Missions equals Evangelism?

The word "missions" is not in the Bible so I can understand how somebody could disagree with somebody else about what it means. The difference between missions and evangelism is not semantics. When I became a Christian in college I was with Campus Crusade for Christ. We had worship every Thursday night, training about sharing your faith, speakers to be brought in to the campus (Josh McDowell, etc.), sharing you faith, going on trips to Florida on Spring Break to share your faith, going on a summer project in Ocean City, NJ, again, to share your faith. Everything I did was called evangelism and wasn't called missions.

Take a look at the book called, "Perspectives on the World Christian Movement". (Perspectives is a "class" that meets weekly for 12 weeks all over the country. In Arizona the courses are called "Pathways".) There are many books about missions both in biographies and non-fiction. This is a basic book and if I were to teach a class on "Missions" I would use parts of this book (as well as other books). My book was published in 1981. Chapter 32 was written by Ralph D. Winter. It's called "The Task Remaining: All Humanity in Mission Perspective". We are all involved in evangelism--that includes missionaries. If you where to read the section called "Evangelism and Missions" you'll get a better picture of what I am trying to say. There is a rating for evangelism: E0, E1, E2 and E3. E2 and E3 means going across cultures, learning a language, etc. E2 and E3 describe "missions" and the people who do it are called "missionaries".

One can say, "I'm going downtown to the homeless people and do evangelism down there. I'm going to learn their language and a culture that's not my own. Therefore, I'm a missionary." To answer that question I would say I remember back in the 70s when "CB"-talk (Citizen Band radio) was quite common (breaker 1-9, breaker 1-9, what's your 10-20?, etc.). I believe it still exists today primarily among truck drivers. Paula's uncle (and some cousins) drive trucks. We get along with them real well. Their "truck driver lingo" doesn't affect me at all when I ask them "Where are you at?". I would not consider myself as learning another language or learning another culture just to share my faith with them. (Although, once a person becomes a Christian they have a tendency to want to return to the same place where you were saved from and share your faith.) Our daughter is getting to the age of "texting"-talk when you use abbreviations and numbers for words. But she still understands "Go do your homework!". They use a different "lingo" rather than another language and culture. Therefore, the person whose going downtown to the homeless people to do evangelism is not a missionary.

Evangelism is something that all Christians are to do. A missionary is a person who normal travels out of the country, learns another language, lives in another culture, on foreign land, etc. to do evangelism; i.e. share the Good News about Jesus!

The difference between missions and evangelism is not semantics. One of the reasons is that the budget of the church requires that you make a distinction between missions and evangelism. We've got to keep the money we spend on missions separate from the money that we spend on just evangelism. Therefore, the money that we spend on missions will increase because the missions budget amount will increase, as well. I'm reminded of the verses found in Rev. 7:9-10 that say, "After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10 and crying out with a loud voice, "Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!"". Now that's missions!