{"id":14,"date":"2009-02-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2009-02-01T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2009-09-09T11:31:27","modified_gmt":"2009-09-09T15:31:27","slug":"are-missionaries-living-in-the-united-states-real-missionaries","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/2009\/02\/01\/are-missionaries-living-in-the-united-states-real-missionaries\/","title":{"rendered":"Are Missionaries Living in the United States &#8220;Real Missionaries&#8221;?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><!--StartImportPhoto--><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/files\/2009\/02\/2313_47960.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-104\" style=\"margin-right: 10px;margin-bottom: 5px\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/files\/2009\/02\/2313_47960.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" \/><\/a><!--EndImportPhoto--><\/p>\n<p>In October 2008 I spent three weeks in Florida, and while down there, I was able to go to the NTM Home Office quite a few times.\u00a0 Our USA Home Office has close to 200 staff members serving 2,300 American missionaries!\u00a0 These home staff missionaries are <span class=\"boldText-red\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">extremely <\/span><\/span>important!\u00a0 And these are the <span class=\"boldText-red\">necessary <\/span>jobs that they fill:<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span class=\"boldText-blue\"><strong>Finance Department<\/strong><\/span> &#8211; making sure that\u00a0 support from churches &amp; individuals reaches my bank account &amp; they also make sure the other 2300 USA missionaries get their support!\u00a0 If you sent it to me in the mail while I&#8217;m in another country, it probably wouldn&#8217;t make it to my bank account!<\/li>\n<li><strong><span class=\"boldText-blue\">Tax Department<\/span> &#8211; <\/strong>these missionaries file taxes for those of us that will be overseas &amp; those of us who have a terrible time with the tax jargon, because the commute would be terrible from Africa or Indonesia!\u00a0 There are volunteers that come to help send out missionary tax forms.<\/li>\n<li><strong><span class=\"boldText-blue\">Member Services<\/span><\/strong> &#8211; there is so much done here: they help track missionaries home on furlough, help missionaries if they&#8217;ve lost a family member, encourage missionaries that have just completed the training (like me) before we get to our country of service.\u00a0 They are great with encouragement.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"boldText-blue\"><strong>Retirement Department<\/strong><\/span> &#8211; they help me with figuring out what I need to do for my retirement and Social Security.\u00a0 Which is something weird to think about at only 25 years old!<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"boldText-blue\"><strong>Mobilization<\/strong><\/span><strong> <\/strong>&#8211; sharing with others about the need for more missionaries.\u00a0 New Tribes looses 80 missionaries a year to retirement, health problems, and more; but there are only 100 missionaries making it to the field.\u00a0 So really we only gain 20 new missionaries a year!\u00a0 We need more help!\u00a0 They also organize trips to different countries for high schoolers &amp; college students.<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"boldText-blue\"><strong>Website Development &amp; Control<\/strong> <\/span>&#8211; you wouldn&#8217;t be reading this right, if not for the computer tech guys!<\/li>\n<li><span class=\"boldText-blue\"><strong>IT Department<\/strong><\/span> &#8211; they help out missionaries at the Home Office with computer problems and also missionaries around the world.<\/li>\n<li><strong><span class=\"boldText-blue\">E-mail Maintenance<\/span><\/strong> &#8211; I wouldn&#8217;t be able to communicate with anyone!\u00a0 And that is not allowed!<\/li>\n<li><strong><span class=\"boldText-blue\">Distribution Center<\/span> &#8211; <\/strong>they handle all online purchases from the NTM Online Bookstore site.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve had them ship me some things that I ordered.\u00a0 The ship to people and missionaries all around the world.<\/li>\n<li><strong><span class=\"boldText-blue\">Retirement Center<\/span> <\/strong>&#8211; when I get old and gray, I can retire in Florida (if I ever grow to like it down there).\u00a0 There are missionaries that help with landscaping, and building more homes for retiring missionaries.<\/li>\n<li><strong><span class=\"boldText-blue\">Communications Department<\/span> &#8211; <\/strong>these missionaries write the news articles on the website, the Daily Prayer Bulletins, and articles in NTM@work.\u00a0 They are the ones that help get the word out to churches and individuals about tribal church planting and prayer requests.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These are <span class=\"boldText-red\">extremely important jobs <\/span>and <span class=\"boldText-red\">without these missionaries<\/span>, <span class=\"boldText-blue\">then I would have a ton of work to do<\/span>!\u00a0 Somehow I would need to make sure I got all my support every single month, take a week or two to get my taxes ready, spend time every month trying to get some more people to help us all around the world, write &amp; call my co-workers to make sure things are going well for them while they are in the US, and more!<\/p>\n<p>And what about those <span class=\"boldText-blue\">missionaries <\/span>that help with <span class=\"boldText-blue\">training <\/span>at the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ntm.org\/ntbi\" target=\"_blank\">Bible Schools<\/a> &amp; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ntm.org\/mtc\/\" target=\"_blank\">Missionary Training Center<\/a>?\u00a0 If there wouldn&#8217;t have been missionaries at the Bible School when I went through there four years ago, it would have taken about 70 years of attending two church services a week to gain the same amount of <span class=\"redText\">Bible Teaching<\/span>!\u00a0 So theoretically I would be ready to be a missionary at 70 or 80 years old!!\u00a0 But I&#8217;ve not received training in how to plant a tribal church, learning an <span class=\"redText\">unwritten language<\/span>, <span class=\"redText\">understanding their culture<\/span> and t<span class=\"redText\">he way they think<\/span>, and so much more at any church.\u00a0 So where do I go if we don&#8217;t have a <span class=\"boldText-red\">Missionary Training Center<\/span> with staff that have been involved in church planting?\u00a0 I won&#8217;t be able to get that training at a church.<\/p>\n<p>I just thought y&#8217;all might like to see another view of the <span class=\"redText\">missionaries that serve in the USA<\/span>.\u00a0 <span class=\"boldText-blue\">I hope that you can see that they are missionaries too!\u00a0 It&#8217;s kind of like being a member of the body of Christ<\/span>.\u00a0 Some are the <span class=\"boldText-red\">mouth<\/span>, some are the <span class=\"boldText-red\">feet<\/span>, and some are the <span class=\"boldText-red\">big toe<\/span>, <span class=\"boldText-red\">left eyebrow<\/span> or <span class=\"boldText-red\">pinky finger<\/span>.\u00a0 But <span class=\"boldText-red\">we all need each other to get the job done!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"boldText-red\">1 Cor. 12:18-27<\/span> &#8211; <em><span class=\"boldText-blue\"><span class=\"normalText\">But our bodies have many parts, and God has put each part just where he wants it.\u00a0 How strange a body would be if it had only one part! \u00a0 Yes, there are many parts, but only one body.\u00a0 The eye can never say to the hand, \u201cI don\u2019t need you.\u201d The head can\u2019t say to the feet, \u201cI don\u2019t need you.\u201d\u00a0 In fact, some parts of the body that seem weakest and least important are actually the most necessary. \u00a0 And the parts we regard as less honorable are those we clothe with the greatest care. So we carefully protect those parts that should not be seen, while the more honorable parts do not require this special care. So God has put the body together such that extra honor and care are given to those parts that have less dignity.\u00a0 This makes for harmony among the members, so that all the members care for each other.\u00a0 If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it, and if one part is honored, all the parts are glad.\u00a0 All of you together are Christ\u2019s body, and each of you is a part of it.<\/span><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What do you think?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":383,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3810],"tags":[753,273,152],"class_list":{"0":"post-14","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-news-article","7":"tag-florida","8":"tag-missionaries","9":"tag-partnership-development","10":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/383"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/crystal-pierce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}