View this Video to hear a brief overview of our call to ministry, our vision, and how you can get involved.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSa9GuB2oME&feature=email
Monday, November 16, 2009
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: When are you moving to Africa?
A: We have no plans to move to Africa. Living remotely from the workers in Chad enforces the empowerment strategy we employ. If I lived there, undoubtedly unwanted dependencies on “the Westerner” would result.
Q: How will you perform ministry in Chad from the U.S.?
A: I will make frequent trips to Chad and stay in constant contact with my immediate disciples and leaders. I will lead small groups comprised of Americans on 10 day trips to serve as “strike forces” to launch specific initiatives as national leaders call for them. Typical activities will be evangelism through sports, medicine and one-on-one witnessing; we will also do discipleship training (classroom and informal).
Q: What will your primary activity be while in the States?
A: I will mostly be working to mobilize resources (human, technological, expertise, finances) that God has placed in the hands of Americans to be used to meet strategic needs for the church planting movement(s) in Chad. I also will be communicating via internet and phone frequently with the “ground troops” in Chad.
A: We have no plans to move to Africa. Living remotely from the workers in Chad enforces the empowerment strategy we employ. If I lived there, undoubtedly unwanted dependencies on “the Westerner” would result.
Q: How will you perform ministry in Chad from the U.S.?
A: I will make frequent trips to Chad and stay in constant contact with my immediate disciples and leaders. I will lead small groups comprised of Americans on 10 day trips to serve as “strike forces” to launch specific initiatives as national leaders call for them. Typical activities will be evangelism through sports, medicine and one-on-one witnessing; we will also do discipleship training (classroom and informal).
Q: What will your primary activity be while in the States?
A: I will mostly be working to mobilize resources (human, technological, expertise, finances) that God has placed in the hands of Americans to be used to meet strategic needs for the church planting movement(s) in Chad. I also will be communicating via internet and phone frequently with the “ground troops” in Chad.
Vision and Strategy for Mission to Chad
Our Vision:
Our vision is to see millions of followers of Jesus from every tongue and tribe in Chad transforming their country to be a place of peace, harmony, and prosperity.
The gospel has the power not only to transform people, but also to transform culture. This is quite a challenge in Chad, a place where corruption has prevailed for the past two decades and war and strife for most of its existence. In 2005, Transparency International listed Chad as the world's most corrupt country. This is a leading cause for the fact that 80% of the population of Chad lives below the poverty line and less than half can read. Christians are outnumbered nearly 7 to 1 by Muslims (dominant), animists, or others.
The task is great, but the gospel provides hope for a better Chad.
Our Mission:
We endeavor to bring the gospel to the remaining 72 ethnic groups that exist in Chad who have never heard or not yet responded to the good news of Jesus Christ. We seek to be used by the Holy Spirit to support a movement that would result in the rapid multiplication of new church plants sweeping throughout Chad and millions of new followers of Christ being added to the kingdom of God. The church in Chad would impact society by bringing peace and prosperity that glorifies God and is a testimony to His power to other countries in the world.
Biblical Basis for Our Focus on the Unreached:
God’s passion since the creation has been that every nation (ethnic group) would know Him – Psalms 96:3-4 Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples! For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; he is to be feared above all gods. God’s promise of salvation for the world’s peoples was given to Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3 Now the Lord said to Abram…I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing… and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." This states God’s intention to raise up a people to lead all of the world’s nations to God.
In Abraham’s time it was Israel that was to be the witness of God to all nations. Today that witness is to come through Jesus’ followers (the church universal). Jesus’ last command before he ascended into heaven, given to his followers, is recorded in Acts 1:8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth." Here we see clearly that the range of our witness as followers of Jesus is to reach the entire world. In fact, Jesus’ also told us that we will not see his return to earth until the job gets done – Matthew 24:14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. And God gives us the assurance that this job will be completed so that every tongue and tribe will be represented in heaven – Revelation 7:9 After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands.
Our focus is on reaching those nations (tribes, ethnic groups) that presently have no representation in heaven. The light of the gospel has yet to penetrate them. We want to be part of ushering in the return of Christ. So, we endeavor to do what we can to complete the task that is commanded of us by our Lord, the task that is dear to God’s heart.
Our Method:
Our approach to the task of evangelizing the remaining unreached peoples of Chad is to foster church multiplication versus church addition. The strategy for multiplication of churches leads to exponential growth as opposed to incremental growth. For example, with an addition strategy I would plant a church and then when it is developed I would go on to plant another. With a multiplication strategy I make disciples (followers of Jesus Christ) who plant churches who make disciples who plant churches.
I focus on the development of a small group of disciples who are taught from the very beginning to make their own disciples who are taught to make their own disciples. So, a chain reaction occurs that leads to exponential growth of disciples and churches. For you mathematically oriented readers, think about the magnitude difference between 10 + 10 versus 10 x 10. The results are even more dramatic as the number of disciples being squared increases.
This diagram illustrates how the number of disciples multiplies if each only develops two disciples each. With only two generations we have 14 disciples. After 4 generations we have 62. If we expand the target group for each disciple from 2 to 5 the number after 4 generations is over 3,900!
