Mobilization Study

I realize that this is a bit of a deep dive on mobilization, and that not all readers will be interested in this topic. For those that do mobilize missionaries from a US context, however, this is a valuable study. It showcases the sort of ideas that you may be exposed to if you are a Missio Nexus member organization.

• See this (with Speaker Bios) on the Missio Nexus website. These are usually only for members - enjoy!

• Download the data, slides, and more at this link

The transcript is provided below.

Decoding the Missionary Pipeline - Transcript

Ted Esler: Welcome to this Missio Nexus webinar called Decoding the Missionary Pipeline Results of the Launch Survey. Now, this was actually recorded on July 17th. Unfortunately, there was a problem with the live event recording, and so our hosts have graciously offered to rerecord this and we're presenting it here for you.

The launch survey organizers were Katy White, Dave Jacob, and John McVay. John is not present with us on the call today. Katy White is the Vice President of Goer experience and a mobilizer with goco. She's passionate about helping the emerging generations find their place in God's global work and equipping other leaders to do the same.

Dave Jacob is a mission's mobilizer, practitioner, researcher, trainer, and consultant. He is the founder and president of Gospel Mobilization, a ministry dedicated to resourcing, training and coaching.

Now the [00:01:00] third survey organizer is the gentleman who's not with us, John McVay. He's a missions mobilizer as well. He started the Ask missionary com website and recently finished serving 25 years within his image medical missions. Without any further ado, let's hear about the launch survey results.

Dave Jacob: thanks Ted. Welcome everybody to decoding the Missionary Pipeline. The results of the 2025 launch survey. This webinar is for sending agencies and churches who really wanna launch more missionaries to the field. It's a joint project between gospel mobilization and Missio Nexus, so we're thankful for our partnership there.

Just in introduction, the way the three of us got together, myself and Katie White and John McVey. John did the original launch survey in 2015. [00:02:00] At that time, I was writing my master's thesis on mobilizing millennials and came across the results of the 2015 launch survey. And they were so useful to me in my research in writing my thesis.

And and just several months ago, John reached out to me outta the blue and asked if I would be willing to partner with him on the 2025 launch survey. Very thankful for that. And he said, we could use somebody else to help us. And so I thought of Katie White author of Mobilizing Gen Z co-author of Mobilizing Gen Z, and the newly released book Tithe Your Career.

And so I thought, Katie could really help us interpret some of this data, especially for the younger generation. So that's how we all got together and worked on this project. And we're super excited to bring you these. Results today and what it means for organizations and mobilizers and [00:03:00] churches.

So you may notice throughout the presentation that there's an ocean's theme here, and it's really based on Habakkuk two 14. The Earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. And so that is our prayer from this survey and from all this data and research that God's glory would indeed cover the earth, like the waters cover the sea.

So let me just start out by praying for us today a short really quick prayer here, and then we'll get into some of these findings. Thank you Lord so much for this opportunity. Thank you for this team of just an incredible people that I get to partner with and and thank you for all those that took the survey.

We pray for them that they would continue to find their way to the mission field, that you, by your spirit would empower them and send them [00:04:00] out in Jesus' name. And Lord we pray that your name would be made famous over all the earth and that as Habakkuk two 14 states that your glory would indeed cover all the earth as the waters cover the sea.

We praise you, Lord. This is all for your glory and your fame. It's in Jesus name. We ask these things, amen. Great. Let me just introduce the survey a little bit, the who, what, when, why, where, that type of thing. This survey was for aspiring missionaries and sent missionaries, those new to the field, those that have already gone to the field.

And so we curated contact lists from globally focused Christian organizations and conferences. There were 14 lists that we had, but only a small percentage from each list actually took the survey. And it's important to note that these [00:05:00] respondents had already expressed an interest in missions in a missions focused organization or a missions focused conference.

So these were people a little bit, farther along in their journey of wanting to. At least get some more information about serving around the world. This data is really going help us see how to best come alongside people who are already somewhat interested in missions to help them reach the field.

It's also important to note that we, the survey was taken by North Americans, only citizens of the USA and Canada. So it's in that context. So if you're watching this from somewhere else around the world, number one, we're grateful that you're here. But also just keep in mind, this is in the North American context, these results.

So these were citizens of the USA or Canada who selected that they were willing to relocate across the world for at least one year or longer. [00:06:00] There were different generational co cohorts that took the survey and that we analyzed. This includes Gen Z, millennials. Gen x boomers, and even the silent generation, those born before 1945, we had over 2,400 responses total.

We were hoping and praying and expecting for a thousand. And so the Lord really blessed this effort and we're so grateful. There were two sections of the survey. One for aspiring missionaries who have not yet gone to the field, and one for those that were currently on the field, they were already gone.

So that's important to note as well. So there was an online questionnaire that captured draws. In other words, what helps people get to the field, what drew them? To be interested and to go. And it also captured their concerns. What maybe hindered them? What were some barriers? We [00:07:00] also asked various other mobilization information, like stage of life that they were at, when they were when they were called, or what.

And preferences for learning about opportunities, important people in their journey to get to the field and so on. These responses were captured between January and March, 2025. So why did we do this survey? We want to send, like you, we wanna send more laborers to the harvest. And it is our hope and prayer that Jesus' name is indeed famous in all the Earth.

So we wanna know how God is moving, what are some of those draws? How is he calling people to the field so that agencies, mobilizers, churches, other missionaries can come alongside and help make them successful? And we also wanted to know what are some of these concerns? What are some of the barriers that we can address those as well?

So I'm going give some big picture strokes here. [00:08:00] This is what I just talked about. The who, what, why. Sorry, I forgot to advance the slide. But what we're going give now the big lessons and then Katie's going break some things down for us. So the first thing that we learned were that conversations about motivations and barriers mobilize people.

Many people mentioned that just filling out this survey helped them to reengage in their journey to consider serving overseas. That's awesome. We're so thankful that this survey actually helped mobilize people just by putting it out there near the end of the survey. Several hundred people responded yes to an optional question that we listed, and the question was, would you like to have a one-on-one conversation to help you discern and explore your potential interest in relocating for the gospel?

So again, several hundred people responded to that. So a key point here [00:09:00] is that great mobilization includes intentional discussions about the factors that are drawing people to consider going and the obstacles that they feel like are in their way. So really important for mobilizers to spend 30% of their time talking and 70% of their time listening, finding out what God is doing in people's lives so that then we can come alongside and help them be successful at getting to the field if that's what the Lord is calling them to do.

This is especially important if you wanna mobilize the next generation. They are uploaders of information, and when Gen Z is talking, they are learning. In fact, here's what one respondent wrote when asked what the missions agency staff person could have done differently. They said the mobilizer could have listened better to how I felt the Lord was directing me rather than trying to persuade me to fill slots that [00:10:00] the mission saw as crucial.

