Blog - Movements: Recent Episodes

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I’ve just returned from a visit to the Middle East. I made it out just in time.

I spent a week interviewing Iranians who had temporarily left Iran for training—men and women from Muslim backgrounds who are now followers of the Messiah.

During the training, I’d grab someone and take them out for an interview. It’s not safe to release the audio, but I will be writing the stories up for my next book.

I was impressed with how ordinary these people are. They’re not superheroes; they’re legitimately afraid of what could happen when they return to Iran. Each one could seek refuge in the West. They don’t. They go back because they want to share the Jesus whom they have met with their friends and family. They’ve started over 2,000 churches.

Their churches are small. It’s safer that way. They don’t draw attention to themselves. The gospel spreads through tight relational ties—from friend to friend and relative to relative.

All they have are the Scriptures, sometimes just the New Testament, and a simple pattern of discipleship. This is a movement, so the newest disciple is a disciple maker. They know what to do because someone has trained them.

I dropped by to say goodbye the day they left for Iran. We sat down and read the story of Paul’s shipwreck on the way to trial in Rome (Acts 27). I asked them, “What’s God up to in this story? Why is he allowing his messenger to suffer?”

It was a holy moment. I was there as their teacher. The wise old guy who writes books about movements. They were there, with Paul, in the hurricane, trusting God to get them to Rome, where they would bear witness to the Lord Jesus.

We said goodbye, unaware that the war with Israel was about to explode.

A conversation with Puck on what to do when you find you are digging in hard soil.

Caravaggio

The outstanding NT scholar of our generation has decided it’s optional for Christians to believe Jesus rose from the dead in bodily form. He says, “I have friends who I am quite sure are Christians who do not believe in the bodily resurrection.”

Some things are so foolish that only a scholar could believe them.

Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, if Christ hasn’t risen, our faith is useless and we’re still dead in our sins.

For twelve months, I’ve been visiting movements around the world and writing up the stories for my next book. The men and women of faith I meet are not sitting around wondering if it’s ok to stop believing in Christ’s resurrection. They are not debating whether they should uphold Scripture on sex and marriage. They’re not spending years discussing these issues.

The brothers and sisters in Iran, Laos, India, Lebanon, or Northern Nigeria wake up every day wondering if today there will be a knock at the door. Wondering if they will be deprived of their freedom, or worse.

The disciples on death row and maximum security in the Texas prison system aren’t debating how they can disobey the teachings of Jesus on sex. Instead, they’re holding each other accountable to honor him with their bodies. They’re appealing to those who want to step out of darkness into his glorious light.

These are disciple making movements on the rise. They know God honors his Word and blesses obedience. God’s future belongs to them.

They know they do not have the option to deny the resurrection and still say we’re following Jesus. Religious institutions love to question the teaching of Scripture, fall into line with the culture, and run headlong into destruction.

A brief but powerful update from Don Waybright on the movement behind bars in Texas.

It takes the wrong sort of commitment to spend eight years in solitary rather than renounce your membership of the Aryan Brotherhood.

Troop was lost. Lost to his wife. Lost to his mother and son. Lost to himself. Lost to the world. God rescued him out of darkness. Christ died for his many sins. Christ rose to give him new life. Troop is a miracle of God’s grace.

For most of his life, Troop had been a “believer.” Christ was his “Savior,” but his faith was not genuine; it was never expressed in obedience.

With Christ as his Savior and Lord, Troop endured another six years of solitary and a life and death struggle with cancer.

I love what his praying grandmother told him, “You're not going to quit! I don't care what the doctor said. You're going back to get treatment and let Jesus do what Jesus does!”

God rescued this man and is recreating him in the image of his Son. It takes time. There are no shortcuts. It’s slow.

Movements multiply because there are so many Troop stories happening at the same time.

Trained in some simple tools and strategies Troop went back into maximum security, and onto death row as a disciple maker and church planter. Now gang members, murderers and rapists are beginning the same journey out of darkness, and they’re bringing others with them. They’re gathering around God’s Word. They’re ministering to their neighbors.

A movement of God is a work of God through his Word and the Holy Spirit. It’s a miracle. Yet God uses a man like Troop sitting alone in solitary, day after day, for so many years. Waiting.

Previously: 349-Troop’s Story

If you want to learn about movements, follow the stories of changed lives. If there’s no stories, it may not be a movement of God. This story comes from my interview with Troop.

Troop admits, “Most of my life has been a calamity of drug addiction and alcoholism, gangs and prison. My gang was the Aryan Brotherhood.”

“When I got out of prison I tried to build a life without God. But I would always go back to drugs, looking to fill the void. My parents, my wife, would ask, ‘Why do you do that? Why do you come out, climb back on a mountain, and just jump back up in a grave?’ I had no answer.

When he committed a capital offense, two jurors blocked the death penalty and the judged sentenced him to 40 years. He’ll come up for parole when he’s 77.

For joining the Aryan Brotherhood, Terry was put in solitary for eight years. He lived in a concrete cell, for twenty-three hours each day. He got one hour a day alone in the day room.

While he was in jail his mother passed away and his sixteen-year-old son passed away. Troop felt alone in the world with no reason to go on. He thought about suicide but then he remembered Jesus from his youth. His parents never went to church, but they had sent him. Alone in his cell he knelt and prayed, “God you’re going to have to do this. I can’t do it. If you’re real, show me.”

He laid back in his bunk. Something changed.

“I felt God say, ‘You've been saying you know me for a long time but you ain't never followed me.’ So I got up from my bunk and I just started throwing sin out under my door. Dozens of pornographic magazines.”

“My neighbors called out, ‘What you doing?’ I yelled, ‘Leave me alone!’ I had surrendered.”

He began reading God’s Word and his life started changing. The desire for drugs was gone. He knew His whole life he’d been missing a relationship with his Creator.

To get out of solitary a gang member has to go through a program called Gang Renunciation And Disassociation (GRAD). There’s a long waiting list. It took Troop another six years to get in.

During that time he was diagnosed with stage four cancer. He spent a year in the prison hospital and weighed just 120 pounds. The cancer was all over his body. He was placed in the hospice.

Cancer didn’t bother Troop. “Even though I was struggling with chemotherapy and throwing up every day, lost all my hair, even my teeth started falling out from nerve damage from the chemo. I was at peace for the first time in my life. I wanted to go and be with Jesus.”

“But my praying grandmother showed up and she said, ‘You're not going to quit! I don't care what the doctor said. You're going to go back and get treatment and let Jesus do what Jesus does.’” He agreed.

Troop remembers, “When my cancer was cured, I wasn't happy. I told God, I don’t deserve this! Why not heal some child that hasn't done anything wrong?

When he finished the GRAD program, and after eight years in solitary, he was released back into prison life. It was hard.

“Solitary felt like Jonah in the belly of a whale. When the whale finally spat me out, I had some choices to make. I was still in prison. I didn't know about discipleship. I didn't know that God had a plan for my life. I didn’t know that God wanted me to tell others about him.”

“Then I heard that was a seminary starting in the Darrington unit. I could earn a bachelor’s degree in Biblical studies. This is what I’d been praying for, a chance to grow in my understanding of the Bible.”

“The studies answered so many of my questions and taught me, some of my questions don’t even have answers. I caught a vision to change the prison through spreading the gospel.”

“I was a poor high school student, but God gave me a desire to study and I made good grades at seminary. God was molding and shaping me. He gave me a group of brothers who invested in me. They loved me. Something I’d never experienced.”

“The whole time, I knew what I wanted to do. God was leading me back where I’d come from — to the gang members in solitary.”

Three years later, I was one of the first tier walkers ministering to the guys in solitary — the troublemakers, the gang leaders, the drug dealers, the violent men. Just like I’d was.”

349-Troop’s Story

One man’s story paints the picture of a movement of God behind bars in Texas.

For the last six months I’ve been on the road visiting locations where disciples and churches are multiplying to the glory of God. Watching and learning. Listening and wondering. In my mind, I’m building a picture of what it is that distinguishes these movements.

In Rajasthan, India about 80% of the disciples in one movement are out making disciples and planting churches. Among them there is an elderly woman, left for dead by the side of the road and rescued by the disciples because that’s what they do. She can’t read or write, but she can pray and share her story.

I met a woman widowed by her husband’s murder in Laos. When he was murdered, God called her to continue his work, which she has for the last twenty years. She trains and coaches teams, making disciples and planting churches. She’s a tiger.

It’s a movement when insiders are leading. And where does their motivation originate?

I kept hearing this same story. We were miserable, Dad was a violent drunkard. They came in Jesus’ name. Now we go and do the same.

These are not churches for the poor, they are churches of the poor. They go with their story, God’s story and the offer to learn how to follow Jesus by reading the Bible together. They minister out of the fullness of what God has done for them. They go in obedience to Christ’s command and he goes with them. The gospel brings transformation. When your drunkard husband becomes a man of God, your whole world changes, regardless of what political and cultural system you’re under. Sometimes communities are transformed to some measure, more often, the gospel stirs up persecution and suffering.

I’ve met so many who have been beaten, imprisoned, threatened, their homes burned down. One family of three disappeared and has never been seen again.

Around the world, these disciples suffer under the Communists, Islamists and Hindu nationalists. The secret of their resilience is the presence of Christ. He promised persecution and he promised his presence. That’s the source of their courage in the face of fear.

Which better reflects the movement of God in Acts? Our experience or theirs?

We hear from Zeke, a movement catalyst in Indonesia with thirty-five generations of disciples and churches.

I wrote this reflection just after the interview.

I’ve been in SE Asia learning from the movements of disciples and churches. Discovering the price that is paid in terms of persecution from family, other religions and government.

It changes you to hear the stories of these brothers and sisters who suffer rejection, violence, imprisonment and death for the sake of the gospel.

Yet most missional conversations in the West ignore what God is doing in these faraway places. They feel they have nothing to learn, despite their lack of new disciples and new churches.

Then this text came in from a friend, now serving somewhere in the Muslim world,

“I was once asked to come and do a few sessions on evangelism with a group of missionaries in London. Over lunch, we planned to head out and share the gospel. The participants were not happy about this and wanted to “people watch” instead and to “observe the culture.”

One guy said, “Talking to a stranger on the street in London feels wrong, like I’ve overstepped a boundary. It would be like climbing into their morning shower.”

My friend didn’t go back for day two.”

Wherever we find multiplying movements, the gospel goes out with confidence, boldness and openness. It hasn’t changed from Acts.

But somehow, our “missional movements” in the West feel they can defy the example of Jesus and the patterns of Acts and trust that the fish will jump into the boat by themselves. Or perhaps they’ve redefined what the gospel is and lost confidence in the foolish message of the Cross.

God uses this world's weak and foolish things to shame the wise.

 GK Chesterton

Twenty years ago today, I launched this blog with this article. My understanding of movements has come a long way, but this is still a good place to start.

“On five occasions in history the Church has gone to the dogs, but on each occasion, it was the dogs that died.”

GK Chesterton

If Chesterton were alive today I have no doubt he would be writing about the sixth occasion. In this generation will it be the dogs that die? Will the Church be transformed to overcome the challenges we face? Leonard Sweet observes that, in the postmodern world the old maps are obsolete. We're going to have to construct new ones as we go. Although the terrain is unexplored, we are not without a compass. Others have faced this challenge.

Jacques Ellul described the whole history of the Church as the history of the reformation of the Church by the Spirit. Paul Pierson contends that in the renewal and expansion of the Church, the breakthroughs always occur on the fringe of ecclesiastical power never at the center. In every generation, in some obscure place, God is beginning something new that will one day impact the center.

That something new can invariably be described as a "movement". By "movement" I am referring to any group of people called by God who are dedicated to pursuing individual and corporate transformation; resulting in the renewal and expansion of the Church in its mission. Throughout church history there has been an incredible diversity of renewal movements, each making their unique contribution. The most effective share five common characteristics.

1. White-hot faith

A sixteen-year-old boy is taken captive by raiders and sold into slavery. Desperate with loneliness, hunger and cold he cries out to God for deliverance and is answered. He goes on to pioneer one of the greatest missionary movements the world has ever seen.

An obscure Augustinian monk agonizes over what it means to be made right with God through faith. His is an intensely personal struggle out of which the Protestant Reformation is born.

A young minister returns from the mission field, a failure in his own eyes, devoid of the experience of God's loving acceptance. His heart is "strangely warmed" by the grace of God and one of the most significant awakenings in modern history shakes Britain and spreads worldwide.

Patrick of Ireland, Martin Luther and John Wesley—we remember them as powerful historical figures through whom God renewed the Church and transformed the world. We honour them as heroes of the faith. We forget they began as broken men crying out to God for an encounter that would change their lives. Out of personal encounter with God, these transformational leaders went on to renew the Church and to shape the world in which we live.

2. Commitment to a Cause

We all seek to avoid the tension created by the gap between our ideals and our reality. Effective movements exploit that gap and raise the tension. They make life uncomfortable for us all. Movements are uncompromising. They heighten tension inside the Church and with the surrounding culture. Movements are born in conflict because they stand for something.

Australians are cynical when it comes to religion. But in Australia the Salvation Army has a 98% approval rating. That's pretty good considering God polls at only 72%! It has taken generations to build that respect. How did the Salvation Army begin as a renewal movement? They began with the same Church and societal opposition that the early Methodists and Pentecostals faced. They were mocked in the Press, they were beaten by gangs, their meetings were disrupted, their buildings burnt down.

Passionate people make history. That's true for both social and religious movements. They take their cause seriously. They have a clear message that is communicated unambiguously and lived out consistently. The result is often dramatic growth.

3. Contagious Relationships

Changed lives are at the heart of every rapidly spreading religious movement. Lives are impacted, friends and family are influenced. New converts become doors through which the Gospel enters into previously unreached social networks. Sociologically, "Conversion is adopting the faith of your friends."

A key to the incredible growth of Pentecostalism in the 20th Century has been its tendency to grow via face-to-face recruitment by committed individuals using their own pre-existing, significant social relationships. Today, the impact of the Alpha program around the world is attributable to that same dynamic—the spread of the Gospel, from life to life.

A simple, supernatural message of salvation; lives are transformed; and the Gospel spreads like wildfire throughout networks of relationships. The cycle begins again as new converts are quickly deployed in ministry.

4. Rapid Mobilisation

George Bernard Shaw observed, “Every profession is a conspiracy against the laity." It's not that movements abolish the clergy. Rather they abolish the laity. Everyone is ordained and mobilized for ministry.

In 1776 just 17% of the Americans were affiliated with a church. By 1850 that number had grown to 34%. The change can be attributed to the dramatic success the "upstart" Baptists and Methodists had in reaching unchurched people on the frontier. The Baptists and Methodists were led by poorly educated, poorly paid "amateurs" who closely resembled the people they served. In contrast, the sophisticated clergy of the established churches were not trained to earn their livings behind horse and plow, nor were they prepared to spend half their days in the saddle going from one rural hamlet to another.

The Baptists and Methodists planted churches where the people were and empowered them to take responsibility for the ministry. A rapidly changing environment demands that new models for leadership development be implemented. The rest is history.

5. Adaptive Methods

Unencumbered by tradition, movements feel free to experiment with new forms of the church and new effective methods of ministry.

Religious organizations are notoriously difficult to change. Over time our methodologies become even more sacred than our message. In contrast, dynamic movements are characterized by "sanctified pragmatism." They are conservative in doctrine but radical in methodology. When John Wesley first encountered field preaching as a means of mass communication, he was offended. Yet, as he was increasingly shut out of the churches of the day he became an ardent practitioner. "I love the rites and ceremonies of the Church. But I see, well-pleased, that our great Lord can work without them."

Movements adapt themselves to the world around them. They pioneer new and effective strategies without compromising their message.

Conclusion

All around us we see the evidence that the Church as a human institution is in continual decline and decay. Today, much of the Church is still grappling with what mission looks like in the modern world and has no idea of the deep social changes that are being ushered in by the emergence of postmodernity. History offers no guarantees that the Church in its current form will survive.

The uncomfortable reality is that "It belongs to the very life of the people of God that it must accept again and again to have its life renewed by a new confrontation with its Lord and his holy will." The Church is the body of Christ, the temple of the living God who renews His people by His Spirit. This experience of death and new life will continue in the Church until the day when there is a new heaven and a new earth and the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, will come down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.

Until that day, let's dream together of what the Church can become and refuse to put our money on the dogs.

  These five keys became the basis of Movements that Change the World.

Movements That Change the World: Five Keys to Spreading the Gospel

Sad news of the demise of the Anglican Church in Iran. Once home to a thriving membership in the hundreds, since the Islamic revolution in 1979 it has dwindled to less than 100 people in a sea of militant Islam bent on its destruction.

Eight days after the revolution, the pastor of the Anglican church in Shiraz, Arastoo Sayyah, was murdered. Bishop Hassan and his family had fled the country after escaping an assassination attempt. When the bishop’s son, Bahram, returned to Iran the following year, he was murdered. Much of the church’s property was confiscated by the regime.

With its bishop in exile, its three church buildings shut and forbidden to take on new members, the future of the Anglican Church in Iran is bleak. Unless something changes, the membership will dwindle, leaving only empty buildings.

Yet 1979 also marks the beginning of the rise of underground movements of Muslims following the Messiah Jesus. They have no bishops or church buildings and don’t need permission to spread the gospel and make disciples among their friends and neighbors.

Estimates range from one to two million disciples in Iran. All around the world Iranians are among the most responsive people.

For generations, Anglicans pioneered churches among unreached peoples across the Muslim world. But Britain is no longer a colonial power. The world has changed. The paradigm has shifted. The demise of the Anglican churches in Iran is tragic, yet we must not lose sight of the movements of disciples and churches that are springing up across the Muslim world without clergy, without church buildings, and without permission.

Their only resources are the Word, the Holy Spirit, and Christ’s command to make disciples of the nations.

What the Islamists meant for evil, God meant for good.

Source: The suffocation and slow death of the Anglican Church in Iran

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A conversation with father and son, Pavel and Danny about making disciples and planting churches in the Czech Republic.

I had dinner in Bangkok last night with Jai, a brother from Laos.

When Jai was twelve, his cousin shared the gospel with him and he turned to Christ from an animist background. He’s been making disciples ever since. He wants to reach his people and free them from darkness and sin to life in Christ.

To support himself and his family, he still farms rice, chickens, ducks and two cows. He takes the gospel wherever he goes. He casts out demons, heals the sick, makes disciples and plants churches. Thousands have turned to Christ, and hundreds of churches have started.

Resources are scarce, but he makes do. Social and official persecution are always a factor. The police warned him many times, “Stop doing this, or we’ll charge you.”

He’s been in prison once, for one year and twenty-four days, but who’s counting?

The prison was hours away. His wife Sawan would ride the bus every week to see him and bring much-needed food.

Jai was threatened but not beaten in prison. He led eleven prisoners to Christ and formed a new church behind bars.

When he was finally released, it was made clear that there would be no imprisonment next time. “If you keep spreading the gospel, we’ll have you killed.” It’s happened many times before. Government officials hire professional criminals to kill Christian leaders who refuse to remain silent. Their bodies left in prominent places.

Jai could go on the run and get his wife and children safely across the border. There he could apply as a religious refugee to be resettled in the West.

But Jai and Sawan have agreed that God has called them to reach their people. So they stay.

In a bustling café in Bangkok, Peter and John sat down to discuss their remarkable journey in Laos—a Southeast Asian nation where the gospel is advancing against incredible odds. Together, they have spent 50 years fostering movements that multiply disciples and churches.

Peter’s journey began in the 1990s. He trained and discipled local believers, leveraging people of peace to spread the gospel through their networks. By the early 2000s, local believers had baptized thousands of new disciples in multiple streams and provinces and saw many dozens of simple churches formed. All of this in a nation still under Communist rule.

In 2009, John started into the work of forming an apostolic band, and with Peter’s guidance, he embarked on the challenge of making disciples among a remote and unreached people group in one of Southeast Asia’s most closed countries.

Despite the progress, the work faced significant obstacles:

1.Competition for Leaders: Traditional denominations and development organizations often lured away key leaders with offers of salaries, education, and leadership roles. This introduced competing philosophies and ministry approaches that then undermined the sustainability of the indigenous movement. Some of the best pioneers were drawn away; others were discouraged.

2.Persecution: Opposition began within families and escalated to include local and national authorities. Believers faced threats, fines, beatings, eviction from their homes, houses being dismantled, imprisonment, and even death.

Professional assassins executed a leader in front of his teenage son. His wife, now a widow, was no stranger to suffering for Christ. As a young girl, she witnessed her father leave his role in the government and turn to Jesus, only to be convicted of treason for believing in Jesus. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his faith. She grew up without a father and now has lost her husband to the cost of following Christ.

3.Cultural Barriers: The majority of the population is Buddhist, with strong cultural and religious traditions that pose significant barriers to the gospel. Reaching the Buddhist-majority Lao people remains a major challenge, with second and third-generation churches among Buddhists being rare.

4.Traditional Denominational Influence: The introduction of centralized seminary programs risked disrupting the indigenous movement by imposing a more structured and less adaptable approach to disciple and church multiplication.

Despite these challenges, Peter and John partnered with Lao leaders to launch a new team in a new location among an unreached people group. This effort resulted in hundreds of new disciples and churches, reproducing to the second and third generation.

When the evangelical denomination introduced traditional seminary programs. Peter and John met with the denominational leaders to share what God was doing and explain why preserving a simple, Biblical approach to disciple and church multiplication was critical.

To their surprise, the national church leaders not only embraced the vision but invited them to train all their leaders in movement principles and practices. The Holy Spirit moved powerfully, and those passionate about multiplying disciples were empowered to proceed. For those who hesitated, the message was clear: “We are going to do this.” Leaders who resisted were replaced.

At the center of this transformation was a 70-year-old patriarch of the church. God stirred his heart, and he dedicated his remaining years to seeing multiplying churches planted among every people and place in the country.

Since 2017, over 50,000 new disciples have been baptized, and 1,200 churches have been planted across Laos. In 1990 the Christian population was 0.2% then grew to about 2% by 2007, today it is over 3%.

Over 100 people groups—mostly animists—have been engaged by near-culture or same-culture disciples. Movements are thriving among minority groups, but reaching the Buddhist-majority Lao people remains one of the greatest challenges. Second and third-generation churches among Buddhists are still rare.

But that’s not the end of the story . . .

Podcast: 346-When Instant Success Takes Decades

From a noisy cafe in Bangkok, Peter and John give an update on movements of disciples and churches in Laos, SE Asia.

image source

By the time Joe arrived in northern Iraq he understood how movements work. He’d spent two years in north India learning the essentials. Through training and coaching local leaders, movements had launched among the Bhojpuri and Magahi peoples. The progress attracted the attention of the authorities and he had to leave India.

Joe served among Syrian refugees and Iraqi Kurds. The locals he trained, planted churches in the refugee camps. Outside the Kurdish region of norther Iraq, ISIS was still in control.

During this time he met Diar, a disciple who fled across the border from Iran. Jesus had appeared to him in a dream dressed in white. He’d left Iran in search people who could tell him more about this Jesus. He found some house church leaders and they baptized him and taught him.

Diar crossed back into Iran and later returned to Iraq with friends he led to Christ. He wanted them taught and baptized.

That’s when Joe and Diar met. Diar was already winning his friends and family, but no-one had trained him to make disciples. No-one had cast vision for reaching Iran.

In northern India Joe had learned some simple, biblical, reproducing skills and tools for entering unreached communities, sharing the gospel, making disciples, forming churches and multiplying workers. He passed these on to Diar and his friends.

Diar brought some more friends across the border to be trained and sent back into Iran to reach their “oikos”. Which they did. Iranians have suffered under Islamic rule since 1979. They are hungry for the gospel.

Eventually Joe said, “We’re not baptizing any more of your people from across the border. We’ll train you to go back and baptize your own people, train disciples and form healthy churches that multiply.”

