Ministry Archives - Page 15 of 26 - Mission to the Americas

Gathering the Nations – the missions calling

December 17, 2009 by ecoach Leave a Comment

I will praise you, O Lord, among the nations; I will sing of you among the peoples. – Psalm 57:9

May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face shine upon us, that Your ways may be known on earth, your salvation among all nations. – Psalm 67:1-2

Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous deeds among all peoples. — Psalm 96:3

Here is a simple observation that fuels our work:

1. The Heart of God the Father.

Instead of asking, what motivates us to missionary work, the starting question should be:

“What motivates God?”

Why would God provide me reconciliation through Jesus?

Was it just because of his love?

Or because of a greater plan in the heart of God?

Is my reconciliation simply because God loves me, or because God wants to use me towards a greater purpose?

Why would God choose to work with me, as a redeemed individuals?

As I’ve meditated on Scriptures with this question, my answer seems to be that

God the father has a heart for the nations.

I am a part in cooperating with God to fulfill God’s plan to gather the nations.

2. The Plan of God: Gathering the Nations.

Revelation 7:9-11 gives us a perfect picture of the fruit of nation gathering. Every tribe, every tongue.

The end of Revelation shows us the complete picture of the redeemed multicultural community and the complete fulfillment of “I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

The fruit of grace — my reconciliation — gives me the ability to cooperate with God in gathering the nations.

My labor in God’s kingdom is all part of this larger work — to gather the nations.

I’m not saved and reconciled simply because God loves me, but moreover, because God wants to use me in gathering the nations.

3. We work in cooperation with God’s plan.

We are called to declare the praises of God and his among the nations. (Psalm 96).

As I mediate on that verse, I’m reminded once again that for people to hear our declarations of praise, we must participate in the gathering of the people.

For some, that is working in multicultural church like I helped plant in my home city.
For others, that is working among immigrants.
For still others, that is working among your own people group.
For us, that is working in other countries, particularly in Latin and South America.

Our particular calling

Our calling to provide evangelism and missions training to churches through out the Americas is our particular expression of ministry to cooperate with God’s plan to gather the nations.

To encourage individuals to reach people for Christ and give them adequate training to do so
To encourage churches to grow in reaching their communities, and help them plan to do so.
To train missionaries who wish to work cross culturally among other people groups
To assist churches who want to send teams to Latin America to cooperate with local churches.
To plant a church for immigrants in my city.

Extending our Work into Nicaragua

December 15, 2009 by ecoach Leave a Comment

In January of 2009, PRMI sent a 5^th team to

Continue training nearly 75 national leaders of Vida Joven Nicaragua in the Dunamis Project and
teach an Ignite course at La Fuente church in Matagalpa.

What a joy to see how this investment is making an impact!

For example, during our evening events with Vida Joven, these leaders helped us in prayer ministry to nearly 250 fellow leaders of Vida Joven, not just from Nicaragua, but from Guatemala and Costa Rica.

After a time of sharing the Word of God, these leaders setup prayer stations where individuals could seek prayer in response to the work of God in their heart.

I watched the leaders we had been training do effective prayer ministry:

for healing,
for forgiveness,
for rededication,
for deliverance.

We were watching the fruit of our training work in action!

We’ve been invited back January 7-18 of 2010 to continue giving our training.

In addition to continuing to grow leaders by adding to the foundations we’ve already laid, we’ll add a new church in the capital city of Managua. The reach of this work spreads!

This year we will focus on

Prayer Ignite for the national directors.
Gateways Ignite for Club Leaders
Spiritual Gift Ignite for La Fuente Church.

Since this is our 6^th trip, we will intentionally let the local leadership we’ve been training do much of the work of the ministry and prepare them for teaching in the future. We want to transition from teaching to coaching.

We are excited about the Lord’s calling us to this mission!

We would like to give you opportunities to be part of our team to disciple these leaders in how to cooperate with the Holy Spirit. Your prayers and financial gifts create the foundation for our team of seven to go.

The host church and Vida Joven will take care of in-country travel as well as room and board at the sites of ministry.

Our target budget as a team is $6,000 to cover our airfares, translation work and some incidentals.

Would you pray about helping?

Financial support is needed by December 31, 2009 for our departure on January 7.

Thank you for praying, considering, and giving as led! We will be happy to pray for you as you pray for us. And we promise to report back after our trip so you can see how you’ve made a difference.

In Christ’s Service,

Sam Hale, Chris Walker, Judy McManus, Susan Finck-Lockhart, Lydia Lockhart, Bill and Marie Ferree

How you can help

Print out this reponse form <- Click

to find out how to mail in a donation, to pray or give online.

Please note, funds raised for this project are separate from our missionary support.

Not Enough Chickens to Kill

November 17, 2009 by ecoach 2 Comments

“Our fundraiser for this weekend is not going to work.
We don’t have enough chickens to slaughter for the tamales.”

So wrapped the announcements at a service where I preached at a church in a suburb east of the city.

They needed 20 chickens to prepare the food for a bake sale. They only had three.

They were trying to generate funds with micro business, but couldn’t find enough chickens.

They were going to use ground beef to make empanadas instead.

Tamales are delicious, more filling, and can sell for a whole lot more at a lower product cost.

But they had to settle for the pricier ground beef empanadas, cutting their profit margins really deep.

