Season 2 Episode 10: Missions with Colin Rayburn

Welcome to the Small Town Church Podcast, the weekly podcast where we discuss all aspects of being in a small-town church. Whether you are a member, on staff, or have just begun attending a church in a small town, this is the podcast for you.

On this week's episode, we are joined by Colin Rayburn. Colin is the Missions Mobilization Associate for the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention. He partners with churches by equipping them to assess, develop, and implement effective missional strategies within Texas, the U.S. and the unreached people groups around the world. He also develops and partners with compassion ministries in order to mobilize the church to meet the felt needs around Texas.

He earned his Bachelor’s Degree from The University of North Texas in Philosophy and a Masters of Divinity from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Great Commissions Studies. Colin is a former pastor and missionary, having served in Western Europe for five years. He lives in Fort Worth with his wife Cindy and two children: Theo & Kaiyah.

For more information on partnering with the SBTC in missions: https://sbtexas.com/advancing-mission/missions-mobilization/

To contact Colin directly: crayburn@sbtexas.com

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Until next time, we pray you delight in God’s mercies, which are new every morning and remember to stay faithful to your small town church!

Transcript

Zach Leonard 0:01

When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship. Welcome to the Small Town Church Podcast, the weekly podcast where we discuss all aspects of being in a small town church. Whether you are a member on staff or have just begun attending a church in a small town, this is the podcast for you. Welcome back to the Small Town Church Podcast. We are glad you are with us. We are blowing right through season two, and uh this episode is all about the overseer pastor. Um this episode we're branching out a little bit from that, but um still definitely within that uh that realm. Um as always, I am one half of the co-host team. Uh my name is Zach Leonard. Um, I've got my my cohort, my partner in crime. He's also technically my mentor in seminary, so he knows a lot more than I do, and he's much more pithy than I am, and that's why I bring him on. But uh Brad Borggren, how are we today?

Brad Borggren 1:11

We're doing good, thank you.

Zach Leonard 1:12

Yeah, um it's we had to uh we had to kind of punt on fourth down for this episode, and we're doing a Zoom call, and um I I nearly called you Crystal because I looked up at the Zoom and uh saw your wife's name instead of yours, and um my brain can't process that fast, and so you nearly got a whole new name for this episode and confused our listeners, but it's all good. Brad, we're we're glad you're with us, and uh and how how have things been?

Brad Borggren 1:38

Well, that that tells you how often I do Zoom. Uh I guess the last time I'm not my wife does a she's in a BSF and they do like weekly Zoom calls, so I guess she had to come up here for some reason at some point, and so I don't uh I saw that and like I was just as surprised as you so that's funny. But hey, it works, so here we are. But yeah, we're doing good, you know. It's um it's a busy season, springtime is always uh Easter season's always a good season, but it's um it can be stressful for pastors, uh especially small town churches, just you know, like we talked about, just trying to make sure everything is is ready to go. So yeah, but it but we've been doing good.

Zach Leonard 2:23

Sure. Well, we are recording this before Easter, but the Easter week is gearing up, and we hope you guys enjoyed our Easter episode and um and were able to get something from that. This week we're gonna be talking about missions, and um, we're going to kind of just cover the full gambit of what it looks like to fulfill the Great Commission as a church, as a pastor, just all things regarding our call to go. So we uh we brought another guest on today and we're excited to uh to have him on. Um he is the missions mobilization associate for the uh Southern Baptist of Texas Convention. I had to write that down because that is a lot of words. Um, but uh his name is Colin Raybird. Colin, how are we doing today? Yeah, doing good. Grateful to be here on you with you guys. Thanks for coming on and uh and lending your expertise in this matter. No, it's my pleasure, man. This is uh this is my soapbox, so I'll talk about it all day long. That's great. Well, why don't you take a couple minutes and just kind of tell people who you are, any in information you want the listeners to know just about you, about what you do, and and just kind of where your heart is, brother.