That's an important quote that I think we should all keep in mind here as we look at some of these big takeaways from the survey. Okay. Next, were some of these barriers, were they just perceived barriers or were they real barriers? So there's noticeable differences in how strongly some specific draws and concerns were rated in the group who haven't yet launched and in the group who are already on the field.

These are important to tune into because they could possibly reveal one of two things. One, the barrier could be only a perceived barrier. While it might seem strong before going, it's rated as less once someone was on the field, because ultimately the barrier didn't stop them from going right. So we should focus significant efforts on helping aspiring missionaries tackle these surmountable [00:11:00] barriers because in reality, they won't stop someone if given attention.

And two, perhaps the barriers actually insurmountable to many. Only those who make it to the field are ones who don't have that present, which is perhaps why the group of current missionaries rated it lower than aspiring ones. If this is the case, we should focus significant efforts on addressing these barriers so they're no longer.

Insurmountable. But either way, our action is the same. Mobilizers need to give significant attention to these areas. The most significant was lacking clear guidance. 50% of aspiring Gen Z said it was a strong concern, while only 8% of the Gen Z who have gone said it was a strong concern. So we really need to help people.

Discern their calling and another resource about a year [00:12:00] ago, Katie White and I recorded a podcast episode gospel mobilization.org/podcast is where you can find our episodes. And if you just Googled helping others discern, calling Katie White, you can download that episode. She gives us some great tools in helping people navigate what God is doing in their life.

And just a few others to note that were barriers, either perceived or real objections from friends and family and not feeling spiritually ready. So we're going address that a little bit later. We also found some significant differences in the needs between emerging aspiring missionaries and older, the older generation of missionaries that are already on the field.

So it's helpful to recognize that there might be some blind spots to the needs, priorities, and motivations of young people amongst older [00:13:00] missionaries. Many of them haven't lived very long in the US in decades, right? So they haven't personally experienced how drastically things have shifted in the spiritual, the cultural, and the relational landscapes.

So that's why it's important to train missionaries on the characteristics of Gen Z organizations. And mobilizers can help educate missionaries to have empathy and understanding of the worldviews, the strengths, the barriers and sources of. Inspiration for young people because as it relates to the mobilization pipeline, older generations of missionaries should be made aware that the top concerns of aspiring missionaries may be totally different than their top concerns they remember facing.

So it can really help them understand what to share, how to listen to younger aspiring missionaries. [00:14:00] So those were some big takeaways that we noticed right off, but I'm going hand it over now to Katie White and talk a little bit about some of this data.

Katy White: Thanks Dave. So this focus, this section now we're going focus on some of the selected data that reveals insights into what aspiring missionaries need to move forward into global ministry and what are some of the main barriers that are keeping them home.

First we're going highlight data specifically about Gen Z, and then we'll also compare and contrast some of the other generations as well. We're specifically honing in on Gen Z here because this is the newest generation that wasn't captured in the original launch survey 10 years ago, and was a huge reason why we relaunched the survey now 10 years later to see what is this generation thinking and feeling as they're considering the mission field.

And we're also really honing in on Gen Z first here because youth and adolescents. In college, those were stages of life that missionaries reports are the [00:15:00] most significant in their decisions to step into global missions. And the current generation that's in middle school, high school, college, and adulthood is Gen Z.

So we're really looking to take advantage of those that are currently in that stage of life is that has been a really core season of life for lots of aspiring missionaries to get them to the field. And we're focusing on Gen Z too, because Gen Z is actually shaping American Christianity right now, which is incredibly exciting.

According to Bara's latest data the state of the church in 2025, US adults who say they have made a personal commitment to Jesus that's still important in their life today. That reached its lowest level it had ever reached in 2021. And there are more than three decades of tracking. It reached its lowest level in 2021.

But today they have seen a 12 percentage point increase since then. That is amazing. And it's Gen Z that's fueling its increase. So listen to what Barna CEO David Kinnaman says he states. [00:16:00] This is the clearest chin we've seen in more than a decade that points to spiritual renewal. And it's the first time Barna has ever recorded such spiritual interest being led by younger generations.

So we're really excited about what God is doing among young people, and we want to partner with him and sending the emerging generation into his global purposes. You will be able to see the data for. All the generation surveyed in the downloadable presentation link that we're going share at the end of today's session.

So you'll be able to see how these draws and concerns rank for every single generation. But first, let's dive in. We are talking first about top factors that motivate aspiring gen Zers, so those who haven't yet gone to the field. What are some of the top factors that motivate them to relocate for the gospel for at least one year or more?

So before we show you the next slide, I want you watching this webinar here to pause. Give yourself a few seconds and [00:17:00] write down what do you think are your guesses? What do you think are the strongest motivators that we found in Gen Z? So pause this recording here, write a few down. After you've wrote a few down, come back, restart this presentation and you can see how close you were.

So now we're about to show you the top five stats of the draws for aspiring Gen Z. So Dave, if you show us our slide here, these were the top five. So number one, you can see the concern for the personal salvation of others. Now these numbers you can see here as, as they had a list of around 2025 draws and concerns that they could choose from, and they had the chance to mark each of these statements as either little to no draw, some draw or strong draw.

So this number here, this 80%, you'll see that is the percentage of respondents who chose. This was a strong draw. 'cause what we're [00:18:00] looking for is, man, what are the strongest draws? What are the main motivators? What are the things that are actually compelling people to step into global service? So 80% of aspiring Gen Z missionaries mention the concern for the personal salvation of others was a.

Strong draw. You can also see guidance through God's guidance through scripture. Number two, a desire to share Christ with the unreached. Number three, if there was a position to use my specific skills or gifts or passions, also extremely high. 74% of respondents made this mark this as a strong draw. And then finally, of the top five rounding out is God's guidance through prayer.

Spiritual realities are very motivating to Gen z. I really, we are really encouraged to see God's guidance through scripture. Prayer be really strong here. Our encouragement to you is mobilization should include Bible study. It should include positioning them in front of the word of God, because 77% would say this would strongly make me more willing [00:19:00] to relocate for the gospel for a year or more.

We also really are going talk a little bit more about specific things that organizations mobilizes and churches can do, but I can't also let this slide pass without also saying spiritual formation. Practices like listening prayer are really important to put in your mobilization pipeline as we see this top five here.

So now we're going show what do you think made it into the next three? So you can go ahead and move that slide, Dave. So here's a list of six here and, or excuse me, a list of five and what do you think? These are kinda the swing boats. These are the next three in the top results for Gen Z. So two in this list here.

We're the next top two of really strong draws, and three on this list here, we're actually at the very bottom of the list. So spend again, a few seconds. You can pause here, you can read through [00:20:00] these five draws listed here. Which two do you think were the next highest? And we're talking 65% of them still said this was a strong draw, and which three do you think were the lowest?

All right. Now that you've had a chance to write down your answers, you can keep going in the webinar. And Dave, if you show us the next slide, these are the answers. So in this purple color here, these were the next two strong draws for Gen Z. So you can see if there was a healthy community of others that would receive me, 65% said this was a very strong draw that would make them more likely to relocate.

