Earlier this year, I gifted this challenge to you, to us as a World Team Global community: “To concretely see, observe and identify the impact of our efforts among two people groups.” After holding two online forums earlier this month, I realized that the ‘why’ behind this challenge may not have been clearly communicated. 
So, why did I ‘gift this challenge’ to you, to us? Three reasons come quickly to mind.
First, God calls us to declare His glory to the nations as a community. When the apostle Paul reminds us of the fact that we are the recipients of the ‘mystery hidden for ages’, he calls us to join him in teaching, proclaiming, declaring that mystery to the nations which is ‘Christ in you, the hope of glory’ (Colossians 1:24-29). The ‘you’ in this text refers to us as a community; a community called to take up this ‘challenge’ to declare Him to the nations.
Second, such a challenge binds us together in new ways as a global community; uniting our strengths and resources towards accomplishing together something that we could not accomplish alone. By nature, we are focused on the ministry to which God has called us. However, when we lift our eyes off that local ministry for just a moment, we gain a greater perspective of what God is doing in our part of the world as well as many other parts of the world.
Finally, other ministry initiatives would be the natural fruit of taking on such a challenge. As our hearts are ‘warmed’ by seeing the impact of the Gospel in concrete ways among two unreached people groups, many in the WT Global community will naturally propose other projects to other unreached peoples. As we see God work, we are spurred on to trust Him to see the Gospel impact other peoples and nations.
No challenge is by nature ‘easy’. Having each other to ‘spur one another on’ is our best next step for addressing any challenge.
Join us for another series of online forums where we will further discuss this challenge. Information on times and the link will be sent soon.
Filed under: Challenge, Community, Unreached people groups | Leave a comment »
I was part of an ‘online prayer’ meeting this past Wednesday. Sounds kind of strange and impersonal. However, seeing everyone’s face around the virtual table and being able to mobilise people from three different regions of the world to pray was a definite encouragement and certainly a plus to spend this time praying ‘virtually’ together.
Back in 2014, we re-introduced one another to the idea of building community with others for our spiritual nourishment and growth in grace. A small working group put together the document: “TC4u: Transformational Communities“. If you have never seen this document or can’t currently find it in your files, drop me a note and I’ll make sure to send you a copy.
In our World Team Global circles, we are used to hearing the phrase: “preaching the Gospel to yourself every day”. By that we mean to say our hold on the Gospel is tenuous and our hearts need to be reminded of the deep love of Christ each and every day in order for us to live out of the Gospel.
Let me give you a couple of examples. First, during the time of prayer, everyone prayed, all at the same time. In our local church, maybe in yours as well, people pray out loud one at a time, one after the other, during time dedicated to open prayer. Now I had experienced this kind of ‘all together’ prayer in small group contexts, but never in a church meeting of 40+ people. Second, they gave room for people to grow in their gifts and talents. The young woman leading worship explained, at one point, that a year ago she did not know how to play the guitar. However, the need arose when their main worship leader left. So, the church encouraged her to learn how to play the guitar and let her ‘grow’ in her ability over the past year. She is now writing worship music which local Christian editors would like her to include in a new release of songbooks for churches. Third, for a small church they had an exciting and adventurous vision. At the end of the service, the pastor explained that he would be leaving for Africa that week because of a ministry opportunity the church had to train a group of women in microfinance. This would allow these women to meet the physical needs of their families as well as open doors of opportunity for the church to minister to the community where these women live. As we left, Rebecca and I both commented on how amazing it was that such a small church could have such a large vision.
Thoughts Along The Journey 