September 26, 2025
- credford5
- Sep 26
- 3 min read
When Josh and I first got married and attended White Oak Christian Church, we were part of a Sunday morning Bible study class. I was a new, young Christian, surrounded by people I considered spiritual giants. These couples (only slightly older than we were) pursued God deeply and lived with a kind of obedience to God’s Word that left me in awe. I looked up to them, not just because of what they knew, but because of how they loved God and loved others.
Then, one by one, they began to leave. One couple went to Haiti to serve as missionaries. Another left to pastor a church in Indiana. A third began language school in France, preparing for life as missionaries. Another couple took a position running a mission in Virginia. I remember feeling devastated. I was asking God why He would take these relationships from me, and I feared that to truly serve Him, I might eventually have to leave my church, my community, and the people I loved. I believed that living a life on mission meant leaving.
Boy, was I wrong.
Over time, God began teaching me that His call is not always to leave. While He calls some to be deployed overseas and others to move across the country, He also calls many to be deployed here in our local community. God’s mission does not always require crossing oceans. Sometimes it requires crossing the street. It requires showing up, serving, and loving where He has placed you.
At White Oak, our vision is that everyone is on the path to full life by discovering their identity in Jesus, being equipped to love, and being deployed for mission.
Every week our White Oak people are deployed in our community whether by tutoring kids through Whiz Kids, mentoring through Side By Side Ministries, distributing gifts with Nate’s Toy Box, or helping serve meals at Zion Church in Hamilton.
These everyday acts of love are ways God is at work, and each one is a form of deployment in action. You can join in right where you are by stepping into opportunities to serve your neighbors and community.
For those whose hearts are drawn toward global missions, short term mission trips allow you to step into another culture and join the work God is doing around the world. If you feel a nudge to go, the first step is simple: complete our Mission Interest Form (https://thewocc.churchcenter.com/people/forms/630354) and explore where God might be calling you to participate.
Acts 1:8 reminds us:
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Our Jerusalem may be our own neighborhood. Our Samaria may be the city around us. And the ends of the earth may be wherever God calls us to go globally. Deployment is about joining God where He is already at work, whether around the corner or across the globe. It is about discovering your identity in Christ, being equipped to love, and stepping into deployment with obedience and courage.
Living a life on mission doesn’t always require leaving home but it does require faith, courage, and action. It requires being part of something bigger than ourselves, investing in people, and pointing others to Jesus.
Where is God calling you to be deployed? Will it be here, in your community, or somewhere across the world? Take your next step today. Step into the mission God has prepared for you and watch as He transforms lives….including your own!
Erin Feiser
Formation and Missions Pastor