For the gospel across the world for a year or more if there's a CA healthy community of others to receive me. And then right after that, a desire to provide practical service to those in need. So a few commentary I would say that stuck out to us about some of these, [00:21:00] this data is that community strongly important for Gen Z.

We're going talk again in a little bit about what we can do as organizations, mobilizes and churches, to really come alongside them in this motivator. Practical needs. Also very motivating. We saw in the top five that a position to use my specific skill and gift was very motivating. And also this desire to provide practical service to those in need.

It really stuck out to me that desire to share Christ with a specific group or city or country was at the bottom. This was one of the very bottom of the list. Positions that are using a specific skills, providing practical needs. These are significant motivators. They're more motivated by this indivi, individualistic, how could I be used for God's global kingdom than these specific locations?

This is important. Tune into that. Do your websites, do your positions, are they all oriented around a location or a people group? This is not strongly [00:22:00] motivating to Gen Z especially those who are aspiring and not yet on the field. One thing I would point out there were two other draws that they could list learning stats or information related to the.

Spiritual needs of a community and learning stats or information related to the practical needs of a community. Learning stats and information related to the spiritual needs was actually rated much higher as a stronger draw than learning about the practical needs yet. You can see they're more motivated by positions that use their skillset.

So a really key here to focus in on is that mobilization should focus on the spiritual realities with the impact they can make through using their skillsets. That's how you're going be able to take. All of these motivators and be able to combine them in order to encourage more young people in the mission field.

Also just a brief commentary. I personally was like, I think a little bit surprised to see injustice was ranked so low. It was one of the very bottom on the list. But I would just say, keep in mind this is [00:23:00] the percentage of Gen Z who marked it as a strong draw. I think what we're learning here is it may not be the strongest draw.

So there are many other things that rank higher. In addition to a desire to do something about injustice in the world you'll be able to see the. Full list of draws and where they ranked in order when you download the downloadable presentation link that we're going give you again at the end of today's session.

So those are some of the main motivators. What are some of the specific obstacles that are derailing Gen Z candidates? So again, I'm going encourage you to pause the recording here and take a guess. What do you think are some of the strongest concerns that young the young generations have as they consider whether or not they would be willing to relocate for the gospel for a year or more?

Pause here, jot down a few of your thoughts. What is your guess of what you think are the strongest concerns? And once you write those down, then come back on pause so you can [00:24:00] see the answer. All right, so we are now going to reveal the answer of what were the top concerns, the strongest concerns for aspiring Gen Z missionaries.

And you can see the top three here. I actually only included three instead of five. 'cause these were actually the only three that were more than a third. Ranked them as the strong concern. So number one, absolute highest, the only one that was a majority, lacking clear guidance or lacking direction towards such a major decision.

Number two, the second strongest concern or barrier, keeping them from being willing to relocate for a year more for the gospel is feeling spiritually unprepared. And then number three, relocating somewhere where I be, where I may be lonely or isolated. I think what really sticks out to me here about these top three barriers for Gen Z is a lot of them are really anxiety related.

This anxiety of having to make this really [00:25:00] big decision of relocating across the world without some really clear guidance or the anxiety of. Feeling spiritually unprepared feeling their weaknesses, feeling like they're not ready, or loneliness, isolation. These are all related to anxiety.

Mobilizers can really help young people grow in some of these skills. Some of the things that, I personally have been working on as a mobilizer myself as I mobilize young people through Go Core, which is spending two years overseas after college in their twenties, is we have invested in writing blogs about decision making, tips and tricks to really help them manage this anxiety and decision making.

Or we have a whole devotional putting them in front of the word of God through discernment. How, what is discernment? How do you discern? We have some exercises we lead them through in our trainings before they launch to the field about subjecting fear to a fear of God and what does it look like to move forward even in the midst of some of our anxieties and fears.

This is really key, I think, for [00:26:00] mobilizers organizations and churches to come alongside Gen Z if we want to see more of them relocate for the gospel. Okay, so what are the next two? So we'll give you another guessing game. You can go to the next slide. Dave, what of these lists? There's four here. Two of them were next.

They were next in the list of, on the top five of the strongest concerns, and the other two were on the bottom of the list. So read through these four. Make a guess. Pause the recording here to jot down your guesses and then come back to see if you can guess which were the next strongest barriers for gen.

All right. And now we're going show the answer. What's the next strongest barrier? So you can see here in the pink, these are the next strongest barriers we saw. 32% said it was a strong concern of being far away from family and friends and missing out on important times with them. And then also, if my role [00:27:00] is undefined or ambiguous, those are the next strongest concerns for the aspiring generation of potential missionaries.

We definitely see FOMO as high fear of missing out is a big thing that's keeping young people from being willing to go overseas. And then also clear roles. I think this was a key finding for me as we were going through this list here, that clear roles are very important. They're actually important.

We'll talk about a little bit more, but they're important to all the generations surveyed in the aspiring group. It's really important we have as much specific information about roles and as possible. And I think it is also particularly important for Gen Z as well. They ranked it so high, I think, 'cause again, ambiguity can really fuel anxiety.

Sometimes. Another strong concern I'm going mention it was, it's not here on this list because it was actually just an optional question and not everyone answered it, but it was strong to those who answered. So those who did answer the optional question, 33% of them did rank it as a [00:28:00] strong concern. So it would be here in this top five.

And that concern is if I was single when considering relocating to the gospel, I would have concerns, I would not find a spouse, or I would never get married. That was ranked. 33% of those who did respond ranked that as a strong concern. So having conversations about relationships and what this means for their future is really important to aspiring missionaries.

One brief commentary. Fundraising, I'm not sure if you guessed that as one of your top guesses. We still haven't even seen it yet in the top five. It was not listed as one of the top five. It was definitely still listed by many as a strong concern. So we thought th we saw 30% listed as a strong concern.

But it was not as strong. My encouragement to you as mobilizers and church leaders and organization leaders is keep in mind the things we think might be the biggest hindrances, may not be the biggest hindrances to those that we're working with. That's why, like Dave said, listening is absolutely important.

Being able [00:29:00] to ask good questions and draw what really is keeping them, what God is doing in their lives and how to walk alongside them in it. I also would mention, we see danger relocating somewhere dangerous or that's less physically safe as pretty low. One question I've heard is how does this relate to what we are hearing about gen Z being a little bit more risk averse than generations above them?

I think what I've found is that young people are more risk averse in the small things. Like we are seeing, like saying yes to something without complete certainty or maybe worrying about how to be financially secure. But Gen Z is very willing to do the hard things, and they are very willing to go to the hard places.

We need to keep in mind that they need help processing these smaller, more emotional, mental risks so that they can step into these big risks and do these big risky things for the Lord. We also saw concerns about the ethics of missions was low. I would just say, keep this in mind. We did not survey the general population here, like Dave mentioned, [00:30:00] we surveyed those who have already expressed interest in emissions organization.