That’s how the movement started and spread to multiple provinces in Iran. It began in Tehran and jumped over to Ilam, Azerbaijan then in the Golestan region and Mazandaran. All through networks of relationships — both Kurds and Persians.

Evangelism, baptism and discipleship now took place in Iran. Joe and Diar still intentionally brought leaders across the border for training. They took them through Titus and Timothy on the characteristics of a godly leader. They covered the priesthood of every believer, releasing authority to baptize. They cast vision to engage new locations, new people groups, new provinces.

Joe had learnt to do this in India with local leaders.

Joe laid the list of unreached places and peoples before the emerging Iranian leaders and they asked God for what they should do.

They read Revelation 7, 9–10 together and cast vision for every tribe, every people, every language to have an opportunity to hear the gospel.

Joe reminded them, they have the same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead. They’ve experienced the oppression of Islam throughout their whole lives. Now they are free and called set others free. They have the command of Christ to make disciples and the promise of his presence as they go.

Diar and his people risked their safety and freedom to bring the gospel to every province. They have healthy churches in twenty-six of Iran’s thirty-one provinces.

Ruhosh is a professional who travels to different provinces for her work and to visit family. After she was trained she went home and shared with family and friends from her university days. She also shared with the people she met through her work.

When she came back across the border Joe mapped the friends and family who were now following Christ. It was sixty nine people meeting in thirteen groups across three provinces.

They went over the characteristics of a healthy church (Acts 2:36-47) and asked Ruhosh, what’s next? She answered, “We need to get them all baptized.” That was her assignment. It was done within a week. They used bathrooms and kiddie pools.

When the churches meet they follow the pattern of Acts 2:36-47. They pray for one another, they worship, they share their highs and lows. They celebrate the Lord’s Supper. They give.

They get into the Word asking:

What does this passage tell us about God and his character?
What does this tell us about man and his character?
Are there sins I need to avoid or confess?
And how can we obey what we’ve learned this week?”

They pray and commission one another to follow Christ and make disciples.

They map their network of relationships and identify who they will share with next. They identify unreached locations and where they will go next.

For security, the majority of the churches are just four to seven people. We have twenty-nine multiplying streams of churches. Their are leaders over those streams who function as elder-pastors. Some function as apostolic leaders who train and coach so that they open up new unreached fields.

Individual churches know the church that started them and the churches they help get started. But it’s not safe for them to be in contact with the other churches in the streams.

People have been arrested and interrogated. One has been killed. The less they know the better.

At the same time, they don’t live in fear. They learn they go out as sheep among wolves and need to be as wise as serpents (Luke 10).

Joe says, “We see the leaders we train for such a small amount of time when they come across the border. It’s essential to teach them to abide in Christ. That’s where the fruit comes from. They want to share the Jesus they have met. The Lord is moving. He is multiplying his disciples and churches in Iran.”

Podcast: 345-Coaching from the Sidelines

Joe can’t visit this Muslim nation, but he can train and coach from the sidelines.

Diar grew up a devout Muslim, praying five times each day, going to the mosque, fasting during Ramadan. His father had always wanted him to be an Imam and sent him for training where he learned Arabic, the language of God.

As he studied the Quran he discovered contradictions. At the beginning of the Quran it says, “Pray for people who don’t believe in Islam.” Near the end of the book it says, “If people don’t believe in the God of Islam you must kill them.”

When he asked his teacher, he answered, “You must obey. This is the Word of God.”

Diar knew he wouldn’t.

At the same time the Islamic regime in Iran was mistreating its people, especially the Kurds. Diar is Kurd.

He wanted to leave Islam behind. Quietly he began exploring different faiths.

He prayed, “God I want to know you! Who are you? Are you there? Are you good? Why is there so much evil in the world?”

He was searching for God but after four years he’d found nothing. So he became an atheist and joined the Communist underground resistance to the regime.

He was angry. He was empty.

One night he had a dream. Over the mountains he saw a shining light in the sky. People were calling out, “Jesus is coming!” The light made him see that each person had dark things inside that controlled them. They were deaf and blind slaves. He saw the darkness within himself and he was afraid.

He woke and began his search for Jesus. He knew the Quran said Jesus was a prophet. But how could he go to find out more?

If he visited a church and the regime found out, he could be imprisoned or worse.

So he traveled to a neighboring country to find a church and learn about Jesus. He visited a house church where he knew people and they shared the gospel with him. He repented, put his faith in Jesus and was baptized.

He returned to Iran wanting to tell everyone they could be forgiven and freed from the darkness within that controls them. “You’re a slave and you need Jesus to set you free!”

He proclaimed God’s Word with power. He talked to everyone he knew. He told them about his dream and the dark reality within. People were set free by Jesus, they were healed, they were forgiven, they were delivered.

The Word spread and grew. So did the opposition from the Islamic government and radical Muslims.

As the movement grew, it was hard to remain secret.

Diar fled the country until the opposition died down.

“Despite the danger, I still wanted to reach my people and my nation. Yet I didn’t know how. I prayed that God would lead me to the right people. I met some Koreans who introduced me to Jerry. He told me he would be honored to help me reach my nation.”

Jerry gave us simple, but powerful ways to share the gospel, make disciples, plant churches and reproduce leaders. We call it the 4-Fields.

Diar returned home.

“As soon as we implemented the training, the movement took off. We were surprised it was growing so fast.”

“Each disciple reached the people around them. We took the 4-Fields training to locations across the country — different regions, different cities. We’ve been doing that for seven years.”

“We could not have done it without the training and the coaching, the love and support. Jerry has released everything to us — he teaches us and then we do it and train others. We teach, we baptize,we help disciples start churches.”

“We have a vision for every village and neighborhood to have a church and access to the Bible.”

“Muslims respect the Bible, it’s a holy book. When you give them a Bible they respect it. When we say, ‘This is a holy Bible," they kiss it and put it with the Quran.’”

“We have started 2,000 churches with some streams to the 12th generation. The churches vary in size from four to twelve people.”

I asked, “Why don’t you leave Iran? Why not escape to a safe place?”

Diar answered, “We have experience with God. Now we tasted and we know this is real. Jesus is our savior, our God.”

“We saw a lot of people change their life. And we know this is true. We will die one day, but with Jesus, we have eternal life. We believe.”

Podcast: 344-Diar and Miriam’s Story

This week I visited Zeal Church in Newport Beach, Southern California. It's one church in a network of multiplying disciples and churches in Southern California.

Sometimes you see it so clearly you’re dazzled by reality.

I’m looking into movement case studies around the world. This morning I did a video interview with a brother in SE Asia. We’ll call him Isaiah. It’s a Muslim nation. He’s seen two decades of advance resulting in thousands of new churches and tens of thousands of disciples.

His English is good, but not a native speaker. So I’m just getting the main points. I’ll visit near year to dig deeper.

But in the space of thirty minutes, I saw it. The difference between his world and mine.

He grew up in a Christian family, ended up in jail where he understood the gospel for the first time. When he got out he headed for seminary and then struck out to plant churches.

Eight hours a day, every day, he was out sharing the gospel with Muslims. That’s all he knew to do. He had no idea how to plant a church, but he believed the gospel that had saved him in prison could save Muslims. He took the gospel to the Mosque, the marketplace, schools and neighborhoods. Two years without a breakthrough. Then one new disciple. Another year of hard work and the movement began.

I asked him if there was persecution. The answer came back, “That’s the price we pay. We teach our disciples to suffer for Christ.”

Leaders in my world get some pressure around Jesus’ teaching on sex and marriage and they bow the knee. They don’t pay the price.

Isaiah told me, “I don’t plant churches. Our workers take the gospel to unreached places and peoples and then help the new disciples plant churches. The workers spend eight hours a day entering unreached communities and sharing the gospel. They don’t go home until they’ve shared the gospel with 5–10 people. Everyday.

The leaders in my world, preach to believers, counsel believers, administer churches. I know one or two who are out every week sharing the gospel. That’s one or two.

The leaders I know have reinvented the Great Commission to serve a vision to “transform” their community, city and society. Something Jesus, the Twelve, Paul and the disciples in Acts never managed to do. Wherever they went, trouble followed them. They took the gospel to unreached places and the fruit was always disciples and churches to the glory of God. Two thousand years later, that’s what Isaiah does.

That’s the difference between the world I inhabit most of the time and Isaiah’s world.

A movement begins when insiders spread the good news and make disciples. This is a story of salvation and multiplication.

This is not Hamid

Jordan and Victor were getting ready to go out into the harvest in Southern California. They prayed, “Lord lead us to someone who is seeking you, someone like Zachaeus in the tree.

Jordan says, “We were at our local hangout reading the Word together, then we decided to prayer walk the area. Just then a guy walked in, but the place was closing. He left and we ran after him!”

We caught up to him and told him, “We love Jesus! and how he has changed our lives. The guy wanted to know more.

Hamid was an Iranian engineering student studying in the United States.

Hamid told them, “This is amazing. I grew up Muslim, but I began feeling Islam can’t be the way God treats people. For the last two weeks I’ve been praying every morning, asking God to make himself known to me.”

Jordan and Victor shared the 3-Circles with Hamid and he wanted to know more. They said, “If you want to read the Bible, we’d love to read with you.”

The next day they met and read through Genesis 1 and John 1. At the end Hamid said, “This is the Word of God! This is what I’ve been seeking! That God created us in his image and we ran from that, that makes so much sense to me.”

Within one week he’d read through the whole New Testament. During that time he was approached by a cult who told him, “You have to get baptized by us if you want to be saved.”

He told them, “That’s not what I’ve read in the Bible.”

The next week Victor baptized him and Hamid was added to the disciples. Now he’s sharing boldly with his classmates and meeting regularly for discipleship and church.

What happened was not an accident. Here’s what I learned:

Jordan and Victor look for people far from God and engage them. They know what their mission is.
They know what to do. They have the simple skills of prayer walking, Gospel sharing and 3-Thirds discipleship in the Scriptures.
They are confident that the Scriptures will speak to Hamid and lead to conversion and discipleship.
What they did with Hamid, Hamid was able to do with his relationships — almost immediately.
They didn’t have to fly to Iran to reach Persians, God has brought them to their backyard.
If you can reach and disciple Muslims in your city, you can reach them in theirs. If you know how to make disciples, all you need to add is some language and culture.
Movements have fresh stories of people far from God like Hamid, who are now following Jesus and fishing for others.

This is what the movement of God looks like. It’s happening all over the world.

For two generations we’ve witnessed the decline and decay of religious institutions across the Western world. As they drift from the Word, the Spirit and the core missionary task, expect more of the same. Meanwhile, God is at work, always on the fringes doing something new, which is at the same time a return to the old ways.

Jesus came to fulfill Israel’s calling to be a light to the nations. He called men and women to follow him and learn to fish for others. He embodied true Israel. He invited his opponents to come and join the celebration as the prodigals returned home.

Eventually judgment will fall on Jerusalem and the Temple and the new Israel will emerge to take its place.

Acts is the story of how the movement of God emerges and comes to replace the Temple and the priesthood.

Jesus’ disciples are not on the inside but on the fringe of institutional religion. The gospel goes out in the power of the Spirit and the fruit is disciples and churches to the glory of God.

It’s the movement that puts pressure on the institution by its very existence. There’s continuity and discontinuity. Continuity — like Jesus the disciples are faithful Jews who believe the Scriptures have been fulfilled in Jesus. They are fulfilling Israel’s destiny. Discontinuity — they engage on their own terms. They do not try and change the system from within. Like Jesus, they invite the religious leaders to embrace what God is doing.

They are the movement of God that fulfills Israel’s calling. The religious leaders have all the institutional power and bitterly oppose the movement. The disciples have nothing but the Word, the Spirit and the core missionary task which they pursue. The gospel goes out in power and the fruit is disciples and churches to the glory of God. The true Israel is fulfilling its destiny by being a light to the nations. Unlike Lot’s wife, they don’t look back at what is passing away. They look forward to what God is doing.

The Rise and Fall of Movements: A Roadmap for Leaders

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A conversation with Berk Wilson who has given his life to reaching students to reach the world.

Previous interview: 079-Pioneering movements among students — Berk Wilson

All over the Western world progressive and former evangelical church leaders are drifting from the authority of God’s Word and are wandering down the Missio Dei cul-de-sac.

The Missio Dei (Latin for mission of God) is a theology of missions embraced by many evangelicals that is “corroding the evangelical missionary enterprise from within.” Peter Pikkert

It was first conceived of by the mainline, liberal Protestant churches resulting in their steady decline and decay. When it had run out of steam some evangelical missiologists embraced the idea, and it became “the the most popular theological basis for missions.”

The Missio Dei argues that the goal of God’s mission in the world is the renewal of the whole creation. The church is called to participate with God in the restoration of all things.

Sounds great, until you dig a little deeper.

The Missio Dei ignores, or avoids, the problem of sin and judgment. Forgiveness and eternal life come only through repentance and faith in Christ’s atonement and resurrection from the dead. Jesus did not pursue political and social transformation, nor did his disciples in Acts. Jesus came to to call sinners to repentance, and to give his life as a ransom for many.

God will restore and transform the whole of creation — on the other side of his judgment. Meanwhile God is at work in human history to discipline his people, and to oppose evil. There is no promise of social and political transformation in this life. The opposite — Jesus prophesied persecution for those who remain faithful to him.

Social and political transformation is the naive hope of Western elites who have access to wealth and power or at least a Facebook account. Today in the majority world Jesus’ disciples suffer for his name. Yet the Word goes out through them in the power of the Spirit, its fruit are disciples and churches to the glory of God, from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

Peter Pikkert: Missio Dei and the Corrosion of Christian Missions

Jesus weeps over Jerusalem

The troubles in the Church of England are another example of how across the Western world progressive and former evangelicals have denied the authority of Scripture and neglected the core missionary task. We shouldn’t be surprised, it’s a recurring pattern in the history of God’s people. Endless conversations are not the answer. The way back is to return to the life and mission of Jesus.

Jesus founded a missionary movement that would go to the ends of the earth. That’s why one of his first acts was to call some fishermen to follow him and learn to fish for others.

He had come to call true Israel out of historic Israel. There was both continuity and discontinuity. Continuity — he came to fulfill Israel’s calling as the true Son of God. God’s people will be a witness to the nations, as God intended. Discontinuity — not all Israel would embrace their Messiah and their calling.

Jesus was a faithful Jew who fulfilled the Hebrew Scriptures, attended the synagogue and the Temple, and the great festivals in Jerusalem. He debated his opponents and urged them to embrace what God was doing. The story of the prodigal son ends with the father’s appeal to the older son to join the celebration; for the son who was lost is now found.

But Jesus does not invest himself in the institution. He doesn’t attempt to save it. His priority is the new Israel which he embodies. He embraces Israel’s true identity and mission. He pioneers a missionary movement as he calls everyone — pharisees, scribes, priests and prostitutes, soldiers, tax collectors and farm laborers. They are the vanguard of the true Israel, the new Israel which will reach the nations and fulfill Israel’s destiny.

In AD 70, the Romans destroyed Jerusalem, the Temple and the priesthood, as Jesus prophesied. Out of the rubble, a movement emerged of the disciples he had chosen, trained and sent into Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the uttermost ends of the earth.

In the conversation with Bill there were some handy lessons for people considering a call to make disciples from where they are to the ends of the earth.

1. Step out

Bill heard God’s call on a mission trip to Nepal ten years ago. When Peter heard the call to go to Cornelius’ house and reach Gentiles he was away from Jerusalem on the edge of what God was doing, open to change.

2. Begin here and now

Bill’s response to God’s call was to begin making disciples and planting churches immediately where he was in Florida.

3. Find your tribe

Bill and Sue partnered with Troy and Rachel Cooper in making disciples and training others. They joined the team headed for Southern California.

4. Put the time in

To succeed in any human endeavor you need 10,000 hours of practice and experience. Bill and Sue put in the hours connecting with people, sharing the gospel, forming new disciples into churches, training and mentoring workers, dealing with all the problems and challenges along the way.

5. Seek God in the fog of unanswered prayer

They had to learn to trust God during years of infertility.

6. Hear his voice

They knew they were called one day, to go after unreached people groups. They identified possibilities. They fasted and prayed and sought input.

As they prayed, Central Asia would not let them go.

7. Watch God confirm

Two weeks after the decision to head for Central Asia, God confirmed their calling when Sue became pregnant with their first daughter. A nice confirmation that they’d made the right choice.

This is another example of what we call “movement to mobilization”. The most effective way to mobilize workers is out of an existing movement. The alternative is to go from mobilization to movement, that is mobilize people who have no experience of making disciples and expect them to make it happen in a strange place.

This is what to look for:

Calling from the Lord
Character developed (in tough times)
Competency (pioneering, training and networking)
Community in the work (disciples, peers and mentors).

These elements don’t guarantee results, but they make them more likely. When troubles inevitably come, you have people who know their calling, are used to persevering, know what needs to be done and are not alone.

Interview: 338-NoPlaceLeft Central Asia

Archbishops of York and Canterbury

The Church of England have been embroiled in controversy over sex and marriage for decades. No-one knows how long it will continue, but it will continue. Denominational officials, leaders of contemporary progressive evangelical and charismatic churches, have told me this is a “complex” issue that will take years to resolve. What they don’t grasp is that some issues are not up for discussion.

When Nehemiah was rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem news came to Israel’s enemies and they sent him this message: “Come, let us meet together... So Nehemiah sent messengers to them with this reply: ‘I am carrying on a great project and cannot go down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and go down to you?’” ‭‭Nehemiah‬ ‭6‬:1-‭3‬

Nehemiah knew that some matters are not up for discussion. God had given him a job to do and he would not to neglect it.

Movements are renewed by making a fresh return to their identity in Christ. Jesus was obedient to his Father’s Word, dependent on the Holy Spirit and faithful to the core missionary task. The book of Acts shows us what that looks like for the people of God. The Word goes out in the power of the Spirit and wherever it goes the fruit is disciples and churches to the glory of God – in every place and among every people group.

That’s true north. God’s people are renewed by returning to their identity in Christ and living out the mission he has given us. As Nehemiah did in his day.

Historically institutions and denominations rise and fall the degree to which they align themselves with the life and ministry of Jesus. The Word will triumph, it will go out to every people and every place. That is as sure as Jesus’ promise. There is no guarantee that any expression of the church will survive and if it does, not guarantee it will remain faithful to the gospel.

There’s a time to talk, and a time to go back to work.

Archbishop Justin Welby (left)

“In a significant interview on the Rest is Politics Podcast, England's Archbishop of Canterbury has denied the teaching of the Bible and the teaching of his church. Archbishop Welby says sex should be in a committed relationship, and it doesn't matter whether that relationship is straight or gay.

All sexual activity should be within a committed relationship, and whether it's straight or gay.

The statement by the Archbishop is a further betrayal of his ordination and consecration vow to banish error and to uphold and defend the truth taught in Scripture.”

We’ve had fifty years of experience of liberal protestants abandoning the authority of Scripture and going with the flow of Western culture. We know where this will end. So why is a new generation of evangelical progressives headed in the same direction?

The battle has always been over the question, “Did God say?” The Bible tells the story of God speaking and expecting our trust and obedience. The movement of God is founded on Jesus’ sacrificial obedience to his Father’s Word. The story of the early disciples tells the story of the spread of God’s Word in the power of the Holy Spirit. The fruit of that spread is disciples and churches to the glory of God among every people and in every place.

Come out from under the authority of God’s Word and everything is lost.

It’s not just the Archbishop of Canterbury who’s bowed the knee. Church leaders across the Western world have gone silent on the teaching of Scripture about sex and marriage, afraid of offending either the culture or their more conservative congregations.

Meanwhile, the Word of God advances in power in the majority world. There are more Anglicans in Nigeria than in Britain and they are dying daily under Islamist persecution. They pay a huge price for their faithfulness to God’s Word. If only the Archbishop would do the same.

A conversation with “Bill” about pursuing movements of disciples and churches in Central Asia, home to around 80 million people. Most are Muslims.

When you make social transformation and evangelism equal partners in the mission of God, history shows, eventually evangelism is lost.

The dominant view of contemporary missiology, is the goal of mission is to transform communities and promote human flourishing by healing social ills and bringing justice. I call it the missional fog.

Instead, in the New Testament:

Missionaries establish contact with non-Christians.
They proclaim the news of Jesus the Messiah and Savior (proclamation, preaching, teaching, instruction),
They lead people to faith in Jesus Christ (conversion, baptism), and
They integrate the new believers into the local community of the followers of Jesus (Lord’s Supper, transformation of social and moral behavior, charity).

Jesus founded a missionary church: its existence and activities were an expression of its missionary calling, its members were fearlessly determined to win others to faith in Jesus as the crucified and risen Messiah. Their mission field began at home in Jerusalem and Judea, and it extended to the ends of the earth.

The goal and purpose of their missionary work was the making of disciples and the creation of communities of disciples—people who turned from their old way of life, put their trust in Jesus, and obeyed his teaching. From Jerusalem to every people, every place.

John Stott, Billy Graham, Lausanne ‘74

It is our duty to be involved in socio-political action; that is, both in social action (caring for society’s casualties) and in political action (concerned for the structures of society itself).

John Stott

In 1974 John Stott led the Lausanne movement to embrace both evangelism and social action as two sides of the same coin representing the mission of God. John Stott saw evangelism and social action as “two blades of a pair of scissors or two wings of a bird”. A view that Billy Graham did not support.

Lausanne has a long history that stretches back to a student missionary movement that emerged on the campuses of the United States and the United Kingdom in the late 1800s. This movement committed itself to the “Evangelization of the World in this Generation.” Tens of thousands of students took up the challenge and took the gospel to the ends of the earth. They helped shift Christianity from a predominantly European-American movement to a global movement.

This student movement ultimately led to the first World Missionary Conference held in Edinburgh 1910. The conference was driven by the watchword of “the Evangelization of the World in this Generation”.

The student missionary movement provided key leadership for Edinburgh which ultimately led to the founding of the World Council of Churches (WCC) in 1948. Yet by then, the Evangelization of the World in this Generation was no longer their watchword. Evangelism was acknowledged, but the real action lay with the social and political agenda. Eventually, the motto became, “The world sets the agenda for the church.”

Ironically, Lausanne 74 was initiated by Billy Graham as an evangelical response to the WCC’s embrace of political and social movements. Such movements were regarded as expressions of the kingdom of God. Yet the Lausanne Covenant, largely crafted by John Stott, includes the statement championed by the WCC that ‘evangelization requires the whole church to take the whole gospel to the whole world’. The “gospel” had expanded to include social, political, cultural and economic transformation.

How does that vision compare with Jesus’ example and teaching on the movement of God?

When Jesus rose from the dead he confronted a defeated band of disciples. In just forty days he transformed them into a missionary movement. How did he do it? He took them on a journey through the whole Old Testament laying a foundation for the movement of God.

He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”

Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised, but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”

Luke 24:44–49

The kingdom doesn’t come without the King and good news of his death and resurrection and the call throughout the world to repent and receive forgiveness of sins.

When the promised Spirit comes in power and the Word goes out Luke shows us what the mission of God looks like in every age and in every place and among every people group. It’s all there in Acts 2 — disciples and churches to the glory of God, beginning in Jerusalem and spreading to every people and every place.

What about political and social transformation? Everywhere the gospel goes in Acts towns and cities are transformed — into riots. When the dust settles disciples and churches emerge. Was Jerusalem transformed? Jesus handed Jerusalem over to the judgment of God. Was the empire transformed? Paul stood before Nero in chains with nothing but the call to repent and have your sins forgiven.

I don’t know if the Lausanne movement is on the same trajectory as the WCC. Movements rise and fall, but not inevitably. The key to renewal is to return to the life and ministry of Jesus—his obedience to the Father’s Word, his dependence on the Holy Spirit and his faithfulness to the core missionary task.

Previously. . . Lausanne and the Evangelization of the World

The Rise and Fall of Movements: A Roadmap for Leaders

Billy Graham, John Stott

Recently thousands of Christians from 200 nations gathered in Seoul, Korea for the fourth Lausanne Congress. The first Congress in 1974 was initiated by Billy Graham and led by John Stott.

