Greatest weakness of modern missions

Austin Gardner • July 2, 2022

 emphasized evangelism and church planting rather than leadership training

 J Herbert Kane in his book A Concise History of the Christian World Mission explains how evangelism and church planting have hurt the modern missionary movement. Read on and think it over. You do not have to agree but I beg you to think about it.



Included in the category of church leaders are pastors, evangelists, teachers, and Bible women. To this day the churches in the Third World lack adequately trained leadership. Some of this is the result of missionary activity, which emphasized evangelism and church planting rather than leadership training. John R. Mott said that this has been the greatest weakness of the modern missionary movement. We were so busy winning converts that we forgot to train church leaders. Many of the smaller churches on the mission field, because of their size, are without full-time leaders. Their leaders are dedicated laymen who practice their profession, ply their trade, or work their farms six days a week and on Sunday lead the church services.


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