“This position here is a springboard to help me see the other side of missions — that it’s not always just about, you know, trying to go overseas and do something, but to understand obedience at the local level.”
On the shelves in Adren Pearce’s office are numerous books, almost all of them theological or related to international missions. “Gentle and Lowly” by Dane Ortlund and “The Cambridge Seven” by J.C. Pollock are just a couple. On the wall behind his computer hangs an Indonesian painting of farmers in a rice paddy field and on the wall adjacent to it hang Chinese characters denoting the words “hope” and “love.” He is passionate about mission work, and one glance around his office is enough to tell.
Pearce is currently serving as the coordinator for service and mobilization in Union University’s Office of University Ministries (OUM). His position places him at the heart of Union’s community outreach. Overseeing the university’s “Serve Teams,” partnering with local nonprofit organizations and organizing Campus and Community Day all fall under his purview.
Less than a year ago, Pearce was just as active on campus as he is now, but instead of leading service projects, he was studying for final exams and writing term papers. A member of the class of 2023, Pearce graduated last May from the School of Theology and Missions (STM) with a degree in Christian Ministry and Missions.
When he first enrolled at Union, his choice of major was obvious.
“When I was 17, I was at this church camp at the beach and I remember feeling this overwhelming sense just of ‘I’m called to do ministry,’” Pearce said.
This calling developed into a desire to go to seminary and then, eventually, to do overseas missions work. Originally, Pearce did not plan to attend Union, due to growing up in the area. However, he ultimately decided this was the best place to prepare him for his future.
As someone interested in ministry, Pearce cares deeply about theology and spent his four years in the STM department sharpening his understanding of it. Tanner Smith, a senior marketing major who was friends with Pearce in high school and at Union, attested to this.
“He is very knowledgeable in all things theology, and I think that’s part of the root of how he operates relationships,” Smith said.
Pearce noted that he also spent much of his time as a student learning to ground his theological insight into love for people — a love for people that is itself biblical.
“People are more important than you just standing up and learning doctrine. If you never learn to love the people around you, then what you say is not going to matter as much,” Pearce said. “Not even half of ministry is standing in the pulpit and giving a great sermon. A lot of it is doing the mundane things that aren’t always fun, like moving chairs from one place to another, making sure everything is set up, being the maintenance man, making sure the computer is working right.”
This is where two different facets of Pearce’s life intersect with each other. He is, by all accounts, someone who has a heart for the nations. He hopes to be able to go overseas, he reads books on international missions and he decorates his office with symbols of Christianity reflected in other cultures. Yet you would be hard pressed to find someone more rooted in their present responsibilities which, right now, are still in his hometown. Maybe that’s what makes him uniquely suited for the kind of missions work to which he aspires.
“If I pick up and move to, say, Indonesia, then my new local is there in Indonesia,” Pearce said. “If I’m not faithful here, local, what makes me think I’m gonna go to this new local and be faithful? So this job here helps me understand that aspect of being a faithful believer here at the local level before going overseas.”
In addition to the community outreach he does for his job, Pearce also practices ministry at the local level by both continuing the relationships he had at Union and forging new ones. That’s his current mission field.
“He also still makes time to meet with people and get meals and get coffee,” Smith said. “He doesn’t drink coffee but he’ll go sit with you and still enjoy that time and still value relationships like he did in undergrad.”
Pearce noted that many of his relationships have changed since he’s graduated and taken his job in the OUM. Though he misses being able to hang out with friends in the dorms, he enjoys that he can pour into freshmen who never knew him as a college student — to them, he’s just an older, married staff member who’s taken the time to get to know them.
Though his ability to practice missions locally by loving the people right in front of him was grown at Union, it was there long before. Smith was at the same church camp where Pearce first felt the call to ministry and recounts a personal story from there. One night, near the end of the camp, a friend of theirs accepted Christ.
“There was one night, he came running down, screaming and crying,” Smith said. “It was just the fact that he ran downstairs screaming that someone just accepted Jesus that shows his heart for ministry and that’s continued.”
Though Pearce does not know exactly where he may go overseas one day, he maintains an openness and trusts that he is being prepared for the right opportunities. He understands that “the nations” includes America and Jackson and Union. The mission field exists everywhere. Oftentimes, having a heart for the nations means being a hometown missionary like Pearce.
The last sentence says it all.