Lausanne’s founding purpose was to promote “world evangelization.” But fifty years later, Ed Stetzer asks if the Lausanne movement is losing its focus on evangelism. Stetzer reminds us, that Lausanne has always had a tension between “prioritism” (priority of evangelism) and “integralism” (evangelism as one part of holistic mission).

In 1966 Stott held that “the commission of the Church ... is not to reform society, but to preach the Gospel.” But the 1960s were a time of great social ferment and within just a few years Stott concluded that social action was an integral part of the Great Commission, that it includes a mandate to reform society by political means.

Stott drew on John’s account of Jesus telling his disciples that as his Father had sent him, so he was sending them. Just as Jesus’ mission had involved caring for people’s bodies, as well as their souls, so should that of the church.

Stott wrote, “It is our duty to be involved in socio-political action; that is, both in social action (caring for society’s casualties) and in political action (concerned for the structures of society itself).”

Billy Graham wanted Lausanne to stick to evangelism and mission as traditionally understood. But Stott threatened to resign from the committee if Graham’s vision for the movement prevailed. Stott won the day.

Lausanne embraced the view that evangelism and social action are “two blades of a pair of scissors or two wings of a bird”.

In 1974, John Stott led a revolution in our understanding of the Great Commission. Is it any wonder then, that 50 years later, the evangelization of the world is only one of many agendas pursued by the Lausanne movement?

I grew up attending an elite private school in Melbourne. It was a boy’s school, but fortunately, just down the road was the Methodist Ladies College (MLC). I have fond memories of attending dancing classes with the MLC girls in year ten.

So I was interested to hear this week that MLC has banned its students from wearing crosses for fear of offending. Someone complained so it’s off with your crosses girls. You can wear them at home.

The Methodist movement began almost three centuries ago after John Wesley’s heart was “strangely warmed” by the gospel. He wrote in his journal, “I felt I did trust in Christ alone for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.”

Transformed, Wesley traveled throughout Britain with a vision for the conversion and discipling of a nation and the renewal of a fallen church. Within a generation that vision extended to the whole world as Methodists fanned out to faraway places like Australia sharing the gospel, planting churches and founding institutions like the Methodist Ladies College, which today has banned the wearing of crosses.

Wesley predicted something like this would happen when he wrote,

“I am not afraid that the people called Methodists should ever cease to exist either in Europe or America. But I am afraid lest they should only exist as a dead sect, having the form of religion without power. And this undoubtedly will be the case unless they hold fast both the doctrine, spirit, and discipline with which they first set out.”

In the Rise and Fall of Movements, I describe how movements rise and fall as they move towards, or away from, the life and ministry of Jesus. Who was obedient to his Father’s Word, dependent on the Holy Spirit and faithful to the core missionary task.

So I’m no longer surprised when church leaders are embarrassed by Jesus’ teaching on sex and marriage. After all, “It’s a ‘complex’ issue that may take years to work out.” I’m not surprised when mission experts turn mission into “human flourishing” and “social transformation”.

This drift has been a recurring pattern in the West for over 100 years. I don’t despair because the rest of the world is leading the way in fulfilling Jesus’ command to make disciples among every people, and in every place.

I just keep following the stories of multiplying disciples and churches to the glory of God. Everything else will pass away.

The Rise and Fall of Movements: A Roadmap for Leaders

Max and Sydnie

Troy Cooper was at the skate park with his kids when he spotted a 19-year-old hippie pro-skater wearing a t-shirt with Scripture on it.

He calls out, “Hey man, nice shirt!”

Max thought Troy was making fun of him so he sat down and began sharing the gospel with Troy.

Max had been praying and fasting for God to lead me to a community where I could learn how to plant churches." Troy was the answer to that prayer.

Max explained, “I’ve been a believer for just under a year. I’ve led eleven people to faith. I want to know what to do with those people.”

Troy responded, “Let’s walk together.”

Troy remembers, “By that time in Southern California, there was a church meeting almost every night somewhere. We would visit a different church each night in the home. Max was seeing the three-thirds format. He's seeing new believers participating in leadership roles within the three-thirds. He's seeing them get together outside of the gathering to share the gospel, to get in the word together, to disciple.”

“He's watching all this play out. He's learning in community. And then I think the next week, we went down with him to Oceanside and he led some guys to Christ. And my sons, Malachi and Isaiah were like, "Hey, man, you got to follow them. You got to walk with them. So they trained him.”

“After a month or two of that, he felt compelled by the Lord to go back to Phoenix. And he led his twin sister to faith.”

“He gathered some of those people that he had shared with before. And based on what he had learned from Zeal and other churches in LA, he started with the 411, the Commands of Christ, then the Church Circle tool to discover what church is from Acts 2.”

Then he started a church in his home. That one church has become many in Phoenix and throughout the US as Max traveled to skating events, connecting with his network of relationships. Everywhere he goes he leaves behind disciples and bands he’s led to Christ and trained.

Max is now married to Sydnie and they’re a team. They’ve just moved to Europe and are building a team to reach their city.

Troy has stayed close to Max and seen him grow in calling, character and competency. Max thrives on the front line, but he’s no longer alone wondering what to do. He’s now part of a community of practitioners in the US, Europe and worldwide.

Troy explains, “With Max and Sydnie serving stateside we saw their:

Calling from the Lord
Character developed (in tough times)
Competency (pioneering, training and networking)
Community in the work (disciples, peers and mentors).

That’s how we knew they were ready to be mobilized from a movement to labor among new peoples in a new place.”

This is such a good story I’m going to follow up with an interview of Max and Sydnie. Notice how God works! He brings Max and Troy together at just the right time. This is a connection made in heaven. That’s what God does, on his timetable, not ours.

But Troy and Max played their part in God’s plan. Max is a new disciple, making disciples, praying the fasting for God to send someone who to mentor and train him. Troy is out in the community with his family, sharing and making disciples. When Max comes along he immediately knows how to equip him and draw him into a community of practitioners. His sons Malachi and Isaiah know how to equip Max because they’ve been doing this their whole lives.

This is not recruitment this is a movement. This gives those who are called to missions an opportunity to grow in character, competency and community before they are mobilized.

Interview: 337 Movement to Mobilization

A conversation with Troy Cooper about the difference between “recruitment” and “movement to mobilization”.

Michal and Bryan King

In 2015 when Bryan King set up a NoPlaceLeft residency it was an experiment. Looking back nine years later, the experiment was a success, but success came at a price.

The residency runs over one or two years. Residents give seven to ten hours a week and are immersed in multiplying disciples and churches — practices, principles and problem-solving.

The first residency resulted in three families deployed in South Asia. Most graduates have deployed overseas, and some have remained in local work.

But Bryan wasn’t prepared for the impact of losing so many dear friends. As each one left it felt like he was losing family.

Around the same time, his family moved into a time of real suffering and hardship with one of his children.

There were conversations he had with the Lord in which he said, “I ﬁnally know what I want to do. This is stuff my whole adult life that's been moving towards, and now I can't do those things.”

He entered a time of deep discouragement.

His validation as a disciple maker and a leader was based on results. When others criticized his movements approach he thought, “I’ll show you. I’ll do this.”

Then something began to shift in him. He sought answers to his discouragement by studying the Gospels and Acts with others. Slowly he realized, “Fruit comes and goes but this is who I am.” Bryan was becoming a different person.

Along the way, God encouraged Bryan. There was Daniel and Laura in a nearby apartment complex who came to Christ. Daniel told him, “If you guys ever think twice about if you made a difference in anyone's life, if you ever think twice about sharing the gospel with anyone, just know that you made a difference in my life.”

There was Elizabeth, “the little short Hispanic lady who showed up at that training” and learned how to share the gospel in the local convenience store, and with her friends and family. She’s joined the team and knows what to do when someone new wants to follow Christ.

Bryan realized, “If I died today, there'd be many things in my ministry that would die. But the men and women that God has raised up, that's the fruit and it's amazing.”

In the middle of pain and chaos, that’s what God was up to. “It's about men and women being transformed into the image of God and obeying Jesus no matter what because He's worthy of our worship.”

Disciples under persecution learn to keep a low profile and watch for what God does next. The breakthrough will come. The same principle applies here. While Bryan was enduring faithfully, God was preparing him for a breakthrough.

He teamed up with Jared and Josh Howard to help prevailing model churches to go after movements. They take church leaders through a six-month process of discovery in the Scriptures. They meet every two weeks online. The Word does the work as they look at Genesis to Revelation or the 4-Fields in the Gospels and Acts. As these leaders see it in the Scriptures they’re hungry for action and ready to be trained in simple tools. As these pastors are transformed, they’re ready to lead their churches into the harvest.

A new door of opportunity has opened. God has done this. When Bryan was down for the count, crying out to God, God was reshaping his heart.

Bryan says, “This is what shifted in me, I know who I am. I am a disciple. I am a disciple maker. This is my identity.”

The interview: 336-Turned Around Leaders, Turnaround Churches

Bryan’s podcast: Unleash the Priest

Terry Solley was fourteen years old when his father put a pistol in his hand and they began doing armed robberies together in Southern Louisiana.

Eventually, they were arrested and at eighteen Terry went to prison for multiple armed robberies for the next eleven years. He got out at twenty-nine and stayed out for just fifteen months. Then he and his father were arrested robbing a Wells Fargo bank and they both went back to prison this time in Texas.

Terry spent another seventeen years in prison, for a total of twenty-eight years of his life.

He became a prison gang member in his first time in prison, he rose in seniority in the gang and spent eight and half years in solitary confinement for being a threat to the order and security of the prison. He was alone, locked in his cell, twenty-three hours a day.

Between the ages of eight and fourteen, Terry went to church with his mom and stepfather, but that ended around the time he began robbing banks with his father. He knew the gospel. He would even have said, “Jesus is my Savior.”

But in jail a second time, in solitary confinement, awaiting trial with his father God got his attention. People came into the unit and shared the gospel with him. Terry realized he didn’t just need a Savior, he needed a Lord. He surrendered his life to Christ, Savior and Lord.

You don’t get free from solitary just because you become a Christian. There’s a process. It would be another two and a half years before he was released from solitary.

Freed from solitary, Terry enrolled in the prison’s seminary. Prisoners with long sentences could go to the seminary, receive a bachelor's degree in Biblical studies and be sent out as a missionary to another prison.

That’s how Terry met Don Waybright. Don was going into the prison to train the seminary students in sharing the gospel, making disciples and forming discipleship clusters that functioned as churches. (Regulations prohibit calling them churches.) Terry dived right in. Soon there were Bible studies in every day room in the prison.

Terry and the team Don trained weren’t just doing the work, they were training the disciples to share their stories and the gospel story and form groups for discipleship. As the movement grew it expanded into other Texas prisons.

Terry became a pastor to prisoners on death row. He was with the men up to their execution.

One prisoner named Anibal knew Terry from twenty years before when they were both gang members but from opposing gangs. He has been on death row for twenty-three years because he murdered a prisoner.

He was stunned by what God had done in Terry’s life. The other prisoners respected Anibal and listened to him. As he surrendered his life to Christ, he became a “man of peace” (Luke 10) through whom the gospel spread. Death row is made up of sections where fourteen men live together. Now churches are meeting in six sections of death row. They study the Scriptures and worship every day. Men like Anibal have surrendered to the Lord and are making disciples. Death row is being transformed by Christ in them, the hope of glory.

Terry Solley (right)

Terry explains, “Throughout the prison, church looks like a group of four or five men sitting around the table, studying the word of God, worshiping together, taking communion together, holding each other accountable, modeling what Christianity looks like for each other.”

“The churches are effective because the men are doing it themselves. They are sharpening each other, discipling and mentoring each other. It’s spreading from prison to prison across the Texas prison system. There are 104 prisons in Texas. We have disciples in 42 of those prisons.”

Terry says, “We know that if a man comes to Christ, his whole relational world is affected. You know, prison gives you a concept of what it means to be a man, but the Bible, the word of God, gives you a whole different concept. So I began living my life as a man of God inside of prison.”

“When I went to that seminary program at Darrington Unit, my father was there. And he began watching me. He began seeing a different son than the one he raised. He gave his life to the Lord because he saw the change that the Lord had done in me. He was 63 years old. A couple of months later, he died of stage four lung cancer.”

“We have men who surrender their life to the Lord in prison, and their children see the difference, and their wives see the difference. They come to the Lord, and they join the Christian community on the outside.”

“But a lot of men do come out of prison and they fall because they don't have accountability and support. That’s why we’re building a five-acre community called Restoration Harbor where men, long-term offenders, can come out of prison, can have a place to stay for a year to get intense discipleship training.”

“We want to build these men up to go back into the prisons with the gospel, to go to the streets with the gospel, to become generational changers through the gospel of Jesus Christ.”

“I broke my wife's heart, I left her alone with our five-month-old daughter and knowing that there are other men in prison who if they don't change, if the gospel doesn't penetrate their hearts, they'll get out of prison, make all these promises to their family and then commit crimes and go right back to prison and leave another wife heartbroken, leave another child alone to be raised without a father.”

“So when I look back on my life and I see how the Lord has changed me, how he has reconciled my family, how he has built and strengthened my relationship with my daughter, every time I wake up and look at her, it motivates me to do what I do because I don't want another wife heartbroken. I don't want another child to have to be raised without their father.”

Links

Interview: 324-Release to the Captives
Texas Prison Outreach

Bryan King has been on a seven-year journey learning how God turns churches around to embrace the Great Commission. Meanwhile, God had a plan to turn Bryan around.

Links:

Unleash the Priest Podcast
151-A Local Church Takes on the Great Commission

Jared spent his first eighteen months in South Asia working hard at all the right things but seeing very little fruit. Then, alone on a 14-hour car drive, he brought his complaint to God. “What is this happening!” God’s response was, “Who are you serving? Yourself or me?” Jared surrendered and the first breakthroughs were just a couple of weeks away.

They came in the form of people, local workers he trained who were committed to action.

Jared says, looking back, in your first two or three years on the field you’re looking for the people God wants you to invest in. It takes time to find those people, but they become the key to a multiplying movement, Lord willing.

You might be sharing the gospel 30 times a month, but you want to move that to 60. How do you do it? You can squeeze out some more time in your schedule and work harder, but that’s addition and it has its limits. A better and more Biblical strategy is to train others and set them loose. Now we’re talking about leadership development.

In 2020 we shared the gospel with around 40,000 people. By 2021 it was 150,000 people. That was achieved because leaders stepped up and trained ordinary people.

A leader would show up at house church and equip in three things:

Identity

They’d cast vision for reaching lost people and then talk about our identity in Christ as a royal priesthood, as ambassadors.

Oikos map

They would take out a piece of paper and have people draw their “oikos” map asking, “Who are the people in your life that don't know God? You’re probably the only disciple they know. God has placed you in their life for a reason. You’re their hope, not an evangelist or pastor they’ve never met.”

Gospel outline

Then we give them a simple, reproducible and Biblical way of sharing the gospel.

What happened next was “crazy”! Everybody was sharing.

So many reports came in like: I shared with this person, and they were healed. I shared with this person, we cast out a demon and started a new house church there. God was at work through his people.

This was typical: a mom rolls out of her bed before daylight drops to her knees and prays for God to do something in her village. That night she’s out sharing with the family next door.

Now we’re taking what we’ve learned to other networks and the same thing is happening.

It’s not pragmatism. When we train in established churches we ask, “How can this church take one step forward in maturity? And how can this church take one step forward in multiplication?” Then someone goes in to equip them.

In 2020 we planted over 2,000 churches, in 2021 it was over 6,000. In 2023 it was just over 17,000.

But nothing changed. Same training, same simple methods.

Disciples are living out their identity in Christ. These principles don’t change. There’s no secret sauce.

The most important shift that has taken place between our first five years and the last five years is learning how to identify the leaders you should be spending your time with. I’m looking for people who are always taking the next step. When they hit a wall they run to the Word of God for answers. Then they take the next step. They obey what Jesus has commanded.

In the first five years, I was trying to motivate people to do stuff. Now, I've switched. Now I look for people who are already trying to do something and I help them sharpen what they're doing.

I invest time and love in those people. That means I’ve only got time for about 8-12 of them. But they all have the people they are investing in and so on. It cascades.

I’ve learned one person is never the answer to the need. Our job as leaders is to help more and more people do the right things well.

In my first few years, I had all the right training, mentoring and experience, but thought everything hinged on me. It’s too big a burden to bear. I’ve learned to risk everything on the Holy Spirit.

The more we have faded into the background, the more the movement has flourished.

The Lord wants us to care for these leaders and we do very little training of them now. It's mostly relationship and coaching and just digging into problems.

And then the majority is just loving on them and honestly, they love on us like crazy.

I went through a season of deep discouragement last year. The life that they spoke into me and the encouragement that they gave me, it was just so humbling.

And it's just a lot of fun.

Part 1: 334-The first five years.

Part 2: 335-The Last Five Years

Check out Jared’s podcast and website.

One morning Jared woke with a compelling question on his mind, “If I believe that eternity is true, and I'm going to spend endless days with Jesus, how should I live my life?”

Every morning for weeks he woke to the same question.

Finally, he answered, “Alright, If it’s true, I want to give the rest of my life to making disciples.” He just didn’t know how.

So Jared sought out training and discovered the world of movements that multiply disciples and churches. In the process, he met, fell in love and married Elle.

As a young couple, they delayed moving overseas for two years while they sharpened their skills making disciples in Austin, Texas.

Finally, they were ready to join a team in South Asia. The fulfillment of their calling.

Fast forward eighteen months and Jared has been applying everything he’d been trained in. He was doing the right things based on strong Biblical foundations and best practices. No fruit. No one was coming to faith. No one they trained was implementing. As his anxiety levels rose, it became the worst eighteen months of Jared’s life.

On a lone fourteen-hour drive Jared wept and poured out his heart to God. “Lord I gave up everything to obey your call. Why is nothing happening!”

As he drove and prayed heard God say, “Jared are you doing this for yourself, or are you doing this for me? I’m not going to share my glory with you.” He said, "Jared, you have never and will never save anyone."

God said, “Jared, why are you doing this? Are you doing this for me?”

God showed Jared his heart. God removed the idols of success and pride. He learned God is the only one that can start a movement.

Jared says, “Man, I repented on that car ride!”

“I had such an approval idol in my life that a lot of my actions and thoughts were coming out of wanting to be approved by other people that I looked up to. I had to realize that the ultimate approval I'm looking for is just from the Lord.”

I learned a lot about contentment, that contentment comes from the Lord, not from the state of the ministry or the progress as we perceive it, but staying content in the Lord. As we faced these challenges together it grew our affections not only for the Lord, but for each other. Our love and desire for one another grew.

One week after the fourteen-hour car trip we met our first guy who broke through to multiply. The next week we met the second guy. A month later we met Lydia who led fifteen people to Christ in her first week as a disciple and now has multiplied disciples and churches to the fourth generation.

In the last four years, the movement has seen over 50,000 baptisms.

Part 1: 334-The first five years.

Part 2: 335-The Last Five Years

Check out Jared’s podcast and website.

I’ve just read the article on the Lausanne website on the danger of preferring speed to faithfulness in disciple making/church planting movements.

The author argues that practitioners of these movements who go after rapid multiplication are prone to pragmatism. They think they “will engineer a movement” through innovation and creativity that produce new strategies and tools.

Seeking success they honor “strategies, steps and solutions rather than mysteries, mystics and martyrs.”

The answer given to this problem is to rest in the sovereignty of God. Practitioners must learn that “God gives growth as weak heralds proclaim a foolish message, trusting in God’s sovereign timing and purposes rather than our own.” That statement is true, but it’s only half the story.

The same concern and solution were once offered to William Carey when he proposed that something be done about a lost world.

Recently I sat with five Indian movement leaders. They were not pragmatic secularists, but men of God who had all suffered for the gospel. They’d all been beaten, some had seen the inside of a jail.

They know how to map their progress and identify unreached people groups. They have strategies, methods and tools, but before all else, they are men of God’s Word, laying down their lives for the gospel.

When they and their people go into an unreached neighborhood or village, they go with an offer of prayer, the gospel and an invitation to sit and read the stories about Jesus and learn to follow him together.

They use technology when it’s helpful, Biblical and reproducible. In one movement a simple SD card loaded with audio and text Bibles and simple discipleship studies has multiplied the impact of their workers. But it’s not the SD card that is the engine room of this rapidly growing movement, it’s the Word of God carried by ordinary believers to their friends and family and people far away.

Tens of thousands have turned to Christ and are meeting in homes as a result. Is that too rapid? Well, in this movement you don’t hear the challenge to repent and believe until you have completed thirty-five studies that begin with Creation and end with Christ. That’s not rapid. But it is.

Those households who repent and believe are baptized and told their baptism, like Christ’s, is their commissioning to make disciples.

Soon they’re opening up unreached homes and villages taking households through the thirty-five studies.

It is not a “rapid” strategy if it relies on thirty-five lessons before someone repents and believes — unless 80% of the disciples are out making disciples. That’s a rapidly growing movement that relies on a slow and careful method of discipleship and church formation. There are much easier and faster ways to “save souls” in India. But these disciples are making disciples and forming new churches to the glory of God. They regard Jesus’ command to make disciples of the nations as urgent.

Here’s the point. In Acts, Luke doesn’t choose between the sovereignty of God and the part we play in God’s mission. It’s a movement of God, driven forward by the dynamic Word of God, through ordinary people. They have a mandate to go to the ends of the earth, reaching every people and every place.

So should we go for quality or quantity? For depth or breath? Fast or slow? These are false dichotomies.

What farmer wants quality OR quantity? A wise farmer works for both. He works for a high-quality crop and lots of it.

The first five years were hard, how did Jared adjust when the breakthroughs came?

Part One: 334-The First Five Years

Jared’s early years in Asia were like being out fishing all night and catching nothing. What was God up to?

Part 2: 335-The Last Five Years

Check out Jared’s podcast and website.

We met in an upstairs room above a cafe. A handful of Indian movement leaders. Our topic was persecution: What are you experiencing? What are you learning?

I was there to listen and learn.

These leaders face opposition all the time. It’s the air they breathe. There are peaks of intensity, there are lulls, but it never goes away.

In India, there’s an anti-conversion law that forbids forcing conversions or offering incentives to change your religion. The law isn’t the problem, it’s how it is applied and the severity of sentencing. There are long jail terms if you are found guilty.

When the gospel goes into an unreached village or neighborhood it is often met with faith, discipleship and new churches. It’s also met with organized opposition from Hindu nationalists.

The pushback begins with threats and can escalate into violence. It was sobering to sit in a room with brothers who had been bruised and bloodied for the sake of the gospel. Some of their disciples have had their homes burnt down.

Sometimes police intervene but often the extremists apply pressure on the police to look the other way. They also pressure the police to prosecute under the anti-conversion laws.

The police may open an investigation. They arrest and question anyone identified as a leader. They’re looking for evidence of coercion or inducements to convert. When they don’t find anything they’ll make threats. They want agreements that the prisoner will stop proclaiming the gospel and hand over the names of those who have become disciples. They want to track the growth of the group.

Mostly there’s not enough evidence, but the investigation is the punishment, especially if it happens every time there’s a new allegation.

There are stories like this wherever the gospel is advancing.

I asked these leaders what they’ve learned as they read the Scriptures and reflected on their experiences.

They told me:

When persecution comes it’s time to humble ourselves before God, to fast and pray.
Persecution is an opportunity to bear witness faithfully to Jesus Christ.
Not everyone is against us. People are watching our responses. Often they defend us.
When the storm subsides, the fruit is new disciples and churches.

I felt a deep respect for these leaders. Surprisingly they could joke and laugh about their mistreatment. There was no fear in the room. No retreat from their calling. It was the price they paid for a nation in darkness for thousands of years to finally see the face of Jesus in the light of God’s glory.

