What Is Home Missions?
Written by C. Joy Marquez
Home missionaries are ministers that God has called to the mission field of America. He may be a chaplain that serves in the hospitals of Detroit, or who cares for soldiers stationed in Iraq. She may work with marginalized women and children in Boston or Los Angeles, or they may serve elderly grandparents in small rural communities of Appalachia. Perhaps, they serve refugees in Portland? Or, maybe they are home missionaries to prisoners in New England, like Doug and Caroline Gregan.
Missionaries usually live amongst those they love and serve, faithfully serving year after year. Their work may go unnoticed by the local church, because it is so integral to the very fabric of society. We may not see them. Nonetheless, like all missionaries, they are reaching a group of people that would otherwise be cut-off from the very message we all long to give them: “Jesus loves you. He died on the cross for your sins. He can change your life, and make you a new creation - a New Brother in the family of God.” This is the Home Mission Field: our own backyard.
The Gregans minister full-time to prisoners, a subculture that is widely diverse, with its own cultural norms and languages - its own rules and traditions.{xtypo_quote_right}The Gregans minister full-time to prisoners, a subculture that is widely diverse, with its own cultural norms and languages - its own rules and traditions.{/xtypo_quote_right} Doug Gregan serves as the Protestant Chaplain and Interfaith Coordinator for the Essex County Correctional Facilities. He is also the Director of New Brothers Fellowship, an aftercare ministry that minsters to men both inside of prison and upon their release. Like all missionaries, they are solely supported by freewill gifts and offerings . Doug does not receive a salary from the prison, a government stipend, or remuneration of any kind. NBF relies upon the church community and individual Believers to support the ministry.
When Jesus said: “Go into all of the world and preach the Gospel,” He started with a command to take the Good News to our own lost communities. Home missionaries, like foreign missionaries, have committed themselves to a lost world. They go into new, hard to reach areas, and plow new ground, oftentimes in hostile settings. When comes the Harvest, everyone rejoices over a new brother in Christ who has settled into his new church family within the local body of Christ. What was once lost is found!
The world has been brought to our doorstep. It is all around us! Prisoners are trapped in a foreign land of sin, as dark as any far-off jungle, but their grievous need is all the more tragic because they are right here, so close! The Gregans are not traveling to distant lands to bring the hope of Christ, but they are going deep into the depths of a world most of us would never want to enter. However, we do have the opportunity to help them go by sending them with our gifts and our prayers.
We also have the opportunity to go with them. Are you interested in a short-term missions position serving alongside Doug? Or, attend the NBF Discipleship Group meetings. There is a need for men who will join in and be a part of the conversation. There are the various projects Caroline oversees throughout the year, providing ample opportunities for anyone. There is something to suit every inclination, talent, and schedule.
Home missions is an essential part of the work God has called His children to do in these Last Days. Let us support the ongoing work the Gregans are doing, and consider being a part of it, too. No passport required.
I just want to encourage you to do one thing today: ask God.
There is something incomprehensible as I witness established Christians with years of faith and knowledge of the scriptures move away from Jesus Christ as He is declared in the Bible. How powerful and sobering is the spiritual transaction that takes place in John chapter 6, concerning the eating of His flesh and the drinking of His Blood.
I've come recently to a conclusion, based on my own testimony and experience, along with observation, and it's this: We, as Christians, reject God at every chance we get and justify it without any hesitation.
If you attend church at all, you will undoubtedly hear a thousand sermons on “Be filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18) for every one sermon you hear preached on “Be ye angry, and sin not” (Eph.4:26). This is a command! It is not a defense for a bad temper. It is not an excuse for an explosion of bitterness from your bruised ego for personal rejection. I am talking here of Holy Anger. God gets angry: “The anger of the Lord was kindled against Moses” (Exodus 4:14); “God is angry with the wicked every day” (Psalm 7:11). (If you must have a bumper sticker, try this last statement for a while -- but be sure that you increase your insurance before you do so.) 
"And while He was in Bethany at the home of Simon the leper, and reclining at the table, there came a woman with an alabaster vial of very costly perfume of pure nard; and she broke the vial and poured it over His head. But some were indignantly remarking to one another, "Why has this perfume been wasted? "For this perfume might have been sold for over three hundred denarii, and the money given to the poor." And they were scolding her. But Jesus said, "Let her alone; why do you bother her? She has done a good deed to Me. "For the poor you always have with you, and whenever you wish, you can do them good; but you do not always have Me. "She has done what she could; she has anointed My body beforehand for the burial. "And truly I say to you, wherever the gospel is preached in the whole world, that also which this woman has done shall be spoken of in memory of her." (Mark 14:3-9)
“Why are you always judging me?”