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National and International Service and Mission

The National and International Service and Mission Department in the Agape Center seeks to involve students in cross-cultural service and ministry experiences. Students will have opportunities both to learn and teach; receive and give, listen and speak, be and do -so much that witnessing transforms into a lifestyle. It is our desire to help students become kingdom builders who will take vocation and calling seriously.

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Helping students to see that education also happens outside the classroom and can enrich the college experience.

Core Principles

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Building partnerships to foster long-term relationships with existing organizations and through these organizations, committing to communities.
Striving to do projects that fit into a vision of community development, (peacemaking and social justice support) that honors the local church, community leaders, and the goals of the community.
Valuing relationships that develop with local people and the learning, growth, and commitments of the participants.
To be intentional about the training and orientation of participants. Teams will meet regularly to learn about service and mission, their particular project and project location and will learn to work together as a team. Team leaders will also be engaged in dialogue with each other and the field staff where the team will be traveling.

Four Main Foci*:

Service

Service projects can often be done effectively within the limits of short time periods, young age groups, limited language capabilities, etc. We will seek to send our teams to do hands-on projects. As much as possible local people should direct the work and we will work under their leadership.

Evangelism (witness)

Witness through word and deed happens in both service and evangelism. Effective evangelism requires longer times and greater language and cultural facility. One-time, short-term teams can play an important role in this long-term effort. We will reflect Biblical understandings, missiological wisdom, and sociological insights as we work with training our teams in this area.

Dialogue

Dialogue about what we believe with those of other faith convictions happens when one is not focused on debate or proselytizing. These teams present an opportunity to encourage this kind of dialogue that has great potential for enhancing the witness of the team.

Presence

There are countries where sharing one's faith verbally is not accepted. The presence of a team of Christian students working in a community like this has the potential for significant impact.

*An in-depth exploration of these concepts is found in Calvin E. Shenk's book, Who Do You Say That I Am? Christians Encounter Other Religions.