4 things I've learned on the mission field this year ...

1. More laborers are needed. Of over 16,000 language groups worldwide, 6,749 (41.4%) of people groups are still referred to as "unreached" with the Gospel message. Even among the "reached", the need to see believers taught and discipled to maturity is staggering. As a mission, we constantly face issues that limit our ability to reach ideals we know we need to achieve due to lack of personel and attrition. We need to continue to pray God sends church planters, pilots, school teachers, boarding home parents, and mechanics this direction, for the work of planting and establishing churches to continue in a way that brings glory to God in PNG. For more info on unreached groups check out the info at http://www.joshuaproject.net/. For more info on the needs of NTM go to http://www.ntm.org/.
2. The church of the living God is the pillar and foundation of truth. The second half of the Great Commission mandate - making disciples - although sometime assigned lesser priority than evangelism cannot be sidestepped or overlooked. As the church grows deeper in its love and worship of Christ, the work Christ mandated in Scripture for all believers to accomplish will be fulfilled. But shepherding the church to this level takes time, and means the missionary task is prolonged by years and even decades before seeing the mature church established. Which is also why we need more laborers (see #1).
3. Interdependence and fellowship within the Body of Christ is paramount to the success of the missionary effort. God's people must strive to conduct ourselves in a way that demonstrates we are Christ's disciples. The level of closeness and interedependence in which we live on the mission field often means freedoms are forfeited and personal rights set aside. When we function well in this, it is a beautiful thing. When not, the power and example of our witness and tesimony is undermined.
4. God's will is to do as much in us as through us. As we see in the Bible, God's people are not immune to illness, hardship, dissapointment, loss, and setback even when (and maybe especially when) we are doing His work. Missionaries certainly aren't immune to this dynamic. Plans fall through. Computers crash. Co-workers go home. Government paperwork is lost. Hours and days can be spent making all these "wrongs" right again. Without faith in the Soverign One who has all such things under control, one very quickly can become disilusioned. We know God uses suffering to further the cause of Christ. We also know it is the training ground for rightousness and peace. To avoid frustration, it's good to remember what Paul wrote to the Philippians about believers having been "granted the privilege" to suffer. In each trial is born an opportunity to live out what God wants for our life instead of our own preference.