We were really focused on, those who are already in your pipeline, how do you get them to move into the next steps and actually turn over into becoming missionaries on the field? Hence the title decoding the missionary pipeline. So this number might look a little bit different than what we're seeing with the general population of Christian Young people.

But those we surveyed that were already in the pipeline but had not yet taken steps to move overseas. They ranked it as one of the lower concerns as strongly. You'll get to see the full list of concerns and how they ranked by each generation and the downloadable presentation link that you can access at the end of the session.

Keep moving forward. As we're thinking about some of the data, what did we see about some of these draws and concerns? I'm going briefly mention what we saw from some of the other generations. So with millennials, main takeaways we saw with the data with millennials, there really were not significant differences than what we've just shared about what [00:31:00] were top motivators or bottom motivators, or what were top or bottom concerns between aspiring Gen Z and aspiring missionary excuse me, millennials.

Those who aren't yet. On the field, they were in slightly different order. Like number one was number two and things like that, but the top five remained very similar. For Gen Xers, we did see a few differences. So the top motivators remained similar for aspiring Gen Xers as well. Also guidance through scripture, prayer positions that use their skills.

Those were all, again, also in the top motivators for Gen Xers. The main one that was different is we saw healthy, having a healthy community of others to receive me. That one dropped the most. That one was only number 11. That was midway through the list. It wasn't even in the top of the list for Gen Xers.

Gen Xers had a few differing concerns. I believe most of these concerns we can see are mostly related to. Stage of life that Gen Xers [00:32:00] would be versus Gen Z and millennials right now, they had more concerns about objections from a spouse if they were on the same page about relocating for the gospel or concern for their children or concern for aging parents.

So less Gen Z we're marking these as strong concerns for many of them don't have those factors present in their lives yet. We also saw from Gen X, they had less concern about being spiritually prepared, and the objections from friends and family was also less of a strong concern for them. Again, I think the more life experience they've had and the more spiritual growth and these older stages of life that Gen Xers are, have likely lessened these concerns.

The biggest differences we saw between the generations is more so those. Secondary motivators. So those things that kind of found themselves in the middle of the list, not top five, not bottom, but in the middle encouragement from friends and peers and encouragement from a mentor, pastor or leader.

Those were much higher on the list for Gen Z and millennials. And again, I think this is [00:33:00] probably more of a stage of life effect than a cohort difference that may decrease as you get older. But it is important that we recognize that a supportive community is much more strongly important to younger generations as they're considering their willingness to re relocate around the world for the gospel.

And then another key thing that I think we noticed as a main differing secondary motivator was gen Z much strongly. Ranked 49% of them said it was a strong draw. If I'm already involved in sharing the gospel here before I relocate to share the gospel somewhere else authenticity is absolutely important to Gen Z.

Those who are already involved in sharing the gospel at home are also likely, I think, to feel more spiritually prepared, which would kinda help in that concern and barrier that they have. So my encouragement is, are you, is there training, is there practical opportunities like this in their pi in the pipeline?

'cause that might help more say yes to going. The last data I'll mention in this section here is a main takeaway related to messaging. I already [00:34:00] mentioned this, but I think it's worth noting again 'cause it is a really key finding. Learning info about the spiritual needs of a community was higher on the list of draws than learning info related to the practical needs of a community for every single generation.

However, if there's a position to use, my specific skills was in the top five for every single generation of aspiring missionaries as well. So mobilization will needs to focus on spiritual realities they're helping meet and the impact they're using through their specific skillset. But I'm looking forward to you getting a chance to comb through the full list of draws and concerns for each generation in the downloadable presentation.

You can, you can access at the end of today's session. I would encourage you before moving into the next section that I'll pass back to Dave, is again, pause this recording here and just take one or two minutes to really pause, reflect on the information you've heard so far. [00:35:00] Jot down something that has stood out to you really help your brain kind of start processing through this before we dive into the really practical takeaways.

What information was the most surprising, what confirmed your current understanding maybe, but now to see it in data form that gives you confidence in some of the decisions you're making. Or is there any ideas that sparked in your mind as you heard us talk about some of these draws and concerns?

Anything you wanna dig into more? Pause the recording here. Give yourself a few moments to reflect. Write that down so you don't lose it, and you can come back and engage that and then come back to our recording because now we are going to dive into the so what our last half of the presentation.

Is the, so what we are going focus now on practical strategies, adaptations, and maybe even some looming questions for organizations, for mobilization practitioners and for churches to consider to increase your effectiveness in sending. In this section, we're going share some actionable takeaways that are tailored to these motivators that we've [00:36:00] just shared.

Some best practices for removing some of these barriers that are stopping some potential missionaries from going, and some insights into creating systems that really set new aspiring missionaries up for long-term success. So Dave, you can now begin our first section of the, so what does this mean for us?

Dave Jacob: All right, thanks Katie. We're going now tackle what this means for organizations and we're talking about globally focused organizations mission sending agencies and the like, so best practices, necessary adaptations, and some of those looming questions. You see the wave picture here. We believe that a wave is coming and what can we do to be ready to send the next wave of missionaries?

We don't wanna miss it. And we hope that this is helpful for organizations. But why are we focusing on Mo [00:37:00] organizations? And the reason is in this section anyway, is because organiz, the organization impacts the mobilization department. So if we're talking specifically about mission sending agencies, we know that the broader culture of the organization impacts mobilizations, not just left to a, the silo Department of Mobilization to do there's some things that we believe from this data is going help organizations. Adapt and send more laborers. So the first thing that I wanna point out is the stage of life to recruit or to mobilize. This is the table from current missionaries, those who have already gone, and we ask them, which stage of your life where most or stages were most significant in making the decision to relocate for the gospel.

So we asked them to check only one or two significant stages, and [00:38:00] really no surprise to a lot of us that undergraduate is very significant. Look at those numbers in the yellow circles. That's why we've spent so much time, like Katie mentioned on Gen Z because they are the current college students.

They're graduating now and going into ministry and going into the workforce. But I want you to notice something. Look right above those three yellow circles on the left. Teenage and childhood years were also significant for many. But also don't discount those past those stages already. There were still significant numbers for a career as we see here for the older generations.

Obviously, the younger generations aren't in those life stages yet, which is why it's not as represented there. So again, you can unpack this data on your own in the downloadable PDF that we'll share at the end of today's presentation. So this was the table from [00:39:00] aspiring. What we ask them, what are the main ways you may like to learn about opportunities to relocate for the gospel?

Choose one, two, or three. And conference and church service were high conferences and and email may be significant. That may have been ranked higher because of our audience. Again, some of those that we surveyed were conference lists, so that could explain why conference was higher. But still interesting though that email ranked higher than social media.

So a question. Do you have an email campaign for people who sign up saying that they're interested? And how long do you stay in communication with them? Are you sharing things that help them be more willing and ready to go? Or are you simply just marketing the organization? Those are important questions.

