Global Consultation on Evangelical Missiology Iguazzu Affirmation Commitment # 14 Member Care: "Service of the Lord in cross-cultural environments exposes missionaries to many stresses and criticisms. While acknowledging that missionaries also share the limitations of our common humanity and have made errors, we affirm that they deserve love, respect and gratitude. Too often, agencies, churches, and fellow Christians have not followed biblical guidelines in dealing with cross-cultural workers. We commit ourselves to support and nurture our missionary workers for their sakes and for the Gospel witness."

Sites Devoted to Missionary Care

Mental Health and Missionary Care Asbury College Psychology Department Website on member care; this is perhaps the best Web site in providing free yet high quality information related to missionary member care. It includes:

• Brochures: Written for missionaries, these brochures contain practical information about various topics related to mental health. They are written in a short, simple, question-answer format and are available either on this web site or printed on 8.5 X 14 paper so that they can be copied and distributed to others. Each brochure is titled, “What Missionaries Ought to Know About __________.”
• The Missionary Care Database: Developed for those involved in member care, this database contains published information about missionary care. Potentially useful for missionaries in general, this database contains information on more than 500 articles and books. It can be used to produce lists of publications or annotated bibliographies containing information on more than 100 topics relevant to missionary care.
• Web Links : Provides selected links to Member Care providers, Member Care Resources, and MK resources.

Member Care Associates : "dedicated to providing a source for networking missionary care information and resources. Our success in this task, however, depends on your participation. Your contribution of member care related materials, resources and information about related activities will make this site a success." The site is maintained by The Task Force for Member Care (MemCa) under the auspices of the Mission Commission of the World Evangelical Fellowship (WEF). There are multiple sub-pages:

• About Member Care - leads to pages that describe the purpose of the site and give background on the organization that sponsors the site.
• Recent additions - is the place where you can go to link to the newest additions to the site.
• Models - offers a variety of perspectives on missionary care.
• Issues - attempts to give a broad overview of missionary care issues.
• Resources - includes full-text articles on missionary care; several bibliographies and reviews of books
• Member Care Task Force and Global Network -- Guidelines Missions Commission, World Evangelical Fellowship: The global missions movement continues to expand, with current estimates of the missionary force at over 400,000 people (Barrett, 1998). How can organizations work together to help provide a "flow of care" for mission personnel? One important way is to form "affiliations" of experienced member care and missions leaders, who can further develop important member care resources for various organizations and regions. The Missions Commission of the World Evangelical Fellowship, which consists of over 50 associate members, has recently formed such an affiliation--the Member Care Task Force (Memca). This paper overviews the work of this Task Force.
• Member Care / MK Task Force (Part of the Evangelical Fellowship of Asia (EFA) Mission Commission): We are an affiliation of colleagues committed to further develop support within Asian mission. We come from different organisations and work together on strategic joint projects. Our special focus is to organise additional resources on behalf of member personnel and their children.

ESA Member Care : Valuable support resources for IMB missionaries in the ESA region, including a FAQ on member care and links to other sites.

Discussion, Ideas, and Suggestions

Mission Mobilizers Database : Brigada's list of books, organizations, and other resources to aid in caring for missionaries. They have several sub-topics under missionary care:

Resources
Financing Missionaries
   Field Care
Accountability
Ideas for Encouraging/Supporting Missionaries
   Home Care
      Re-Entry
Books on Reentry
Ideas for helping re-entering missionaries
Retreats
   Tentmakers
Startup
Field Issues
Finances Issues
   Issues
Are we loyal to the target people or to the missionary sent?
Moms and Ministry

Links and Resources for Sale

ACMC : ACMC (Advancing Churches in Missions Commitment) helps churches become more effective in missions. ACMC is the network through which the latest information is shared for local churches in missions - leadership, organization, education, communication, practical congregational involvement and the development and care of missionaries. The topics page has some valuable articles and they also offer resources for sale

Barnabas International is an organization whose vision it to provide "a world-wide ministry of encouragement to missionaries, MKs, & national pastors" Be sure to check out their resources page (the Mission Links button provides links and e-mail addresses to more than a dozen ministries).