Colin Rayburn 3:28

Yeah, so I um I can I can come right out of the gate and say that I never meant to get into missions. That was not what I saw coming for my life. Uh, but the Lord uh saved me when I was 20 and kind of disrupted all the plans that I was building. And uh really, just like kind of everyone else in mission, just began to give me a heart for the lost. And um, so kind of from that point, uh my wife and I we served in Paris, France, um, for several years, uh just leading up to COVID. So our kids were born there. Uh most of them we had we had um we had a kid uh a year ago, so we have a one-year-old now. Um so we got to kind of raise some of the kids there and just kind of fall in love with the church in France. I actually went to France originally to do my pastoral residency. And so we started with a church planning team there, uh, got to plan a church that the Lord just decided to bless and it grew. Um, it just kept growing and it was really a great experience. And then when we moved back to Texas, um ended up uh working, coming here to work at the Southern Baptist Texas convention where we got to be begin to develop a missions program. Um and so just been just been blessed by every step of the way. It's like the Lord just uh continues to bless everything we're a part of, and it's uh it's just been a blast to be a part of all of it.

Zach Leonard 4:35

That's great, awesome, praise God. Well, Brad, why don't you uh you jump in and and just kind of throw out any questions that you have and we'll just kind of go from there.

Brad Borggren 4:45

Yeah, and so Colin, we are we're glad to have you. Uh it's been good to kind of see you from afar at different SBTC meetings. Uh and and we're kind of coming at this from a different perspective in the sense that um a lot of times it's you know, small town churches, especially churches that are going through a revitalization process, you know, missions can be one of the last things that, you know, honestly, it may not even be on anybody's radar. Um, but but me and Zach agree that healthy churches multiply uh on some level. And so that obviously could be locally, it could be nationally, you know, God willing, internationally, you know, the Great Commission bids us uh to to the nations. And so um just to kind of throw it out there, you know, can you help us as small town church pastors or churches in revitalization settings uh just understand that that yes, while the Great Commission is a massive mandate, that it's not too big uh for small churches?

Colin Rayburn 5:56

Yeah, I mean, uh like I said, this is this is one of my favorite soapboxes. And um I think one of the most important things that churches need to recognize is that um missions is not an additive to the who the church is. Um if you look at scripture, you can break it up. Like you can see the arc of scripture being nothing but a missiological meta-narrative moving forward, uh, which is just you know that that you know ten dollar word for this is a consistent theme you see through all of scripture. You can really trace it back as far as uh Genesis 2.15, where God gives Adam um the mandate to grow the garden. And as you know, the garden is the presence of the Lord and it expands across um the all of creation at that point, then you see that move forward with Israel, the tabernacle moving around, you see it move forward in the temple, the nation-state, the theocratic nation-state of Israel as it begins to expand, but then ultimately in Christ, as followers of Christ begin to radiate out through the church. And so I think you can follow those high points, but most commonly when the church thinks, and I'll say the contemporary evangelical church, when we think about missions, we think about Matthew 28, 18 through 20, where we go forward and uh make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And we think of, and I don't want to get overly critical about the American contemporary church, but often when we think of missions, we think of it as a task that needs to be accomplished. But what I would always push churches towards is it's not a task to be accomplished, it's it's the missio day, the mission of God that we've been invited into. And we can root that all the way back to Adam. It's something we are consistently invited into. You flash forward to Psalm 67, you see what, or actually, we let's let's go back to Genesis 12. You see the Abrahamic covenant. He is blessed so that he will be a blessing to the nations. Psalm 67, it's the nations are blessed as a result of the people of God and the mission that they're accomplishing. But then it flash forward all the way through, say, Mark 16, 15, where you have the disciples of Christ are compelled to go forward and proclaim the gospel to all of creation, leading to Psalm or Psalm uh Revelation 7:9, where you have all nations worshipping God before his throne. And so you can see that the eschatological aim has been consistent all the way through scripture. And so I would always encourage churches just to take a step back and recognize no, you're being invited into something, it's not an additive to who you are, but it is the missio day that you have been invited into, um, that is the penultimate act leading to the ultimate act of the worship of the Lord.