My writeup of the interview with James…

Mohammed was a bad Muslim from a region controlled by rival clans engaged in crime. A drug dealer for thirty years, he’d done ten years in prison for murder. In prison, he’d cried out to God to make himself known. Now released and at home, God woke him up one morning and told him to go and wait outside for his messenger.

Meanwhile a German missionary near the end of his time in the country was driving through the region, his rental car company was tracking his movements and became concerned that the car had been stolen. They knew how dangerous the region is. They remotely disabled the car and it rolled to a stop outside Mohammed’s house. Through a translator, the German shared the gospel, and Mohammed believed and was baptized.

Six months later, God connected Mohammed with James and Hope, two Americans serving in the Middle East. They met Mohammed and they met his two wives and sixteen children. One of his wives explained, “I wish you’d come earlier. Since meeting Jesus he no longer gets drunk, he no longer beats us and he’s given up cocaine.”

James went with Mohammed to share with his sister’s household. When his jihadi nephew came home and discovered his parents wanted to follow Jesus, he took a rock and threw it at his father narrowly missing him but hitting Mohammed and putting him in hospital. Mohammed became known in the village as, “Our very first infidel.” He responded to the attack with love but didn’t stop talking about Jesus. The story has spread to other villages and now he is known as a man of forgiveness.

James and Hope trained him to make disciples and immediately he began to share the gospel. Within two weeks Mohammed had two relatives to baptize, but didn’t know how.

They met at James’ place and while the bathtub filled with water, he took them through the study on baptism. James baptized the first one showing Mohammed how to baptize his cousin. Mohammed refused, James insisted. Mohammed came out of the bathroom staring at his hand saying, “What did I just do!” Something came over him and he realized he was made for this.

This was the beginning of a movement among Muslim background Arabs somewhere in the Middle East.

James took Mohammed on what he calls a “modeling journey.” Mohammed is from a large clan and has relatives everywhere. They visit a home, share the gospel and the story of Zacchaeus with another Muhammad and he believes. They get in the car and drive with Muhammad to one of his relatives. James announces, we’ve come to share an amazing story with you and Muhammad is going to tell it (with a little help from James).

Family after family want to follow Jesus.

It’s no longer safe for James, a Westerner, to travel with Mohammed but that’s ok, Mohammed has led Mahson to Christ and trained him. They travel throughout their region going from place to place. Mahson emerges as “Paul” to Mohammed’s “Barnabas.”

In Mohammed’s village, twelve families have become disciples and there are baptized disciples in 35 villages in the region. Mohammed and Mahson are out most days sharing the gospel and making disciples. They’ve set a goal to have at least one church in every village in their region.

When a household believes they work through a series of studies called the Commands of Christ in a three thirds pattern. Then commissioned to reach their community.

Mahson and Mohammed return to the villages and pick up a local leader to go with them to open up a new village. “Paul and Barnabas” are building teams with their own Silas, Luke, Priscilla and Aquila.

Now Mahson and Mohammed focus on this next layer of leaders learning to do what they do. They have twenty leaders who go into unreached communities, share the gospel, baptize new disciples, teach them to obey Christ’s commands and gather as church.

As the movement develops, James says his role is always changing but his relationship with Mohammed and Mahson stays the same.

“We talk on the phone every day. We treat one another like family, even though Mohammed is twice my age. I treat him like he’s my father. His health’s not great, so I’ll drive him to the doctor. Hope will call him to make sure he’s alright and is taking his medication.”

In the early days James’ role was more directive. Now he’s pushing them to find solutions in the Scriptures. They do their own problem-solving and keep him in the loop.

One of Mohammed’s disciples died of cancer. His background was Shia Muslim. When a Shia dies there are all kinds of rituals and prayers from the Quran that must be prayed. Shias if they do these prayers the right way and follow the ritual, it'll help the deceased when they face judgment.

Yet this man had died a follower of Christ, set free and forgiven.

Should they let the prayers go ahead?

James pointed Mohammed and Mahson to the Scriptures for the answer. They read the parable of Lazarus and the rich man and concluded that Muslim prayers can’t harm this disciple, he’s with God. But there will be 300 Shia Muslims at the funeral who need to hear about Jesus. They need a chance to repent, before it’s too late.

So they allowed the Muslim prayers over the body, and then 300 Shia Muslims heard the gospel.

James says his role changes as the movement spreads. Mohammed and Mahson are now more experienced in leading a movement than he is. James relates to them as peers and points them to the Scriptures as their authority.

War in the region has forced James and Hope to play a background role supporting the emerging leaders. This is an Arab movement, at a time of great turmoil in which people are looking for answers. They’re turning to Jesus, the Prince of Peace.

Recently a militiaman arrived at the home of one of the disciples, Moses. He threatened Moses and his family for turning to Christ and left.

The leaders of the movement gathered around Moses to support him and decide how they should respond.

Moses was a leader in a large and powerful clan. Many of his people had recently become disciples of Jesus. Some of the younger men took matters into their own hands.

They forced their way into the militiaman’s house and told him, “You don’t come to our leader’s house! You don’t threaten him and his family!”

Then they broke his arm.

Meanwhile Moses and the leaders were deciding not to respond to the threats of violence with violence, but with forgiveness. That was Jesus’ way.

When they heard about the attack on the militiaman, Mohammed, Mahson and Moses drove the young disciples to the hospital to apologize and to pay his medical bills. They drove to the man’s home and apologized to his family.

On the way home they told them, “What you did does not represent Jesus’ teaching. If you do it again we’ll treat you like you’re not followers of Jesus.”

Moses is from a powerful and feared clan. It’s the first time in history that anyone from Moses’ clan has asked the forgiveness of someone from the militiaman’s clan. It happened because of the gospel.

Like Peter in the garden waving his sword, the young disciples were ready to fight, ready to go to jail, ready to defend the gospel — but in the wrong way. They learned an important lesson that night and the news of what happened spread throughout all the whole region. These followers of Jesus are a people of peace who forgive.

If they can reach their district it will open the door to reaching every district in their country. Even now the gospel is traveling through their disciples into other Arab lands.

Another story from my visit to South Asia…

When Covid hit South Asia thousands who relied on their employers for housing found themselves on the streets without food, water or shelter.

Many had moved to the city for work and had family back in the villages.

They thought, “If I can get home I can live off the land”. Often home was hundreds of kilometers away. Many died trying to escape the cities on foot in the intense heat of summer.

The disciples responded with the gospel and groceries. Rahul and Aisha were distributing food, praying for people and sharing when they met Hema. She had cleaned and cooked for a family. They panicked thinking, “What if she infects us? She’s another mouth to feed and we don’t have enough for ourselves.” So Hema was on the streets without an income and nowhere to go.

Rahul and Aisha invited her home to live with them. Through Rahul and Aisha, Hema found Christ.

Soon after, Rahul suggested they call the family who had kicked out Hema to see if they needed food. Hema called them and they went over with a food kit and shared the gospel. Hema offered her forgiveness and they turned to Christ.

Today a church meets in their home.

John and Rachel were on an exploratory trip to South Asia, seeking God’s will for their future. In the area they were considering there was a centuries old temple dedicated to the god Krishna.

The ancient temple was in a small town that attracted thousands of pilgrims to mark Krishna’s birthday. The idol was surrounded by priests and devotees. Clouds of incense and the sounds of singing filled the temple as they bathed and dressed the god.

John and Rachel stood in the middle of the crowd.

As the worship reached its crescendo, Rachel wept for a people lost in darkness who worshipped a god made out of stone with a painted face. Her tears flowed and drew the attention of the people around them. It was time to leave.

As they made their way to the entrance, a young woman approached Rachel and in perfect English asked her why she was crying at such a happy event. Outside on the steps of the temple, Rachel explained her tears and then shared the gospel. The young woman responded, “I’ve never heard anything like this before!”

That morning Rachel had prayed, “Lord I don’t know the language here, but somehow let me share the gospel today.” God had answered her prayer and given her and John the confirmation of their calling to South Asia.

James and Hope are somewhere in the Middle East where God is working in amazing ways.

For security reasons, there’s no video of this interview. Hope insists it’s not because James isn’t good looking.

Previous interviews:

320-James and Hope: The Call
321-James and Hope: The Work

Here’s what Trevor’s story taught me.

Begin where you areTrevor got his start when he was at seminary among Cambodians who had fled the murderous Pol Pot regime of Cambodia. The Khmer Rogue had killed anyone with an education. These refugees were simple-minded village people. Or at least that’s what they appeared to be.

These new believers were uneducated but smart, resourceful and committed. They were deep in their understanding of the Scriptures and actively engaged in making disciples. Lacking formal education they made good church planters. Working among immigrants gave Trevor his heart for Asia.

Eventually, he found his way to Asia as a professor at a seminary with a difference. Students spent the week in classes and the weekends out sharing the gospel, making disciples and planting churches. To graduate you had to plant a church with twenty-five baptized new disciples.

Trevor became a mentor to the students as they faced challenges in planting churches in a Muslim nation. As they wrestled with the roadblocks, Trevor watched and learned.

Move towards the gaps then watch and learnHe soon noticed a gap in the church planting strategy. They were making progress among the majority population, but not among unreached people groups (UPGs).

So he set up a mission organization to target the gaps and recruited students to go after them. He hired students to do two-week cultural surveys of the UPGs and filtered them based on their behavior. He was looking for people who were better at evangelism and disciple making than he was.

From that pool, he selected four students and sent them out to hard places and hard people groups to reach. One of the students objected, “But we don’t know anything!” Trevor replied, “When you learn something let me know.”

In the early days, a breakthrough was one or two new disciples from an UPG.

The students tracked the breakthroughs and identified fruitful practices.

They discovered that offering prayer was an effective way of connecting with people.

The Islamic leaders would write out Quranic verses on paper, pray them and then burn them and give the ashes to the person to drink.

One church planting couple tried writing out Scriptures and praying them over a glass of water. The person drank the glass and was healed. They modified a cultural norm and added Biblical content.

The planters discovered that praying the Bible over the sick resulted in an open door for evangelism that led to discipleship. What they were seeing in the field was matching patterns in the Gospels and Acts.

Another effective approach they discovered was to ask Muslims, and even religious teachers, “Have you ever experienced God?” Culturally, it was a strange question to ask. They’d answere, “No” and then reply, “How do you experience God?”

They wanted to know how to experience God in the everyday challenges of life. When they faced illness or demonic oppression, they had nowhere to turn.

An encounter with God in Jesus’ name was a far more effective starting place than an antagonistic debate. They become convinced that somehow Jesus is Lord and then go on a journey to understand what that means.

Follow that relationship!Another lesson they learned was reaching groups, not just individuals.

One of the workers was the first to get to three discipleship groups. He was convinced the most effective method was to disciple individuals, partly from security concerns. Other workers went after groups of people. Their progress was slower, but after six months, they began to reproduce while the one-on-one guy never went beyond three and had dropped back to just two groups.

Trevor discovered in this culture people don’t do things one-on-one and secretly. If it’s secret and private it’s considered shameful.

From that point they decided, to target groups. For instance, the young men eating boiled peanuts in the cool of the evening while they strummed their guitars and sang. They trained the disciples to talk about the gospel in natural groupings of people whether they were friends or relatives.

Discipleship and church planting begins with those gatherings of people discussing the Bible together.

Trevor says the book of Acts uses the word “ecclesia” three ways: the small gathering in homes, the church across the city and the church throughout a region. We need each form of church.

If it’s fruitful, keep goingWe created an experimental culture. The experiments had to be low-cost and low-risk. They would set them up and then watch and learn.

For instance, they had a twelve-month program for training workers. We had good trainers and selected the best candidates, none of which worked out. It wasn’t fruitful. But they were invested in that program and Trevor was reluctant to end it.

Then one of the local leaders came to him and said, “We need to shut this down, it’s not fruitful. Our purpose was not to run trainings but find the right people.”

He wanted to replace four months of training with just one or two days of training.

So he went to a strong missions church of 400 with a heart to reach Muslims. He asked them to pick 10% of the church most likely to reach Muslims. Then he gave them just one day of training.

Out of the 40 he trained, he found just four who took the training and applied it in the field over the next few months. They kept reporting in and asking for more coaching. Now he’d found the right people, and began training them as they reached Muslims.

Across twenty churches, in every case the total number of Muslims reached and discipled is more than the original size of the sending church. If the church was 400, there would be more than 400 in the underground churches.

They learned the purpose of training is not training but to find the right people and apprentice them in the field.

You can have your cake and eat it too Trevor said, We often hear, “We want quality not quantity”. Show me the verse that says we don’t want quantity. The book of Acts reports on quantity and quality.

I grew up on a farm, I never heard an apple grower say, “I want quality not quantity.” I never heard a dairy farmer say, “I want quality but not quantity.” No farmer says that.

They all want both. They know quality and quantity are related symbiotically.

That’s why we’ve made such good progress towards a multiplying movement of disciples and churches. But I'm not going to discuss the numbers. But it has been a surprise.

Almost every quarter when the counts come in, I have to cry, I have to weep about what God's been doing.

My interview with Trevor.

Trevor’s website and resources

I was traveling in South Asia last month. We had a twelve-hour drive broken up with stops for chai — tea made with buffalo milk, spices, ginger, and lots of sugar all boiled up together.

We were finishing up when DJ said give me a few minutes. He goes over to the owner and announces, “I’m a follower of Yeeshu Maseeh (Jesus Christ). We pray for people and we teach the Bible. Can I share my story with you?”

He shares his story and prays for the owner’s family. The owner is intrigued and wants to know more so DJ pulls out a microSD card and gives it to the owner to load on his phone. Then he shows him how to use it. He can listen to the Bible stories and watch the Jesus film with his family.

DJ promises to call the next week and see how he is doing and answer any questions. He tells him, “Watch the film with your family, listen to some of the lessons, then we’ll talk.”

As they speak there were five men and boys standing around and listening. He asks the owner about his family, his village, father, mother— everything. His village is near, so next time he’s on the road DJ can visit his village and meet his family.

The whole interaction took less than twenty minutes. DJ wasn’t looking for an easy convert but an open door into a household as an open door to a whole community. He’d given the owner something to think about and something to do. DJ will follow up with a phone call and if the owner is open, a visit to meet his family.

I watch this scene unfold and the first thing I notice is DJ, rescued by God when he was a teenager from the tyranny of Hinduism and domestic violence. Devoted to the gospel, convinced of its saving power, ready over a cup of chai to tell his story and invite someone to learn more. Yes, he’s a leader and should know what to do, but he’s the leader of thousands of ordinary people who are doing this every day.

That doesn’t describe many Christian leaders and believers I know in the West.

Watching on the whole time is Gary, the seminary-trained Westerner, he came to South Asia twenty years ago sto find leaders like DJ. He prayed, “Lord can’t you trust me with more than just one guy?” No, but to that one guy, God entrusted a movement of disciples, leaders and churches.

In a movement leaders are not known for their ministry, their preaching, or their oversight of others, they are known for the workers and pioneers they launch.

Another thing I noticed was DJ didn’t wait until he’d “earned the right to speak”, Jesus had already given him all the authority he needed. The Bible has a word for it — “boldness”. Not brashness, not rudeness but free and uninhibited speech. That’s another difference I notice with leaders and believers back home.

Someone will read this and say, “It’s obvious he’s an evangelist, not a shepherd.” No, he’s a shepherd who, like Jesus, left the 99 to go after the one. That’s what it takes to see a movement of God that will sweep regions of the world numbered in billions of people just like that chai shop owner, his family and community.

A conversation with Trevor about the rise of a movement of disciples and churches somewhere in Asia.

We’d been on the road in South Asia for three weeks. We’d covered thousands of kilometers and met hundreds of people. The purpose was to hear their stories and experience the life of a movement of God.

We had a ten hour drive to get back to base so I hit record and used the time to interview my hosts Gary and DJ. Here are some reflections on what I learned from the trip and our discussion.

I kept hearing the same story over and over So many times we'd be sitting in a courtyard or in a room where there was a fan going as it was hot outside. Someone came to us and told us their story of meeting Jesus and offered to pray for us.

We kept hearing the same story over and over again. It went something like this, My husband was a drunkard and lazy, always angry and oppressed by demons. We were miserable. Someone visited offering prayer and he was set free. Now we are learning to follow Jesus and there is peace in our home. My husband listens to me, takes an interest in the family and even helps with jobs around the house! Now he’s motivated to work and our lives are much better.

I got to know some of these angry, drunkard, demon possessed men and despite the language barrier, I could see they were now godly men full of the life of Christ.

Another recurring theme was healing, Our child was desperately ill. We had lost all hope that she would live. Then there was a knock at the door and the offer of prayer. God healed our daughter and now we follow Jesus. Many of our relatives and neighbors follow him too.

Typically there was a problem with alcohol, demonic oppression, sickness and family conflict. People were miserable and found no consolation in Hinduism. Then someone arrives at door, a relative, a neighbor or someone they’d never met before sharing their story and offering prayer.

They experience the power of God and turn to Christ.

I met an elderly woman whose husband died. She had no children to support her and her husband’s family abandoned her by the side of the road to die. The disciples found her and took her in. They fed her, brought her back to health and found her a place to live. She heard the gospel through them and is now following Christ and going out in pairs to tell others about him.

Reaching householdsThe movement doesn’t target individuals but whole family networks in their homes. Even if the head of the house isn’t responsive they still want to meet in the home so he gets to hear and give at least passive approval to the whole household hearing.

Often you’d look around the room and there’d be three generations present. An extended family household could include more than a dozen people living under the one roof. Other relatives were living nearby.

The entry method is simple — go in pairs, knock on a door, share your story, offer prayer — any believer can do it. The purpose of the visit is not to gain a convert but to invite the household to read stories from the Bible together.

Technology as a multiplierWhat happens next is unlike anything I’ve seen before. The messengers come with inexpensive micro-SD cards with an audio version of the Bible and the studies in the local language. There’s also the Jesus film in the local language. Even if the messengers are illiterate, which some are, they can still listen to the Bible stories and do the studies together.

Most families have a least one basic phone that will take the SD cards and play them.

The messengers will load the SD card and show how they work and set a time when they can return and go through the first study. Having the resources in audio format means any believer can help a household through the studies that are designed not just to provide content, but lead to obedient discipleship.

There are 35 studies that begin with creation and end with Christ. They could be spread over 35 weeks, but many households move through them much faster. Even if the messengers can’t be there for every study, the family reports in and discuss what they are learning either over the phone or when they meet.

Why so many studies? There is a deeply entrenched Hindu (or Muslim) way of seeing the world that needs to bow to the One True God revealed in the Scriptures and that takes time. The studies don’t target other religions but present the Biblical story in a positive way and allow participants to make their own decisions about the implications.

Typically, it’s one household at a time going through the studies as multiple households at once get out of sync with each other.

Sixty percent of households that begin the studies don’t complete them on the first attempt — but 40% do.

Discipling to conversionSurprisingly the call to repent, believe and be baptized does not come until after the 35 studies are completed. That call is the first study in a series on discipleship. Sometimes not every member of the household is ready for repentance and baptism, but they have been involved in the process has led to some members following Christ. Their involvement means that the gospel is far less likely to divide families.

Immediately they are baptized, new disciples are trained and commissioned to go to other households to tell their story, offer prayer, an SD card and opportunity to read the Bible together. When they are baptized, new disciples learn that Jesus’ baptism marked the launch of his mission.

Until now things have moved slowly. One household has completed 35 studies from Creation to Christ. Then following their baptism, begun a new series in discipleship. Typically the messengers journey with a family for six months to get them established in their faith. They stay with the new disciples until they are confident, competent, and independently able to share what they have learned. If it takes longer, they stay longer.

Going slow to go fastThe assumption is, that not everyone is a gifted evangelist, yet every disciple is called to make disciples. That includes elderly, illiterate widows, and one young woman who began visiting with her father when she was twelve. In her early twenties now, she’s bold as a lion.

They’ve been sharing what they are learning as they go through the studies. Now they are commissioned to go to their relatives and neighbors as missionaries. An assessment of the movement revealed that a staggering 79% of disciples do just that. The movement goes slow in order to go fast. In the first year 200 people took baptism, the next year it was 700, then 2,000, 9,000, 20,000 and 40,000.

The SD cards are a simple, biblical and effective method that multiplies the movement’s breadth and depth. But this is not a movement of the SD card. This movement is fueled by the joy of the Lord in the hears of ordinary people who have been set free from demons, death, sin and the devil. I saw the love of Christ in them. They’re growing as disciples because they are making disciples.

I met a number of disciples that were going into six, ten and twenty villages. In each village they had started multiple new churches. As we drove into some of these villages my host would say, “We have a church in that house. We have a church there. We have a Bible-study just beginning in that house …” as they waved to the faces they recognized along the way.

Near and farThe disciples have a vision to take the gospel to “near and far.” Near means their neighborhood or the next village. Far can mean to villages hundreds of kilometers away.

I met an extended family of farmers made up of grandparents and the families of three brothers. The brothers decided one of them would go to a far way location where there were not disciples or churches. One left his family behind to go for three months. During the day he worked as a farmer, at night he shared the gospel and made disciples and planted churches. While the families back home supported him and wife and children back home.

No outsider told them to do this, there was no external funding, just a determination to obey Christ’s call to take the gospel to every people and every place. This story was the norm rather than the exception. That’s why over 95,000 churches meeting in homes have been started and hundreds of thousands of disciples made who are making disciples.

Find out more: southasiansands.wixsite.com/ekrasta

Ever wondered what you’ll do in your retirement? This report just came in from one of my heroes, who is a least twice my age.

After a long haul flight and a long drive through the night, he listens to reports of the gospel going out to families and villages resulting in new disciples and churches.

The majority faith is Islam deeply rooted in ancestral spirits, local spirits, powerful witches and other spiritual practitioners. Effective evangelism in the area normally involves delivering persons from these with focused prayer of up to five hours.

All believers attending the training are fully self-supporting. The one meal a day provided was large enough that they could take portions home to their family since day laborers and fishermen were unable to earn income on the training days. Two of the men walked daily five hours each direction to attend.

A significant movement of God in a remote region of Africa.

It sure beats playing golf.

I’m through security and ready for the flight to Melbourne. I’ve been on the road in South Asia for three and a half weeks on the road.

I’m ready to go home and hug the grandkids and walk the dog, but this trip has changed me.

For more than three decades I’ve read everything I can on movements, and I’ve interviewed hundreds of practitioners — nothing beats being in the field, face-to-face with first-generation believers pursuing multiplying movements of disciples and churches.

We drove thousands of kilometers and met hundreds of people, I never grew tired of hearing their stories — how the gospel came to them and their families. How the sick were healed, demons cast out, alcoholic men freed to love and serve their families. How salvation came to multigenerational households, their neighborhoods and nearby villages and how they sacrificed to take the gospel to faraway places.

I never grew tired of hearing this story time and time again. The gospel is on the move in South Asia and everywhere it goes in the power of the Spirit, the fruit is always disciples and churches to the glory of God.

Why should we be surprised? Isn’t that the story of the movement of God in Acts?

A conversation with Gary and DJ on a multiplying movement of disciples and churches somewhere in South Asia.

When you watch or listen to this interview you’ll be gazing into the future. The future of world missions is Nigerian, Brazilian, Chinese, Indian, Persian and in this case, Nepali.

A conversation with Liam Wilson and Isaiah Bennet about multiplying disciples and churches in Canada.

A conversation with Liam Wilson and Isaiah Bennet about multiplying disciples and churches in Canada.

Justin White, Robert Koskei

Robert Koskei had a secure position as a bishop in an African Pentecostal denomination when God called him to take the gospel to Southern Sudan. He left his homeland of Kenya with no financial support, language training, or contacts. He’d never been outside Kenya but the Spirit compelled him and Robert obeyed.

When he arrived, he had nowhere to stay. He met a Ugandan pastor who spoke English and pointed him to a hotel run by Kenyans. Robert found an elderly man from the same tribe and place, they were virtually relatives. When he heard of Robert’s mission he offered him a place to stay and food for as long as needed.

