On a continent ‘becoming more and more the
“There are a handful of things that I want to see before I’m done,” says the Rev. Morrie Lawing, executive director of Outreach North America (ONA) and a 1993 graduate of Erskine Theological Seminary. “One is that, when I ask a member of a church session about their missions effort … I want them to ask, ‘do you mean our foreign missions effort or our domestic missions effort?’” Lawing’s passion to see the Gospel carried to the ends of the earth begins not with far-off lands, ONA, the domestic missions agency of the ARP Church, supports congregations across North America by guiding and offering resources in the areas of church planting, revitalization, and during nearly 40 years of congregational ministry. A former member of the Erskine Board of Trustees, Lawing has served as a pastor in Florida and North Carolina, most recently in North Charlotte. “I had been there for 18 or more years and was fairly content,” he recalls. “We were looking to call an associate and build another building, so Before he was a pastor, he served as a Young Life volunteer in Greenville, South Carolina, then
heard about an opportunity to become a Young Life Church Partner and went to work for the Rev. Jim Corbett at Devenger Road ARP Church in Greer, South Carolina, as a youth director. “Jim was quite the mentor to me—he was my hero in so many ways.” It was Corbett who initially encour- aged Lawing to pursue a seminary education at Erskine. While he studied at Erskine Seminary, Lawing remained in Greenville, thankful for the op- portunity to continue the work he had begun at Devenger Road. “I was at the seminary with men like Bobby Elliot, Rob Patrick, Chad Reynolds and, you know, some other old guys like me,” says Lawing, grinning as he remembers his friends. Lawing speaks appreciatively about several of his seminary professors. He credits the late Dr. William F.H. Kuykendall with laying a foundation for him in Old Testament and Hebrew. Classes taught by the late Dr. John Carson, who later served as president of Erskine, “the ARP’s resident historian,” and “a kind man,” also made a lasting impression on him. Lawing began his pastoral career at Bartow ARP Church in Florida, then gained experience in home missions by planting a church in South Charlotte and then another in North Charlotte, his most recent call before his move to ONA. Some might think that as executive director of ONA, Lawing is now engaged in full-time church-planting. “We don’t plant churches,” he says, stressing that ONA comes alongside the presbyteries but does not take over their work. In assist- ing an individual church, everything is done through and with the approval of the governing presbytery. Lawing is enthusiastic about ONA’s three areas of focus—church planting, revitalization, and evangelism. In the area of church planting, “I am very convinced that the model we should be using is a mother-daughter relationship,” Lawing
says. A church in its infancy has a much better chance of reaching healthy adulthood if it has a “parent church” willing to nurture it until it can stand on its own. This model affords more safety than sending out one man to build a church from the ground up. “I think knowing that relationship exists in the church planting division is extremely important,” he says. Commenting on ONA’s work of revitalization, Lawing says, “In some ways the churches that are in need of revitalization are church-
how the Lord might be pleased.’” Regarding the importance of evangelism, Lawing says that ministers committed to evangelism “want to see the lost come to know Lord advancing and seeing new people come into that Kingdom.” Lawing believes Christians are no less “strangers” in North America for having been born here. His prayer is that God will send labor- ers into His harvest, beginning with faithful men and women who see themselves as missionaries even when they are most at home.
Paul and AnnMarie.
12
The Associate Reformed Presbyterian
Erskine Seminary
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