Zach Leonard 8:25

Amen. That's great. I also think that it's important to remember that uh to your point, even though it's not an act, a task that we're supposed to do, there is in the Great Commission, there is a great promise and a hope. I mean, that what we're doing is attainable. I mean, he tells us don't go try it, go do it, and I am with you. And I mean, you look at that section right there in 20 where he says, Behold, I am with you to the end of the age. This is not something we're doing on our own. We're we're coming into something we've been invited to do. Um for whatever reason, Christ decided to use the crooked sticks that uh are us, um, and and we can take heart in that. And and I I that's such a great point. Uh one question that I do have, and and you may want to take this in different I don't know, zoomed in and move out to 35,000 feet, however you want to take it. Um I would just as we said before we record, I'll just I'm gonna ask the question, I'm just gonna let you cook. But um the for churches who have I mean, I think important to start with, a church needs to have a culture of evangelism before they're going to actually see that missions is important. If they're willing to sit back on their laurels and let somebody else do it, it's going to be very hard to talk that church into saying, yeah, let's get involved in missions. But for a church that is, we're speaking to churches here in this episode, they are on board, they want to be involved, kind of starting right there at the grassroots level and maybe working your out way out. What are some ways that churches can get involved and and fulfill that mandate, if you will?

Colin Rayburn 10:03

Yeah, I mean, one thing, uh, this is not it's um natural for me. I always forget, which shows I think the level of arrogance that I have. But man, we we start everything in prayer. Um, we go before the Lord, we um, you know, we plead with him to learn basically what what it is that he would have of us. But I think um even in that prayer, we ask that the Lord would lead us, but he's also given us the indicators of how the church can proceed. And so one of the things, and this is kind of my particular soapbox, if you will, um, and this is this comes from years of I think frustration on the field, years of frustration, uh wanting the church. I mean, someone made the comment, he's like, we don't know why the Lord gave us the Great Commission. Surely he had a better idea, but no, he gave it to us, he gave it to the church, and in all her brokenness, he gave it to us. And I think one of the things we have to realize as local churches is we are finite. Um, we are a finite group. We are a finite group of finite individuals. And because of that, we have uh what I like to refer to as capacity, right? So we have a finite capacity. And I think often when we think capacity, we think limitations. But what I always like to push churches towards is no, you don't think about your capacity as a limitation, but you think about it as an opportunity to be precise in your missions endeavor. And so all of our churches, they have, I mean, when we think first, we think financial capacities, that's obvious. We have temporal capacities. Our people only have so much PTO to give. We can't expect them to give all their PTO every year after year after year. We're gonna burn them out. And so we have to begin to think of how has the Lord given us unique capacities that will influence the way we move forward? But then even further past that, we want our churches to be considering their missions program in light of who their members are, which you know, what languages do you speak? What are your vocations? If you have, you know, 20 dentists, maybe you need to think of how you can incorporate the war on gingivitis with the Great Commission and beginning to link those two together. And so our people should always inform how our missions are moving forward, because we don't develop a missions program based on some sort of external mandate to go solve this problem out there. The Lord's made us a unique people in a unique space at a unique time, and he's given us unique ministry to go forward. So when we take all of that and we consider small churches in particular, and I'll say this within the SBTC, the average church size is roughly 75 members. And so we have large churches who are out there doing incredible things all over the place, and we have smaller churches who are trying to figure out how to get involved. And I'll always bring it back to this. I fell in love with the Southern Baptist Convention specifically through the cooperative program, figuring out what the cooperative program is and how it works and um the benefits that it brings. And I make the argument that the cooperative program is probably the best mystiological tool that the church has created, beating out even the Jesuits since the 400s. I think it's just one of the greatest tools we have. And it's specifically because the local town small church can be involved at an incredibly high global level just based on the cooperative program. But I want to push back on kind of one of those concepts as well. I think within the Southern Baptist Church, um, we have had a tendency to take our greatest asset, which I think is that cooperative program, and kind of fall into what has become our greatest weakness is that because we have a global international missions program, we have a national missions program, uh, so on and so forth, we have, I think, retreated to a default of cutting a check and saying that our church is faithful in missions. And what I want to push small-town churches towards it specifically is that the Lord has uniquely gifted them to do what we see in Acts 1.8. Acts 1.8 is this really amazing mystiological passage that uniquely, and I'd say amidst all of their scripture, it uniquely roots itself and embeds itself in the unfolding mysiological narrative of scripture, the redemptive uh narrative, to where you see how does Christ command his church to go out? He commands them to radiate out. And so it's not just a simple, well, you just work in your local area. No, he refutes that. You radiate out to the end of the earth. But it's not that just you go to the ends of the earth, no, you start local and then you also radiate out towards the end of the earth. And so when we think of like how can small town churches begin to get involved missiologically, it's like, well, if you're SBC, congratulations, you're already involved. How can you then leverage who God has made your people to be and begin to radiate out through the ends of the earth through the natural processes that we have?

