Missionary Minds is a series of exchanges with missionaries around the world.

Joel Porcher, his wife Deanna and their four small children minister in Ghana, West Africa. They are in the midst of a church plant started by a missionary friend who is now stateside. The work is called Anchor Baptist Church, which is located in a village community just outside Cape Coast, Ghana.

1. Finish the sentence: Do not become a missionary if ____. You think the developing world is more open to the gospel than the West.

2. What are the most common errors that missionaries make? They do not pray enough for the work and often neglect their own walk with the Lord and their family. We cannot move people, God can. They shortcut the process of leadership training wanting to move on to the next work or their next season of ministry pre-maturely. They do not get close enough to their church members to actually know what is going on in their lives.

3. Who or what played the greatest role in your call to missions? The providence of God through His word, friends, and exposure to cross-cultural church planting. 2 Corinthians 4-5 have been significantly impactful in God placing in our hearts the conviction to pursue cross cultural church planting.

4. What missionaries (past or present) have been most influential on you? Apostle Paul, Hudson Taylor, Jim Elliot and some personal friends who are on the field or have been on the foreign field.

5. What do you know now that you wish you had known when you first arrived? I wish that I had a better grasp of the convoluted history between Africa and the West. The excuses that we hear and the distrust that we experience cannot be properly appreciated without an understanding of history.

6. What is the most misunderstood thing about you and/or your ministry? From our friends in the states: The nature of African Christianity, evangelism, discipleship, and leadership training. From our friends in Ghana: Our motivation for doing the work in their country.

7. The biggest blind spot Western churches have in relation to missions is _______. They philosophically approach the work like a CEO approaches building a corporation or they approach missions as a hobby that makes them feel relevant.