Soon he found Sudanese who spoke the trade language of Swahili and he began the work of evangelism, discipleship and church planting.

When two years later God called Robert back to Kenya, he left behind a small network of disciples and churches.

Back home, his former denomination cut him off. Either he came back under their “covering” or he should leave. Robert returned to his hometown of Nakuru, five hours north of Nairobi and began doing what he’d learned to do in South Sudan — evangelism, disciple making and planting new churches with local leaders.

That’s when God connected him with Joey Gordy and Justin White, two Americans with a vision for movements across Africa, based in Nairobi. They met through a Facebook contact.

Joey and Justin have learned to filter the many requests they receive for training and support. So when Robert got in touch they agreed to meet with him on the condition that he knew they could not provide any financial support. What they offered was training, brotherhood and coaching if Robert was willing to do the work.

That’s exactly what Robert wanted.

By now Robert and his wife had seven children. Robert sells second-hand clothing to support them. He drives the five hours down to Nairobi to pick up bales of clothing to sort and sell. On one of those trips, he called to see Joey and Justin.

With new contacts, Joey and Justin had learned not to meet over coffee or lunch but to take them into the harvest. Robert had no experience sharing with Muslims so out they went into a Muslim neighborhood sharing the gospel and then meeting for discipleship with new believers in a church start.

Robert was mesmerized. He was in.

Around the dinner table, they trained Robert in simple, reproducing methods of evangelism and disciple making. Immediately Robert knew this was what he’d been looking for. Justin and Joey recognized a man who had been prepared by God to pioneer a movement of disciples and churches among his people.

Back in Nakuru, Robert immediately began teaching others what he had learned.

Soon Joey and Justin were taking that five-hour ride up to Robert’s home to train him so that he could train his people and anyone else in the district who wanted to learn. As the gospel went out the fruit was disciples and churches meeting in homes, spreading throughout the county and to six other counties. The 60 new churches have been planted mostly by new and existing disciples.

Three things this story teaches us about finding pioneers like Robert:

God shaped RobertThis story began more than a decade ago when God called Robert to walk away from his position and salary and go by faith to South Sudan. He followed the Spirit’s direction and God was faithful while Robert returned two years later, a different man.

Robert was an instant success, ten years in the making. He often speaks of the impact of Joey and Justin’s training, coaching and brotherhood. So why didn’t God bring them together earlier? God was shaping Robert’s heart.

Joey and Justin have found that it’s rare for a movement pioneer like Robert to come from among new disciples. Character and faith take time to form.

The right tools multiply the impactBy tools I mean simple methods for training everyone to share the gospel, and form disciples and new churches. Tools don’t create a movement — that’s God’s business. But the right tools equip disciples to multiply the impact of God’s Word.

Robert learned how to share the gospel, how to read the Bible for discipleship, how to turn a group into a healthy church, and how to grow godly leaders. All the methods were simple, reproducing and biblical. Joey and Justin trained Robert, he trained his people, and they trained new disciples.

Find people who are following Jesus and want to fishWhen Jesus called his first disciples he gave them a command and a promise: Follow me (with all that implies) and I’ll teach you to fish for others. Jesus didn’t just make disciples, he made disciple makers. That is the difference between a ministry and a movement.

Traditionally we make disciples. We make “mature believers”. But Jesus made disciple makers, in the harvest field, among people far from God.

Joey and Justin cast a wide net and found Robert. They set the bar high. Did he want to follow Jesus and learn to make disciple makers? Yes. They couldn’t offer money, but they could offer training, relationship and coaching. They would be at his side as Robert pursued God’s calling to multiply disciples and churches to the glory of God, from Nakuru to the ends of the earth.

Podcast interview: 328-Looking for Robert

The story of how God shaped and prepared a movement pioneer — Robert Koskei — and the role of the outside leaders — Justin and Joey — who identified him, trained him and partnered with him to see disciples and churches multiply to the glory of God.

Carter Cox can remember the day his extended family began to meet as a church—it was January 7, 2017.

It was his idea, picked up by his father. When they started they were still not sure it was the right thing to do.

Since then three of his siblings have entered the kingdom. Two came off serious addictions. Two walked through crises in their marriage. Lives have been transformed as other friends of the family have entered the kingdom. Today they meet every Thursday around a meal. Carter is the eldest of eight children, seven are married. With spouses that’s seventeen adults and eighteen grandchildren.

Carter’s dad leads the church and has started another church at his workplace that meets on Fridays. From the church in the workplace, someone has started churches in three different prisons.

James (name withheld) was an evangelist who became a disciple maker and church planter in the United States. He remembers starting hundreds of groups in homes which he regarded as churches. Everything was a church. If he gathered with one new disciple he called it a church. James learned that two disciples meeting may become a church, but not until the disciples meeting had taken on that commitment and identity of church. He learned not every new believer means a new church until there is some critical mass as the gospel spreads through a relational network and there is a conscious commitment by the new disciples to forming a church. In Acts, sometimes they are added to an existing church, and sometimes a new church is formed.

Today James coaches leaders of underground movements somewhere in the Muslim world. In the last five years they’ve moved from around 200 churches to two thousand. There’s severe persecution, people have been thrown in prison. Two people have lost their lives. These disciples are learning how to live as the people of God, learn to love one another, forgive their enemies, and suffer faithfully. These are not just matters for individual discipleship, they are matters related to the health and maturity of the churches.

When the Spirit came with power at Pentecost, immediately the gospel went out to an unbelieving world gathered in Jerusalem calling everyone to repent, be baptized, be forgiven, and receive the Holy Spirit. How does the day end? With disciples and churches Jerusalem on the way to the ends of the earth, bringing glory to God.

As the Word goes out to every nation, tribe and language, God is gathering his people — a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. That’s where history is going. That’s why church matters.

The full interview with Carter and James: 327-Church Matters II

A conversation with Carter and James about why church matters. It begins with a great case study from Carter. Listen to the end for another compelling case study from Iran.

A conversation with Nathan Shank and Jeff Sundell on ecclesiology — why church matters in a multiplying movement.

Steve Addison, Josh Husmann

Josh Husmann interviews Steve Addison on Acts and the Movement of God. Recorded at Exponential 2024 in Orlando.

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Don Waybright baptises a prisoner

Don Waybright wrote this response to my interview with Terry Solley. . .

Before the sun rises every day on Texas Death Row you will hear the songs of praise and Amazing Grace echoing from the cells.

In the past year, thirty-three Death Row inmates have followed Jesus in baptism. These inmates lead five churches that meet daily for worship, Word, prayer, and learning to love God and love one another.

They are caged separately but that does not inhibit their worship. When a man receives his execution date, they conduct a special service, and as he makes the Death Walk they sing Amazing Grace. The condemned man is placed in Death Watch until his execution. The most dangerous criminal in the Texas Prison system has a special cell on Death Watch. Whenever he is removed from the cell, his hands and feet are shackled. Yet, he is a born-again disciple maker and ministers daily to the other men on Death Watch. The men on Death Row often feel God could not forgive their horrific crimes. Yet all who call upon the name of the Lord will be saved. The Gospel sets these men free.

One seemingly demon-possessed killer has been on Death Row for twenty years. His hair and beard a wild tangled mess – cussing venom constantly, his cell shielded to protect guards from his spit. Today he has been transformed by the love of Jesus demonstrated by Leroy and Barry. His hair and beard are clean shaven, he is baptized, transferred to Death Watch to the sound of Amazing Grace, sharing the Gospel with every guard. Two days later he was executed and like the thief on the cross, entered Paradise.

Another man who had been on Death Row for twenty-six years said, “I have been in everything you can be in—it is good to now be in God. Jesus laid His hands on me!” He quoted all of Psalm 34 from memory as his last words before execution. He received a stay of execution and continues to lead one of the Death Row churches every day.

Barry and Leroy are two multiplying inmates with special security status and freedom to make disciples on Death Row. They have been used by God to create this new humanity among a people and place that seems inhuman.

This is a work of the Spirit-Word-Mission. In the last year, Leroy and Barry have baptized over forty prisoners in solitary. Before being transferred to Death Row they led a movement in a prison south of Houston that saw 90 baptisms in solitary in nine months.

Inmates that were trained with these two in the simple, biblical reproducing disciple making approach have transferred to other prisons and seen amazing fruit. The largest Texas prison reached NoPlaceLeft with almost 300 churches meeting weekly, and 500 baptisms in four years. Inmate leaders have trained over 2,000 inmates to share the gospel, and over 500 to plant churches. There are over fifty church planting multiplication leaders across six Texas prisons. Texas has the largest prison population in the United States.

Several of these NoPlaceLeft inmates will be released soon, and plans are in place to help them keep spreading the Gospel and making disciples in prisons, in our cities, and in the nations.

Don Waybright

324-Release to the captives

A conversation with Terry Solley about movements of disciples and churches behind bars.

Terry's ministry: texasprisonoutreach.org

I listened again to my interview with Matt on reaching the New York metro. A few things stood out . . .

God has brought the nations to New York which has the highest concentration of unreached people groups for a US city.

To reach a complex city like New York you need to have a vision for unreached peoples and places.

That means multiple teams going after peoples and places.

Matt and his team couldn’t start everywhere, so they started somewhere with fasting and prayer and 30 days in the harvest locally in Queens.

Matt identified the top ten unreached people groups and places in New York and mobilized and trained teams to go after them.

The Holy Spirit burdened him with Urdu speakers from Pakistan. God provided a teammate with experience reaching South Asians. The Holy Spirit led them to a tea shop frequented by Urdu speakers. Matt shared a dream his wife Cassie had about Urdu speakers which led to a chance to train a young Pakistani believer in making disciples. They’ve met others whom Jesus has encountered through dreams.

The Holy Spirit opened the door to a partnership with a couple reaching Central Asians. As disciples and churches form the gospel is going out from New York to Turkey, Central Asia, and Pakistan.

Through partnerships, the door has opened to mobilizing some Garifuna believers from Honduras to take on five peoples and five places in New York.

Matt and the teams he serves envision 100 apostolic bands across metro New York reaching 1,000 segments (peoples and places).

As Matt and Cassie pray about reaching Urdu speakers globally they are thinking about their exit strategy for New York — six to ten teams with a “what will it take” vision for the city.

The interview: 323-New York Calling

What do you do when the vision outstrips reality? A conversation with Matt Foshee in New York.

Podcast: Cassie and Matt Foshee talk about NoPlaceLeft in the Mormon heartland of Utah.

Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. 1 Peter 4:12

A few thoughts about the interview with Chris who was a pioneer for a movement of disciples and churches somewhere in Asia when all hell broke loose.

The first attack came through a leader Chris had promoted without first being tested. The local believers were suspicious but couldn’t say why. The fruit of his influence was conflict among the disciples.

So Chris did a background check and discovered this leader was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. So Chris confronted him and confronted his followers who had slipped in to undermine the movement and promote a false messiah.

When wolves show up it’s time for the shepherds to fight.

The second attack came through violence and intimidation. God kept Chris and his family safe from serious injury but the attack was overwhelming. Chris discovered he was out of this depth. He turned to God, he turned his weakness into faith, and while two demonized people screamed abuse outside his home he took to prayer. For three days he sat before God with an open Bible.

On the third day, he still did not know what to do, but he did know that the risen Lord has authority over evil spirits. He walked outside and in Jesus’ name commanded them to stop! They fled in terror.

Not only had God won the victory, but Chris was a different man. He had stepped into his authority in Christ. In his weakness, he experienced the power of God and would never be the same.

What Satan meant for evil and the destruction of a movement, God meant for his glory. When all hell broke loose, God refined and purified his people and won the battle.

Podcast: When all hell breaks loose

Throughout March I’ll be working my way east to west across North America talking about Acts and the Movement of God.

Check out the links below to find out more.

March 20241st Toronto

4th Charleston

5–7th Exponential Orlando

9th Tampa

11–13th West Palm Beach

15th Austin

21–22nd Los Angeles

24 San Francisco

25–27th Salt Lake City

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What happens when all hell breaks loose on a growing movement of disciples and churches? That’s our topic of conversation with Chris who served somewhere in Asia.

James and Hope live in an Arab city known for its riots and revolutions. They know the smell of burning tires. But the explosion that ripped through the city killing 100 people took the danger to another level.

Most mission agencies would have evacuated them. Instead their mentor turned up with a small team and began working beside them. It was to be a turning point.

With limited Arabic James and Hope prayer walked the most devastated neighborhoods. From 6-8:00 am they walked and prayed in neighborhoods that no foreigner would normally be in.

Soon they made connections. All they had to offer was prayer and the people welcomed them. They met CC who had been seriously injured and whose house was barely liveable.

Sitting outside drinking coffee she asked, “Why are you here?” They answered, “We’re praying for the community in the name of Jesus and asking for God’s blessing.”

CC wept as they prayed for her.

A few days later they returned to discover an aid agency had chosen her as the first one in her community to have her home restored. The work was completed in three days. It was better than before the explosion.

CC told them, “This is because of our prayers!” She became the first new disciple James and Hope baptized.

Soon eight women were meeting in CC’s house to listen and discuss the stories about Jesus.

James and Hope would meet with their language teacher in the morning and learn the stories in Arabic then share them with the group with some questions they’d memorized. Coco would lead the discussion but James and Hope had no idea what their responses were.

Coco shared the gospel with her 85-year-old mother. Who told them, if you pray my son gets a job and God answers, I’ll believe in your God. The next day he had a job as a security guard, she turned and believed and was baptized.

In the aftermath of the explosion James and Hope learned how to enter a neighborhood. How to pray for needs and see God answer. How to be invited into homes for coffee. How to tell a Bible story to Arabs. All this while they were still learning the language.

Meanwhile God was preparing them for an open door in another part of the country.

Mohammed was from a region dominated by clans engaged in crime. He’d been a drug dealer for 30 years. He had spent ten years in jail for murder. In prison, he’d cried out to God to make himself known. Now released and at home, God woke him up one morning and told him to go and wait outside for his messenger.

Meanwhile a German missionary on his last day in the country who had no Arabic. As he drove through the region, his rental car company was tracking his movements and became concerned that the car had been stolen. They remotely disabled the car and it rolled to a stop outside Mohammed’s house. Through a translator, the German shared the gospel, and Mohammed believed and was baptized.

Soon after James and Hope were out sharing the gospel in the city, they met a local disciple who doing the same. She was the translator for the German missionary. Through her, they heard Mohammed’s story and the next day, the three of them drove out to meet him.

They not only met Mohammed, they also met his two wives and sixteen children.

One of his wives explained I wish you’d come earlier. Since meeting Jesus he no longer gets drunk, he no longer beats us he’s given up cocaine.

Immediately James and Hope trained Mohammed to identify his relational world, pray for them, and share his story and the gospel. Then they went with Mohammed to meet his sister, her husband and her family. They all turned and believed and Mohammed baptized them the next day.

When their jihadi son came home and discovered what his parents had done, he took a rock and threw it at his father narrowly missing him but hitting Mohammed and putting him in hospital.

Mohammed became known in the village as, “Our very first infidel.”

He responded with forgiveness and love and didn’t stop talking about Jesus.

His story has spread to other villages and now he is known as a man of forgiveness.

In his village, twelve families have become disciples and there are baptized disciples in 35 villages in the region. Mohammed has trained a coworker and they are out most days sharing the gospel and making disciples. They’ve set a goal to have at least one church in every village in their region.

If they can reach their district it will open the door to reaching every district. Already the gospel is traveling through their disciples to other Arab nations.

Mohammed is the last person you would ever choose to be an apostle to the Arab world. The foolishness of God is wiser than the wisdom of men.

Podcast interview: 321-James and Hope: The Work

The second conversation with James and Hope about their call and how they are going after NoPlaceLeft in the Arab world.

320-James and Hope: The Call

I’ve been thinking about my conversation with James and Hope on their call to the Arab world. There are at least five gems buried in this story that shed light on how God calls movement catalysts. They’re not rules, just patterns that we can learn from.

God chooses unlikely people

James was a depressed eighteen-year-old when his sister handed him a bible and told him, “Read this.”

He took her advice, read the Bible, and put his faith in Christ. Immediately, James thought, “If I believe this, I need to do something about it.”

His sister told him, “You need to meet Zach.”

God will lead you to your ZachZach Medlock was engaged on college campuses sharing the gospel, making disciples and planting churches.

Zach trained James in telling his story and sharing the gospel. He taught James how to draw up a map of his relationships and set him loose on his college campus.

James teamed up with another student, Trey, and they began planting churches on and around the campus. James learned this is what disciples do.

The fruit was multiple generations of disciples and churches meeting in dorms and homes, made up mostly of African Americans.

Hope’s father is a missions pastor. When she was in her teens, she told him she wanted to be a missionary. He told her, “If you’re not making disciples where you are, you won’t make disciples somewhere else.” But she didn’t know anyone making disciples in her world.

Then she heard about Zach’s ministry to students and signed up for a one-month outreach. That’s when she met James.

Through Zach, she learned how to share the gospel and form new disciples into gatherings. Through Zach, he met James.

In her first semester of college, she shared the gospel with around 100 people on campus.

Get busy and the call will find youJames planted a church in his dorm. That church started other churches with new disciples, most of whom were African Americans. As he studied the scriptures his heart was drawn to Muslims. He read David Garrison’s Wind in the House of Islam and was disturbed by the lack of progress in the Arab world.

Reading Jeremiah he he felt overwhelmed with the challenge like Jeremiah who prayed, “Alas, Sovereign Lord, ‘I do not know how to speak; I am too young.’“

God answered him from the passage ‘Do not say, “I am too young.” You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you.“(Jer 1:6-7)

Encouraged by that word, James enrolled in an Arabic class. On campus, he met Saudis, Yemenis, and Syrians. He would greet anyone who looked Middle Eastern with, “assalamu aleikum” (peace be upon you). Soon he was drinking coffee and being invited into homes. He visited the university mosque and eventually every mosque in town to learn, understand and share the gospel.

His heart was on fire whenever he got to share with someone from the Middle East. He studied the Bible with over fifty different Arabs. Although none of them came to faith, his calling to the Arab world was established.

Meanwhile, Hope was also studying Arabic and launching discovery studies with over twenty people on her campus.

James and Hope began dating on a mission trip to the Middle East. They knew they were both called to reach Muslims. They decided to marry and then move to the Arab world.

Seek wisdomThey sought out advice from Steve Smith, a movements catalyst. He advised them to:
Identify a family of unreached peoples who share a common trade language.
Move to a leading city.
Learn the trade language.
Get busy sharing the gospel, and making disciples.
Keep learning and stay open to God as he leads you to the gaps of unreached and unengaged peoples.
Wait on GodAfter their marriage, they spent time waiting on God in prayer. As they listened James saw a picture of the Middle East and a great key inserted into an Arab nation and it lit up and then all the countries in the region lit up around it. They took this to mean that a movement of God would begin in that nation that would touch the region.

That Arab nation is where they live today.

A few final thoughtsJames and Hope were not self-made. God called them to himself and this work. God brought them together. People played a role, but God oversaw the process. There’s no formula for creating movement catalysts but there are patterns of how God works.

He calls people who are devoted to doing his will. He links them with mentors who provide training and coaching in disciple making movements wherever they are. He guides people who are already doing something with what God has given them. He speaks through his Word and the Holy Spirit to confirm his calling. He speaks through the wisdom of Godly and experienced counselors.

Full interview: 320-James and Hope: The Call

A conversation with James and Hope around their call to the Arab world.

A conversation with a young man we’ll call Matthew. He and his friend Hugh spent three months in a Muslim-majority country sharing the gospel and making disciples.

Our last trip together.

A conversation with my friend Dave Lawton on losing my wife Michelle and finding the goodness of God.

Over 700 people have now watched Michelle’s funeral.

Steve and Jasper

Thank you for the encouragement and support of so many people worldwide.

Over 600 people have now watched Michelle’s funeral.

People have been asking, What’s next for Steve? Well, I’m not sure, but I do have a plan.

Between now and Christmas I’m sorting out the legal and financial issues that arise when someone dies. It’s been good to be active without being too busy. And yes, Michelle left me a list to work through! I’m also spending some time with our children and grandchildren in Melbourne and Sydney.

Then on New Year’s Eve, I will fly out to Athens where I’ll be for two months. I have good friends and partners who are based there and serve movements of disciples and churches across the region — North Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia and Europe. It puts me back in the field learning from and supporting pioneers.

I don’t know yet if I’ll be writing. I don’t know if I’ll be putting out more podcasts. I feel I need to step back a bit and see what God brings to me in this season.

Then I’ll come home via North America visiting ten cities on a tour to promote my book Acts and the Movement of God: From Jerusalem to the Ends of the Earth.

That puts me back in Melbourne around Easter. By then I should be clearer about what God has for me in a new season of life and ministry without Michelle. What won’t change is the calling we shared — multiplying disciples and churches everywhere to the glory of God.

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Session 1: A Shepherd for Every FlockFrom the first church(es) in Jerusalem and consistently emerging from each subsequent harvest field, recognizing elder/overseers in each field is a part of the work of mission (Titus 1:5-6). Paul carried greatly for this task. Paul often returned the venue of persecution to see that elders were appointed (Acts 14:23). What plans and patterns have you and your disciples made for leadership recognition in the midst of your church planting? How do your plans fit with the biblical example and/or expectation? Are we satisfied with the qualifications detailed in scripture? Are these qualifications sufficient? Why or why not?

Session 2: Sent Ones Who Join the TaskThe task of mission is multiplied as “sent ones” take up the task of repeating the process of church planting. Developing and releasing such laborers does indeed find precedent in the pages of the NT. In today’s study we consider the use of the word ‘apostle’ beyond the 12 apostles qualified in Acts 1. As we acknowledge both the closed group of eye-witnesses to Christ’s ministry and resurrection and the seemingly ongoing role of “sent-ones” across the Mediterranean world, how might the use of these terms challenge our thinking regarding leadership roles in the NT? Do you and your ministry anticipate and make provision for those called to “go”? How might the ongoing role and expectation for such calling inform our reading or re-reading of the NT?

Watch the series on Youtube

Session 1: Pictures of Church IdentityOne of the most overlooked aspects of church planting is the introduction and local ownership of church identity. Beginning in Acts 2, today’s study considers the matter of local commitment to “the number.” The New Testament utilizes numerous word pictures to catalyze church identity. Today’s study considers these metaphors for church identity and challenges listeners to consider how such passages might be leveraged to call for church identity. To be sure, beyond doing or not doing, being church is a clear expectation across the NT.

Session 2: Discerning NT Venues for ChurchThere is no example of churches in the NT lacking a venue to gather. In today’s study we consider the simple, practical question: where did NT churches meet? Though many options exist for venue in the 21st century, how might the NT (universal) precedent offer insight into the efficiency and advance of NT church planting? Surely, amidst multiple options available today, beginning new churches in the homes of new believers remains a viable option for church planting in our fields.

Session 3: Decision Making and Church DisciplineAcross the NT record, decisions are presented as catalyst to local responsibility for various congregations. In today’s study we consider a variety of such decision. Examples of choosing leaders, designating offering, the confrontation of false teaching and finally, and finally the stand of the local church for holiness each call for congregational responsibility. Where we consider such decisions, how might we employ the NT precedent of local responsibility? Have you considered such responsibility as a catalyst for maturity? Are your default responses to such needs or decisions consistent with this NT precedent?

Session 4: The Value of the Lord’s SupperThe NT ordinances are Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Each of these introduce and demand identification with the Lord’s sacrifice. Just as Christ died and rose again baptism pictures for us a chance to associate with Christ as we to have died to our old way of life and live in the power of his resurrection (Rom. 6). Similarly, the Lord’s Supper serves as a reminder of the Lord’s death, but also platforms self-examination, confession, unity and worship. How have your disciples and church planting efforts benefited from the Lord’s Supper? How might you leverage its many lessons as a reminder of the Lord’s expectation for his bride?