Emmaus Road International : ERI, a ministry providing resources for third millennium missions, has several resources of help, including a paper entitled " Eight Possible Next Steps " ( Adobe Acrobat Reader required).

Godspeed : A Christ-centered faith ministry offering help to Christian missionaries and pastors who are hampered by emotional stress, situational conflict, or physical illness, to enable them to fulfill their mission and calling. At Godspeed we seek to help missionaries and pastors care for God's flock with all of the diligence of a shepherd ... good pasture and quiet waters, rest and refreshment, counsel and healing; to restore His servants and equip them to return to and remain on the field, so that they might faithfully and effectively lead others to Christ, the Good Shepherd. Pages of interest from this site include Missionary Medical Moments and Other Sites of Interest .

International Teams "work hard at perfecting our program, providing our missionaries with the tools and resources they need for success and removing or minimizing the barriers that might hinder them." Among their eight objectives is one to foster personal care of team members which includes "The provision of personalized care and service for each missionary at every stage, from time of inquiry through training, departure, time on the field, furlough and retirement." They provide "Member Care" as a topic in their database of available resources for sale.

LinkCare Center : Link Care exists to serve God by helping people grow in personal integrity, spiritual wholeness and emotional health. The Multimedia Center is constantly under construction. Link Care staff and consultants regularly develop materials and resources which are made available to interested users. There will be many resources for which there will be no charge. These will include short articles, "executive summaries" of longer texts and workbooks, and initial chapters of language manuals. There will be many resources which can be downloaded to a user for a nominal charge. These will be longer articles and workbooks.

Member Care Resources : Part of Grace's Resource Place , the third section of this page is on missionary care and provides a valuable list of Web-based resources.

Mission to the World's Web links to resources on missionary care

Mission Training International : Working together with churches and mission agencies to prepare and nurture Christians for effective intercultural life and ministry since 1954.

MK Connection : a central place for finding things of interest to MKs and TCKs.

OSCAR (UK information service for World Mission): This is a large site with many links. The sections of use in Member Care are Pastoral Support on-the-Field and Post-Field Counseling , which contains information on organizations or individuals who can provide post-field counseling for missionaries and overseas Christian workers.

Articles and Bibliographies

Evangelical Missions Quarterly has two articles on-line which deal with member care issues:

• "Crisis Intervention for Missionaries" by Karen Carr, in Evangelical Missions Quarterly and available online which explains the CISD model of intervention: "One mechanism for helping individuals process the impact of a trauma is the use of the Critical Incident Stress Debriefing (CISD) model, developed by Jeffrey Mitchell. It has been used successfully with emergency personnel, and has been adapted for missionaries. The essential components of this model are: (1) a trained de-briefer meets with the traumatized individual or group within 24 to 72 hours following the trauma; (2) the debriefers facilitate a discussion of the traumatic event in which they cover the facts, the mental and emotional reactions to the incident, and the symptoms experienced both during and after the event; and (3) the debriefers educate the victims on normal responses to crises in order to normalize their response and to give them increased understanding about what they are currently experiencing and what they might experience in the future."
• "Boomers, Busters, and Missions: Things are Different Now" by Ken Baker, who relates: "Member care is a significant concern. For the Boomer missionary, member care is a crucial issue. Being first-class consumers used to many choices, they have actively shopped around for a mission agency that meets their felt needs."

Selection, Training, Member Care and Professional Ethics: Choosing the Right People and Caring for Them with Integrity Paper presented at the IFMA/EFMA Personnel Conference Orlando, Florida December 4-6, 1997.

Missions Resource Network has a good introductory article on missionary care and a brief bibliography of suggested readings.

The Psychology of Missionary Adjustment (an online Senior Integration Paper by Melissa J. Dyches at Covenant College).