Close WindowEvangelism Through Sister-Church
Links
In
Jesus' Great Commission for the Christian
church Jesus stated "All power is given unto me in heaven and
in earth. Go ye therefore, and
teach all nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father, and
of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit: teaching them to observe all things
whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even
unto the end of the world [age]. Amen." Going
into and teaching all nations entails a lot
more than supporting your own denomination or congregation with your
tithes and offerings. In other
parts of this section on evangelism you have seen some tools that Christians
can and do use to go into all the nations of the world and teach them about Jesus, teaching
them the gospel. You know we
are in a spiritual warfare as we fight to get the gospel of Christ
and his kingdom into all nations. In
any real war you have the front lines, and you have the nation or nations
that manufacture the weapons, ammunition, equipment and food to help
those on the front battle lines to wage the war. The
Christian churches that are in the vicinity of where evangelism is
on the move, penetrating nations that are as yet not totally reached
with the gospel of Jesus Christ, can be considered the forward bases
of operations. These forward bases of operations often do
the brunt of the work in evangelizing into parts of the world we would
have to expend great amounts of money and resources to effectively
reach if we were to try it ourselves, and yet they do it with a minimum
of resources and often operate on a shoestring. If
we evangelized like some of these spiritual troopers we'd be a Christian
nation again. If a congregation
or group of congregations are doing
it better than we could, and for less, then it would make sense
to supply these congregations by forming sister-church relations or
links with them. This can be done by finding out what Christian
church congregations are evangelizing heavily in their part of the
world and forming a sister-church link between your congregation and
theirs. How effective is this
method? You must be aware of
the rapid spread of the Calvary Chapel movement, not just across the
United States, but now around the world. They
started out as one tiny congregation of 25 people in Costa Mesa, California
in the early 1970's. To see
how the Lord inspired Pastor Chuck Smith with a highly effective model
of ministry that grew this one individual congregation, and all the
others to follow as independent affiliates click on "Powerful
Concepts of Ministry" and read all the articles in that section. But
how in the world can a group of independent affiliate congregations
spread around the world with no centralized collection of funds, as
is done in most centrally run denominations with a Headquarters church? When
I was a member of a tiny Calvary Chapel congregation (it was 12 members
when I first started attending and grew to 125 members in 2.5 years!),
just about the time when I left them, their pastor said he was taking
about a quarter of the tithe/offerings donated every month and sending
them to a tiny Calvary Chapel congregation that was starting up in
York, England. I remember wondering what this could have to
do with evangelism. I realize
in hindsight as I studied the Calvary movement that with them evangelism
is a local event, taking place when one highly motivated individual
evangelizes to another person he knows who is not born-again, both
by his or her good example and by word of mouth. The
congregation grows. But when
a congregation is small the pastor still must be paid and the hall
rented where they meet. How is that done with 12 members? It is done by the financial support of sister-churches. As
the congregation being supported grows sufficiently to support themselves,
they too start supporting others further out in and around the world. Want to see how far Calvary Chapel's have spread
around the world? Log onto http://www.calvarychapel.org and click on "Churches". First
click on the U.S. map, and then on the "International"
map. Remember this movement or Christian revival
started out as one tiny 25 member congregation in Costa Mesa, California
back in the early 1970's.
But you don't have to support your own
tiny congregations in remote places of the world. You can support congregations in non-Christian
and remote parts of the world that you may learn are carrying the gospel
of Jesus Christ powerfully to the nations around them as well as to
their own nation. I will give
you two such examples. The story which follows is the story of a group
of congregations in Irian Jaya (formerly
Borneo). The other is a Christian
orphanage/old age home in South India which would love to form a sister-church
link with a Christian church congregation in the United States (or
England), or even form a few of these links with congregations over
here in the US. Currently the tiny (and financially destitute)
ministry of UNITYINCHRIST.COM (run entirely on my own tithes and offerings)
is supporting this tiny ministry in South India. I call these thirteen children “my kids”. (We
write back and forth to each other! They’re
wonderful—and in such great need.) Be
sure to log on. They’re beautiful children. You can also email their head pastor, and he
will email you in person about the orphanage.
editor
UNITYINCHRIST.COM
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