Also, church service was very high, especially for [00:40:00] Gen Z. We're going unpack what this means for churches later on in today's presentation, but recruiting for specific roles on the field like Katie already mentioned, the phrase what the quote was, if there was a positive, a position to use my specific skill, gifts and passions, as Katie mentioned, that was very high for aspiring Gen Z millennials and Gen X as was des desire to share Christ with a specific group or city or country that was in the top 10 for both boomers and Gen Xers who are already on the field.

But it was near the bottom for aspiring Gen Z millennials and Gen X, gen Z ranked it the least of all the generations. It is important that we are defining their roles. And if you remember, not having clarity was a concern that was just as strong for aspiring Gen [00:41:00] Z as fundraising was.

Fundraising is a concern, 30% rated that as a strong concern, but not having clarity in their role was another strong concern. So the traditional mobilization approach doesn't usually include addressing clarity in their role. And maybe one reason why the traditional approaches focusing on location, for example, are failing younger generations.

As we've mentioned perhaps on your website for your mission sending agency, instead of having places and them to search by places, perhaps having some of these specific roles listed instead may help you mobilize more. So there's a stark shift from previous recruiting practices. Boomers and Gen Xers who are already on the field rank this concern much lower.

So it's important that teams [00:42:00] that are already on the field, that they provide clarity for people looking to join them, join. We know that Healthy Teams was ranked as a high draw for Gen Z. The desire for teamwork and collaboration and community is especially pronounced for the emerging generation. So if you want to send more young missionaries to the field.

We highly recommend that you address the health of your organization and your teams on the field. Are you transparent? Are you authentic? Those are characteristics that are very important to health. And Gen Z is very in tune to that. So remember, 65% of aspiring Gen Z missionaries listed if there was a healthy community of others to receive me as a strong draw.

So that's almost two thirds. This isn't just a difference between those prior to or already on the [00:43:00] field of all generations of current missionaries on the field. Gen Z was the cohort that listed that. There was a healthy community of others, or at least I thought it was healthy to receive me. They ranked that the highest as a strong draw for why they said yes, it's more than double, than the Boomer and Gen X generation.

So how can your organization invest in creating a sustaining and healthy organization and healthy teams on the field if you want to recruit more young people? And again, that goes beyond the mobilization department. The organization has to be healthy. Teams on the field need to be healthy. The other thing that we noticed is the younger generations in their preference for making.

Decisions in increments. Obviously too, there are various entry points for long-term missionary service. 40 to 60% of every generation of missionaries already [00:44:00] on the field that were surveyed said that a short-term mission trip was one of the main ways they were inspired or learned about opportunities to relocate for the gospel.

So perhaps this is going to keep growing for newer generations. Here's what, here's this quote rose as a motivator between aspiring millennials and aspiring Gen Z. And it was if I could relocate for a year or two to start before committing for longer somewhere else. So that rose between millennials and Gen Z.

We also asked current missionaries. When you first moved overseas, how many years did you initially plan to be there? The average for Gen Z is less than half of the boomer generation. Gen Z listed four years, as opposed to the boomer generation that listed nine. So again, the younger generations are going make decisions in increments.

[00:45:00] Teams have to understand the value of this opportunity and use these opportunities to coach participants towards longer involvement. Focus on building relationships with short-term participants and teams. Don't just give them a task, a wall to paint, for example. Show them real life on the field, not just the best or the most shocking parts of missionary life on the field.

They wanna be able to see themselves there. It's also important to note that conversations with a missionary was more often cited as a main way. Current missionaries were inspired to relocate for the gospel than conversation with an organization staffer. So this coincides with the Barna study. Their report on the future of missions.

They conclude that missionaries are indeed the best mobilizers. So how can we motivate missionaries to mobilize? How can [00:46:00] we train them? How can we increase mobilization training for missionaries when their plates are already full? These are important questions to ask and to try to find solutions for a mobilizer role.

Also should include mobilizing career missionaries to mobilize. So these are some insights for creating onboarding systems that set new team members up for long-term success. And finally, good follow-up and coaching is so important. Do you have a follow-up plan in place once someone returns from a short-term trip or from an internship?

Do you have good processes to track with and stay in communication with people who return from short term or midterm involvement? And is there a direct challenge and invitation that you're asking these people to take a next step [00:47:00] Is that clearly offered a direct challenge? Is there a clear next step for those who are recently home from the short term or midterm assignments?

I also want to address this issue of spirit spiritual readiness. As Katie mentioned feeling unprepared spiritually was the number two concern for aspiring Gen Z. It was less but still a top five concern for the, for aspiring millennials, but only 16% for aspiring Gen X, perhaps due to their stage of life, like we've mentioned.

But Gen Z feels their weaknesses more than they feel their strengths. So can we provide spiritual growth opportunities in our pipelines? Perhaps mobilization looks more like discipleship than it does recruitment. Can we commit to walking longer with applicants? This is a big shift for some of our organizations who are in [00:48:00] recruiting phase and new need new missionaries right now.

It's also important that maybe we rephrase and we say not yet. Instead of, no, I know. One agency who wanted to, was in the process of mobilizing a midterm missionary when they realized he confessed that he was addicted to pornography. Instead of saying no to this individual, the mission agency said, can we walk with you to help you overcome this in your life?

Can we walk with your pastor to help you get victory in this area? And they did. And this individual is now on the field. So this is the power of discipleship mobilization and saying not yet. We're with you. We believe in you. Can we help you get there? So it's important. Saying not yet is not a no, but it's an invitation to a richer Yes.

So can we shift our mobilization efforts to reflect that? A [00:49:00] few other important considerations for organizations that I will just mention briefly. We know fundraising is likely keeping many people from the field. So perhaps new models may help address this barrier. It's also important to note that experienced mobilizers are vital.

It's important to receive mobilization training and to have veteran mobilizer. So here's an interesting data point in the survey. When given the choice of who are the main persons, you may like to discuss, pray, and process about an opportunity to relocate for the gospel. Aspiring Gen Z and aspiring millennials chose organization staffer who has decades of experience and may be much older than I am, that was double as high as an organization staffer, who is fairly close to my age, but has less than a decade [00:50:00] of experience.

Really important that we have diversity on our mobilization staff. However, an organization staffer who takes time to listen well, that ranked much higher than one who shares information I need, but doesn't take as much time to listen. So experienced mobilizers shouldn't be afraid of their age compared to aspiring missionaries, but all mobilizers should be good listeners.

So hire staff who are strong in the art of listening and continue to provide training and accountability that will grow into that skill. And finally, kingdom Over organization. What do we mean by this? 68% of Gen Zers who have gone said they had contact with a different organization before they had contact with the organization they launched with.

That was significantly higher than the Boomer and [00:51:00] Xer. And Gen Xers. So really important that our organizations understand Gen Z is shopping around and they are having lots of conversations with lots of mission agencies. And mobilizers should position themselves instead of trying to recruit them to your organization.

