“I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow.”
1 Corinthians 3:6
Our ministry vision the past 13 years has been to reach 100 nations with our Management for Church Leaders™ (MCL) training. As of today, our MCL training has been taught in 99 nations. We had envisioned reaching the 100th nation through a training that was scheduled for the Seychelles in March by Pastor Wilson Esambe from Cameroon. But this training did not happen because of the global virus pandemic. We are hopeful that training can take place soon. Consequently, we expect to reach our goal of 100 nations sometime in the next month or two.
Our original ministry intent was to “scatter the seed” of our MCL training. In other words, God directed us to spread it to as many nations as we could. As a result, the vision God gave us was to plant our training in 100 nations. With that vision nearing achievement, it became evident to us that we needed to ask God for a new vision.
Last year I began that process of prayer and meditation for a new vision from the Lord. I presented some ideas that the Lord had revealed to me at our annual board of directors meeting last November. We discussed them but decided to continue to pray for God’s direction and clarity. Earlier this year I presented the vision that I believed the Lord was calling us to achieve. Our board approved that new vision a few months ago, but we decided to wait to announce it until after we had accomplished our current vision. However, since we are so close to our goal of 100 nations, we believe that now is the time to let you know where we are headed in the future.
After much prayer, deliberation and discussion with our board, we believe that God now wants us to make sure that our training is more “firmly planted” where we have sown its seed. As a result, our new vision will be to establish an active global MCL trainer in 50 nations by the year 2025. An active global trainer is someone who conducts our training on a regular basis each year. Although we currently have 73 global trainers in 39 nations, only 20 nations currently have an active trainer providing regular, annual training. That means we need to establish an active trainer in 30 more nations over the next 5 years.
This vision is based on 1 Corinthians 3:6. The church in Corinth was praising Paul and Apollos for their work in establishing the gospel there. But Paul proclaimed that “I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow.” We have done what Paul did by planting our training in 99 nations. But now we need to do what Apollos did. We need to feed (“water”) the training seed we have planted by providing trainers and resources in those nations without an active trainer to help our training grow and develop there as well.
Our strategy for achieving this new vision is three-fold. First, we will begin with nations where we have a global trainer who is not active and work to have them become an active trainer. That may require funding training expenses or providing additional training tools. Second, we will look to establish our training in the curriculums of the Bible Colleges & Schools where we have taught our MCL in the past, or where we now have contacts. That could mean revising our training to fit school curriculum formats. It also might include some travel costs for us to introduce it or teach it ourselves. Finally, we will look to identify potential global trainers in nations where our MCL training has been planted but there is no global trainer. That may entail communication or travel costs.
By establishing an active global MCL trainer in 50 nations we will be strengthening our ministry, expanding our training within more nations, and ensuring the training of more pastors and church leaders in the future. We believe that this new vision is God’s will for this ministry. As we turn our attention to fulfilling the call that He is now giving to us, we look forward to seeing how God grows this ministry in the years ahead. Please pray for us as we embark on this new adventure!