Why Business As Missions?

Why Business as Missions?

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking over this question the last few weeks. I’m in the process of filling out a grant application. All the rumors you’ve ever heard about how much work and how in-depth they are is unequivocally true. While I am challenged by it—it’s the good kind of challenge.

It’s the kind of challenge that has made me really dig down and examine what we are in Guinea to do. It’s made me ask: why business as missions?

We are frequently surrounded by other missionaries while we are here in Africa. We get to directly hear about God’s work that is happening on this side of the world. There are missionaries here doing church planting, translating the bible, teaching discipleship and training pastors. There are missionaries who train doctors and nurses. There are missionaries who develop radio programs to broadcast God’s word. There are missionaries who share the gospel with children, who develop friendships with Muslims and explore with them how Christ can change their lives.

Then there’s us.

How can I even begin to justify our work here when I stack it up next to all the amazing, inspiring and obviously Kingdom-growing work being done in West Africa? I get shy and apprehensive when missionaries ask us “what is your ministry in Guinea?” Sometimes I muster up all of my communication expertise, try to put my 4-year, umpteen thousand dollar communication degree to work and present a prolonged persuasion of why what I do in Guinea will make an impact on the Kingdom of God. And yet other times I simply reply that we do “business as missions” or “business development” because I think that if I explain in more detail what it is we are doing, their eyes will glaze over and I’ll see blank faces staring back at me.

And I wonder if part of the barrier is that traditionally missions has been things like church planting, pastoral training and bible translation. It’s no surprise that my role as business developer doesn’t fit into the outline that’s been created over centuries of missions work.

If business isn’t a traditional ministry, hasn’t been tested, tried and true and doesn’t have obvious visual results of life changes, then why do it? Why do we leave our home? Why do we leave behind our family, our friends, our pets? Why do we spend months and months going through the awkward process of asking people for money and fundraising? Why put ourselves through the hassle of international travel or the trepidation of adapting to a new culture? Why persevere through feeling unsure and unintelligent learning a new language? Why endure having “white person, white person” chanted at us any time we leave our home? Why do we live without foods we are used to eating and comforts we are used to having?

Often I will respond with, “because God asked us to.” And that’s true. That’s the main reason I do all of those things. And hopefully a viable reason for most of the choices I make. When God says jump, you jump. But “because God says so” isn’t a reason with any real heart behind it. That's a reason with an obligation. It’s the same reason kids eat their broccoli or brush their teeth. Someone said to. It’s not because they truly believe that broccoli will change their overall health or that teeth brushing will reduce dental bills.

So for the past few weeks as I continue to wrestle with “why business as missions?” I’ve done more than just come up with a solid persuasive essay for my grant proposal—I’ve evaluated why we are here, why I am really here.

It’s more than “because God asked us to.”

I really believe in this stuff.

I believe that there are people who will not enter into friendship with Jesus through traditional evangelism and missions. In fact, there are people here who may never interact with a Christian…. 

…unless their drivers education teacher was a Christian, or the guy who prints their photos, or the lady who sells them their rice. 

Business is a daily, engrained part of every Guineans life. A large majority of Guineans own their own small business. And if we are really supposed to “meet them where they are” as I’ve heard said so many times, then this is the place. They’re selling oranges.They’re buying vegetables. They’re adding minutes to their cell phones. They’re having clothes made. They’re buying property. They’re doing all the things it takes to run a household. 

By helping national believers to start businesses we are affording them the opportunity to do life with their muslim neighbors. Their business is a tool to share the gospel. Where there may not have been a way to meet new people and “be Jesus to them,” there now is. 

While I may not be directly sharing the good news of Jesus with people in Guinea, and believe me, I doubt my French is good enough to do so, I am enabling the people who live here, who raise families here and who call this place their home a chance to minister to people they otherwise would not have come in contact with.

And even though I’ve had to struggle with my insecurities about figuring out exactly how I can justify my non-traditional ministry, it’s become more and more clear that an approach to introducing people to Jesus that may seem unorthodox and unusual is the perfect approach for me, unorthodox and unusual me.

-Hannah