One of the joys of missionary life is when new Christians are keen to be part of the ongoing ministry.The other day, young Ben came to me and said he'd like to learn to play bass guitar. I told him to come early to church the next week and I'd be happy to start teaching him. Sure enough, he was there bright and early and eager to learn a few notes. The next week he was trying a few more, and started "jamming" with the other musicians after church.

A missionary's job isn't to stay on as the entrenched pastor of the church that he or she starts. I've often heard it said around OMF circles in Thailand that missionaries are like the scaffolding around the outside of a new building. As soon as the building is complete, the scaffolding is no longer necessary. While this isn't a comfortable concept for the "scaffolding" that has to move often it's very necessary for the growth of the church and the local church leaders. While the founding missionaries are still there, the local Christian leaders will either never be willing to take full leadership of the new church, or they will begin to feel resentful that they aren't being given the opportunities to develop to their full potential. While most people's job performance is rated by the amount they do, a missionary's job performance should ultimately be rated on the amount they stop doing in order to allow a local Christian to carry it on.

In our church plant at Pak Phanang we successfully handed over a number of the ministry areas, especially leading worship on a Sunday morning. We take whichever Christians are available when we do evangelism, and try and get them to do as much as they can. Our next step will be to start some sort of preaching class. And as for Ben and his music lessons? I can't wait until I can give up my "bass" activities. :-)