings in a way which honours him too. We should pursue professional excellence, but it should be excellence in the service of God and not excellence in the place of God.
Another area that bears mentioning is that of part-time jobs. If a visa has been granted to a bi-vocational worker for a job that is essentially only part-time, then let us rejoice in the freedom that it gives. There is no lack of integrity in doing only a part-time job if that is all that one has committed to and been given a visa for. For the Type 2 or 2.5, it may give much greater time and freedom to pursue the mission part of their calling.
The Type 2s That Are Forced to Be Type 4s
The prevailing paradigm for funding mission has been that this has been paid for by those in the sending countries: sending churches and other supporters. This has worked okay while mission has been from the West to the rest. Having led the industrial revolution, the West has become significantly wealthier than the rest and so Western Christians have had the wealth to fund mission to the rest. For some workers, one of the attractions of serving as a professional is that you don’t have to raise your support, you have an employer that pays you. For those of us who are privileged to come from wealthier countries, that is a choice we can make.
However, as we all know, the centres of gravity of Christianity have shifted. Most Christians now live in the majority world. That includes many churches with an enthusiasm and confidence for sharing the gospel that is often lacking in the West. With a few exceptions (Korea is a major one) their national economies do not match their Christian numbers or mission enthusiasm. Consequently, their mission sending under the sender pays model is cramped by lack of finances.[5]
That doesn’t mean their missionary enthusiasm has been completely quenched. Many are still venturing overseas with a strong mission calling and vision, while sustaining themselves through taking paid employment in the Field country. This has a good biblical precedent as Paul’s tent-making was primarily about self-support. It was also the way missionaries were often funded in the early centuries of missions. However, because of the urgency of having funds to live, most do not have the opportunity for substantive language-study. Most Asian languages take the best part of two years of full-time language-study to master (unless you have the advantage of already speaking a closely related Asian language). But without language, the contribution of these workers is much less than it could be. To release the missionary potential of the churches in these countries, we need a fresh approach in which mission (1) is paid for by employment (tent-making) and (2) still has opportunity for the worker to learn the language and culture as foundations for long-term effective ministry.
To take this forward, we need to recruit people with the intention that long-term, their support will be provided by employment on the Field. Therefore, they need to be potentially employable and willing to take this route, and also have sufficient support to cover two years of full-time language study, culture acquisition, and initial training and experience in ministry.
Workers Move!
This scale is not intended to be a series of boxes in which we fit people but a tool that will help us understand people and for them to understand themselves. And workers will move along the scale – in both directions!
Those who begin as Type 3s, or even as Type 4s, may end up as Type 2s or 2.5s. My mission has seen this in a number who first linked with us informally because their profession had taken them to a country where we work, but over time they have become long-term co-workers with us. On the other hand, those who came thinking that they were Type 2s or 2.5s may have discovered that their profession is a much more integral part of what God is calling them to be and do than they had recognized or can expect to realize in a developing situation.
Understanding and following God’s calling is part of a lifelong pilgrimage. It takes time and different experiences for us to understand His call. One’s calling is not a static thing – it changes! We may be called to major on one type of vocation for a while, but subsequently the Lord calls us on to be/do something else.
Are We Asking the Wrong Question?
The question about vehicles or platforms is often framed as a “which is best?” question. Is it best to go as something closer to the traditional missionary – theologically trained, financially supported by churches, and spending a few years learning the language – before selecting the profession or platform that seems to best facilitate the ministry? Or is it best to go as a marketplace professional: using the qualifications one already has and seizing the professional opportunities in unreached countries; not pausing for years to go through theological or language study; staying on top of one’s professional game and simply scattering to the ends of the earth with one’s profession and the good news of Jesus.
In many ways, the “which is best?” question is often only a relevant question for the first group. For the second group, serving in their profession is a given. They feel called to serve in their profession. The question is not whether to stay in their profession but whether, while staying in their profession, they can also serve God’s purposes in mission.
Nor is it an either-or question but both-and. The larger question is not whether the unreached will be reached by tentmaking missionaries or by marketplace professionals, but whether they will be reached at all, and how God will use the glorious variety of His people to do that. There is clearly value in having people in as diverse a range of occupations and platforms as possible so that the gospel witness can reach the greatest variety of people.
Conclusion
In summary, our challenge is to select the best platforms when we have the choice, to be aware of the way our choices shape the message that we bring, to serve with integrity in everything that we are called to do, and to develop structures that will give the training, support, and ongoing mentoring and encouragement so that professionals of all kinds will be effective in contributing to indigenous, multiplying church planting movements in every unreached people group or region of the world.
Ian Prescott, PhD, from the United Kingdom, has served in Asia with OMF International for more than thirty years. He started in the Philippines where his focus was church-planting and related ministries. He has since been involved in a number of East Asian countries with a particular focus on the development of work in creative access contexts including China, North Korea, and Indo-China. His doctoral studies were also focused on Creative Access Mission.
[1] One might also call this an apostolic calling as in Ephesians 4:11. This helps recognize both that it is a biblical calling and that we are not expecting that everyone should be called in this way. However, apostolic is used to mean so many different things in today’s church that using the term will probably increase confusion rather than diminish it.
[2] I would emphasize that I am using vocation as a synonym for calling not as a synonym for profession. Thus, God may call someone to leave their profession, but it makes no sense to talk of him calling someone to leave their vocation; he is calling them to a new vocation.
[3] Medical professionals have told me that I am misusing the term schizophrenia, but many bi-vocational workers have told me that it captures exactly how they feel.
[4] Andrew Scott, Scatter: Go Therefore and Take Your Job with You (Chicago: Moody, 2016, Kindle edition): location 240.
[5] I realize another paradigm is that these countries provide the manpower and churches while Christians in the wealthier countries provide the finances. This is working to a limited extent but it cannot fund the full potential of the missionary movement from these countries.
