Missionaries News & Stories

The application for the 2023-25 cohort of young adults serving in social justice ministries internationally launches Nov. 1.

Jonathan, a physically challenged maintenance worker at the hospital, often catches a lift with me after work. In appreciation, Jonathan says, “May God give you long life.” He is slow at walking to the vehicle and in getting in and out.

When I received an email confirming my selection as a missionary to serve in Mozambique, I couldn’t believe it. When I arrived, I faced different challenges, including language, since I come from an English-speaking country.

As a United Methodist clergy member from the Philippines, my missionary assignment is to serve the “coldest capital city in the world,” Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. 

As a Global Mission Fellow US-2, I moved from my small town in Arkansas to Miami to serve as the Fundraising and Outreach Coordinator for Florida Justice for Our Neighbors, a nonprofit that provides free, high-quality immigration legal services to low-income immigrants throughout the state of Florida.

Three young adult Global Mission Fellows serving in the U.S. reflect on ways the program has shaped their understanding of self, God and the world around them.

Within 20 years, missionary pastor Juarez Goncalves has coordinated the planting of seven United Methodist churches in the United States, centered in New England where he serves multiethnic communities.

Watch the highlights from the commissioning service of Amanda Kirkscey, Trisha Manns, Olga Gonzalez Santiago and Arabia Sweet.

In 1960, Ruth Johnson Colvin decided to volunteer her time to do something about the high rate of functional illiteracy in Syracuse, where she lived. Sixty-two years later, the nonprofit she founded and the methods she designed to teach literacy have spread across the United States and into 26 developing countries around the world.

The application has launched for the next cohort of young adults who will serve in social justice ministries in the United States in 2023-25.

Missionary Julie Wilson tracks the progress of gentrification in her Winston-Salem neighborhood by looking out the front door. The community members Open Arms serves are increasingly losing their rental homes to people who can purchase and rebuild them.

Fifty-four missionaries were commissioned for service in nine different worship events taking place around the world from April to July. Some begin service in new placements while others continue with work they began during the pandemic.