Heart of Mission

S9E06-After nearly 20 years with CMS, including eight years as Executive Director of CMS Queensland and Northern New South Wales, Mark Fairhurst reflects on mission, the church and the privilege of helping people discern where God might be calling them.
Mark shares the story of Adam and Helen, CMS missionaries in Japan, whose plans for ministry changed after a difficult season. Their story is a reminder that God can redirect our plans and use our gifts in unexpected ways.
But this conversation is about more than missionaries. Mark challenges churches to see global mission as part of their core DNA—not simply something to be interested in or support, but something the whole church is called to embrace and actively send people into.
He also explores what it means for CMS to remain a “society”: a fellowship of churches and Christians who share responsibility for the spread of the gospel. Missionaries are not lone-rangers, but are sent, supported and upheld by a wider community of believers.
Mark reflects on the unique role of CMS Summer School, including the challenges of having three conferences cancelled in four years, and why these gatherings remain so important for encouraging, equipping and strengthening the church. As Mark prepares to finish his time with CMS, he leaves churches with a clear challenge: keep mission at the heart of church life, grow a vision for God’s heart for the world, and look beyond ourselves to people of every nation, language and culture.

S9E05-What does it look like to walk alongside Aboriginal people in the Top End and share the hope of Jesus?
After more than seven years of ministry in Darwin, Derek and Rosemary Snibson are retiring from CMS service. In this episode of The Heart of Mission, they reflect on a ministry marked not by quick fixes or grand programs, but by relationships, patience, listening and a willingness to learn.
Derek and Rosemary share stories of walking alongside people in hospitals, prisons, rehabilitation centres and local churches. Even amid significant challenges, they have found a surprising openness to God, the Bible and Jesus. God is at work in unexpected places—raising up Aboriginal leaders and opening hearts to his healing and grace through Jesus. Their ministry has also changed them. They speak honestly about learning to suspend judgment, listen deeply, respect cultural differences and recognise their own need for love and care from the community. Instead of trying to have all the answers, they have discovered the joy of standing alongside others in weakness, dependence and faith.
You don't necessarily have to move across the country or become a full-time missionary. Every Christian can learn to step outside their familiar world, listen to others and discover what God is already doing.

S9E04-Matt and Bex serve high school students in Japan through camp ministries and after-school programs. Before Japan, the couple spent years leading the RICE movement in Melbourne, mobilising thousands of young Asian Australians toward faith — work that could easily have continued to "flourish" at home. Instead, they found themselves drawn toward Japan's much harder, slower mission field, where only 1% of the population is Christian despite 450 years of Christian history.
Matt and Bex share the story of their calling, including Bex's breast cancer diagnosis just weeks after committing to full-time ministry, the strange grief of feeling like outsiders in a culture they physically resemble, and the deep encouragement of watching people like Jim, Kay, and Mia take steps toward Jesus in a culture where faith carries real social cost.
At the heart of the conversation is a challenge for anyone discerning their own future in ministry: is your goal effectiveness, efficiency, success … or availability to God, wherever he calls? Matt and Bex don't pretend the answer is easy, but their story is a compelling picture of what it looks like to trust God's timing over your own sense of usefulness.

S9E03- What does it really take to share the hope of Jesus across cultures? For many people considering mission, language learning can feel like one of the biggest obstacles. Is it really necessary? Couldn't English be enough?
But learning another language isn't simply a practical skill—it's a profound act of love.
Joined by CMS language trainer Louise Simon and long-term missionaries Kay and Chris, this conversation uncovers how language opens the door to deep relationships, genuine belonging, and meaningful gospel conversations.
You'll discover the significance of a person's "heart language" and why hearing the gospel in that language can have such a powerful impact. Louise also explains how CMS prepares missionaries for this journey, challenging the common myth that only naturally gifted linguists can learn another language.
Language learning can be difficult. It takes persistence and humility. But as our guests remind us, learning someone's language isn't just preparation for ministry—it is ministry. And through that investment, lives are being transformed as people encounter Jesus in words that truly speak to their hearts.

S9E02-Louise and Greg spent years serving in Australia — Louise in kids' and women's ministry, Greg in database systems with churches, AFES and CMS — before relocating to a large international church in the Middle East with their three young children.
In this episode, they share what it looks like when "database ministry" and frontline gospel work turn out to be deeply connected. Going from a small suburban Aussie church where everyone knows everyone to a church of a thousand people and 90 nationalities – how do you welcome, connect, and disciple everyone who walks through the door?
Louise tells the stories of several people she's discipled: Marina, a South Asian ministry apprentice learning to teach the Bible rather than just "babysit" kids; Anna and her son Samuel, discovering the gospel afresh from a different religious background; and David and Joanne, a husband and wife drawn closer together through wrestling with a tricky Old Testament passage. While, Greg explains his role as executive pastor — building (and sometimes tearing down) the "trellis" of systems and structures that support real gospel growth.