Can we have a kingdom mindset and can we say we want to help you fulfill God's will on your life? If it's with our organization, great. If our organization is not a good fit, how can I still help you navigate your calling, discern what God is doing, and find an agency along with you that might be a good fit for you.

That opens up a lot of trust and. In my opinion your chances of recruiting them maybe will be a lot better because they're trusting you to be open and honest instead of trying to get them to do something, come with your organization. So let's truly care about [00:52:00] people and what God is doing in their lives versus trying to recruit them to our organizations.

At this time, Katie's going take over and talk about what this data specifically means for mobilizers.

Katy White: Awesome. Thanks Dave. Yeah. So what does this mean for mobilizers? What does this mean for the practitioners? What does this mean in your day-to-day job as you're talking with and walking alongside people in their process from interest all the way to making it to the field?

So one of the first things that I wanna share is be aware that there may be some differences between what I'm calling door opening versus threshold crossing draws and concerns. So there are some things that may be really significant as a motivator or concern that keeps people from even opening the door to say, am I even willing to consider going overseas for the gospel?

And those. Initial door opening draws and concerns may actually [00:53:00] be different than what are some of the threshold crossing like now I'm actually going take that step across the threshold into the mission field. So keep that in mind. I think that's really important. I wanna share one specific quote that someone who filled out the survey responded to that I think really illustrates this.

This person said, my main draws to be willing to consider going were the scriptural mandate experiences with the lost and the reality of the unreached. My main draws to, and this is all in caps by them actually going, our confidence that the team there is healthy and will care for me. That my children will be valued and taken care of and that we'll make enough money to take care of our family and ourselves.

And there's enough flexibility of roles in the organization I could so that can stay with them for years, even when my skills and specific job desires change. So this is illustrating, there's different door opening motivators and barriers versus [00:54:00] threshold crossing. This is why it's extremely important that we are listening another key point I think for mobilizers to consider is we need to help synthesize.

Versus inform. So how can we synthesize information instead of just giving more information? So this is where coaching skills are absolutely key. Like Dave mentioned at the very start of this webinar, people want to talk about their barriers and motivators. They want to talk about their fears, their concerns.

They want to talk about their passions. Here's a few selected quotes from other respondents. They said, being asked and answering these questions feels very validating Over the years, my questions about how I engage in cross-cultural ministry have taken many turns, but it does remain a core value. It is encouraging to return to these topics with hope and an edge of action.

Thank you to all those involved with this survey and for your service and [00:55:00] mobilization. I heard this from a person I got to also have a Zoom call at with and got to actually hear more about their journey. She said the concerns. That I listed on this survey, I realized were the exact same concerns from eight years ago.

And I'm tired of making that my concern. I'm tired of that stopping me from what God is calling me to do. And it was an incredibly encouraging conversation. Another respondent said, this is a quote, this will. This was actually a really good survey just for me personally being able to evaluate how I feel about relocating for the gospel.

It's a good temperature test. So asking these questions, drawing out, helping people synthesize the information they're learning and hearing and how that's actually landing in their heart and their mind is really important for mobilizers to do. Your job is not just give me the info. Honestly. They'll probably find that info better online.

Let them do the research and then your job as mobilizer mobilizers to help them synthesize that information and how that's affecting their desires to go or to not [00:56:00] go. You can help bring calm and clarity to some of the confusion or the overwhelmingness of all the vast array of opportunities out there and what this means for them.

I would encourage you to remember as a mobilizer, aspiring relocators for the gospel. They don't need more information. They need tools and relationships that are helping them process that information. Another quote from a survey, respondent said, I'm a college student. And sometimes it feels like so many opportunities are presented for missions abroad that it becomes overwhelming.

I think presenting people with causes and then resources for discernment and encouragement would be most helpful. We ask them what could organizations do better? That was their answer. Resources for discernment and encouragement are most helpful. We also, asked all of the.

All of the aspiring relocators how much a staff member helped them and all of those who are already on, who have gone those already on the field. How much did a organization, staff member help you? And we saw a lot of [00:57:00] Gen Z. They said an organization helped them much versus some or none. We can really, it really will take a compassionate mobilizer that's helping them synthesize and process the information in order to help them cross the threshold.

A caution here as you're helping them understand and synthesize all the information they're learning. Here's an important quote to keep in mind from a survey respondent. I want to learn about possibilities, but I'm not interested in talking with someone whose purpose is to just fill an opening.

Remember, your purpose is not just to fill an opening. Your purpose is to offer opportunities and help people discern, is this where the Lord is leading them? Can I come alongside you to help you get there? Really practically some specific questions as a mobilizer to start getting your wheels turning from just sharing information is synthesizing.

How do I do that? Really think about questions that help them process and then build action steps. An example is. What have you already learned about this opportunity? When someone first comes to a [00:58:00] conversation with you, I guarantee they've already researched you online. So the first question is, what have you already learned about this opportunity?

Maybe right after they've talked to a team leader, I've gotten to a deeper step in the organization. Now you can ask, what more have you learned? Does this make you more or less likely to move forward? This information you've learned doesn't make you more or less likely to move forward. Why and why not?

What are other things you feel like you need present to help you take that next step? Basically, what's missing? Why haven't you taken the next step? What are you waiting on? What are you expecting to take the next step? How could you receive that? Or do you really need to receive that? And we can help them process and synthesize these things to help get them deeper into the pipeline.

Oh, I also wanna touch on some really important coaching conversations. So like we said, coaching skills are very vital for mobilizers. What are some conversations that are very helpful that we feel like the data is revealing are very helpful to be connecting about with the people you're walking alongside in the [00:59:00] pipeline?

Calling and guidance number one, absolutely huge. It was the number one concern for all generations of those who are aspiring and who have not yet gone a lacking, clear guidance. I wish I could spend a lot of time diving into this 'cause this is a topic I'm very passionate about personally. And how do you help people to discern calling?

You can actually learn a new framework for what does it look like to help people understand. Calling Biblically in a book that I just published. It's called Tithe Your Career by Paul Vanderwerf and myself. I found it revolutionized the thinking of Gen Zers who've read it so far and really unlock them and release them from this barrier.

I'd really encourage you to check that out. 'Cause we've seen it do wonders as we're helping people assess and understand, calling it and guidance. Another really important conversation as a mobilizer, are you having this conversation? This might be a really helpful list of things to every week look through and say, did I have these conversations?

The second one is the biblical mandate for global gospel work. We [01:00:00] saw God's guidance through scripture was in the top list of all aspiring missionaries of every single generation. This is a strong. Draw. So are we studying, are we discussing scriptures together? Are we putting them in front of the word of God?

Are we helping curate Bible studies where they can see God's design through scripture for global gospel work? You're going find that to be really motivating and help people move farther along in the pipelines. Overcoming obstacles is also a really important conversation for mobilizers to have.

I find some really helpful language as I'm walking alongside people in the pipeline, is helping them understand what you're feeling is common. Maybe you can even refer back to this data. Did you know out of 2,400 people surveyed, 50% of them said the exact same thing? You're saying, you are not alone.

