Mission Resources on the Web

Our focus in this article is how international mission agencies can work together in functional collaborative partnerships.

In view of the fact that Africa is the focus for this issue of EMQ, we decided to explore what we could find relating to Africa and missions in this installment of “Missions on the Web.”

Intentional care of missionaries as an integral part of a mission agency’s mandate is a growing reality. …Does the World Wide Web have a role in fostering missionary care and providing resources for missionaries and mission agencies?

Asia is awakening to the Web; indeed, Asians are global leaders in some aspects of Internet technology.

Prior to the Internet, inexperienced church planters often faced the prospect of a lonely job in a new location struggling to know how to launch a church. Today a wealth of tools, resources, helps, and discussion groups is available to anyone in the world with an Internet connection.

Can the Internet, that technological monster now home to so much pornography and rapidly becoming the darling of global capitalism, actually be an effective means of bringing the good news of Jesus Christ to lost and hurting people? There are now plenty of personal testimonies that indicate it can be.

The world is rediscovering geography, to the delight of many in international missions.

Back in the “old days” (say, two or three years ago), if you wanted to read a missions magazine, journal, newsletter, or bulletin, you’d have to subscribe—or go to a local seminary library. Not surprisingly, the World Wide Web is providing options most of us never enjoyed in grad or Bible school.

Most of the people you want to talk with today—pastors, donors, missionaries, recruits, etc.—expect to find you on the Web. Not having a Web site today is like a business not having a fax machine a few years ago.

Interest in persecution of Christians, symbolized by the annual International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church (most recently held on November 15), continues to grow. The Web should be an ideal place to look for up-to-date, relevant, and important information.