Tag: encompass world

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Mission Mobilizers gather in the MidWest

MobilizersRetreat-2013_10On October 9-10, 2013, Encompass hosted a 24 Hour Retreat for Mobilization/Mission Pastors in central Ohio.  This gathering included leaders from five states. The retreat setting, campfire and all, created a flowing conversation ranging from short-term mission trips, to local church mission “successes” and even to how do churches create “pathways” to groom more cross-cultural workers.

The sharing of life, ministry, stories and principles invigorated everyone.  At the conclusion, each leader was challenged to a four-step application process:

1)   Think (spend some time working through all that was discussed)

2)   Draw  (put the current reality down on a piece of paper, and draw a future reality)

3)   Communicate (figure out good ways to share mobilization with the church)

4)   Experiment  (try some innovative ideas to mobilize many into cross-cultural mission)

 

Here’s a list of some of the “recommended resources” that were shared over the 24 hours:

Maximum Impact Short-Term Missions

Credible Study on the Impact of Short-Term Missions

When Helping Hurts by Steve Corbett & Brian Fikkert

What Every Church Member Should Know about Poverty by Bill Ehlig & Ruby Payne

“Mission Pastor’s Profile” by David Mays

Bible Study from Acts for Supporting Churches- “Behind the Goers” by Mike Jentes

Mobilizer Retreat Whiteboard 2013
This is a picture of the white board that we had for the weekend…

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August E-newsletter from @MikeJentes

WHAT’S HAPPENED WITH ME
The Latest Scoop
533 Challenge #iam533

Whew…it’s been a busy summer lot of travel!

Kayla, Korey and I attended the Momentum Youth Conference with a theme of “I Am Second.” It was a powerful week with great moments of worship, spiritual challenge and making friends.

 

With Encompass World Partners we did a special project called the 533 Challenge.

 

We built a wall and filled it with the faces of the least-reached nations in our world – 533 people groups (approximately 70 million people) who have little or no opportunity to hear the gospel. In order to direct prayer toward these peoples, we asked students to take part in the “533 Challenge” – a challenge to pray daily for the least-reached over the next 30 days.


Students “adopted” a specific people group by removing one photo from the wall and signing a commitment card. Participating students are then photographed and replacement cards (with the students’ faces!) are quickly printed to replace the empty spaces on the wall. An Encompass staff member then prays for each student and gives him/her a prayer journal to take home along with their adopted people prayer card. For those who commit, we will be sending daily emails and text messages to equip and remind them to pray.
By Friday night, our wall was transformed from pictures of the least reached, to pictures of prayer warriors for the least reached! All of the 533 people groups were adopted!

Mike-explaining533

 

Mike-praying533

 

And then the work of praying every day began. It is hard to believe that the 30 Day Prayer Challenge portion just concluded yesterday. 

Below is an excellent video which gets at the heart of why we did the 533 Challenge.

 

See all of my August E-newsletter from @MikeJentes.

My E-newsletter Archive:

Read my June 2013 e-newsletter
Read my May 2013 e-newsletter
Read my April 2013 e-newsletter 

 

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Burk, Brasil and the Breaking Future

So this morning as I was praying, the Lord brought to mind the nation of Brasil. A large and important country in our world. I’ve been praying regularly for the church in Brasil to rise up and seize the opportunity afforded it by the World Cup being on their soil next summer.WorldCup-2014-Brasil

I quickly shot off an email to my colleagues, Steve Bailey and Bruce Triplehorn who serve @EncompassWorld for that nation. I found out earlier this week that Steve was on the ground there, and I wanted them to both be sowing seeds and listening to what the Holy Spirit might be stirring up. We are praying for a coalition of leaders, churches and ministries who would be mobilized to the ministry opportunities of relational evangelism, discipleship and church planting afforded by the World Cup in Brasil.

As that email left my computer, another came in from Tom Julien (who I always listen to):

A faithful warrior has entered heaven with his eternal “weight of glory”  (2 Corinthians 4:17).  What an example he was.

I quickly scrolled down in the email to find out who, and it was Bill Burk. “Amazon Bill” as he was affectionately known who served as a missionary taking the Gospel to the unreached along the Amazon river for 6 decades!  I remember as a child hearing the stories of the Amazon Rain Forest and the Good News going to people who had never heard about Jesus! I prayed for Bill and Imogene as a youngster.

In these moments, I’m reflecting on how the future of missions is breaking open in these two happenings around Brasil. A few musings:

  • Like Amazon Bill, we still need people who are crazy enough for Jesus that they’ll take the Gospel to the hardest places on our planet!
  • I’ve been challenged by the hundreds of “Unengaged, Unreached People Groups” in our world, and Bill Burk was going to those people groups decades before that “title” was dubbed in missions circles.
  • Our heritage @EncompassWorld and “our present” both are strong in taking the Good News to the unreached of our world!
  • The unreached are not just in the jungle anymore, they are in our cities…in the Urban Jungle.
  • The breaking future of reaching these unreached peoples in not just in solo, pioneer missionaries, but in coalitions of leaders, churches and ministries who will covenant together for the Great Commission.

burksMy deepest sympathies and prayers go out to Imogene and the whole Burk family.  They will miss their beloved here, and we all know that another “saint in glory stands.”

Press Release from Encompass World Partners 

2007 Interview about Amazon Bill’s Legacy and his “Plumb Line”  by GraceConnect

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Metaphors and the Church by Dave Guiles

DaveGuiles-Headshot
Dave Guiles

Encompass World Partners director, Dave Guiles, has been doing some intriguing study and work on “Conceptual Metaphors” and how they play a significant part in developing concepts and behavior.

Dave’s research shows that real change takes place when we are successfully introduced to new metaphors. This is true because:

1) Metaphors organize the way we think,
2) Metaphors enable us to gain new insights,
3) Metaphors create identity, and,
4) Metaphors serve as a guide to future actions.

To help illustrate this important truth, Dave explored how the self-concept of the early church was formed through the introduction of three important conceptual metaphors:

THE CHURCH IS THE FAMILY OF GOD
THE CHURCH IS THE BODY OF CHRIST
THE CHURCH IS THE TEMPLE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

“The success of the early Apostles in establishing churches in the diverse cultural soils of their world was directly related to their ability to lead new congregations into a clear understanding and acceptance of these metaphors. Because of their importance in revealing the true nature of the church, these can be referred to as ‘essence metaphors.”

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Core Orientation with @EncompassWorld

Encompass

core_2013_group_photoA great week with some great people! This week of core orientation for Encompass World Partners was really helpful in getting “indoctrinated”:-)

We did talk about the stuff of vision, mission and values, and we were inspired by the story of James Gribble and other Encompass missionaries. Their life stories and lessons learned were very pithy!

IMG_9252We also got to go to a different ethnic restaurant each day, and pray for that part of the world. The food was great, and Atlanta is a very diverse place! A great place for the future of being an apostolic center!

If God continues to raise up workers like the men and women I spent the week with, the building of Jesus’ Church is in good hands!

Encompass Core Orientation