Zach Leonard 14:23

That's great.

Brad Borggren 14:26

And kind of we got a couple of questions that kind of jump forward a little bit. Um, and so I'm actually gonna go to one that probably maybe leads to the next step in that of, you know, say we as a church find out who uh who we are, you know, how God has gifted us. Uh we've we've got that passion for reaching the nations, whether that's across the street or across across the world. Um, what have you seen both and and you probably work more with IMB than NAM, if I was assuming, uh, but what have you seen in in both of those organizations uh that church planners need most outside of cutting that check? You know, obviously they need prayer on a regular basis, daily basis. Uh they do financial support. You know, we um me and you as former IMB people like we understand just the the massive benefit of not having to raise support uh like that that can't be understated. But yeah, what what are some things, what are practical needs, be it you know, pastoral training, um member care type, you know, counseling. What what have you seen on the field that churches or that the church planners need the stateside churches can come along and partner with?

Colin Rayburn 15:55

Yeah, uh it's a great question. And I think honestly it applies to foreign uh international workers as well as church planners. Is I mean, you guys have experienced this too, as you guys go into ministry, um, and maybe it's just me, I don't know, but I I assume we're all in the same boat, is when you start off on some sort of ministerial process that the Lord has commanded you to do, uh you're probably not the expert in it. And you're just trying to be faithful to what the Lord's called you to do. Um, and I find, I don't know about you guys, but often I'm just flying by the seat of my pants trying to be faithful to what the Lord's called me to today. Um, and that's where, and you guys mentioned this before, is that um there is something we have called discipleship, mentorship, different things like that um that are invaluable to church planners, to missionaries is and I'll say this when I was on the field, I think we hit the field when I was, I want to say 23 or 24. Um, and um, this is not our doing. Um, I like to say that we made every possible mistake you could possibly make in missions and in church planning. We did it all wrong to the best of our ability. We did it all wrong. Uh, but the Lord decided to bless it. And by 2019, um, our church was apparently labeled the largest and the fastest growing church in France, which is, you know, it was mind-blowing because one, you have to understand statistically, we had almost 200 people, but in France, that was that was a mega church. Um, and the reason I bring that up is because, man, we didn't have a clue what we were doing. Um, but I had faithful brothers, some elders from our church, um, and some other churches come alongside of us and just begin to invest in us. And of course, yeah, there was a financial element to it. But one of the I think the most um underrated um and overlooked opportunities for churches to begin to invest in, whether it's a missionary or a church planner, specifically even here in the States, because this is a this is a side note. Just because someone's church planning in the States does not mean that they're not going to be isolated. They will totally be isolated, even just because they're in their own culture or in a very similar culture, it has very much so the same process. And so, what our church planners, what are what our international workers need um above above the finances and even beyond prayer as well, is that discipleship element. And often that looks like even if you're a small town church uh pastor and you might not think you have anything to offer missionaries or church planners, man, the Lord works through all of us and he delights to do so. And as we said before, the Great Commission, I don't know why the Lord gave it to the church. He probably would have been better off doing it without us. But the Lord delights in using all of us because he's glorified in it. And so, man, I would say every small town church needs to adopt a missionary, adopt a church planter, and just begin to invest relationally beyond finances. Um, and I'll even leave it with this is our church, the our sending church came to visit us once. They just sent two of our pastors. Their whole goal was to come visit us for a week, just take us out to dinner, just invest in us, send us out on dates. They took care of our kids, and me and my wife, we hadn't had a date uh because we were some of the oldest people in the church. No one knew how to take care of kids, but our pastors came over and just loved well on us. That was one of the most meaningful investments anyone made for us.