Rationale:
This approach mandates that the Chadian people be the church planters, the missionaries, and the church leaders. This is extremely important when considering the nature of the task of evangelizing the unreached peoples of the world. The majority of the remaining unreached ethnic groups in the world are difficult to reach (a good reason for why they are last to be reached). Most of them are in areas that are hostile toward the gospel. Conditions for evangelizing are dangerous and/or the regions where the people live are hard for outsiders to cope with (diet, climate, etc), which makes a sustained effort difficult.
Languages and customs are unique among these groups (it can take a foreign missionary as many as 8 years to adequately learn the language and customs and establish a level of trust to effectively witness to a foreign culture).
All of these factors strongly support an approach that deploys the national workers as God’s front line missionaries and church leaders.
Our vision is to see millions of followers of Jesus from every tongue and tribe in Chad transforming their country to be a place of peace, harmony, and prosperity.
The gospel has the power not only to transform people, but also to transform culture. This is quite a challenge in Chad, a place where corruption has prevailed for the past two decades and war and strife for most of its existence. In 2005, Transparency International listed Chad as the world's most corrupt country. This is a leading cause for the fact that 80% of the population of Chad lives below the poverty line and less than half can read. Christians are outnumbered nearly 7 to 1 by Muslims (dominant), animists, or others.The task is great, but the gospel provides hope for a better Chad.
Our Mission:
We endeavor to bring the gospel to the remaining 72 ethnic groups that exist in Chad who have never heard or not yet responded to the good news of Jesus Christ. We seek to be used by the Holy Spirit to support a movement that would result in the rapid multiplication of new church plants sweeping throughout Chad and millions of new followers of Christ being added to the kingdom of God. The church in Chad would impact society by bringing peace and prosperity that glorifies God and is a testimony to His power to other countries in the world.
Biblical Basis for Our Focus on the Unreached:
God’s passion since the creation has been that every nation (ethnic group) would know Him – Psalms 96:3-4 Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples! For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; he is to be feared above all gods. God’s promise of salvation for the world’s peoples was given to Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3 Now the Lord said to Abram…I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing… and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." This states God’s intention to raise up a people to lead all of the world’s nations to God.
In Abraham’s time it was Israel that was to be the witness of God to all nations. Today that witness is to come through Jesus’ followers (the church universal). Jesus’ last command before he ascended into heaven, given to his followers, is recorded in Acts 1:8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth." Here we see clearly that the range of our witness as followers of Jesus is to reach the entire world. In fact, Jesus’ also told us that we will not see his return to earth until the job gets done – Matthew 24:14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come. And God gives us the assurance that this job will be completed so that every tongue and tribe will be represented in heaven – Revelation 7:9 After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands.
Our focus is on reaching those nations (tribes, ethnic groups) that presently have no representation in heaven. The light of the gospel has yet to penetrate them. We want to be part of ushering in the return of Christ. So, we endeavor to do what we can to complete the task that is commanded of us by our Lord, the task that is dear to God’s heart.
Our Method:
Our approach to the task of evangelizing the remaining unreached peoples of Chad is to foster church multiplication versus church addition. The strategy for multiplication of churches leads to exponential growth as opposed to incremental growth. For example, with an addition strategy I would plant a church and then when it is developed I would go on to plant another. With a multiplication strategy I make disciples (followers of Jesus Christ) who plant churches who make disciples who plant churches.
I focus on the development of a small group of disciples who are taught from the very beginning to make their own disciples who are taught to make their own disciples. So, a chain reaction occurs that leads to exponential growth of disciples and churches. For you mathematically oriented readers, think about the magnitude difference between 10 + 10 versus 10 x 10. The results are even more dramatic as the number of disciples being squared increases.
This diagram illustrates how the number of disciples multiplies if each only develops two disciples each. With only two generations we have 14 disciples. After 4 generations we have 62. If we expand the target group for each disciple from 2 to 5 the number after 4 generations is over 3,900!Rationale:
This approach mandates that the Chadian people be the church planters, the missionaries, and the church leaders. This is extremely important when considering the nature of the task of evangelizing the unreached peoples of the world. The majority of the remaining unreached ethnic groups in the world are difficult to reach (a good reason for why they are last to be reached). Most of them are in areas that are hostile toward the gospel. Conditions for evangelizing are dangerous and/or the regions where the people live are hard for outsiders to cope with (diet, climate, etc), which makes a sustained effort difficult.
Languages and customs are unique among these groups (it can take a foreign missionary as many as 8 years to adequately learn the language and customs and establish a level of trust to effectively witness to a foreign culture).
All of these factors strongly support an approach that deploys the national workers as God’s front line missionaries and church leaders.
In short, our method is one that equips and deploys national workers to reach the peoples of their home land for the gospel. I will function not as the front-line missionary, but as a mentor, coach, assistant and encourager for God’s front-line workers. These workers cross ethnic boundaries, but with a much deeper understanding of and acceptance by the target culture than could a Westerner like me. I strongly believe that the indigenous worker will be the primary tool God uses to preach the gospel to the remaining tribes and tongues that are to be added to His kingdom.
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