JOEL-NEWS-INTERNATIONAL-399 * 3 APRIL 2002 * WWW.JOELNEWS.ORG
IN THIS EDITION:
Five great stories of transformation in our time!
JN399-1. Africa: 15% of population know Jesus
JN399-2. Ecuador: transformation in Cuenca
JN399-3. Russian town 'raised from the dead'
JN399-4. Church in Argentina ministers to whole city
JN399-5. Revival in the Himalayas
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QUOTE - "Most people, when you ask, 'How are you doing?' -- they'll say, 'I'm doing ok, under the circumstances.' Under the circumstances? What are you doing under the circumstances? Who put you there? Why don't you get on top of the circumstances? Circumstances are like a mattress on your bed. You get on top of them and you'll rest easy. You get underneath them and you're going to suffocate." (Rick Warren)
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JN399-1. Africa: 15% of population know Jesus
"Today, Africa is possibly the most fertile ground for the gospel and thus for church planting," according to church planting researchers Ngwiza Mnkandla (Zimbabwe), Kuraj Chitima (Botswana) and Danie Vermeulen (South Africa) during a Dawn movement strategy conference in Colorado Springs, USA. In 1900, there were around 1.6 million Evangelical Christians in Africa - around 1.5% of the population. Today, that number has grown to some 116 million, or 14.8% of the population.
CHURCH PLANTING MOST EFFECTIVE METHOD
Vermeulen pastored traditional churches for years, trying various methods to make more disciples and increase local church membership. "I eventually discovered that planting new churches is the most effective method of making disciples," he says. His church planted 38 others, with a total membership of 6,000. In Africa today, new churches and church networks are springing up everywhere.
A mile wide, but only an inch deep? "Africa's church is like a shallow river: a mile wide, but only an inch deep," a quote attributed to English theologian John Stott, is no longer true, according to the African leaders. "Africa's spirituality and passion are impressive, and it depends on how we define depth," says Ngwiza Mnkandla. "The moment we copy Western models of church and leadership, we lose ourselves. When we accept our inheritance from God with dignity, the depth grows, and we see all sorts of indigenous breakthroughs." Christian leaders such as Dion Roberts in Abidjan lead churches with an attendance of 200,000. The Nairobi Lighthouse Church, founded by Don Matheny, has trained its members so well that literally everyone is able to lead people interested in Christianity to Jesus. The same day, pastors visit the new believers, often leading the whole family to Jesus and planting a house cell. The church has an attendance of around 6,000.
INCREASED GROWTH POTENTIAL
Vermeulen estimates that the growth potential of the Christian churches is greater in the next 10 years than in the past, for the following reasons:
- the growth in recent years occurred almost completely without a strategic component, and was often the result of large evangelistic campaigns. The result of including a strategic component can be seen in Zimbabwe, where churches cooperated in a national project to plant 10,000 new fellowships;
- technological progress makes it easier to reach previously remote areas;
- the African church is rapidly gaining a missionary mind-set, and financing and sending out an ever increasing number of missionaries;
- the openness for the gospel continues to grow. Poverty leads to personal crises which cause people to seek God, but the main force is AIDS, which has become Africa's number one problem - 71% of people infected with AIDS live in Africa. Governments have no answer, and people facing death are increasingly turning to God. Islam and animistic religions are obviously unable to help, so pastors are increasingly turning funerals into evangelistic outreaches, calling people to Christ.
JESUS FILM ON MOSQUE WALL
"I recently saw 2,000 Muslims decide to follow Jesus," says Vermeulen. "We arrived in a Muslim village to show the Jesus film. There was not a single Christian family in the village. Our projection screen was too small, and the largest white wall in the village was that of the mosque. We asked the Imam, who granted us permission to show the Jesus film there. That evening, hundreds saw the film, and the Imam was the first to respond to the call to follow Jesus. So many were set free during the ensuing prayer for deliverance from demonic powers that most of the villagers decided to follow the Imam's example. In 5 days, 2,000 Muslims became Christians, and 5 churches were planted to help the people in their new-found faith."