Watch the series on Youtube: youtube.com/@DiscoveringtheMissionaryTask
Download the 4-Fields manual by Nathan and Kari Shank

I was going back and forth with a dear friend of many years about same-sex marriage. Something that would have once seemed inconceivable with this brother just a few years ago.

I went to Genesis 2 and God’s intention from the beginning. Then to Jesus’ endorsement of the biblical vision for marriage in Matthew 19.

The scriptures are clear. Even leading scholars who support same-sex marriage agree the Bible opposes it, but they argue the Bible is wrong.

Here’s the response that floored me, “Steve, that’s what it says, but what does it mean?”

Now we’re back in the Garden and the Serpent asks, “Did God really say?”

The winds of change have swept the Western world and they seek to bend God’s people to their will. “Did God really say?”

Through the ages, movements of disciples and churches have risen as they’ve placed themselves under the living Word of God. These same movements have fallen when they place their word above that living Word. God means what he says.

Session 1: Baptism as ExpectationIn Matthew 28 disciple-making assumes, or is even initiated by, the acceptance of Baptism. In today’s study, we survey post Pentecost examples of Baptism. As we consider these examples, we intend to wrestle with three key questions; who received baptism? When was baptism performed? And finally, who gave baptism in each example? As you consider the NT examples, how do your own thoughts or commitments to practice Baptism come into view? Are there reasons we diverge from NT precedent? Are we free to adapt, or wise to consider universal examples across the NT?

Session 2: Where might we begin?Matthew 28 sets a high bar. We are to teach our disciples to “obey all that Christ has commanded.” Amidst the breadth of the NT where might we begin? Today we celebrate the example of Acts 2:42 where new disciples “devoted themselves to the apostles teaching.” Have you considered the personal disciplines initiated in the first churches of Jerusalem? These personal disciples observed in the obedience of the 3000 baptized in Jerusalem were organized in what we call the first church following Pentecost. How might you commit, introduce, and expect such mobilization of disciples and disciple-making in your ministry setting?

Session 3: Scripture Intake as CatalystThere is no tool for disciple making like the Word of God. Today’s study challenges each of us to reconsider how we might campaign, commit to, and benefit from regular planning and accountability to scripture intake. As you gather your disciples, what commitments have you made? How might the descriptions of the Word of God you read together prompt you to commit again to sit under its authority?

Watch the series on Youtube

Cynthia Anderson talks about her new book, The Multiplier’s Mindset. She unpacks the shifts in our thinking we need to navigate as we pursue movements of disciples and churches. Cynthia is a trainer, coach, podcaster and friend.

Links

multipliersmindset.com
Mindset questionnaire
Dare to multiply podcast

A conversation with Zeth and Hannah Hill about their calling to London.

David Cervenka felt like he was hitting his head against a brick wall until a phone call sent him on a journey of discovery and breakthrough in Japan.

A conversation with Jacob Boss about trends across Britain and Europe.

A conversation with Frank Schattner about his journey from pioneering movements among the Hmong people to the Joshua Project and now the Fidelis Project. Fidelis provides online training and higher education for movement catalysts.

Links:

Fidelis Project: fidelisproject.com
Jonathan Project: joshuaproject.net
Hill 111: hill111.com

For centuries Spain has sent missionaries to Venezuela. This is the story of Gabo and Barbara Ayala, called by God out of Caracas, Venezuela to Granada, Spain.

Find out more: movimientotrestercios.es

Ross Douthat

Jesus doesn’t urge Peter to go ahead, betray me, I understand.

Jesus doesn’t tell the woman taken in adultery: go back to your lover because your situation is complex.

Jesus doesn’t tell Zacchaeus the tax collector: actually keep the money you have unjustly taken because you need it to support your family.

Jesus dines with sinners, he hangs out with prostitutes and publicans, he evangelises the much-married Samaritan woman, he welcomes thieves into eternity. But he never confirms them in their sins, or makes nuanced allowances for their state of life; that sort of rhetoric is alien to the Gospels.

Ross Douthat

To Change the Church: Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism

While in Thailand I visited the border where I met one fearless lady from Laos. She’d crossed the Mekong River to equip Thai believers to reach their people before returning to Communist-controlled Laos.

Find out more: mekongkingdommovement.com

Steve and Jasper, Port Fairy

If you want to meet strangers, get a dog that likes people. Our Jasper is a people magnet.

I was walking Jasper yesterday when we met Rafael. While he patted Jasper and Jasper licked his face I asked Rafael where his accent was from — Columbia, but he’s living in Melbourne now. He loves it, but misses his parents and nine brothers and sisters.

Your parents must be good Catholics! They were. What about you Rafael, do you have a faith?

Not really, but sometimes I pray.

When I was young my brother threw a ball at me and it jammed in my throat. I stopped breathing and died. My parents rushed me to the hospital, praying that I would recover and I did.

What about now Rafael? Are you seeking God? Do you want to know him?

I know he’s there, but I’m not seeking him. Although I know my mother prays for me every day.

I prayed for him. We swapped numbers and went on our way.

Rafael knows God rescued him from death as a child. He knows his mother prays for him, but he has no sense of urgency or need for God. He represents his generation.

So why bother engaging the Rafaels of this world at all? Because his story is not over yet.

I wonder who Jasper and I will meet today on our walk?

A conversation with Joe Stewart and Ron Johnson in Denver, Colorado about multiplying disciples and churches from where they are to the ends of the earth.

Links:

simplechurch.global
chasm.solutions

According to Robert Clinton, few leaders finish well. Here’s one movement catalyst who’s an exception to the rule. What can you learn from his email to friends and supporters?

To a few friends.

Tomorrow I leave for a two-week trip to Sierra Leone, West Africa. Good Lord willing & the creek does not rise, I should be back home early next month. I greatly appreciate your prayers for me, John, traveling with me and the local believers hosting us.

Travel is always sketchy. From home in North Carolina outbound there are five airports in three countries, one small boat across a river delta, one borrowed four-wheel vehicle and several two-wheel vehicles. Return is also five airports in four countries. Daily we will be traveling to varied teaching locations about forty-five minutes one way on a local obstacle course dodging goats, potholes, big trucks and meandering herds of cows. Meal plans are yet to be determined. I am up to date on my malaria meds. Prayer for traveling safety is appreciated.

John has been coaching three local team leaders online. This will be the first time for all of us to meet face-to-face. Prayer is needed for bonding, and good cross-cultural communication as we will operate in several languages.

I have been to this country many times. I have never met these three local believers who are working in a part of the nation I have not previously visited.

The local majority religion is about a week away from completing fasting month. Most of our participants were formerly part of that culture. A few were well-recognized leaders in local communities. During this month of religious zeal, it is not uncommon for ordinary events to generate conflict. It is always possible for conflict here to move from verbal to physical violence. Intercessions that our guardian angels will be especially vigilant for our hosts and us appreciated.

We look forward to hearing the testimonies of new family members. We plan to model activities that can safely be celebrated in homes. Many have already been dunked. Some are already hosting home groups. Our visit supplements and complements the excellent online equipping John has been providing. A solid foundation has been laid. I anticipate many late-night sessions of good book discovery expeditions.

We have been asked to prepare subjects such as persecution, multiplying disciples in villages and neighborhoods, how to lead and multiply discovery Bible studies, dealing with conflict both inside and from outside, and how to sustain churches of former members of the majority religion. A perennial favorite is walking through the life of the Messiah and tracing lessons learned from the Book of Acts.

The trip will provide the opportunity to continue training face to face which I much prefer to Zoom.

In the last month, I have helped teams in Somalia, Lebanon, India, the Middle East, Indonesia, Pakistan, and one team in the Washington DC area. As much as I praise God for the internet that allows us to connect around the globe, I really enjoy the face-to-face and multi-hour sessions, especially around meals.

Our lodging has promised that they have internet, but electricity may be intermittent. I’ll try to contact Susan regularly.

Special thanks to several who have contributed support and those who have donated good books that are hard to find in that country.

Bill

When I grow up, I want to be like Bill.

Another Pentecost has just come and gone, yet are we any wiser regarding the identity and calling of God’s people?

When the day of Pentecost dawned, one hundred and twenty mostly Gallileans were gathered for prayer believing Jesus would soon fulfill his promise and pour out the Holy Spirit on them.

Jesus had risen from the dead and restored his scattered band of disciples. Over forty days he taught them from the Scriptures explaining how God’s purposes were fulfilled in a suffering and rising Messiah and how they would take this Gospel for the forgiveness of sins would go to the ends of the earth. The Spirit was coming in power on all of God’s people to equip them for the task.

This is a movement of God. Like Jesus, they are under the authority of God’s Word, depending on the Holy Spirit, and faithful to the core missionary task.

Why should we expect a movement of God in the West if we bend and break the Word of God in an attempt to flow with the latest cultural trends? Why should we expect a movement of God if we limit the work of the Spirit to our meetings instead of bearing witness to Jesus in a lost world? Why should we expect a movement of God if we promise heaven on earth without the message of the Cross and the call to repent and believe?

In Acts, the Word is on the move in the power of the Spirit from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth—every people, every place. The Word and the Spirit combine to bring salvation and to create communities of disciples who are learning to follow Jesus and fish for others.

Our identity and calling as God’s people are on display at Pentecost. Until we return to who we are, we won’t see a movement of God.

 Jen Norton

I like to imagine what would happen if the Spirit fell upon a group of disciples today, just as he did at Pentecost. Imagine the sensation. Within hours there would be a live video feed going out to the world as the crowds made their way to this holy site.

Then the debate would erupt on social media as to whether this is a genuine move of God.

We are in as desperate need today for the power of the Spirit as that ﬁrst generation of disciples. But how are we to recognize a work of the Holy Spirit? Pentecost shows us that when the Spirit moves in power, we’ll see the life and ministry of Jesus lived out by disciples in communities, spreading from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

The Spirit serves the expansion of the Word. Luke says it is the Word, not the Spirit, that grows, and the outcome is communities of disciples. And so, on the day of Pentecost, the outpouring of the Spirit reaches its climax in the proclamation of the Word to the nations and the formation of the church in Jerusalem.

Out of the nations of the world, the Holy Spirit creates the people of God—Jews, Samaritans, Ethiopians, Romans, Syrians, Greeks, Galatians, Lycaonians, Macedonians, Achaians, and Asians—united in their faith in Jesus as Savior and King. This work of the Spirit is at the heart of God’s mission.

The Spirit breathes life into this movement of God, directing, intervening, propelling, correcting. There are apostles, prophets, evangelists, teachers, and elders, all gifted by the Spirit, but they don’t direct the movement; the Spirit does, and he uses whomever he chooses.

As the movement expands, it is the Spirit who forms new disciples into churches and strengthens the life of the churches, enabling them to live in the fear of the Lord, encouraged and increasing in numbers. When Ananias and Sapphira deceive the community, it is the Holy Spirit who protects the purity of God’s people. When the mission to the nations languishes, the Spirit uses persecution to get Philip to Samaria. When the Samaritans believe, the Spirit conﬁrms their place among the people of God. It is the Spirit who brings Peter to the house of Cornelius; and as Peter preaches, the Spirit falls upon Gentiles, demonstrating acceptance by God through faith in Christ alone. The Spirit is given to the Samaritans and the Gentiles, just as it was to the Jews at Pentecost. The Samaritans and Gentiles will also bear witness to Jesus throughout the world. When the barrier between Jewish and Gentile disciples must be removed, it is the Spirit who guides the Jerusalem Council. The Spirit appoints both leaders within the churches and leaders who multiply churches in new ﬁelds.

It is the Spirit who blocks Paul and his missionary band from pushing further into Asia Minor, and it is the Spirit who then ﬂings open the door into Europe. After his ﬁnal mission as a free man, Paul is compelled by the Holy Spirit to go to Jerusalem, which brings about his arrival in Rome, where he will bear witness to the emperor. The book of Acts ends with Paul in chains, awaiting trial in Rome. The missionary is bound, but the Word still goes out in the power of the Spirit. The mission will continue, despite what happens to Paul. The story is not ﬁnished, and so the Holy Spirit continues to work, as a new generation of disciples accept the challenge of taking the gospel to the ends of the earth.

Without the work of the Spirit, there would be no proclamation, no conversions, no churches, no power to release Satan’s captives, and no missionary movement.

When the Spirit came in power at Pentecost the Word went out into Jerusalem bearing the fruit of disciples and churches to the glory of God. That’s the “why” of Pentecost—a missionary movement headed to the ends of the earth. Every people. Every place.

This is an edited extract from Acts and the Movement of God.

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My third and final author interview with Josh Howard on my latest book, Acts and the Movement of God.

We talk about the spiritual battle and how the church in Jerusalem became a multiplying movement of disciples and churches.

Find out more at: movements.net/acts

Buy on Amazon Buy @ Koorong Austrlia

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If you listen to my podcast you’ll be as cool as this guy

I’ve been doing podcast interviews for the release of Acts and the Movement of God.

There’s some overlap in content but I’ve also tried to vary the stories and focus of each one.

Each of these podcasters is focused on multiplying movements of disciples and churches, so check them out.

Praxeis with Dave Lawton
On the Road with Peter Lyndell
H3X with Mark Goering and Dave Miller

My second author interview with Josh Howard about my new book, Acts and the Movement of God.

We discuss the church in Jerusalem as the role model for every church. We learn that discipleship and church formation are two sides of the same reality. We identify the pattern of engagement in Acts between the movement of God and a lost world. We see how the movement advances through both miracles and martyrdom, signs and suffering. We hear how the movement of God is advancing today in the redlight district of Mumbai and an Islamist-controlled neighborhood in the Middle East.

buy on Amazon

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 Join us for the launch of Steve's latest book on Facebook Live. Discover how to bridge the gap between the movement of God in Acts and our experience.

Three copies of the book will be given away. Steve will take questions about the book and share some of its most important insights.

Check the date and time for your location.

I talk with Josh Howard about the release of my latest book: Acts and the Movement of God: From Jerusalem to the Ends of the Earth.

We discuss how Luke wrote to help us bridge the gap between our experience and the movement of God in Acts. We talk about how Jesus launched a missionary movement that was under the authority of God’s Word, dependent on the Holy Spirit, and on the way from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth with the gospel. Finally we ask, What can Acts teach us about the people God uses to fulfill his mission?

Download the Acts Discovery Worksheet: bit.ly/4-FieldsDiscoveryActs

BUY ON AMAZON

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 BUY ON AMAZON

It’s a few days early, but who’s complaining!

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Kevin Weigelt talks about his story of pursuing NoPlaceLeft in Romania.

Find out more: europemultiplyteam.com

A conversation with Jake and Stacy Jarrell about their calling to Spain.

Here’s my pitch for Acts and the Movement of God, due for release in May.

Learn more

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We’re one month out from the launch of Acts and the Movement of God. We dig deep into the book of Acts to rediscover the principles and practices of a movement of God and then look around the world to find what that looks like today. Here’s one of my favorite stories…

Disciple making movements teach the newest believers that they have the authority and responsibility to make disciples.

Kumar Pillai is a movement catalyst in northern India. One of his disciples was an illiterate, low-caste Hindu who took the name Israel. Low-caste Hindus are known as “untouchables,” their very presence brings ritual impurity. From generation to generation, they are restricted to occupations such as garbage collectors, sanitation workers, and street sweepers. From 4 to 9 each morning, Israel swept the streets.

Kumar trained Israel to share his new faith. Israel couldn’t read, so his children helped him learn Bible stories by heart.

Israel shared the gospel with his relatives and friends, many of whom put their faith in Christ. at would normally be enough for a semiliterate, low-caste street sweeper. But Kumar trained Israel how to make disciples among his people.

On one occasion, Israel visited his community, and Kumar went with him. Israel led the son of a local Hindu priest to Christ, and as they walked to a local ﬁshpond, Kumar asked Israel to baptize the young man. Israel was reluctant. With a smile on his face, Kumar told him, “You baptize him. I have a fear of water!” So, that day, Israel baptized his ﬁrst disciple.

Later that day, Kumar and Israel visited Israel’s elderly father. When the father heard that his son, a street sweeper, had been trusted to baptize a new Christian, he wept. His son, from such a low caste, had been honored with real responsibility.

Israel has since learned to read and write, and Kumar has trained him to plant churches. Typically, the churches are ten to ﬁfteen people seated in a circle on the ﬂoor. They pray and sing, their only instrument is an Indian tambourine. They read the Bible together, using a 3-Thirds approach. Out of their poverty, they give to needs within the community of faith and the wider community and they are known for their generosity. Their giving pays for food, or a hospital visit, or school fees.

Israel has led seven other street sweepers to Christ. One of them, Abraham, is also planting churches. Israel has been the catalyst behind multiple streams of new disciples and new churches. He’s lost count of how many, as it’s hard to track while he is still working a full-time job as a street sweeper. He has won the award for the best street sweeper in his town three times.

At the heart of every movement of God, there are people like Israel. Jesus chose men and women like Israel. When Israel came to Christ, Kumar saw a disciple who could make disciples, baptize them, and teach them to follow Christ together. Kumar released authority and responsibility to Israel, backed up by training and coaching.

Can we see the Israels around us? We must shift our focus from what we can achieve, to helping the newest disciple reach their community. The skills aren’t diﬃcult, but the shift in understanding can be. That’s why Luke wrote Acts.

Acts and the Movement of God: From Jerusalem to the Ends of the Earth is due for release on May 12.

Russell Godward leads a conversation on the journey from established church to movement.

Links:

Russell’s YouTube channel.
Church to movement page

A conversation with Nathan Zziwa about the progress they are making towards NoPlaceLeft in Uganda.

Peter's conflict with Simon Magus by Avanzino Nucci, 1620.

The love of money has destroyed too many promising leaders and movements. Here’s what I’m learning about movements and money from the book of Acts.

When revival broke out in Samaria, thousands turned and believed and churches were formed throughout the region for the first time (Acts 8:9–25; 9:31). Satan’s counter-attack came through Simon the Sorcerer. He too had believed and was baptized, but like Judas, his heart was corrupted by the love of money.

Principle 1: Movements serve God not money. Peter’s clash with Simon the sorcerer is a powerful illustration of Jesus’ teaching that you cannot serve both God and money. Leaders who use their position to gain money and power will corrupt a movement and must be confronted.

A disciple trusts God by placing obedience to his Word above the desire for money, comfort, and security. Just as a disciple who falls into the love of money will become unfruitful, so a disciple making movement that grows to love money will become unfruitful. Money does not fuel movements—commitment and faith do.

Principle 2: Movements ordain everyone. At Pentecost, the Spirit fell on everyone, and they all declared the wonders of God revealed in Jesus Christ.

You cannot pay enough people to make a disciple making movement happen. Volunteers, not paid professionals, do most of the work in any movement. For every movement leader like Peter or Paul, there are hundreds, even thousands who devote their time and resources for the cause.

Principle 3: Movements keep their options open. In Luke’s Gospel and Acts, there isn’t one funding model. God provided a variety of funding sources for the advance of the movement. Some missionaries supported both themselves and others through their trade. Some workers served at their own expense. Even the grateful inhabitants of Malta honored Paul and his companions and supplied their needs for the journey to Rome. Ordinary believers, wealthy individuals, and churches gave money and other resources. Hosts opened their homes to traveling teams; homes which then became meeting places for new churches.

Principle 4: Movements travel light. The challenge of funding a movement isn’t only about raising money; it also involves keeping costs low. Jesus instructed his disciples to leave their wallets behind when they went out on mission. God provided through the people who welcomed them. The pattern of God providing through receptive households continues in Acts.

The movement Jesus started didn’t require a temple, a priesthood, or any of the trappings of the ancient religions. As the gospel spread, churches sprung up where they were needed, not where they could be afforded.

Principle 5: Movements stay nimble. There was no supply chain from Jerusalem to the churches started in Samaria or on the Phoenician coast; nor was there one from Antioch to the churches in Macedonia and Achaia. Authority and responsibility were continually released to the field. The new churches soon had their own local leaders and were responsible for their own funding. It wasn’t long before these churches released resources and workers for new fields. In this way, the movement remained flexible and nimble, able to multiply. To organize and fund the movement centrally would have choked its life and growth.

Finally . . . The oxygen of a movement is the commitment of its people—to give, to go, to serve without pay, to open their homes, to work with their hands, and to trust that God goes with them as they take the gospel from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

This is an edited extract from my forthcoming book, Acts and the Movement of God: From Jerusalem to the Ends of the Earth. It should be out in May 2023.

Previously: It matters how movements handle money

Brian and Bobby Houston

Disturbing allegations have been raised in the Australian parliament concerning the use of money by the leadership of Hillsong.

Thousands of documents obtained by a whistleblower show a disturbing pattern of spending.

Hillsong’s former global senior pastor, Brian Houston has denied the allegations. It’s now up to the Australian charity watchdog to investigate.

It matters how movements handle money.

When Jesus walked away from his trade as a carpenter, he left his mother in the care of his brothers and sisters.

Jesus called his first disciples away from their usual occupations to follow him while he trained them to fish for people.

Sometimes God’s provision was miraculous—the feeding of the crowds, the coin to pay the temple tax, the miraculous catch of fish—but not always. Jesus relied on the financial support of some wealthy women who sometimes traveled with him. He relied on the hospitality of people like Zacchaeus. When Jesus sent his disciples on mission, he taught them to trust God for the provision of food and lodging through the people who welcomed them and their message.

Sacrifice and generosity fuel movements, but greed stifles them. The Gospels give just one reason for Judas’s betrayal—greed. Jesus warned that worry, riches, and pleasures choke the Word and prevent it from producing a crop.

Jesus urged his disciples to give generously, trusting that their heavenly Father knew their needs and would provide.

There were no luxury watches or business class flights for Jesus’ disciples. No green rooms to cater to their needs. No designer sneakers to wear on stage.

Movements of disciples and churches rise and fall as they move towards, or away from, the life and ministry of Jesus. That’s why money matters.

 A conversation with one young couple called by God to pursue movements of disciples and churches in South Asia.

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Every time you board a train on the London Underground, you’ll hear the announcement to “Mind the Gap!” It took a while before I realized it was referring to the gap between the platform and the train.

When we read the book of Acts, we soon discover there’s a gap between our experience and the movement of God described within its pages. We’re standing on a stationary platform and the only way to board that train, is to step across the gap.

That’s why Luke wrote Acts. He’s the only Gospel writer to tell the one story of Jesus in two parts. What Jesus began to do and teach in the Gospels; he continues to do as his Word goes out in the power of the Spirit.

When Jesus rose from the dead, he confronted a band of dismayed and disillusioned disciples. How did he restore them and form them into a missionary movement? Luke tells us the risen Lord taught from Genesis to Malachi and explained how the Messiah must suffer and rise again and how repentance for the forgiveness of sins must be proclaimed to every people group and in every place. Finally, he promised them the power of the Spirit. This is the essence of the movement of God in Acts—obedient to the living Word, dependent on the Holy Spirit, and faithful to the core missionary task of making disciples and multiplying churches from where we are to the ends of the earth.

We see this fleshed out on the day of Pentecost, the outpouring of the Spirit reaches its climax in the proclamation of the Word to the nations and the formation of the church in Jerusalem, and the birth of a missionary movement.

God’s Word is on the march. The story of Acts is the story of the progress of the Word throughout the world. Wherever the Word goes in the power of the Spirit, the fruit is always disciples in community to the glory of God.

Acts is not just a book about the early church. Acts is a book about God and how he brings salvation. Acts has one story to tell and its main character is the living God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The Father’s plan is centered on his Son, whose obedience to death brought us forgiveness of sins and a restored relationship with God. Now risen and enthroned, the Lord Jesus rules through the Spirit, who empowers the disciples to proclaim this salvation to all. As the Word spreads, the Spirit forms those who repent and believe into the new people of God who are witnesses to the ends of the earth. Angels appear, prophets speak, prison doors open, houses shake, thousands believe, persecutors fall to the ground, the Scriptures are fulfilled—God directs the mission.