Zach Leonard 18:56

That's great. Um kind of to piggyback off of that a little bit, why don't you talk about um your role at the SBTC and how the SBTC with the uh cooperative program, but also with m just the uh just what you guys do in missions with the SBTC. Just kind of talk about your role and just what the SBTC does in regards to missions.

Colin Rayburn 19:27

Yeah. Uh so my elevator pitch, someone asked me what what do we do? I just tell them that we help churches develop uh meaningful and sustainable missions programs. Um and so you guys know this. If you if you if you're a church plant, you actually have the opportunity to develop your missions program from the ground up. A lot of our churches don't get that when a when a pastor comes in or a missions committee or a missions pastor, when they come in, they inherit something typically. And so what we have seen kind of through through the decades within the church is that we have this kind of ebb and flow of missional partnerships that are typically rooted in relationship. And so one of the things that we try to do, and really I kind of pin everything that we do in missions mobilization in a four-quadrant process. And so we have uh basically missiological education, just helping churches, as we talked about in that first question, how do you root your church into the mysiological meta-narrative of the church of Christ and of scripture? Your church has a role to play, you're invited to play this role, um, and it should inform everything you do. So that's the theological component. But then we help churches apply that. Uh, we move them to what we call a um a missional partnership process. And this is where um we I try to be delicate because it can be seen as pretty crass. But what we end up doing is we help churches develop their missional structure in what we'd call a portfolio. So you have a portfolio of missional opportunities, whether whether you call it that or you call it something maybe more theological, but it's a portfolio at the end of the day. And it should, as we see in Acts 1.8, it should be an Acts 1.8 style portfolio where you're local, you're national, you're international. It can look like however the Lord has designed your church to be, but it should be a portfolio at the end of the day. You should have multiple things that you're doing that reach both into the Great Commission, evangelism, and the great mandate. Compassions are felt-based ministries. It should be well-rounded because your church is the expression of Christ's ministry in a contemporary local context. And so we help them develop that mission's portfolio. And so what that kind of looks like is we'll help them identify opportunities in their area, how they can begin to make their, I'll say their financial contributions become more precise into what they say that they want to do and who the Lord has made them to be. So instead of being just this kind of sporadic giving in several different directions, we'll help them hone in uh their financial capacities to be um as precise as possible. And then we uh one of my favorite things is I actually get to take churches all over the world to help them develop those partnerships. And so um, this is actual um it it was an accidental byproduct of my dissertation. Um, and I I don't love Being known as this guy, but it's it's what the Lord decided to do. Um, and so through my dissertation, I accidentally created what can only be considered the e-harmony of churches. Um, it's it's it's everything like what it sounds. It's um we call it M link, so we don't call it e-harmony, but uh missions link. And basically what it does is it helps churches identify their unique capacities and then pairs them to similar profiles all over the world. And as we um and actually, you know, thank thank the Lord for AI, because that's the that's the tool I needed to actually start drawing all the links together. So it's an AI-based algorithm uh that links churches to those mission opportunities. Um, and then once we figure out what would be the great um opportunity for these churches, uh, we then get to take them all over the world and help pair them up and do um, as much as I hate it, basically speed dating with uh with missionaries and church planters and all sorts of things to help them figure out okay, you guys, we're a match on paper. Do you work relationally as well? And then what are the next steps moving forward? How do we round this out? What are the logistical steps to bring our churches on these one to two week mission trips and different things like that? What are the outcomes we're trying to attain? Um, so on and so forth. Uh, we also run a uh mobilization or I should say a missions leaders network across the state to help uh create a cohesive ecosystem of missions movements across the state. And then lastly, we do missionary care. How can we begin to care for the missionaries uh that we already have in the field? Uh continue to send and receive well.

Zach Leonard 23:28

That's great. Um, Brad, do you have any other questions, final questions you want to get to as we start to kind of downhill slope this episode a little bit?

