The Joy of Welcoming Internationals for Thanksgiving
Inviting international friends to Thanksgiving is one of the best cross-cultural missions opportunities available to American Christians....
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UPSTREAM BLOG
The Upstream Blog is published two times a week and contains content from missions leaders, pastors, missiologists, and the Upstream team on a wide variety of topics pertaining to being a sending church. Leave us some comments or questions!
Joshua Bowman
Oct 19, 20234 min read
Cross-Cultural Missional Partnership: Some Perils of Neglect
The one-sided reality of failed cross-cultural partnerships may lead to the following errors.
Mike Easton
Oct 9, 20234 min read
Why Empower National Partners
One of the great joys of being a missions leader is getting to travel and see the work of God in the least-reached places of the world....
Matthew Hirt
Oct 2, 20235 min read
Building Healthy Multinational Teams
A young man from a West African country asked me, “How can I be a missionary? Missionaries do not come from my place.” The only...
Larry McCrary
Aug 10, 20234 min read
Global Professionals Can Reach the World for Christ
Let me tell you a little about Joe. Joe was a business student at a university in the U.S. He spent one semester studying abroad in an...
Shirley Ralston
May 29, 20237 min read
Creating a Network of Care Trip Goers
Is Your Church Ready? Care team, what do you do when one of your church’s global workers reaches out and asks for help? What if your...
Bruce Mewbourne
May 22, 20235 min read
Providing Cross Cultural Opportunities Locally
Immigration and migration represent a Great Commission opportunity for the church. Migration is not a new phenomenon. A casual reading of...
Matthew Hirt
May 8, 20235 min read
Worldview Discovery as an Evangelistic Tool
We all possess a unique worldview that shapes how we perceive and understand the world around us. Scripture challenges all of our...
Mike Easton
Apr 3, 20234 min read
10 Questions to Ask Potential Missionaries
I have often said that if I could give a million dollars towards global missions, it would dedicate it to figuring out who will flourish...
Matthew Bennett
Feb 16, 20234 min read
Three Reasons to Make Disciples in Local Languages
Here are three reasons that we must be committed to language learning and disciple-making in the language of the heart.
Anna Daub
Nov 21, 20226 min read
How to Do Missions in the Global South
Christianity continues to blossom in the Global South.[1] Our missions strategies and methodologies, while remaining unyieldingly planted...
Matthew Hirt
Nov 14, 20225 min read
Why and How to Do Missions to the Global South
As we come alongside brothers and sisters around the world to engage in the missionary task, we need new terms and categories to describe...
Mike Easton
Nov 10, 20223 min read
Training Sent Ones for Multiplicative Discipleship
We should teach our future missionaries the principles of multiplicative discipleship no matter which church model they encounter.
Luke T.
Nov 7, 20223 min read
Training Church Members for Cross-Cultural Living in Everyday Life
Discipleship 101: Pray, read your Bible, go to church, participate in cross-cultural training . . . Wait, what? Isn’t that the kind of...
Bradley Bell
Nov 3, 20225 min read
So You Wanna Be a Missionary—Who Are You Discipling?
I love the enthusiasm I encounter among aspiring missionaries. It drips from them like water from your hands when there are no paper...
Larry McCrary
Oct 24, 20225 min read
Exploring Alternative Pathways to Missions
Fourth Church is situated in a midsize city in the midwest. Their city has seen a lot of growth the last few years as people have moved...
Bradley Bell
Oct 16, 20222 min read
A Liturgy for When a Loved One Is Ailing Back Home
Father, when first I set sail on this life in another land, I believed your promise, that for every house brother sister father mother...
Ryan Martin
Jul 31, 20226 min read
Cultivating Missions Awareness Through Local International Ministry
A little over a year ago, my family and I transitioned churches. This was not the first time either my wife or I had sought a new church...
Shirley Ralston
Jul 18, 20226 min read
Marketplace Ministry from Experience, Pt. II
Make the Most of Your Foreign Assignment Click here for part one of this article series. Engage in Marketplace Ministry If God has led...
Matthew Hirt
May 23, 20225 min read
Cultural Sensitivity in the US Context
A large movie poster of Shah Rukh Khan was not what my wife and I expected to see as we walked into the movie theater in southern...
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