This is a really real consideration for you to have, but it doesn't have to hold you [01:01:00] back. It's really key helping people understand they can overcome obstacles. They can do hard things. They need to hear that from you. They need to hear stories of others who have overcome these obstacles that they know they're overcomeable.

This is especially key. I know as a new mobilizer, I felt like maybe talking about. The difficult things or the things they were afraid of or concerned about was counterintuitive to helping them go. That is actually not the case. I like to spend most of my time talking about some of their concerns and barriers and reminding them that we don't have to shrink back from the heart because you have within you literally and dwelling inside you the same spirit that rose Jesus from the dead.

And that spirit is not a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of self-control. We don't have to worry about talking about the hard things as mobilizers because we have a God who dwells with the people that you're encouraging and empowers them to face. Tough things. I was really inspired when I recognized when [01:02:00] Jesus was preparing his disciples for their ministry, he was really honest with them about the hardships they were going face.

John 15, John 16 records some really sobering words from Jesus about the grief, the confusion, the hatred that these disciples were soon to encounter. But they also include some of the greatest promises of scripture. This is where he foretells of the advocate, he will send the spirit of God, the very presence of God with us.

And John 1633 says, he tells 'em these things so that they can have peace. In this world, you will have trouble. But take heart, I have overcome the world. So it's really important that we are helping aspiring missionaries talk about these concerns. Bring them out into the open as they bring 'em into the light.

Now the Lord can speak into them, encourage them to bring them to God. Don't be afraid to engage the barriers and encourage them that they don't have to be afraid to engage the barriers. They can tackle them instead of avoiding them. And then together as a mobilizer, ask the spirit of God to comfort and to counsel, and to empower them [01:03:00] in the barriers that they're facing.

Another really important conversation you should be having with aspiring missionaries is this fear of missing out, that, that's really important to them. My encouragement, my best practice I would share with you as we're talking about what they're going be missing out on, is to honor the weight of the sacrifices.

Honor the weight. You don't have to minimize the things they're going miss out on in order for going overseas to look lucrative enough. You can honor the weight of the sacrifices, and then you can point them to the glory of God, because that's the only thing that will outweigh the circumstances. I love the hymn.

Turn Your Eyes upon Jesus. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in his wonderful face. Then the things of earth, these things, they're leaving behind. They're going grow strangely dim in what? The light of his glory and grace. They're only going grow dim if they're focusing on a light that is brighter. And so honor the way to the sacrifices.

You don't have to minimize the sacrifices. You just have to magnify the glory of God. And that's what's going help those [01:04:00] sacrifices minimize in a way that will help them step into the where the Lord might be leading them to relocate for the gospel. Fundraising also is a conversation that's very helpful to have.

One thing that I am curious about, I'm just wondering something, I'm wondering, as a mobilizer, I wonder if the biggest barrier that's keeping people from saying yes is not the philosophical concern about fundraising, but the practical concern. Do they believe they can actually do it? Do they believe It's not just whether or not they need to raise support, but if they believe it's actually possible for them.

So that's an encouragement to help them train, give good coaching. There's also hope because this was one of the barriers that was very similar. Those aspiring before they went to the field and those who are already on the field. All about a third of them all ranked it as a strong barrier, but it's encouraging that they still got there, even though 30% of those who are currently on the field said it was a strong barrier.

They're on the [01:05:00] field. Effective training and coaching for support raising is really key to help people address this barrier. Here's another selected quote I'll share from the survey. One respondent said, our biggest and very worldly hindrances were leaving good retirement plans and upcoming large promotion at work.

And the idea of support raising when we have college degrees, that would be wasted. But through the training and encouragement from our ministry director, our hearts were quickly changed and yearned to get started support raising, and now we love it. So that's an encouragement. Of how you can help people walk through that conversation.

Another best practice for mobilizers is recognizing the importance of a supportive community. So this is really important. I think there's a slide on the next table here. Who are the main persons you would like to discuss, pray, and process with about an opportunity to re relocate for the gospel.

So we can see here friends and family are much higher than an organization staffer or a [01:06:00] mobilizer. So you might be thinking what do I do about that? As a mobilizer, I know my voice is not the loudest, it's not the most important, and that's absolutely correct. We can actually embrace that. It's really helpful, I think, to know our limits.

The best thing we can do as a mobilizer is to help them process what their community thinks by asking questions, what are your friends and family thinking about this opportunity? Why are they thinking that way? What conversations have you had with them? So help them process. What their friends and family are thinking and then coach them and how to talk with their friends and family.

There's some guidance on some really best practices on how to have conversations with friends and family that are located in the notes. Of this slideshow that you can again, download at the end of the webinar. Some really helpful, very practical tools about what it looks like to help them have conversations with their friends and family.

Because a supportive communicate, [01:07:00] excuse me, a supportive community is extremely important to younger generations. And it's a strong draw that's going help them say yes as they are considering going overseas. If their community remains unsupportive, you can also help them access and find support within other mentors and church community and help them press into the body of Christ spiritual mothers and fathers, spiritual brothers and sisters that could help them navigate the lack of support they might be receiving from their very close friends and family.

And then my last tip for mobilizers is what does it look like to create encouragement and growth accelerator opportunities in your pipeline? Like Dave mentioned, many Gen Zers, will they feel their weaknesses more than they feel their strengths? I think it's important to note. They don't have more weaknesses than other generations have, or they don't have more weaknesses than they have as strengths, which is really important that we [01:08:00] believe and embrace, but they feel their weaknesses more.

That's just the dominating message of our culture, is their identity is in their weakness. One, we can help them actually see that it's in our weaknesses, that God is glorified, so we can help them understand and recognize that 'cause that is definitely a different message than what the world is telling them.

And two, we can help provide spiritual formation opportunities in the pipeline that's going help them feel more spiritually prepared. We can encourage them to be sharing the gospel on their campus and then debriefing with them how that went and coaching them through that mobilizers. We can help provide and encourage.

Some of those growth accelerator opportunities within the pipeline, and we can really encourage them in what we see in them. We could speak life over them about the strengths that we see. We can speak encouragement and the areas that they feel are lacking. As it relates to that, that ambiguity is a big concern.

For people. We've been talking about that, but as a mobilizer, you can also help [01:09:00] them see ambiguity in many ways is just a part of life ministry. You can help them be able to recognize that it's possible to follow God and to an unknown future because we have a known God and we can focus on what we know about God in the midst of our unknown future, and we can leave that in his hands.

I also think it's really helpful that we can also provide the whys behind the clarity we can give. For example, I think a big reason why cla a lack of clarity or ambiguity is such a strong demotivator for young people is because they are used to having answers at their fingertips. So if they can't find the answer that makes you suspicious, but many of them just don't understand the process of relocating for the gospel.

So if you can help them know why you aren't able to provide a very specific answer for something, for example I don't know exactly what language school you're going go to because it depends on which language schools have openings. [01:10:00] A year from now when you'll be launching after you fundraise.

