The “Great Commission” is a mandate for all Christians. Not a select few. We will all be held personally accountable for our stewardship of the Salvation, Gospel and Grace that God has bestowed upon us. We are not allotted the luxury of Subcontracting the Command to “make Disciples of all nations.” Yet that is what many seem to be promoting. A socially distanced, sanitized Substitutionary method of ministering at arm’s length. Simply send money to a worthy cause for Christ...and we imagine we’ve done our part. Let the experts handle the ground level details. We subcontract frontline, face-to-face encounters with unbelievers to the professional charities. Afterall, we reason, “They know better how to handle these things.” Which begs one question: where is that in the Bible?

Where do we find Jesus, or the Apostles promoting a Corporate Missions Method? Yet a plethora of Mega- organizations are now purportedly “making Disciples” on our behalf. Children are sponsored, church plants are funded, wells are drilled, Bibles are sent, and gift boxes are strewn around the globe. And I never need to leave my couch. Welcome to Arm-chair Advocacy and Contact-less Discipleship in the 21st century. Cheering from the sidelines, we count the number of “sponsorships” we fund...but never the number of people we have personally reached for Christ. The metrics are all wrong. The motives suspect. The salt is tasteless.

Scurrying about the globe with pre- planned ministry models, we adopt artificial “targets” of success: numbers that we are compelled to meet in order to validate ourselves. “Our mission is to plant 10,000 churches in 10 years in the 10/40 window.” Again, we’d be hard pressed to find a mandate or method like that in the Bible. But we’d easily find one in the Business world. We’ve invited in the “experts” to advise the people of God on everything: giving, sending, building, growing, discipling, communicating, evangelizing, missions. As if a Business model is what Jesus was REALLY advocating. As if “bigger” means “success” and “smaller” is “just a start.” Yet Jesus never traveled beyond a 100 mile radius of His birthplace. He never had more than 12 Apostles. He had no website, no blog, no internet, no electricity... like 75% of Sub-Saharan Africa to this day. Business Modeled Ministry is simply nonsense in such Contexts. Turn off the grid and most ministries experience immediate meltdown.

God’s work is face-to-face. Jesus proved as much. God didn’t send a message in the sky. He sent His Son. He didn’t text us the Gospel. He spoke it in our very presence. He didn’t forward a You-tube video. He literally and publicly carried a cross and died upon it...naked and alone. He made Disciples Himself...and sends us out to do the same.

Which brings us to the point: Disciples are made face-to-face. Those Disciples then go forth as Disciple-makers themselves: making new Disciples face-to-face. There is no room for Surrogates. Only frontline Ambassadors.

It’s painstakingly slow, utterly cost inefficient and indescribably exhausting. Peter Drucker surely had a better “way” in mind. The world’s number one business consultant invented iconoclastic strategies such as “Outsourcing”. In the last phase of his career, he launched into the “untapped church market”. He was unsaved, and privately disparaged the Gospel. His “Outsourcing” consultancy morphed into the “Church Growth Model”. The church swallowed it hook, line and sinker. And we’ve been sinking ever since. Obsessed with metrics, we rush ahead to the next target...right past the woman at the well.

It’s rare to find Missionaries mobilizing for the field these days. It’s even more rare to find “stand alone” pioneer missionaries and ministries. And yet that is the model that fueled the great evangelistic endeavors and foreign missions from 1760 through 1960. Independent and individual labors of men and women of God who were moved by the Holy Spirit to new lands, new tribes, new peoples. Sent out on one- way passage. At great peril. It is estimated that less than half of “those who went out” arrived alive on the mission field. And of those, less than 25% survived 5 years. Of those who did, 95% died on the foreign field. A terrible business model. But a magnificent work of God.

Fast forward to 2022. Post-covid. “Missions” has been decimated. Countless missionaries are permanently off the field. Their projects closed. Never to reopen. New projects, new missionaries and “pioneers” are few and far between. Individual missionaries have been replaced with Mega-Missions-Ministries. The low-lying fruit is picked up and pronounced in ever enticing publicity campaigns. The coffers are full. The numbers staggering. The pictures compelling. All that and people are sitting at home more than ever before. Churches continue to be missing 30% of their pre- Covid members. How can we be getting so much done with such little personal, individual, pioneering, face- to-face involvement?

WE'RE NOT

It never worked that way with Jesus. And it’s not working now. A momentary showing of the Jesus film does little to nothing, if a missionary does not remain in their midst. A shoe box does little to nothing if the gospel is not presented, re-presented and represented face-to-face, day-by-day in their village. A monthly sponsorship does little to nothing if the real agenda is “reaching a child’s potential” rather than “reconciling all to Christ.” Sending Bibles around the world does little to nothing if no one is there to directly teach, disciple and model the eternal Truths of the Gospel. It’s just not that easy. The work of ministry cannot be facelessly dropped off like an Amazon package. Nor can it be accomplished on a two-week Spiritual Safari. We rush to do “more, more, more” with “less, less, less” human contact and commitment. We have placed shackles on the timeless, holy and unhurried work of the Holy Spirit.

We need to get out of the house, and into the marketplace. Off the couch and onto the field. Out of our comfort zone and into the unreached zone. And that isn’t confined to overseas foreign missions. Although that is the most neglected realm these days. It could equally be right across the street. Or at the workplace. Or in the local nursing home. We need to connect. Practically, not Digitally. We need a lot less “Face-Time” and a lot more “face-to-face”. Turn off the Zoom, the (anti) Social Media, the Meta, the mesmerizing YouTube. It’s digital Crack. We’re addicted and pretending it’s acceptable because it’s “ministry.”

No. It's Not.

The DSM Bible Schools in the slums of East Africa have none of that. No trendy ministry announcement videos on a big screen. No Bibles apps on phones. No downloads about Discipleship. No thumb drives full of teachings. No virtual classroom teachings or online seminars. Class notes are written on a board...then handwritten by each student in their own notebooks. Homework is marked by hand, individually. One student at a time. For 295+ Pastors and Ministry Leaders every week. Counseling is only face-to-face. Fellowship is always hand-in-hand.

That doesn’t make us special. But what seems to be increasingly unique is that we do everything “face-to-face”. Through Bible Teachers painstakingly raised up over decades...face-to-face. Who in turn, will continue teaching, counseling, and discipling countless others for decades to come...face-to-face.

It takes a team of committed individual efforts. Everyone out of bed and on the road by 5:00am. No one home until well after dark. Ministry that is mind-numbingly slow, time consuming, repetitious and exhausting. And face-to-face.

Until we see Him...face-to-face.