This was just one evidence of the visible poverty of where I preached in Mid-November.

God did good stuff, the word went forth with power, but I came home almost emotionally wrecked.

The apparent poverty made it an emotionally hard calling.

Pictured below are the front and rear of the one room church.

You can read more about it from “An Offering of Lemons.”

Where was I?

This area was just east of the city, a very densely packed suburb of single story dwellings (not the high rise density of the city).

63,000 residents
45 churches, most under 100 members.
Suggests that less 10% have been reached for Christ.

About 30 minutes by crowded highway travel speeds, out near the airport. Many residents commute / from the city by public transportation.

A horrible head on bus crash (by a speed drunk driver in an illegal and loaded dump truck) in October killed over 25 commuters.

Pastor describes it as a red zone (very dangerous).

Some of his members called it a hot zone (almost very dangerous).

One or two were saying there is no problem, just pockets of activity.

The street corner from the church is supposedly a gun fighting point between three gangs fighting for control.

The stores that were open when we left had iron bars blocking the entrance– business was conducted passing goods and money through the iron bars.

Face to Face with Poverty

I’ve seen poverty as I’ve visited many places in Latin America.

I also know that it’s more prevalent in other countries like Nicaragua (where I’ve seen things I wish I hadn’t), Cuba, and Haiti.

But Thursday night was another real in-my-face encounter, not just images from a slide show on the internet.

It stays with you for days, and makes you wonder, what can you really do?

Training Pastors in Poor areas.

This pastor leads a pastors association in the town.

They want me to do an evangelism training for several of the pastors of the 45 churches working in this neighborhood.

They want Brenda to do a training event too.

They want to organize a campaign and a big event.

It’s pushing me to think about through church evangelism strategies in light of lack of resources:

money,
time,
people.

I’ve always believed that effective evangelism will manifest the kingdom’s presence.

Here is what I’m noodling on: What would that look like in this very impoverished area?

How will I see what impact the training will make?

Supporting our work

Clearly, there is a lot of work to be done in this area.

Our partners enable us to bring evangelism training to this impoverished area.

Your ongoing support keeps us here to provide training for these pastors, even if there are not enough resources.

Would you consider helping us fulfill this calling?

Where can Bible Institutes Go?

November 3, 2009 by ecoach Leave a Comment

I live in two worlds:

Latin American
North American.

I travel back and forth frequently, and am often amazed to the point of incredulity with some of the questions my North American friends ask me.

“Do you have indoor plumbing?”
“I didn’t know there were skyscrapers there . . “
“Do you eat chicken?”

For those that perhaps have never traveled internationally, or don’t even know what a missionary does, the common perception is that we live in a thatch hut in the jungle with nearby indigenous peoples who don’t wear clothes.

I have to show people photos of my city to show them that I live in a city like Miami, and yes I have indoor plumbing.

I have taught in churches that do not have such plumbing. One doesn’t need to go to far outside the city to encounter indigenous tribes and the general need for indoor plumbing. My trip to the Darien province assured me of this.

Here is the church bathroom:

But sometimes, I’m caught with asking questions that stretch my worldview and my experience.

Can they read?

We wanted to take a Bible Institute course to a remote corner of this country, accessible only by plane.

No cell phone coverage.

In fact, no electricity.

In planning the development of the Bible Institute, we had to ask the question of literacy, and knowledge of written and spoken Spanish.

For those who work frontier missions, this may be a standard operating question.

But this one was a new one for me. Yet it is one that needed to be ask.

At the moment, we’ve put this development on hold. We are still in the interest gathering stage. We don’t know if it will materialize, but we’ll keep it in the hopper as the Lord permits.

An Offering of Lemons

October 19, 2009 by ecoach 2 Comments

Through God’s sovereign working, we’ve received an invitation to do a workshop here in November in a church out in a very poor suburb of Panama City.

According to the pastor, this suburb has over 63,000 residents, only 3% of which are professing Christians. I’m told there are approximately 45 churches trying to serve this residential area, with most memberships under 100 people. This suggests an large unreached population.

The church itself is on a main road. It is a one room structure with a metal roof, and thus it gets very hot inside when the sun is out, or very impossible to hear when it rains.

The walls are made of whatever material can be found. Picture is the block wall. The back wall is unfinished wood planks, or 1/4 plywood on some battens. Other times it’s tin.

We attend a prayer meeting on a Saturday morning in this structure to help plan the event in November.

Instead of a Sunday morning time, when the sun would overheat the building, the workshop will be on a Thursday evening after working hours. This will present a logistical challenge for our team to get there on a school night, in the dark, and without a car.

Pastor leads up a pastors association and his dream is to have several churches squeezed into this little one room church for an evangelism workshop.

Yes, that is a stake holding a piece of plywood in place.

We had rented a car for the weekend to make sure we were able to get out there. Even with a car, it was still about 45 minutes from where we live. I can’t imagine the bus trip during rush hour traffic.

The community needs are so great (one block away is a intersection that at least 3 gangs fight for control over – it’s the border between them all). Crime is a concern being the “gringo” in a poor neighborhood after dark.

The lack of resources is clearly visible in the structure of the church, as well as a little thank you gift we received: a bag of lemons from the tree in the back yard.

Pray for this little church, the workshop, and the logistics of how we will get there.