Brad Borggren 23:38

Yeah, and I mean, yeah, that was that was great, Colin. And and I do want to ask, and that'll be kind of my closing question is how do we begin that end-link process, or how does a church begin that process? But but I want to go back to something you mentioned and and something that I struggled with overseas. Like I I would always kind of dread, and and this is gonna sound terrible. Uh I would dread when my supervisor, my cluster leader, whoever said, Hey, we have this team coming from the US, they're gonna be here for 10 days. Can you find something for them to do? And I'm like, man, that's uh and the reason I kind of dreaded it is because sometimes they would come with bigger goals uh to do in 10 days than we had in three or four years, right? You know, they want to see people get saved, disciples, churches planted, you know, they and and that's the ambition we need, but it's um I mean that's not really possible in a 10-day in a 10-day trip, so to speak. And and I really loved what you said that some of your most meaningful times and and and the most ways the church has blessed you and your family was just to love on you, right? And um longevity is an issue with the IMB, right? That you know, the average tenure is is somewhere around or used to be somewhere around uh 10 years, you know. And so obviously the longer we can keep people on the field, the more long-term success they're gonna have in that capacity. And and maybe that just looks like a church saying, hey, we're not theological experts, or we're not uh we're not missiologists, can't even say the word, but man, we can love on people and we can we can show up and and just take care of them um spiritually, but also just emotionally. And uh, you know, I think not that every trip is gonna be that way. Some churches are obviously gonna be more gifted to getting into the nitty-gritty, the the evangelism, the discipleship. Um South Asia we used a lot of those as kind of the tip of the spear, like, hey, if y'all get kicked out, you're going home anyway. And so be as bold as you want to be. Um but I but I appreciate you you speaking to that point that that it's not all um well, you know, there's a role for Barnabas's, I guess, as as much as there is for Paul's to kind of keep it in that acts perspective. Um But yeah, I would just ask if there's anything you want to share in in parting, but also, you know, what would be the first step for a especially an SBC church, but even if if someone's listening who's not a part of this other Baptist convention, uh, or not even in Texas, uh, what would be the way for them to get involved, uh at least conversationally, uh, with the SBTC to get paired up with the M link?

Colin Rayburn 26:41

Yeah. I think there's um I could even link really what you said. Um there's that relational aspect within missions. And I I love that you used the South Asia example because that's the exact opposite of what we had in Europe. So in Europe, anyone can come, they can really do whatever they want for the most part in most places, um, within within reason. Um, it's not like South Asia, where you will get kicked out, you, you know, your visa will be denied and you'll be black barred. Um in France, for example, on public property, um, well, I guess not public property, on uh like in schools and different areas like that, you're not even allowed to have religious clothing, you're not allowed to bring up religious conversation. That is illegal. Um, but the worst case scenario, you're gonna be removed from that property. South Asia is different because you will be removed from the country. And so, just as you said, that man, that really benefits our missionaries because you can be the tip of the spear in South Asia and do things that really they have to maintain the visa for the long-term presence. But our churches get to have short-term presence. And I specifically say they get to have short-term presence because there's things that happen in the short term that don't happen in the long term, and there's things that happen in the long term that don't have happen in the short term. And the Lord has uniquely equipped the contemporary, you know, postmodern 21st century church to enter into the short-term context. And I think it's an asset for not only the church, but for the kingdom. And so these short-term trips, um, they've gotten a you know a lot of bad rap here recently. There's a lot of people writing out against them. But at the end of the day, I think they they bring about something that's unique uh for the American church that we wouldn't get otherwise. Um, for a lot of a lot of churches, um, and again, I don't want to be overly critical, but a lot of churches, they'll practice evangelism all over the world, but not at home. And that's that's a problem. Other churches will practice evangelism at home and decide they don't even want to go to the nations. Well, that's problematic as well. So these short-term trips offer a chance for not only our missionaries to be served and in kindness and in love and to be um to be loved on by the churches who are coming um to visit them and spend time with them. But at the same time, whether we as missionaries want to admit it or not, just because we've spent years in the culture, we've got we've got we've become familiar with the culture, we've become familiar with the language, that doesn't mean that the Lord won't delight to use a short-term team to come do something unique and special. In the same way, just because we're maybe we don't know the culture, we don't know the language, man, we cannot bind the hands of the Lord to think that he can't do something amazing. And so the Lord has decided both of these avenues, um, I think to be the thing that we are going to stand before his throne, glorifying him for all of eternity in light of what he's doing, even through these short-term trips. And I think we have to be aware of that. So just to kind of piggyback on what you said, uh, but then kind of answer the other question on how churches can get involved. Um, as you've probably gathered at this point, my man, my my drum is always take take stock on how the Lord has uniquely equipped your church. You have unique capacities that the church down the road does not have to the glory of God.

