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We are amazed at how God continues to take BCCL into the missions track over these last two years. It’s like opening a can of worms – but in a most positive way! – for us to participate in the huge task that’s unfinished in any way that He enables BCCL.
Mission Mobilization Summit
Timothy and I attended the Asia Mobilization Summit in Indonesia at the end of April and first week of May. Around 80 mission mobilizers from around 20 different nations attended the summit. Its goal was to work together to come up with strategies to mobilize local churches and believers for missions in Asia. Today, per Joshua Project, there are sadly 3.4 billion unreached people in the world; most of them are in Asia. Of the 7,280 unreached people groups (UPGs) in the world, 3,199 are unengaged UPGs (called UUPGs)—they have no contact with a Christian at all, and they do not have access to the Bible as well (per Nurisa). Most of these UUPGs are in Asia, thus the urgent need to mobilize for mission work in Asia. From the day that Jesus uttered the words “the harvest is plentiful but the workers are few” to this day, the harvest is still plentiful and the workers are still so very few. Mission strategies need to change, and partnerships are needed all the more in this day and age. Some mission mobilization organizations like Operation Mobilization have been focusing on Generation Z as a more viable age group to start planting the passion for missions in their hearts at a very young age. Many Millennials have sailed along and are now too busy with college or career to even think or care about missions, although there’s a rare few of them who are still interested. The challenge today is how to communicate with and mobilize the Gen Zs. There are a lot of success stories in Korea and other parts of Asia, as presented in the summit.
For missionaries who are already in the field, retention (how to keep them in the field) is one of the biggest challenges. It’s been found that some local churches are not able to hold the rope for the missionaries that they send. The mission-sending organizations cannot hold the rope alone. They need the local church who sent the missionary to help with missionary care—communicating with them to make sure they are okay on the field, pray for them, and continue supporting them, just like what the church at Philippi did with Paul during his missionary journeys. This is our prayer at BCCL, to train believers to mobilize their local churches to help “hold the rope” through various mission-support ministries (prayer, mobilization, missionary care, etc.) they will start up. The summit affirmed that we are right on track with participating in God’s mission story.
Where God Leads, He Provides
We continue to praise God for the many different and creative ways He is providing for our mission students’ upcoming local cross-cultural exposure trip in Mindanao (south of the Philippines). We did a mobilization fundraiser called “The M:28 Banquet—A Dinner for God’s Cause.” “M:28” stands for Matthew 28, the Great Commission. They sold tickets for a nice dinner, which they prepared themselves. They shared about the indigenous unreached tribes that they will minister to and led their invited church friends and family to pray for such tribes at the banquet as well. We did a total of three M:28 banquets in April.
Then they also did silent auction and thrift shop events, where they pulled out their own pre-loved, used items to sell in such events. We are so thankful for donations of items from fellow believers with a heart for mission that helped a lot in our students’ fundraising endeavors. Please pray for our students’ upcoming local mission trip May 24–June 1. Pray also for the bigger fundraising hurdle they will face starting in June as they prepare for an international short-term mission trip they are required to experience early next year. It will require months of prayers, fundraising, and spiritual preparation. Thank you so much!
Then, to help prepare our students for this short-term mission trip, we had the joy of having Elsie Lewandowski, a retired NAB missionary, visit us May 7–8 for a night of listening to her stories of God’s amazing miracles in the many mission fields she had served in over the last few decades. It was very encouraging to the students for their upcoming cross-cultural experience. It is always a blessing to hear powerful testimonies of God’s work through His missionaries! Our prayer is that God would raise up long-term missionaries through the mission-training program we are doing at BCCL.