Here are a few important excerpts. If you would like to see the entire statement, you may contact the Personnel Department.

Statement on Sexual Purity

Our authority

(1) Our fundamental and unchanging authority is the Word of God. Scriptural injunctions concerning sexual misconduct are valid for all time and all cultures.

(2) We interpret God's Word in community with the people we serve. "We do not live to ourselves" (Romans 14:7). We recognize that biblical standards of holiness may prevent us from engaging in behavior otherwise acceptable in some cultures. Likewise, we recognize that behavior otherwise permissible according to Biblical standards, may not be appropriate to the culture in which we serve, or may cause offense to the people among whom we serve. In these cases, our authority is love. "If your brother or sister is being injured by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love. Do not let what you eat cause the ruin of one for whom Christ died" (Romans 14: 15). "Abstain from all appearance of evil" (1Thessalonians 5:22, KJV).

Lines of accountability

(1) We are accountable, first and foremost, to the Lord Jesus. "So then, each of us will be accountable to God" (Romans 14:12).

(2) We are accountable to the authorities established by the Mission. Missionaries are directly accountable to their Project or Conference Director, and by their referral, to the General Director of the Mission.

(3) We are accountable to the national church among which we serve. Sexual misconduct is never "private." Misconduct should be confessed and its consequences resolved, insofar as possible, in the context in which it was committed.

(4) We are accountable to one another. We will hold one another mutually accountable, as sisters and brothers in the Body of Christ. We will be alert to moral weakness in ourselves and within our missionary fellowship, and encourage one another in holy living. "And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds" (Hebrews 10:24).

Summary of prohibited behaviors

(1) Fornication - specifically, premarital sexual relations. "The body is meant not for fornication but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body" (1 Corinthians 6:13).

(2) Adultery - specifically, extramarital sexual relations. "Let marriage be held in honor by all, and let the marriage bed be kept undefiled; for God will judge fornicators and adulterers" (Hebrews 13:4).

(3) Homosexuality - sexual relations between members of the same sex. "You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination" (Leviticus 18:22).

(4) The use of internet-based or printed pornography. "But fornication and impurity of any kind, or greed, must not even be mentioned among you, as is proper among saints" (Ephesians 5:3).

(5) Sexual harassment - unwelcome verbal or physical sexual advances in a non-reciprocal relationship. "Do not speak harshly to an older man, but speak to him as to a father, to younger men as brothers, to older women as mothers, to younger women as sisters with absolute purity" (1 Timothy 5:1-2).

You can become a member by mail, too.

Write to...

World Mission Prayer League
232 Clifton Avenue
Minneapolis, MN 55403

In Canada, you may write to...

World Mission Prayer League
5408 49th Avenue
Camrose, AB T4V 0N7

You can become a member by dropping by our offices. We would love to meet you!

We think of membership as a pretty serious commitment. On the one hand, we expect all of our members to pray. We understand prayer to be our basic work -- our basic contribution to the Kingdom's cause around the world. We expect our members to take it seriously.

But we expect something more, too. We hope that all of our members will learn to evaluate their lives and commitments in light of the wonderful Kingdom of Christ. Christ gave himself for his people. He challenges his people to give themselves for him.

Finally, we hope that our members will participate in our praying community in a variety of ways, and as they are able. We hope that they will want to vote for members of our Home Council in annual elections. We hope that they will want to join us for a prayer retreat or family camp, or simply stop by our offices for a visit. We hope that they may want to visit one of our fields of activity around the world. If they cannot visit, maybe they will want to write to members of our team serving elsewhere in the world.

Membership means all of this. It means taking up your place in the Kingdom's cause, in the context of our praying community. It means finding a role in the story of God's love for all the world.