But here's the top three we usually send people to, and here's why I would suggest all three of them are great. So you're giving them a reason of why they can't get that information and helping them grasp some of the things that are known even in that lack of ambiguity and that will help them move forward even without some things that we just aren't able to provide clarity in, even though it is, it, I do think it is a challenge for us to really try and provide as much clarity as possible, but that's how you can help them navigate some of those things.

That's a growth accelerator that you could invite them into as a way to grow in spiritual maturity throughout the mobilization pipeline. I'm going now pass it back to Dave here and we're going wrap up with one last section on what does this mean for churches?

Dave Jacob: Awesome. Thanks Katie. Yeah. As we close today we wanna help to frame this data for those that may be ministering and mobilizing, sending in a church context.

[01:11:00] We know that lacking clear guidance is a hindrance. When asked, what is the most important thing that should be done to help launch more people? One respondent said, for every critical comment made about why the person should not relocate for the sake of the gospel, help should be offered, prayer should be prayed over them.

So obviously when people don't have clear direction, they freeze and they do nothing different. It's too risky. It's too scary. So preaching and teaching on topics such as how to hear God's voice or how to make godly decisions, those topics could go a long way to help a young person discern how the Lord is guiding them.

We also talked about feeling spiritually unprepared. We all know that we can grow in our own personal walks at times we all feel spiritually unprepared [01:12:00] for whatever task God may be asking us to do, right? But let's be careful that we don't put missionaries on a pedestal. They aren't super spiritual, they're just obedient.

Here's an example. When we asked a survey participant, what is the most important thing that should be done to help launch more people and why? Here's what this respondent wrote. I think missions needs to be talked about differently in churches. Missionaries are talked about in a way that people don't think they can measure up to.

I think it's important to dispel any myths that missionaries are only extraordinary people. Missionaries are ordinary people who God uses for his glory, and yet. What does the discipleship process look like in your church? What kind of disciples are you making? I've heard some argue that disciples [01:13:00] aren't made from the pulpit.

So do you have small groups and what do those look like? How are your people being challenged to live out their faith and to go deeper? Are your church activities all fun and games, or are there meaningful events like outreach to the poor and then neglected? Are there bible studies on various topics that people can choose from?

Can they join a small group to really dig deep into the word? So what are some other things that churches can do? Pastors and missions pastors to really go help their congregation go deeper in their walk with Jesus. I wanna also point out that conversations with a pastor or mentor or teacher ranked really high for aspiring Gen Z and millennials.

The younger generations want to discuss their calling with their pastor, not to be talked down to, but to talk [01:14:00] with them. Taking time to listen and discern, giving encouragement and inspiration, and a few words of wisdom when appropriate. That will go a long way. So when asked for any final input on our survey, one aspiring respondent wrote, I believe that there are a lot of people who would love to serve overseas for a few years, but don't know that it's a valid option and that it would be so meaningful.

So conversations with a pastor can help an aspiring missionary overcome these top two concerns. Above that, we have talked about is there room on our pastor's schedule for these conversations? And it might take the pastor being the one to reach out to the aspiring goer. Maybe you see some something in somebody's life, man, God is really working in them instead of waiting to reach out and initiate these really [01:15:00] impactful conversations.

Next are stories told by missionaries. In my opinion, this is absolutely huge. 59% of aspiring Gen Z and 57% of aspiring millennials ranked stories from missionaries speaking as a strong draw. This was the highest. Factor and bring missionaries in to share. This could be for Sunday school, a small group, a five minute window during the service.

Maybe they're preaching an entire sermon, having a meal afterwards. You want to involve the missionary in as many activities as possible where they're relating with the people in your congregation, and ask your missionaries to tell story time and time again. When I'm asking people, how did the Lord call you to serve as a missionary?

They say something like this missionary came to my church. I don't remember their name. I think they went to this country, but they [01:16:00] told this story and they tell me the story because they remember it. Here's again a barn of study, a quote from the future of missions. They said Knowing a missionary is transformative when it comes to engagement with missions.

If you do nothing else, open the doors of your community to missionaries. They are missions with skin on and a close relationship, and regular interactions with them will do more to rouse your church for global ministry than just about anything else could. Once you've identified the missions sensitive young people in your sphere of influence, work on connecting them to missionaries at an individual level.

Many current missionaries would like to mentor the workers of tomorrow, but need help getting connected if you can help make that happen. And then finally [01:17:00] short term trips and conversations with missionaries for those who have already gone. Every generation listed short-term trips and conversations with a missionary as the top two ways they like to hear about opportunities.

So a simple question, is your church organizing short-term trips on a regular basis for different age groups for intergenerational trips? If you're not sure where to start, call up a few mission agencies to help you talk with a missionary that you support to help you. It's during these trips that participants are having deep and meaningful conversations with missionaries.

So again, when we ask the question, what is the most important thing that should be done to help launch more people? At the end of the launch survey, one respondent wrote, show people what real life workers are actually doing. It's [01:18:00] not all just church-based ministry or living in a hut somewhere, homeschooling your kids in isolation.

So those are a few tips to hopefully help churches implement some of this data. Again we're going give you all of this. So here's where you can go. Gospel mobilization.org/launch survey will take you to a form and just fill that out real quick and you can get the PDF and all these slides with our speaker notes for free.

There's survey design on there. If you're a missions nerd like me, you can find all that methodology in our design, the demographics, the limitations. There's quotes and summaries of answers to questions like what's the most important thing that should be done to help launch more people and so on. Really.

We're, Katie and I are about to record a few podcasts to unpack more of this data. So subscribe [01:19:00] to the Gospel Mobilization podcast or follow it on your favorite podcast app. And if you want to contact us, this is how you can reach John or Katie or myself. Just write to us at info@gospelmobilization.org.

So thanks again everybody for joining us. We'd love to hear from you what you think about this presentation. And if you have ideas for future surveys, we'd love to touch base. So thanks again to Ted and Missio Nexus for hosting today's podcast. I'm going turn it over to Katie to close us today in prayer.

Katy White: Thanks. Lord, we just submit ourselves before you. You're worthy and we desire to be used as your hands and your feet and your mouthpiece of those who you are drawing into. This next step of relocating for the gospel. Lord, I just pray that as we receive may we now walk forward in humility and in in [01:20:00] power in all of the things that we've learned.

We ask for you to go before, go behind and be among all of our conversations in these weeks and months and years. Lord, we desire for you to use us because we desire to be an answer to your prayer that more laborers would be sent into the harvest field. We love you. We thank you, we pray this in the name of Jesus.

Amen. Alright, thanks for being with us guys.

Ted Esler: Well, there you have it, and I hope you enjoyed it. Now, this particular piece of media is not available only to Missio Nexus members, but to anybody, so feel free to share this with anybody you know that is interested in missions mobilization. You'll see the kinds of things that are available to Missio Nexus members.

I hope this blessed you. You have a wonderful rest of the day or evening, wherever you are.