ALPHARETTA, Ga. (BP)–Following a missions tour with his family and the news that his wife has cancer in remission, singer/songwriter Russ Lee uses his musical platform to talk with urgency about missions and evangelism.
Once a vocalist for NewSong and now New Vision Church’s worship leader in Murfreesboro, Tenn., Lee is working with the North American Mission Board to recruit workers for the harvest.
In addition to writing the original track — “Are you the one?” — for use in NAMB’s missions information materials with the same name, Lee has been promoting the work of North American missions at concert venues and churches throughout the nation.
“Somebody has to do something because we’re a generation away from no missionaries,” Lee said. “I’m very guilty of feeling like I’m that somebody. I can’t do everything but I can do something.”
And that something is giving missionaries a song and a platform.
Lee visited the North American Mission Board Aug. 7 to shoot a music video which will be available for download from NAMB’s missions opportunity website, www.answerthecall.net, and distributed at conferences in DVD format.
A musician with 10 chart-topping singles and a lifetime of performances behind him, Lee clearly continues to see his vocation as a calling through which he can encourage people, including himself, to action in the local church and worldwide.
Following a late night of playing at New Vision Church and a drive to the mission board’s offices in Alpharetta, Ga., Lee talked about his recent months on the road in behalf of missions.
“My wife looked at me one day and said, ‘It’s your 25th year of ministry,'” Lee said, prior to a green-screen recording of his song. “She said, ‘You need to do something next year that’s so God-sized that only God can do it.’
“We took six months and decided to go wherever God opened the door,” Lee said, describing his family’s tour of more than a dozen countries. “We saw 6,000 people come to Christ that year.”
As the story of North American missions is shared at churches and conferences, Lee hopes his music video will capture the ears and hearts of attendees.
“We want people to ask themselves the question the song asks,” said Randy Nessly, NAMB’s team leader of missionary mobilization. “We pray God will use this to plant seeds of a call into missions among people of all ages.”
NAMB offers a number of short-term and career missions opportunities for believers, from high school to any age, with information available at www.answerthecall.net.
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Adam Miller is associate editor of On Mission magazine at the North American Mission Board.