Acts calls us back to the beginning—to a movement born in obscurity, without wealth or influence, captivated by God’s grace, devoted to prayer and the spread of God’s Word, bold in persecution, generous in love, experiencing God’s powerful presence, on the move from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

Acts ends abruptly with Paul under house arrest awaiting trial. Why? Luke is saying the movement of God doesn’t begin and end with Paul or the early church. The movement of God continues until there are disciples and churches to the glory of God, in every place, and among every people group.

Luke is not just saying, “This is how it was,” he’s saying, “This is how it should be.”

It’s time to bridge the gap between the movement of God and our experience. The train is leaving the platform and we need to get on board.

UPDATE: My next book, Acts and the Movement of God: From Jerusalem to the Ends of the Earth should be out sometime in May 2023.

In preparation, you may find this resource helpful for working through Acts in a group or individually: 4-Fields Discovery in Acts

Enrique Simonet 1892.jpg

After sixty years of the sexual revolution, the bishops of the Church of England have finally succumbed to the spirit of the age. They have shown themselves to be unfaithful to the teaching Scripture affirmed through 2,000 years of church history and by the vast majority of world anglicans today.

What would Jesus do with the Church of England? How would he confront a corrupt religious institution?

Jesus placed his life and ministry under the authority of God’s Word. He came to fulfill the Scriptures, not overturn them. In his teaching on marriage and sexual morality he intensified the demands of law, expecting his disciples to be faithful in marriage (the lifelong union between a man and a woman) and chaste in singleness.

He warned that temptation will come, but God will judge those who cause his “little ones” who believe in him to stumble.

Jesus stood against the religious authorities of his day who controlled the temple and the priesthood. They were wealthy, politically aligned with the dominant power and keen to protect their privileged status.

How did Jesus deal with them? For most of his ministry he ignored them. When Jesus was presented at the temple there was no High Priest to welcome the Messiah. Jesus was received by two elderly prophets, Simeon and then the widow Anna who had spent her life before God, praying in the temple. They welcomed him.

Jesus didn’t return to the temple for his baptism, he went out into the wilderness. There he identified with repentant sinners seeking God’s mercy in the face of the coming judgment on unfaithful Israel.

Through his baptism and wilderness testing Jesus was shown to be true Israel—obedient to the Father’s Word, dependent on the Holy Spirit and faithful to the core missionary task to be a light to the nations.

His first disciples were not recruited from among the learned scribes and the priesthood, but among ordinary people who obeyed his call to follow and learn to fish for others.

Jesus doesn’t try and capture the institution. His life and ministry fulfills Israel’s destiny and calls disciples whom he forms into true Israel. God has abandoned the institution, and judgment will fall, but his mission continues.

That’s what Jesus did, it’s what he still does today.

A conversation with JT Timblin with the latest news on movements of disciples and churches in Southern California.

Connect with JT: neighborsandnations.org

Follow the story: 285-LA Update

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Everyone’s talking about the revival at Asbury seminary.

Revivals are marked by intense of prayer, confession and repentance from sin, worship and adoration of God revealed in Jesus. Sometimes the power of the Spirit is displayed through miracles and physical manifestations of his presence—people may cry, shake, rejoice, and fall to the ground.

Revivals are a work of God’s grace. And of course, there are excesses and charlatans who manipulate revivals for personal gain. Faith and discernment are required; both cynicism and naïveté are unhelpful. We should not despise revival but test the spirits.

How do we discern a movement of God?

Begin in Acts. It’s the gold standard for understanding how God works in the world.

At Pentecost we find 120 men and women united in prayer, waiting in faith for the coming of the Spirit. Jesus has restored his disciples, teaching them from the Old Testament why the Messiah had to suffer and die and be raised on the third day. He’s laying a foundation for the core missionary task—this gospel for repentance and the forgiveness of sins is going to the ends of the earth. But first they must wait for the power of the Spirit who will turn this motley bunch of disciples into a missionary movement.

Luke shows us what revival looks like—obedience to God’s Word, dependence on the Holy Spirit and faithfulness to the core missionary task. As Acts unfolds we learn that the mission is making disciples and planting churches from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth—every place, every people group—to the glory of God.

Forty days in the Word with the risen Lord was followed by ten days of intense prayer.

They pray, not to summon the Spirit, they pray because Jesus has promised them the Holy Spirit and given them a job to do.

When the Spirit comes, the house shakes, the wind blows, tongues of fire rest on each disciple and they erupt with the praises of God in the languages of a lost world. It’s a reminder that the Spirit is given to bring glory to Jesus among every people group and in every place.

The Spirit falls and the old and young, rich and poor, men and women—every disciple—proclaim the greatness of God revealed in Jesus.

At the heart of this movement is the dynamic Word of God, fulfilling his ancient promises and proclaiming the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection. This Word is on its way from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth in the power of the Spirit. And wherever the Word and the Spirit go, the fruit is disciples and churches to the glory of God.

What does that look like? In Acts 2 the disciples connect with people far from God and proclaim the gospel calling them to repent, believe and be baptized. Promising them forgiveness of sins and new life in the Spirit, so they too can be witnesses.

The new disciples are formed into gatherings across Jerusalem and beyond in which they learn to follow Christ. The day of Pentecost ends with Luke showing us what that looks like — prayer and worship, generosity and love, obeying the apostles’ teaching, meeting from house to house, celebrating the Lord’s Supper. Every day the Word went out and God added disciples to the churches.

This is just the beginning. Jerusalem will birth a missionary movement that multiplies disciples, churches and leaders, as the Word continues its journey from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

That’s what revival looks like.

Glenn and Rhonda Stewart tell the second part of the story of a movement of God in Rajasthan, India.

Explore the resources mentioned in the interview: southasiansands.wixsite.com/ekrasta

 Certain Bishops and Archbishops of the Church of England have placed their wisdom and experience above the Word of God. What has gone unchallenged for thousands of years, what is upheld by the vast majority of global Anglicans and followers of Christ, has been rejected by a privileged few.

This was an exercise in “listening”. These bishops have listened to the whims of a godless culture and the lies of the Enemy. The storms will come and this house, built on sand, will fall.

Wolfhart Pannenberg has said it better than I can:

Here lies the boundary of a Christian church that knows itself to be bound by the authority of Scripture. Those who urge the church to change the norm of its teaching on this matter must know that they are promoting schism. If a church were to let itself be pushed to the point where it ceased to treat homosexual activity as a departure from the biblical norm, and recognized homosexual unions as a personal partnership of love equivalent to marriage, such a church would stand no longer on biblical ground but against the unequivocal witness of Scripture. A church that took this step would cease to be the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.

Wolfhart Pannenberg

I’m putting the final touches on a book about the book of Acts. It’s been my main focus of the last couple of years, but also the outcome of thirty years of investigation into movements.

Looking back, Acts has left me surprised.

I was surprised by how clear and concrete God’s mission is in Acts. Luke covers the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter two. The Spirit falls, the Word goes out and the fruit is disciples and the first church to the glory of God. The church in Jerusalem becomes the first of a movement of disciples and churches on their way to the ends of the earth. It’s as simple as that.

Another surprise was that the Acts of the Apostles was not a book primarily about the apostles, or the early church—Acts is a book about God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God is the main character. Acts is the story of how God works in history to pursue his mission. He works as his people proclaim his Word in the power of the Spirit. Acts is the story of the spread, growth and multiplication of God’s living Word resulting in the multiplication of disciples and churches in ever-widening circles.

A third surprise is the trouble the messengers encounter. They are beaten, chased out of town, imprisoned, put on trial, stoned, beheaded, and shipwrecked. Every major breakthrough is preceded and followed by trouble. Yet God is working out his purposes and the Word keeps on advancing, despite the weaknesses of the messengers and the opposition they face.

Another surprise is the lack of central coordination of the mission. Often the apostles are catching up to what God is doing through the people he has chosen. At Pentecost, the Spirit fell on every disciple so they would declare the wonders of God to the world. The apostles have their part to play, but not at the expense of ordinary disciples who spread the Word wherever they go.

Luke wrote Acts because he was convinced the story about Jesus was not over. The risen Lord continues to lead the way through his disciples as they proclaim the Word in the power of the Spirit from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth, resulting in disciples and churches to the glory of God among every people and in every place.

To not be surprised by Acts is to assume we’ve got this thing sorted. We’re in charge and we know what to do and how to do it. The God of Acts is a God of surprises.

Some people think a movement is a sovereign work of God. Others think it takes a lot of hard work and sacrifice. Glenn and Rhonda Stewart know both are true.

Explore the resources mentioned in the interview: southasiansands.wixsite.com/ekrasta

 Village boys

This report came in late last year. I’ve just read it for the second time and the impact was even greater than the first. It’s from a Communist nation in Asia.

My friend writes:

Two weeks ago brother Noy was brutally beaten to death by hired killers on a remote section of road. Noy was a rural rice farmer who demonstrated wisdom, had a great rapport with others and was an exemplary father to his children. He led his local house church and started other village churches. He was faithful to the Lord even unto death leaving behind a widow and eight children. His effectiveness in disciple making was the reason local civic leaders had him killed.

This is the eighth martyr we have known in thirty years. Brother Noy was a third generation disciple of someone I trained.

Two family members have given their lives to Christ because of Noy’s death and there has been nightly worship every day since his death despite village leaders forbidding all Christian activity. The local church is caring for the family.

Nevertheless there is much pain and a raging spiritual battle. Village leaders continue their scrutiny and verbal harassment. Other believers in the village are afraid their families might be next.

This sort of thing is going on all around the (non-Western) world with little attention from the world’s press. The Lord sees. He knows.

Go deeper: 268-Somewhere in SE Asia

 Download the worksheet

Here’s the 4-Fields Discovery worksheet and instructions to go along with my next book, Acts and the Movement of God.

Let me know what you think in the comments below.

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It’s official, after years of impasse, the bishops of the Church of England have decided the church must bless what God condemns. There’s no change to the official doctrine of the Anglican Church that marriage is between one man and one woman for life. Instead there will be services of dedication and thanksgiving pronouncing God’s blessing on same-sex couples who marry or enter civil partnerships.

Caught between the teaching of Scripture and the spirit of the age, the bishops have attempted to have it both ways.

The Church of England is the established church of Britain. The Archbishop of Canterbury will crown King Charles. Anglican Bishops sit in the House of Lords. Once the political and cultural elites shifted it was inconceivable that the Church of England would not ultimately go with them.

All of Europe’s present and former state churches are in terminal decline. It’s not all bad news, every time they close a church due to dwindling and aging congregations, a piece of prime real estate is sold and the proceeds banked.

When Jesus rose from the dead he restored his failed disciples, opening their minds to understand the Scriptures, teaching them why the Messiah had to suffer and rise again and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem (Luke 24:44–49). He gave them the core missionary task of making disciples and planting churches to the glory of God. He promised them the power of the Spirit.

The restoration of a fallen church is possible, but only if it will place itself under the authority of God’s living Word, and dependent on the Holy Spirit get back to making disciples among every people and in every place.

The future of the Anglican Church will not be determined by bishops, but by the risen Lord, which should bring both consolation and the fear of God (Revelation 2–3).

Lipok Lemtur talks about the tragedy and triumph of making disciples in the red-light district of Mumbai, India.

For more:

Hilltop of Hope
288-Don and Theresa's Story
224-God Calls and Shapes a Movement Pioneer (Lipok)

Bud Houston shares his story and talks about the opportunity to reach the unreached people groups of North America.

Find out more: UPGNorthAmerica.com

Joey and June Gordy have given their lives to multiplying disciples and churches. Their current assignment is in Africa.

Previous interviews:

281-Joey’s Story (India)
223-Africa Calling (Justin and Rachel White)

Ian Paul over at Psephizo has done a great job of dismantling the progressive attacks on Biblical teaching about sex and marriage. He makes two important points.

First, according to the vast majority of scholars, the biblical witness is clear. Where the Bible mentions homosexual behavior at all, it clearly condemns it. Renowned scholars Walter Brueggemann, Timothy Luke Johnson and Walter Wink support same-sex marriage but agree the Bible condemns homosexual activity.

These three at least have the intellectual honesty to accurately interpret Scripture rather than twist Scripture to bolster their case.

Second, for them and many other clergy, it’s not a question of what the Bible teaches, it’s a question of whether the Bible is right.

I think it important to state clearly that we do, in fact, reject the straightforward commands of Scripture, and appeal instead to another authority when we declare that same-sex unions can be holy and good.

Luke Timothy Johnson

The Gospel is not to be confused with or identified with the Bible. The Bible contains all sorts of voices that are inimical to the good news of God’s love, mercy and justice.

Walter Brueggemann

As one principal of a theological college advised me, we need to balance what Jesus taught on sex and marriage with his more inclusive sayings. Our word rules over God’s Word. We have become like God, deciding for ourselves what is right and wrong.

Ultimately this is a battle over the authority of Scripture and not something we can agree to disagree on.

And so we are back in the Garden and the tempter is asking once again, “Did God say?”

All over the Western world, once-dynamic movements are drifting into decline and decay. Here’s one recent example.

Holy Trinity Brompton (HTB) is a 3,000-strong charismatic-evangelical Anglican Church in London’s West End. For a generation, HTB has been at the forefront of church renewal in Britain and worldwide. Under Nicky Gumbel’s leadership, the church birthed the Alpha cause that spread to 130 countries and resulted in the conversion of hundreds of thousands of people.

A few months ago, Nicky Gumbel stepped down from the leadership of HTB and endorsed the appointment of Archie Coates as his replacement.

In 2009 Coates was sent out by HTB to replant St Peter’s Brighton. Today around 1,000 people attend each Sunday.

The seaside town of Brighton is the unofficial gay capital of England and hosts the annual Pride Festival. As vicar of St Peters, Archie Coates was “very supportive” of the parade and noted that the church has many LGBT people who attend.

Coates believes sexuality is a secondary issue like Britain’s exit from the European Union (Brexit). He refuses to preach or teach about his own views on sexuality for fear of causing disunity in the church.

Movements that multiply disciples and churches rise and fall depending on whether they are moving towards or away from the life and ministry of Jesus. Jesus lived his life and fulfilled his mission through obedience to his Father’s Word.

The culture has shifted, but Jesus’ Word will never pass away. Once we place our word above God’s Word all hope is lost. Movements drift, then decline and then decay. The only way back is to deny our fear of rejection and restore the supremacy of God’s Word above our fickle opinions.

The story of HTB is being played out all around the Western world as church leaders, denominations, seminaries and mission agencies are deciding whether to place the culture’s word about God’s Word. We can decide, but we can’t choose the consequences.

A conversation with Don and Theresa Waybright about their journey towards multiplying movements of disciples and churches.

More on Reach the Rest: reachtherest.org
More on the work in the red-light district: hilltopofhope.com

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I don’t need to tell you that there is a massive shift taking place in the western world regarding human identity, sexual morality and marriage. That shift is sending shock waves through western Christianity.

Bishops in England are lining up to embrace same-sex marriage and gender ideology. They sense they may be winning a battle that has raged for decades. Meanwhile, the archbishop is silent and refuses to discipline those who reject the church’s teaching.

In Australia, the Baptists of NSW decided to disaffiliate churches and pastors that embrace same-sex marriage. The head of Baptist Mission Australia and the head of missiology and evangelism at the NSW Baptist theological college opposed that move.

This shift is everywhere in the western church and it is not going away. How can we understand and respond to it from a movement perspective?

Here’s the heart of it.

When confronted with a conflict like this the first thing to do is return to our identity. Disciple making movements follow Jesus’ example by placing themselves under the authority of God’s living Word revealed in Scripture, they depend on the power of the Holy Spirit, as they pursue the core missionary task of making disciples and multiplying churches to the glory of God, from where they are, to the ends of the earth.

The way to meet this challenge is to remind ourselves of who we are and remain faithful to our identity in Christ, wherever that leads.

In the next post, we’ll talk about what that looks like.

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My first attempt at a blur for my book on Acts and the Movement of God. Happy to get feedback.

There’s no other book like Acts. It ties together the coming of Jesus and his continuing mission through his Spirit-empowered disciples. Acts is a book about the unchanging God. Its relevance cannot be confined to the past.

Acts is about the spread of the Word in the power of the Spirit from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth fulfilling the Father’s plan through the crucified and victorious Lord Jesus.

Embattled witnesses triumph through trials and establish communities of disciples in ever widening circles radiating out from Jerusalem.

The church in every generation must return to the book of Acts and find renewal in its identity and mission or risk being swept away by the spirit of the age.

A conversation with Steve and Melissa Behrens about making disciples in the Australian outback.

The Behrans serve with praxeis.org

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I’m still working on a book about Acts and the Movement of God. It’s got me thinking about why we see so few movement in the West and a related question—where are our Pauls?

Where are the Pauls today? Who proclaim the gospel where it has never been heard? Who make disciples of people who are far from God? Who plant churches where there were none. Who raise up local leaders and head missionary teams of dedicated workers? Who refuse to settle down, but continue to move on to unreached fields, strengthening the churches they leave behind?

If we want to know why there are so few disciple making movements in the Western world, we need look no further than our patterns of church leadership. They are far from the example Jesus set and inspired in the book of Acts. We don’t lack money and education, we live in relative peace and security, but where are our Paul’s?

Our mission is the spread of the Word in the power of the Spirit bearing the fruit of the disciples and churches from where you are to the ends of the earth. Such a mission requires leaders like Paul, but also Priscilla and Aquila, Timothy, Silas and Titus, Junia and Andronicus, Apollos, Luke and Epaphras plus a host of ordinary disciples whose names are unknown.

Perhaps if we returned to the mission we’d find our Pauls and Priscillas and Aquilas, and Timothys …. and a host of ordinary disciples whose names are unknown.

Hundreds of lives have been transformed by the gospel as it spreads among the military and their families. This is one of those stories.

Find out more: noplaceleftarmy.net

A conversation with Troy Cooper on progress towards NoPlaceLeft Southern California.

Find out more: coopersonamission.com

A conversation with Jim McKnight about making disciples and planting churches among the 1.3 million people who serve with the US military.

Visit noplaceleftarmy.net to learn more.

David Bareham, Essex

I’m writing a book on Acts and the Movement of God. I was looking for a current story to go with the story of Peter and Cornelius. I came across this interview from 2018 and thought it does the job well.

David Bareham is a successful church planter and pastor in Essex, England. He launched the church in 1995 and since then it has grown steadily to 500 people, helped by the influx of immigrants from Eastern Europe and Africa. Around forty nations attend the church. Most years, they add about fifteen people to the church by conversion, many through the Alpha course. In addition, the church has planted four churches in Essex.

Yet it troubled David that they were reaching so few people in the community. Most of their growth came from existing Christians.

Then he heard of a local pastor, Russell Godward, who had stepped down from his church to focus entirely on reaching people far from God. At first, he thought Russell was crazy. When Russell invited him to a training he agreed, but arrived skeptical. I was with Russell that day, and I remember David’s searching questions.

But David kept coming back for more. He attended three identical training events until he was sure there was something in this. The training covered the basic Biblical foundation and skills in sharing the gospel and making disciples followed by time in the community connecting with people and sharing the gospel.

David kept pressing in because he wanted to see his church reaching lost people in their community. He spent time with Russell out in the community offering prayer, sharing the gospel. David believed if you’re going to bring change into your church you have to immerse yourself in it first.

It embarrassed him that as a church leader, it was years since he had led someone to Christ. He felt he didn’t have the time to connect with people outside the church. If someone came to know Christ, he had no discipleship plan, apart from, “Come to church, listen to my sermons, join a life group and sign up for Alpha in four months.”

He prayed he would lead someone to Christ every month. God answered his prayer. He formed a discipleship group for new believers. Using a discovery approach, they worked through the Commands of Christ, learning how to follow Jesus and make disciples.

A young man called Ben came to Christ, David baptized him and invited him to do the Commands of Christ. When he asked Ben who else he could bring, Ben invited his mother and grandmother. On the first night, both turned and believed.

David trained Ben to share the gospel with his friends, which he did. Ben was not confident, so he’d call David and ask when can you come over and share the gospel with my friend? On a holiday to Spain, Ben finally led one of his friends to Christ, but not before he sent a text to David saying, “Help, I’ve forgotten the prayer I ask them to pray!”

While this was happening, David was working with his elders to gain support for the new direction. He’d been on a journey, and he didn’t want to leave them behind. On one occasion they needed more time and so he canceled a church training and gave them time. But he didn’t stop sharing the gospel and making disciples.

Stories circulated throughout the church of the new decisions to follow Christ. They were baptizing people with no church background, who were joining Discovery Groups, and making disciples.

As God was at work, the church culture was shifting, and the elders embraced the new direction. David remembers it took about one year for God to turn him around, then another two years to win wide support in the church, but it wasn’t time wasted. All along the way, the gospel was getting out and people were turning and following Christ.

David has formed a team to take the training to every life group in the church. He and his team now train throughout Britain and Europe, helping other churches to reach out beyond their four walls.

A conversation with an author who is both a practitioner and researcher. His name is Emanuel Prinz and he’s just released a new book entitled Movement Catalysts: Profile of an Apostolic Leader.

I’ve previously interviewed Emanuel about his work in Sudan.

Visit the Movement Catalyst blog.

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I’m still working on that book on Acts and the Movement of God. Wondering why there’s such a chasm between our experience in the West and what we see in Acts.

Acts tells the story of the progress of the Word from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth overcoming all manner of opposition. The messengers are under continual pressure, yet God ensures the Word keeps moving on, never taking a backward step. Wherever the Word goes, the fruit is disciples and churches to the glory of God.

There are many ways we can deny the power of God’s Word and therefore stifle any hope that we will see disciple making movements in the West.

The first is to place ourselves above God’s Word, deciding for ourselves what is right and wrong. For many modern-postmodern scholars, the Bible only contains the Word of God, and they get to decide what that Word says. Once great movements of God have fallen into this trap and then faced spiralling decline. New generations of church leaders are following in their wake, at the mercy of the spirit of the age.

An opposite error is to uphold the authority of Word of God then confine its use to seminaries and church meetings. Of all the preaching in Acts, Luke records only one message before a believing audience, the rest are to people far from God. The Word goes out into public places and homes, prison cells, in the markets, a lecture hall, a governor’s palace, even on a sinking ship. Every disciple is a messenger empowered by the Spirit.

Others seek spiritual experiences as an end in themselves. They want their hunger for God to be satisfied at the expense of a lost world. But the work of the Spirit in Acts is all about the progress of the Word resulting in the birth and growth of communities of disciples. The Spirit was given that we might be witnesses to the world. Even a genuine work of the Spirit will atrophy if we keep it to ourselves.

A final way we deny the power of God’s Word is when we redefine our mission as economic, social and political transformation. Acts is explicit, God’s mission is all about the spread of his Word bringing salvation and the creation and growth of the people of God. Transformed communities may result, but there is no guarantee. Jerusalem was not transformed. Paul was run out of many cities, yet he still completed the work the Holy Spirit gave him to do. Heaven on earth will come, but only on the other side of God’s judgment.

In contrast to the above, disciple making movements view the Word of God as the power of God at work in the world bringing salvation and resulting in multiplying disciples and churches.

A conversation with David about making disciples in a war zone.

Find out more and support the work in Ukraine.

A conversation with Joey Gordy about the start of his journey towards multiplying disciples and churches, the stories and the lessons along the way.

Joey’s field research: A System Dynamics Perspective on the Sustainability of Church Planting Movements in North India.

A conversation with Troy Cooper and friends about the importance of finding your tribe as you pursue movements of disciples and churches.

Wandaro Dabaro

I’m working on a book on Acts and the movement of God. I’m looking for stories that show how the realities of Acts are still at work today. Here’s one that got my attention.

When Sudan Interior Mission (SIM) missionaries arrived in 1927 most of the tribes in southern Ethiopia were either Muslim or pagan. They labored for the next ten years and saw 150 disciples formed into three fledgling churches.

Then in 1935 Mussolini’s fascist Italy invaded Ethiopia and the Emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie, fled for England. Two years later the Italians expelled the missionaries.