Zach Leonard 29:37

Amen.

Colin Rayburn 29:38

And you need to figure out what are those capacities and how has how has the Lord led us to be to create a precise myssiological movement out of our local church's context. And from that point, I mean, so again, we can always hop back to the Southern Baptist Church. We have an incredible opportunity through the cooperative program, through the International Mission Board, through the North American Mission Board. And I think even all of us on this call have benefited from the cooperative program uh from seminaries. We all paid half price at seminary because the church picked up the tab to train us theologically. And so this is this amazing system that we have in the cooperative program where you can also find missionaries, you can find church planners that are all over the world based on what the Lord's already done through the local church. And so if you're Southern Baptist, man, start there. You have partners in your area and you have opportunities to go all over the world through really this incredible program. But even if you're not Southern Baptist, I would say you probably still have those opportunities too. You need to take stock on who is in your local church because I guarantee you, someone in that local church knows a missionary somewhere. Start there. Who is your missionary? Who's your church planner? I mean, even does you know, one of the deacons have a son who is in a church plant in, I don't know, Boston. Man, that there's an opportunity. There's a relational link that's there. And so I guess that's what I'd say. Man, start with your relational links. Start with your capacity, start with your opportunities that are already there and settle for nothing less than the ends of the earth. But that's also going to start locally. Again, I'll be beat this drum all the time. Acts 1.8, Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria to the ends of the earth. Amen. Um be that the church, and even I'll go, I'll take it even further than we probably all need it to go. The Lord Christ is talking to the entire universal church at Acts 1.8. They're all centered in Jerusalem at that moment. And he says, go to the ends of the earth. And so all of us sitting in Texas right now, we're the ends of the earth from that scenario, and we are um blessed by those who have gone before us to relay the gospel to us that we might also stand before the Lord for all of eternity. And so your local church, man, stay settle for nothing less than the ends of the earth, but don't neglect any any aspect or geographical radius in the midst uh before you get to that point, if that makes sense.

Zach Leonard 31:47

That's great. so a couple things to throw in there. I'm going to uh I'm going to play the role that Brad usually plays in these episodes. I have a uh a tendency to soapbox, and Brad always is the one that says, Well, think about this. I think your points on it not being an either or but an and both, basically. for those churches who do give financially and give large sums, but maybe are lacking in the evangelism part, let's start by saying thank you for your faithfulness. Thank you for your willingness to give monetarily. Um just like anything else, let's just shore it up a little bit. Let's see what's the next thing that we can do that's a little bit better. Um and and settle for pushing to be just a little bit more like Christ in everything that we do. Um so st we want to start there and just say thank you for those of you who are really good at evangelism. That's great. Is there a way that you know look near uh locally, is there a way that you can get involved now? Continue what you're doing. Is there a way you can get involved in a greater cast the net wider, if you will, in into maybe even global missions if possible? And for those who are really focused on global missions and international and sending out the checks, thank you. I mean, we really appreciate your faithfulness. Is there something that you can do closer to home? Um it you God has gifted you in that community in a way. Is there a way you can do that? And the last thing that I want to throw out there is something that I heard a while back and it's just always stuck with me. In regards to the short-term mission groups that that go out and they're wanting to see these big active moves of God when they go out, whether that's local evangelism or international missions, the thing we need to remember about the Bible is that it's a highlight reel. It is not a compendium of every single activity that took place over 8,000 years, right? It it is the high points. Inside those pages are hundreds, if not thousands, of men and women who faithfully got up, worked, served their families, loved their their churches, loved their the communities around them, and then faithfully went home in death to to um to be with the Lord. And I think it's important that we remember that our perseverance sometimes is going to be just putting one step in front of the other. And when we serve in missions, whether that's um connecting with a missionary and supporting them, or um actually sending someone and though that person goes themselves, we also should remember that there are going to be times where it will look like plodding, and that's okay. Um God is still faithful and still sovereign, even in the moments where it looks like it's moving slowly. And so I just kind of want to put those those thoughts out there. Brad, do you have any final thoughts as we wrap up the episode?

