Coming Along Side Young Life Panama

While in Nicaragua in January 2010 working with Vida Joven (Hear their stories), I got to meet the new leaders for Young Life Panama.

As I heard their stories of how God is opening the door for Vida Joven Panama, His miraculous provision, and the blessing of others to launch this group, I’m convinced that God is inviting us along side the pioneer leaders to encourage them, help them and pray for them.

Working in Panama Viejo

The three Leaders (center of the photo, with Brenda and our friend Stephanie) are working together in the neighborhoods surrounding Panama Viejo.

They’ve been involved in leadership training with Young Life to learn its methods and have started their contact work.

We listened to their dreams of organizing the first Young Life club, and how they are serving the community surrounding Panama Viejo.  It’s all in the launch phase at the moment.

Called to Work Along Side.

Part of our calling here is to come along side and encourage ministries.  These three leaders are pioneering a brand new work, and we get to participate by praying for them and as God opens the doors, providing evangelism training when needed.

Each one is a volunteer, and trying to do this on top of full time jobs or full time university studies.  They are offering their Saturday’s to spend time with kids at the soccer field, introducing themselves, organizing soccer matches, and inviting people to serve the community.  One project they hope to organize is the renovation (painting) of the walls that surround a school soccer field.

This is missional outreach.  Along the way, these leaders look for opportunities to hear people’s spiritual thirst and talk with them as the Lord leads.  It’s not agressive evangelism, but simple contact work and buildling relationships with the community within which they serve.

It was a joy to have them at our home for dinner and hear their stories of individuals they contact, and how that will hopefully lead to a club.   It’s a joy to come along side and encourage them.

You’ve Really Given me Liberty

After teaching on evangelism this weekend Vida Abundante in Calidonia, Maria (not her real name) pulls me aside and tells me

Your teaching has relieved a giant burden I’ve been carrying. . ..

It’s Not Our Job

Maria had heard teaching on evangelism over many years that could be summarized like this

• Here is a script to memorize.
• Share that script with as many people as possible.
• Rejoice with those that pray a prayer.

This is a common teaching paradigm that focuses exclusively on the skills of sharing your faith and in many cases has divorced ongoing discipleship from evangelism.

For years, Maria had faithfully obeyed this teaching. She grew confident in talking to strangers, using gospel tracts, and fine tuning her presentation.

Yet in all her years of energetically “working the program” she hardly ever saw a conversion experience.

In spite of all her confident theology about God working mysteriously, she experienced

• the mounting feelings of disappointment,
• the growing pain of continued personal rejection, and
• the mental energy drained in trying to fight self-criticism.

Her desire to share her faith was diminishing.

She felt totally responsible for all the outcomes.

Evangelism had become a human work.

• If they don’t repent, I’m doing evangelism wrong.
• If they don’t accept Christ, it’s my fault.
• If they don’t repent now, it must be because of some problem in my life.

Evangelism becomes a burden after repeated failures and rejection.

Nobody wants to do that all the time.

There are better ways to enjoy life than experiencing rejection every time you talk about faith.

Finding Freedom

Maria heard me teach on How the How the Holy Spirit draws people to faith.

She saw how God works through a process of bringing people to faith — a conversion to Christ is often at the end of series of key events that God uses.

Watching her respond through the teaching, her face showed evidence of the proverbial “light bulbs” going off.

The emotional burdens that had grown on her from all her rejection experiences in evangelism were fading.

What was building in it’s place was a confidence in God’s sovereignty and a joy that comes with relief from burdens.

She pulled me aside and said

Your teaching has relieved a giant burden I’ve been carrying. . .

She proceeded to tell me how this teaching had

• transformed her view of evangelism,
• helped her to see God’s responsibility
• given her a new fearless freedom to be a vessel in God’s work.

What a joy

There is a profound joy in watching people accept and apply this teaching.

For our ministry partners, this is the fruit of your work — people finding liberty to be more effective witnesses for Christ.  You enable us to fulfill our vision for 2010 of impacting churches in the Americas to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in the work of missions and evangelism.

Narcisso goes to Peru

If you remember, one of my students is Narcisso.  He was in one of my classes on evangelism and has regularly contacted me outside of class to talk about his work, his calling, and his dream.