During the years of occupation SIM received no news from the church in Ethiopia. We now know that the fascists launched a ferocious attack on the new movement. Church leaders were imprisoned. Some were flogged until the flesh was torn from their backs, three died in custody. It seemed that all the fury of darkness had been unleashed. The leaders did not waver, but used their punishment as an opportunity to proclaim the gospel.

Meanwhile local evangelists penetrated deep into the unreached regions. The evangelists were farmers who lived by faith, relying on whatever support other believers could provide. The movement grew rapidly.

Five years later when the Italian forces were driven out they left behind an indigenous movement of churches and 10,000 disciples. By 1943 there were over 200 churches and 25,000 believers. The churches had worked out their own church life and leadership structures. They had no other guide than the instruction from the SIM missionaries to obey what they found in the Word of God.

From the beginning the SIM pioneers determined this would be an indigenous church. The focus of evangelism was not the mission compound but along the roads, under trees and at communal events. Discipleship took place in small informal groups rather than classrooms. The missionaries’ goal was an Ethiopian church led by local elders, not the missionaries. They founded no theological school, church leaders were trained informally through in-depth Bible-studies. There was no salaried clergy but pastor-elders were volunteers living by faith. If there was a church building it was built as a larger version of an ordinary house and paid for by the people themselves.

The SIM missionaries laid the foundation for indigenous church, then at the right time God removed them and the Word multiplied. Back in England, God’s people were united in prayer for Ethiopia, yet they were distressed that their prayers appeared to go unanswered. Meanwhile a national movement of faithful disciples and churches was forged in the fires of persecution.

Cindy Anderson talks about the shifts in mindset that need to happen in order to see movements of disciples and churches.

Download Discover Key Mindset Shifts

Russell Godward (right) and team.

I’m working on a book on Acts and the Movement of God. My editor rightly points out, I need more contemporary stories that help people bridge the gap between the Book of Acts and our experience. Here’s one of those stories.

John McGinley was the senior ministry of Holy Trinity Anglican in Leicester, England. He’d just returned from meeting with his staff to discuss a proposal that we train people to go into the community offering prayer. It was bad news, “Steve, my team agree this won’t work in England. It may work in Australia, but it’s different here. We will not be welcome if we visit people in their homes.”

Then he added, “On the other hand, nothing is working here, so why don’t we give it a try!”

Two months later we trained seventy-five people from churches in Leicester and around the country to visit homes and pray for people. In five days over 1,200 homes received a visit and of those over 400 welcomed prayer. Most of the others were still happy that we dropped by.

What happens went you offer to pray for people? Here are some responses I’ve had: “Wow, I just got out of jail yesterday and I’m trying to get back together with my partner and two sons. Pray for that.” Or, “Pray for me, my dearest friend died last week.” Or even, “Can you pray I’ll win the lottery!” Or, “I can’t believe it. Yesterday I asked God, if you’re there, send somebody and you turn up!” Or, “No I’m ok thanks.”

All around the world, one of the simplest ways to engage someone in a conversation about Jesus by asking, “Is there anything I can pray for you right now?” It works for people you know and for people you’ve met for the first time.

I was out in the English town of Basildon with my mate Russell Godward. We approached a retired couple who wanted prayer. They’d just come from the hospital where the husband was getting his medication for depression sorted. I shared briefly about my own background with depression. Then he opened his heart and told how twelve months ago their daughter had succumbed to cancer leaving a husband and young family. As I prayed I felt God’s heart for this couple. I shared the gospel. They weren’t ready to take things further but as they drove away the husband looked at me and his face was beaming. God had done something in his life through a simple offer of prayer.

If the Good Shepherd is our model of pastoral ministry, shouldn’t we be out looking for lost sheep? Find a partner and go and do it. Discover that Jesus is already active in the lives of your friends, neighbors and the strangers you meet.

Don’t stop with prayer. If someone wants to know more, explain the gospel to them and invite them to read the Bible with you. Ask three questions: When could we meet? Where could we meet? Who else do you know who would be interested?

Remember, your imperfect start in making disciples always beats someone’s perfect, but untried model.

A conversation with Josh and Julie about God’s call to pursue NoPlaceLeft France.

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I’m writing a book on Acts and I’m getting input from my editor that it needs work on helping people apply the lessons. Here’s what I wrote originally on the Holy Spirit in Acts. Below is my first attempt at the application side.

There are two opposite errors regarding the work of the Holy Spirit today, one is to confine the work of the Spirit to the pages of Scripture and banish him from contemporary experience. The other is to pursue the individual experience of the Holy Spirit as an end. Luke wrote Acts to remind every generation that the Spirit is given to bear witness to Jesus throughout the world. The one who empowers is also the one who unsettles God’s people, ensuring they remain on the move. We are in as desperate need today for the power of the Holy Spirit as that first generation of disciples. How are we to recognize a true work of the Holy Spirit? When the Spirit moves in power we’ll see the life and ministry of Jesus lived out by disciples in communities, spreading from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

It’s over a century since a son of former slaves cried out for a fresh work of the Holy Spirit that would sweep the world. Today his prayers are being answered in the impoverished favelas and prisons of Rio de Janeiro.

Drug gangs rule Rio’s favelas. The police dare not enter. The Rio prison system is an extension of the favelas. The gangs, not the prison officials rule on the inside.

Wherever the gangs are strongest, Pentecostalism thrives. Faith in Christ has enabled these desperate men in appalling conditions to reject death and affirm the right to live. Pentecostalism thrives behind bars because it has adapted to this harsh environment by taking on the structure and function of the prison gangs. The prison churches are run by prisoners. Members are easy to identify: they dress differently, quit drugs, and spend time studying the Bible.

Rio’s most stigmatized residents have built churches where they experience joy, brotherhood, and dignity in one of the city’s most apparently god-forsaken places.

The relationship between Pentecostal churches and the narco-gangs is characterized by respect. The churches treat gang members as people worthy of redemption. The gangs in turn command their members to treat the church members and pastors with respect and to acknowledge their authority in the community.

As long as the Pentecostals are known as a group who practice what they preached, they are protected from prison violence and allowed to occupy space in the prison and in the favelas.

This is Pentecostalism at its best, with its emphasis on the power of the Spirit enabling every believer to bear witness to Jesus in the darkest places resulting in disciples and churches to the glory of God. Yes, the overflow is community impact, but their mission is to make disciples.

When the Spirit came at Pentecost they asked, "What does this mean?" In this message Steve Addison answers that question.

I’m writing a book on Acts and the Movement of God. My editor just asked me, “You’ve already written five books on movements. Why do we need this one?” Here’s what I wrote back.

Acts is the final test of our understanding of our part in God’s mission. If at the end of all our best thinking, strategies, planning, and implementation what we have bears little resemblance to God’s mission revealed in Acts, then we’ve missed it. We’re lost in our own imaginings and feeble efforts.

Acts is the test of whether we’ve got it right. We’re not talking about methods, we’re talking about the nature of God revealed in Jesus Christ and how he works in the world through his people. God hasn’t changed since Luke wrote Acts. Jesus rose from the dead and sent his Spirit upon his disciples with a clear mission in mind. What was true for them remains true today.

I’ve spent my adult life pursuing movements that multiply disciples and churches to the glory of God. I’ve been a practitioner, a trainer, a coach, a podcaster, a researcher and a writer. I’ve wrestled with the case studies from history and around the world. All for nothing, unless what I have aligns with the God revealed in Acts—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—and his mission.

That’s why I wrote this book because every generation must return to the beginning and learn the lessons of Acts. What Jesus began to do and teach in the Gospels continues through his disciples in Acts. The risen Lord leads the way as his Word goes out in the power of the Holy Spirit. There is no wall of division between Luke’s age and ours. Jesus reigns and is present through the Holy Spirit. As his Word goes out, the fruit is always disciples and churches from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth—every people, every place.

Why spend your life on anything else?

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Not finding it easy to write a synopsis of my book on Acts for my editor. Here’s what I’ve got so far (unedited!). Let me know what you think.

The one story of Jesus is told in two parts. What Jesus began to do in Luke’s Gospel, he continues to do in the book of Acts. Acts tells the story of how God pursues his mission through his people. Acts is a book about God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The movement of God begins with the risen Lord. When Jesus rises from the dead he confronts a band of disciples in hopeless disarray. He restores them, he gives them their mission and tells them to wait for the Spirit to come in transforming power. The Spirit came at Pentecost and the mission began as the Word went out. Thousands turned and believed and were added to the community of disciples. This was just the beginning.

As the Word goes out in the power of the Spirit, the fruit is disciples and churches to the glory of God from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth—every people, every place.

The life of the first church was characterized by joyful worship and prayer publicly and from house to house. They were devoted to the apostle’s teaching. Their love for one another overflowed in generosity to the poor among them. The church in Jerusalem is an example for every church; it shows us what discipleship in community looks like.

They filled Jerusalem with the knowledge of Jesus. They responded to violent opposition with prayer, forgiveness and bold proclamation of the gospel. Persecution propelled the movement out of the city into Judea and Samaria. God was the initiator of every breakthrough. The risen Lord overwhelmed Saul the destroyer on the Damascus road he called him to open the eyes of both Jews and Gentiles, turning them from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God, that they may be forgiven and added to God’s people. The Lord sets the parameters of his mission. The Word goes out, the fruit is disciples and churches to the glory of God.

When the mission to the nations stalls, God moves Peter further and further away from Jerusalem into Gentile territory. Finally, when the Spirit falls upon the Gentiles gathered at Cornelius’ house, Peter understands. Gentiles are accepted into the people of God through faith in Christ alone. They do not have to become Jews. It takes time, but eventually, through God’s intervention, the door swings wide open to the Gentile mission.

In Antioch, the Spirit falls upon a band of prophets and teaches fasting and worshipping. Barnabas and Paul are set apart to form a missionary band that will take the gospel to key cities along the trade routes of the eastern Roman Empire. They encounter violent opposition from both Jews and Gentiles, but God protects them. As they proclaim the gospel disciples are made and churches are planted in city after city. Despite the danger, they circle back to strengthen the disciples and appoint local leaders in every place. Only then can it be said that they completed the work the Spirit gave them to do.

After more than a decade Paul could look back and say, there is now no more room for him to work in these regions. He had proclaimed the gospel where it was unknown and planted and strengthened churches where there were none. He trained local leaders. Now he was ready for the next unreached field. This time he planned a mission to Spain via Rome.

Paul says a tearful farewell to the churches in the east and heads to Jerusalem. The Spirit intervenes to warn him that in every city trouble and hardship await him, but God will get him to Rome. In Jerusalem he is attacked by a murderous mob and arrested by the Roman authorities. What follows is two years of legal battles and delays in which his enemies seek to have him either handed over or executed by the Romans. The only way out is for Paul to appeal to Caesar.

There are many more dangers on the voyage to Rome yet Jesus stands by Paul and the gospel goes out to everyone on board and to the barbarian inhabitants of Malta.

Acts finishes with Paul in custody in Rome awaiting trial. He is chained to a Praetorian guard day and night yet the Word still goes out unhindered from the center of the empire to the ends of the earth. Luke doesn’t tell us what happened to Paul in the end. Acts was never about Paul or Peter. Acts is about the living God, revealed in Jesus Christ. Luke tells us how God is at work in the world propelling his Word forward in the power of the Holy Spirit through his people. The Word never stops moving. The Word never takes a backward step. Wherever the Word goes, salvation comes, disciples are made and new churches are formed—from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth. This is the mission of God into which he calls every disciple.

Acts is as relevant today as the living God is relevant today. Acts is not a manual on methods; it’s a book about God. We ignore its message at our peril. Luke does not build a wall of separation between his age and ours. Luke calls every generation back to the beginning, back to the life and ministry of Jesus, shown in Luke’s Gospel and the book of Acts.

If at the end of all of our learning, discussion, creativity and planning, what we have looks nothing like the book of Acts, then we’re in trouble. Acts leads us back to the movement of God for a lost world.

A conversation with Tyler Brown about multiplying disciples in the Mormon heartland.

Related:254-NoPlaceLeft Utah

My next book will be on the movement of God in Acts. Here are a few (unedited) thoughts on the role of the Holy Spirit in the movement of God.

In the last days I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Acts 2:17

Before Pentecost Jesus was the sole bearer of the Holy Spirit. Following his death and resurrection, Jesus’ disciples experience his presence through the Holy Spirit.

The giving of the Spirit is the giving of God himself to every believer. Through Christ, God established a new covenant with his people. It is through the Holy Spirit that the Messiah now reigns. Jesus’ mission continues, but the work is carried out by his disciples empowered by the Holy Spirit.

“Luke doesn’t explain the Spirit, he shows him at work.” We learn who the Spirit is by what he does. There is a pattern—whether the Spirit is given to John in his mother’s womb, or to Jesus at his baptism, or to the disciples at Pentecost, or to Saul in Damascus—the gift of the Spirit always results in witness and mission.

The Spirit comes upon every disciple for a clear purpose—to bear witness to Jesus beginning in Jerusalem and continuing to the ends of the earth.

The Spirit is no respecter of persons. At Pentecost the young and old, rich and poor, men and women, are all indwelt by the Holy Spirit and have the power to bear witness to Jesus. There is no clergy-laity distinction—they all have the authority and responsibility to make disciples.

The Spirit works through the gospel to bring people to saving faith and form them into communities of disciples. The evidence of the Holy Spirit’s presence is the disciples transformed lives and powerful witness.

The Spirit has to do with the proclamation of the Word. The Spirit of prophecy comes upon all of God’s people and they declare his wonders to the world. The Spirit fills Peter so he can speak to the people of Jerusalem. The Spirit enables Stephen to speak with irresistible force. To speak boldly in the name of Jesus is the clearest sign of the Spirit’s work.

The Spirit serves the expansion of the Word. It’s the Word, not the Spirit, that Luke says grows, and the outcome is communities of disciples. On the day of Pentecost, the outpouring of the Spirit reached its climax in the proclamation of the Word to the nations and the formation of the church in Jerusalem.

The Holy Spirit establishes, unites, purifies, protects and increases the people of God. “The Spirit is about the mission, but the mission is to save, recreate, and reconcile a new people.”

Schnabel writes, “The Holy Spirit creates a community of people with diverse backgrounds, united in faith in Jesus as Savior and Lord—a community that includes Jews, Samaritans, Ethiopians, Romans, Syrians, Greeks, Galatians, Lycaonians, Macedonians, Achaians, and Asians who come to faith in Jesus.” This is the heart of God’s mission.

The Spirit breathes life into this movement of God, directing, intervening, propelling, and correcting. There are apostles, prophets, evangelists, teachers and elders all gifted by the Spirit. They don’t direct the movement, the Spirit does, and he uses whom he wills.

As the movement expands, the Spirit forms new disciples into churches and strengthens the life of the churches, enabling them to live in the fear of the Lord, encouraged and increasing in numbers. When Ananias and Sapphira deceive the community, it is an offence against the Holy Spirit who protects the purity of God’s people. When the barrier between Jewish and Gentile disciples must be removed, it is the Spirit who guides the Jerusalem Council. The Spirit appoints leaders within the churches and appoints leaders who multiply churches in new fields. On a later journey the Spirit blocked Paul and his missionary band from pushing further into Asia Minor and then opened the door into Europe.

When the mission to the nations languished, the Spirit used persecution to get Philip to Samaria. When the Samaritans believed, the Spirit confirmed their place among the people of God. The Spirit brought Peter to the house of Cornelius and as Peter preached the Spirit fell upon Gentiles demonstrating acceptance by God through faith in Christ alone. The Spirit was given to the Samaritans and the Gentiles, just as it was on the Jews at Pentecost. The Samaritans and Gentiles too will now bear witness to Jesus throughout the world.

After his last mission, Paul was bound by the Holy Spirit to go to Rome where he will bear witness to the emperor. The book of Acts ends with Paul in chains, in Rome awaiting trial. The missionary is bound but the Word still goes out in the power of the Spirit. The mission will continue despite what happens to Paul. The story cannot end, the Holy Spirit continues to work as a new generation of disciples accept the challenge of taking the gospel to the ends of the earth.

Without the work of the Spirit, there would be no proclamation, no conversions, no churches, no power to release Satan’s captives, and no missionary movement.

Acts is not the story of a by-gone era. The risen Lord continues his mission. He is powerfully present with his people through the Holy Spirit as they take the Word from Jerusalem to the world; making disciples and planting churches.

Jeff Bennett is a local pastor in Canada learning about the transition from church to movement.

They left everything and followed him.

My next book will be on the movement of God in Acts. Here are a few (unedited) thoughts on movements and money.

I have not coveted anyone’s silver or gold or clothing. You yourselves know that these hands of mine have supplied my own needs and the needs of my companions. Acts 20:33-34

Jesus led the wayWhen Jesus left Nazareth to be baptized by John in the Jordan he walked away from his trade and income as a carpenter, leaving his mother in the care of his brothers and sisters.

Jesus called some of his disciples away from their usual occupations to follow him while he trained them to make disciples. Jesus urged them to trust the Father to provide. The first disciples left their fishing nets, boats and hired workers and trusted God to provide. Peter at least was trusting God to provide for his wife, mother-in-law and children. James and John left the family business in the hands of their father Zebedee. Matthew left his tax booth.

At times God’s provided miraculously. Jesus also relied on the financial support of a group of wealthy women who occasionally travelled on mission with a wider group of disciples. Jesus modelled dependency on the hospitality of those who, like Zacchaeus, welcomed him and his message. When Jesus sent the Twelve and the Seventy (two) on mission he expected God to provide food and lodging through households who likewise welcomed them.

The spread of God’s Word is at the heart of the movement of God; worry, riches and pleasures choke the Word and prevent it from producing a crop. Jesus taught it is hard for the wealthy to enter the kingdom of God. The rich young man went away sad, his wealth was the one thing that prevented him from following Jesus.

Jesus taught his disciples to give generosity to the poor. He shared a common purse with the twelve from which they met the costs of their mission and gave to the poor. Jesus wanted his disciples to give generously, trusting that their Father in heaven knew their needs and would provide.

The Gospels give just one reason for Judas’ betrayal. He wanted the money. Money played a role in Satan’s attacks on the emerging movement through Judas, Ananias and Sapphira, and Simon the sorcerer. The love of money and the comfort and security it brings is a threat to discipleship and the health and expansion of a movement.

The story in ActsIn Acts life in the community of faith is characterized by generosity so that the needs of the poor are met. People did not regard their wealth as their own.

The leaders of the movement were from Galilee. After being on the road with Jesus for three years, they probably relocated their families to Jerusalem. Somehow they had to support themselves in what must have been an expensive city. Luke doesn’t give us the details of how they did that, although he does report Peter’s reply to the lame beggar at the temple, “Silver and gold I have none.”

Most likely they relied on the generosity of the community for the support of their families and to cover the costs of their mission in Jerusalem and beyond.

When the Greek-speaking widows were overlooked in the daily distribution of food, the apostles responded by appointing seven men of character and spiritual maturity to sort it out while the twelve prioritized prayer and the ministry of the Word, ensuring the health and the expansion of the movement.

Paul proclaimed the gospel free of charge and did not want to be a burden on new disciples. He was willing to humble himself and go down the social ladder to support himself and his coworkers. Priscilla and Aquila, like Paul, could support themselves when they served in Corinth, Ephesus and Rome.

Paul accepted gifts from other churches only after he left them and only if the gift came without strings attached. In his letters, Paul defended the right of missionaries to be supported by the churches. While in Corinth, Paul worked as a tentmaker in the shop of Aquila and Priscilla. When Timothy and Silas arrived with a gift from the Macedonian churches Paul put aside his trade and devoted himself full-time to the mission.

Paul was in Roman custody for over four years during which he could not earn a living. Typically prisoners were not fed by their captors and had to rely on the generosity of others. Fortunately during his longest imprisonments in Caesarea and Rome, there were local believers who could help. As a prisoner in Rome, Paul was responsible to pay for his accommodation. Rome was an expensive city and Paul’s apartment was large enough for him, his guard and coworkers, and the many guests who visited. It’s unlikely Paul would have been allowed or able to work while a soldier chained to his wrist.

Jesus did not leave his disciples any instructions regarding financial provision and management. He gave them his Word, the Spirit and the task. He promised that as they went to the ends of the earth, he would be with them. There was no map, strategic plan or timetable. Just a promise that the power of God’s Spirit was enough to get their witness to every people and every place.

Who paid for Luke and Aristarcus’ voyage to Rome with Paul? Who paid their living expenses when they arrived in Rome? Luke doesn’t say. He’s not focused on organizational and funding issues, which is not to say they are not important. Jesus expected his disciples to work it out as they went, but there are some lessons we learn from Luke’s account.

According to Jesus, a true disciple trusts God by placing obedience to his Word above the desire for money and security. Just as a disciple who falls into the love of money will become unfruitful, so will a disciple making movement become unfruitful. Money does not fuel movements, commitment does.

The vast majority of the work in any movement is done by volunteers, not paid professionals. Nobody paid Philip to go down to Samaria and preach to thousands. Nobody paid unnamed disciples who fled Jerusalem with the gospel and opened the door to reaching Gentiles in Antioch. For every Paul, there are hundreds, even thousands who volunteer their time and resources for the cause.

In Luke’s Gospel and Acts God provided a variety of funding sources for the advance of the movement. There were missionaries who supported themselves and others through their trade. There were volunteers who served at their own expense. There were ordinary believers, wealthy individuals and churches that gave money. There were hosts who opened their homes to travelling teams; homes that became meeting places for new churches.

The challenge of funding a movement isn’t only about raising money, it also involves keeping costs low in the first place. The movement didn’t require a temple, a priesthood or any of the trappings of ancient religions. Most of the workers were volunteers, most of the churches met in homes.

The other strategy is to push the responsibility for funding to the field. There is no supply chain stretching back to Jerusalem from Samaria or the Phoenician coast or back to Antioch from Macedonia and Achaia. The churches that were planted soon had local leaders and were responsible for their own funding. It wasn’t long before these churches released resources and workers to advance in unreached fields. In this way the movement remained flexible and nimble, able to multiply. To organize and fund the movement centrally would have choked its growth.

The oxygen of a movement is the commitment of its people—to give, to go, to serve without pay, to open their homes, to work with their hands, to trust that the power of God goes with them as they take the gospel from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth.

I talk to David Broodryk in Durban South Africa about his local work, reaching cities, and what he’s learning about developing movement leaders.

This text just came in from David Broodryk:

A correctional facility in Zambia has transformed! Prisoners are sent as ambassadors into the surrounding communities to share how Christ has changed them. Five months after starting a disciple making movement in the prison, all incidents of fighting, murder and immorality have completely ceased. Prisoners are found reading scripture, worshipping and praying instead.

The team visited this week and distributed another 115 Audio and 220 printed Bibles. Please pray for this team as they try to respond to many invitations from other prisons who want to see the same things happen there. Pray also for the prisoners as they leave - or are transferred to other facilities - that they will be carriers of the gospel wherever they go . . .

Emanuel Prinz talks to Steve about the emergence of movements of disciples and churches in Sudan.

Jesus was a failure by these standards and so was Paul. Before the cross he condemned Jerusalem for rejecting her King. His prophecy of Jerusalem’s destruction was fulfilled in AD 70. The temple, the city and its walls were transformed into a pile of rubble. Its people dead or enslaved.

The only cities in the New Testament transformed by the gospel were transformed into riots and division.

Paul stood before Nero in chains with nothing but the gospel. Rome was not transformed

The book of Acts is the story of the spread of God’s Word from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth. Everywhere the evidence of God’s transforming power are multiplying disciples and churches to the glory of God.

The heavens and the earth with be transformed one day—on the other side of God’s judgment. Until then we have a job to do.

It appears the message of Easter has been hijacked.

The Crucifixion by Rubens

Listen to two skeptical historians on my favourite podcast discuss the history and significance of the Cross.

One of them is Tom Holland author of Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World.

Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World