Brad Borggren 34:59

No, I think that's great. Uh Colin, again, thank you for joining us and sharing your expertise. And yeah. And great luck with may God continue to bless all your endeavors.

Zach Leonard 35:12

Amen.

Brad Borggren 35:13

You know, for his glory for the expansion of the kingdom. So thank you. Praise God. Thank you, brother.

Zach Leonard 35:18

Yeah, Colin, well, do you have any final thoughts you want to give our listeners as we uh as we sign off?

Colin Rayburn 35:23

No, I think I've already said it, but um, you know, I always run it in my mouth, so I'll clear it with this man. Settle for nothing less than what the Lord has called us to.

Zach Leonard 35:31

Amen.

Colin Rayburn 35:31

Um, there's rich blessing in all of it. And yeah, just as you said, there's trotting. Um, and I think I've uniquely been blessed by the opportunity afforded to me by those saints who went before us. There have been, I mean, Europe is often known as the missionary graveyard, but for some reason, right now, the Lord is calling millennials to himself. And uh chumps like me get to step into something that everyone else has already built and just get to reap the benefits. And man, we're just thankful for the Lord and his kindness in calling us to enter into the missio day or the mission of God.

Zach Leonard 35:59

That's great. Um, one final thing that I do want to ask of you as we close out the episode is there a way people can contact you or a website that they can get more information about what the SBTC is doing in regards to missions if they're interested in partnering in some way.

Colin Rayburn 36:12

Yeah, absolutely. So you can just go to sptexas.com uh to kind of get all of our resources, or more specifically, you can go to sptexas.com forward slash advancing mission, forward slash missions mobilization uh to find all of our content there. You'll find MLink, you'll find opportunities to sign up for our vision tours. We'll help your church develop partnerships, um, even finding your way into the missions leaders network across the state.

Zach Leonard 36:36

That's great. And we'll make sure to put that website in the show notes for anybody that doesn't want to rewind the episode to write that all down. Um we'll make sure and put that in. And if it's all right with you, we'll even put your email in there if they want to contact you correctly, uh connect directly uh to see if I could speak. Um, but we'll we'll put all that information in the show notes. Um, Colin, again, thank you so much for coming on. We really appreciate it. Um, and um we uh we we would look forward to seeing what you and the SPTC is going to do in missions and how churches can partner with you. Um as always, we uh we thank you for joining us on this episode of the Small Town Church Podcast. We are grateful for your listenership. Um when Brad and I decided to just turn on the uh microphones for these uh for these conversations we were already having, um, we were we really weren't sure who was going to listen, but we knew that the small town churches were a kind of an underutilized, underserved realm, and we wanted to get some voices to that. So thank you for your listenership. Um if this blesses you in some way, please feel free to share it. Um as always, if you have prayer requests, if you have questions, if there's any way we can partner with you, leave a comment on the episode um that you're listening to, and we will see that. But also you can email it uh email us at the smalltown church at or smalltownpod at gmail.com, and we'll be sure to respond to that and partner you to you in any way. Well, as we sign off, we thank you for um again listening again this week, and we will see you next week on the Small Town Church Podcast. Thank you for joining us for this episode of the Small Town Church Podcast. We pray that you have found this episode useful. If this episode has blessed you in some way, please share with someone else who might benefit from it. If you would like to partner with us, leave us a review so the algorithm can share this podcast with other people. If you have a question, please email it to thesmalltownpod at gmail.com, and we will do our best to answer it either in a later episode or in the QA episode at the end of the season. Also, if we can partner with you in prayer in any way, email us so that we may have the honor of joining you in that prayer. Until next time, we pray you delight in God's mercies, which are new every morning, and remember to stay faithful to your small town church.