He is self-employed as an ambulante, a salesperson who walks around selling little wares like crackers and posters on the street.  Pictured with him is his box of stuff he was selling that day for .25 to 1.50. 

“Hermano,” he greets me as I answer his phone call after I return from Nicaragua.

“I’m going to Peru to study missions — to take a 6 month course on high speed, down into 60 days – focused on working with indigenous groups.”

Knowing his plans, his dreams, and his diligence in pursuing those dreams of being on the mission field, I’m eager to find out how I can help.  I know he’s been working on this dream for a while.  The time of fulfillment is now.

Narcisso is a man of faith and has displayed the character over time that has convinced me of his calling.

He’s raising $400 to finish out some funding issues and needs it in 3 days.  Panama has a hold on issusing passports, so he needs his passport to come through.  His travel visa is set to expire if he doesn’t use it. 

There is a lot of prayer requests in what he tells me — mountains need moving into the sea.

We give him an offering — so many people have invested in our dream to serve in Latin America.  We want to help Narcisso reach his. 

Over the next few days — all the funds come him for Narcisso.   Passports come through.   His visa is clear.  It’s clear that God’s hand is on Narcisso.

He left for Peru. 

I can’t wait for his return to see how he’s grown in his calling.  To watch him grow in his calling is a blessing that we get to see.  Our supporters enable us to invest in the lives of future missionaries such as Narcisso to make an impact around the world.

Childrens Ministry Workshop In Caimitillo

Last year, Brenda did a workshop at a church in Caimitillo, Panama.  We were invited back to do a little ministry time with some 6-13 year old girls as part of an outreach to families.

See the video and hear the story.

[Feed Readers: Click Through to See the Video.]

Check out this brief Video about some of the work that Brenda did to help a church with it’s outreach to the parents of children, and a morning of making crafts with the children.

We enjoy this work, and our partners help make it possible to make an impact.  Thank you all!

A Student of Missions

Yesterday, I met one of my students out in the market.

He’s taken the evangelism training and it has impacted his confidence in talking about his faith.

He now looks for those moments where the Holy Spirit prompts him to speak with spiritually thirsty people.

I’ve gotten to know him outside of class,

• Sharing lunch with him on occasion, and
• Hearing his heart for working among immigrants, and
• His calling to work on the other side of the world.

Working the market

He’s self-employed as a “ambulante.”

In other words, he who walks around crowded areas in the hot sun of the day.

He carries his inventory of cookies, cards, and posters

He calls out as he walks to draw attention to himself.

He sells his brandless stuff for quarters and dollars at a time.

In picture above, he’s got some Mother’s day cards in the box (.50)

He’s got cookies (.25).

In his hand (off camera) were some posters he sells for $1.50, and off his right shoulder was a canvas bag of other goodies.

He changes out his inventory regularly based on what sells, and the season of year.

He goes to crowded areas, bus stops, markets, and simply walks around trying to sell his merchandise.

If he doesn’t walk and sell, he doesn’t make any profit.  He doesn’t have income to pay for his rent or groceries.

It’s a hard living, eeking out by quarters and dimes at a time.

Preparing for Global Missions

He wants to work in one of the former soviet republics, so he’s learning business principles here to fund himself.

He dreams of growing his work into a micro-enterprise so that he can fund missions work.

As we stood on the noisy and crowded street corner that morning in front of a busy shop, he told us stories of God’s provision in his life to grow his business next year.

Donors who believe his call to missions that give him money

• to grow his business,
• to buy better inventory
• and hire another worker.

He also continued to tell me how he’s had Spirit led evangelistic conversations with people along the way as he walks the streets.

I see this student working hard to join in the plan of gathering the nations.

He wants to grow a successful reselling business to fund himself in his work.

Meanwhile, we get the joy of investing in his life, giving him training to do the work of evangelism and nurture his missions calling.

He’s beginning to teach some classes on missions, and occasionally gets to preach in churches about the missions calling, and I can see that he is anointed of the Lord to do that.

Your support helps us invest in this man

Your partnership in prayer and giving enables our work to make an impact.

Thanks for helping us invest.

Gathering the Nations – the missions calling

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.

Not Enough Chickens to Kill

“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?

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.