Stylus Magazine Indesign Template
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Fall 2011 Sharing the Gospel and our very lives Building on the Solid Rock A note from Dr. Sammy Murimi In the ShareNet issue of 2010, we gladly reported that 98 churches had been planted by the Share International (SI) STORM teams and SI-supported missionaries and pastors between 1997 and 2010 – including our very first church plant among the Toposa people of Southern Sudan. By July 2011, the number of churches had multiplied to 133, with a recorded total of 18,506 sincere conversions to Christ! In addition, since SI started partnering with Messiah Gospel Ministry in India in 2004, 15 churches have been established among the Dalits in the Andhra Pradesh Province and an estimated total of 1,500 people have committed their lives to Christ, despite prevalent persecution! These churches continue to be nurtured in the Word of God each week by trained pastors and missionaries for whom you provide support each month. You have played a significant role before the Lord in this remarkable growth by helping us plant nearly 150 churches in 14 years; an average of 10 churches each year! I cannot thank you enough for all your prayers and support over the years. Truly “the LORD has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes” (Ps. 118:23)! I invite you now to move with us to the next critical phase. As With 133 churches in Turkanaland and Southern Sudan alone, new believers answer the call to actively share the Good News those who have been appointed to church leadership positions and make disciples in remote villages, my concern is how to has reached 665 – that is an average of at least 5 leaders per maintain the momentum while ensuring real and personal church! The need is urgent, to heed the Apostle Paul’s charge spiritual growth among the church leaders themselves. Our to his protégé Timothy – “to be a workman approved by God” mutual responsibility is to ensure that “everyone who hears” the (2 Tim. 2:14-26) if the churches that SI continues to plant words of Jesus “puts them into practice.” That is the test of true in Turkanaland and beyond are to withstand the imminent spiritual growth. winds of false doctrine. The need to build a permanent facility in Lodwar now - a facility that will accommodate and teach/ A note from Practicing the words of Jesus must first begin with, and then train the existing and potential church leaders from across be upheld by the church leaders. Indeed, unless leaders are Turkanaland and the neighboring tribes - could not be greater Dr. Sammy Murimi well grounded spiritually in the immovable foundation of “The and more urgent. Rock” – the very “words” of Jesus – the churches they plant will be shallow spiritual images built on shifting “sand” (Matt. Here is where you come in. I appeal for your help in raising 7:24-27). This mission would be an empty church-planting the first $500,000 (of the $2M needed to complete the facility) movement, not a well-watered, Word-rooted Church growth needed by December 2011 in order to start construction of reality. It would be a church whose individual members bear Phase One of the SEND Center in Lodwar by January 2012. The the characteristics that Christ describes as those who “hear local labor force in Lodwar is unlimited and God has already the word of the kingdom and do not understand it, then the called Taylor and Leigh Ann Kilpatrick from Ruston, Louisiana to wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in their oversee the construction of the Center. They have raised 75% of hearts”; or one “who hears the word and immediately receives their family support already and are ready to move to Lodwar it with joy, yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a as soon as $500,000 for the SEND Center construction is raised. while… When tribulation or persecution arises because of the Please read more information about the SEND Center itself on word, immediately he stumbles.” (Matt. 13:18-22). Such a church page 11. would easily fall victim to the “sleight of men” with “cunning craftiness” (Eph. 4:14), and to those who “follow deceiving spirits I ask you to consider, pray, and generously make a financial and things taught by demons… hypocritical liars” (1 Tim. 4:1, commitment towards Phase One of this important project. I am 2). Such a church is bound to fall with a “great crash” when the confident that in a few years, you and I will affirm that the “seed” winds of false doctrine beat against her. SI must prevent these imparted among the indigenous Church leaders at the SEND dangers among the people-groups where this ministry has been Center has also fallen on “good ground” in the remote villages; commissioned to serve. that the Word has been heard and understood, and that it is indeed bearing fruit and producing a crop - “some a hundredfold, SI must ensure that the missionaries, pastors, and evangelists some sixty, some thirty” (Matt. 13:8)! we send out to unreached people-groups (we have now identified 14 such tribes that surround Turkanaland in Sudan, May you experience with us the same delight of “sharing the Ethiopia, and Uganda) do not spread false doctrine, leading the Gospel and our very lives” as together we build a beacon of growing flock of Jesus Christ astray. We must continually and light in Turkanaland. Come alongside us and help us build the regularly gather the growing number of indigenous Church SEND center now. Kindly indicate your support in the enclosed leaders together to impart upon them “sound doctrine” (Titus response card and mail it in the attached return envelope. 2:1), the “doctrine of Christ” (2 Jn. 9) that they are called to propagate. We must begin to do so now. That’s our next urgent phase. Sammy Murimi / Director ShareNet - Fall 2011 3 Share International SITE Team of Evangelism SITE, headed up by John Nakara and Stanley Alem Lokwawi, is the ministry of SI responsible for surveying and mapping the spread of the Gospel in Turkanaland and its neighboring tribes. SITE makes the very first contact with the unreached village’s witch doctor and leaders to seek permission for outreach. SITE then plans and holds evangelistic events and outreaches in the village and recommends an SI- trained missionary to be commissioned there to plant a church. SITE also helps growing churches and pastors plan further outreach among their neighboring villages and tribes. Between January to August this year, SITE screened the Jesus Film in 8 villages, held 3 seminars for church leaders on outreach and evangelism, organized one large open air evangelistic event (“crusade”), and hosted 3 prayer outreach events. A total of 520 Turkana people gave their lives to Christ through these events. Pastor James Lourien of Lodwar said, “If we could have five evangelism oriented ministries like SITE in Turkanaland, all the Turkana people could be reached with the Gospel within a very short time. The problem we have in Turkanaland is that every evangelistic ministry wants to promote its own church or funding agency. Only SITE does outreach through any Evangelical denomination or church in Turkanaland. SITE’s outreach promotes only the Gospel of Jesus Christ.” During one SITE event, a deaf child was brought to the meeting by his mother. Believers laid their hands on the child and prayed for healing. His mother says, “This child has had hearing problems for a long time. We have taken him to the hospital several times, but there was no cure. In the end he lost his hearing completely. Today I have seen God’s healing power. Today I have joy. I had enrolled him in a school for the deaf, but now I will withdraw him and take him to a regular school.” 4 ShareNet - Fall 2011 ShareNet - Fall 2011 5 Church Growth The Church in Turkanaland is growing! and by providing tools for ministry. Not only is the number of churches growing (133 to date) and the number of believers growing (18,506 recorded We have a target goal of reaching all of Turkanaland in decisions for Christ to date), but spiritual growth is 5 years, and we believe this can be achieved with the 76 beginning to take root as well! Weekly discipleship indigenous missionaries we have already trained.. We believe meetings are taking place in all the churches, despite our people will have heard the Gospel and we will have migration due to drought and famine affecting numbers given them the opportunity to make decisions based on in some villages. Many churches are growing in the love the message they have heard. Many people are in need of of God’s Word so much so that they are sharing the love training, and we are excited about the SEND Center that will of Christ with their neighboring villages, planting churches be built for this purpose. and serving. We have sent out 26 indigenous missionaries to date and This year alone, SI held revival meetings and conferences are trusting God for even more as support is received. in partnership with the pastors and missionaries in their Churches and believers can get involved by adopting a village, respective churches. Some of the topics covered included giving and praying. spiritual leadership, the roles of church leaders, the role of women in the church, the essentials of a Christian marriage, the role of youth in the church, changes in Supporting a local indigenous adolescence among youth, Christian doctrine, what God missionary has many benefits: detests most, humility, giving, and uplifting others.