MALAWI: ROMANTIC SEMANTICS
Danie Vermeulen, previously a pastor in South Africa and now strategy advisor for church planting movements, reports of a church planter in Malawi who has planted 30 churches among the Yao, a predominantly Muslim tribe, in the last 30 years. Most of the churches were the result of 'power encounters' such as healing or deliverance from demonic powers. Vermeulen sat next to the church planter in a seminar in South Africa, during which the speaker emphasised the importance of good theological and missiological training for church planting, claiming "it is impossible to plant churches among Muslims without understanding semantics!" The church planter leaned across to Danie, asking "what is semantics?" Danie's answer: "A little devil." "That's what it sounds like," replied the church planter, relieved.
Source: DAWN Africa and Friday Fax
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JN399-2. Ecuador: transformation in Cuenca
Rainer Killus of Open Doors reports of a transformation in Ecuador:
When I arrived in Cuenca 19 years ago, there were around 500 Christians in 8 churches - in a city of 400,000. One month ago, I returned for the first time in 11 years, having lived in the city for 8 years until 1990. Today, there are 30,000 to 40,000 Christians in over 50 churches!"
When I arrived at the airport on 15 November 2001, people asked me 'Do you remember me? I'm Lola. I haven't suffered from epilepsy for 16 years now!' and 'Do you remember me? No? I only had a month to live when you prayed for me. I had cancer!'
The Archbishop has his residence in Cuenca, which is also known as 'the Vatican and Athens of Ecuador'. When I arrived in 1982, preachers and new believers suffered strong persecution. Once, when I was preaching in a park, the Catholic priest set drunks on us, so that we needed police protection. It was very dangerous! In the 8 years in which I lived there, I heard of at least three occasions on which Christians were attacked and killed.
UNITED PRAYER LEADS TO BREAKTHROUGH
In December 1984, two brothers from different churches approached me, asking me to join them for prayer every morning from 5am to 6am. Only a couple of weeks later, a number of other Christians joined us. We prayed specifically for unity and reconciliation between Christians. After two months, there were 20 of us.
Then they started to report that people were being saved in their churches without effort or evangelisation. In our church, we repeatedly experienced healings - the lame walked, people were freed from epilepsy and demonic bondage. During that time, I noticed that I had to "keep my arms up"; if I prayed for less than 1 hour each day, the church started to stagnate, and if I prayed longer, the growth continued. In October 1990, I handed a church of 250 adults and 150 children on to my successor; one year later, it had grown to 800 people.
In 1990, the city had 18 churches and around 2,000 Christians. That number has multiplied by 20 in a decade! The city has really been transformed - almost 10% of the population are born-again Christians! The Catholic church stopped all forms of persecution some time ago. Christians are everywhere; there is a Christian radio station, at least one Christian newspaper in each town, and there will soon be a Christian television station. And people continue to be saved!
POWERFUL HEALING TESTIMONIES
During the visit, I heard a number of reports of long-lasting healings. Rosa Barros from Cuenca, for example, was suffering from terminal pancreatic cancer in 1988. The doctors did not expect her to survive the day when the family asked me to accompany them to the hospital and pray for her healing. When I arrived, the doctor confirmed that the young mother of three small children was close to death. Through our prayer, she was healed, and with her husband, still serves on the staff in a church. Rosa asked me to visit her sister, who was also in hospital with pancreatic cancer. We prayed for her, and she was saved and subsequently healed. Her doctor confirmed the healing the same day.
A Christian glass-blower had a tragic accident in November: a drop of liquid glass sprayed into his left eye. He was taken to hospital, where the doctors immediately operated. The drop of glass, at 1100 degrees Celcius, had destroyed the cornea and pupil. I went to the hospital with his brother to pray for him after the operation. When the doctor removed the eye-patch the next day, he could see perfectly, and had a new eye! Even today, he can still see better with the 'replacement' eye than the 'healthy' one!
Source: www.offenegrenzen.de and Friday Fax
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JN399-3. Russian town 'raised from the dead'
Ussinsk, in the Komy region of the Northern Ural, is an amazing town. Its oil wealth lasted only a short time, and the economy collapsed completely a few years ago. "Three years ago, the mayor publicly proclaimed 'Those who can still leave should do so!' General poverty, unemployment, crime, drugs, unfinished buildings and the growth of heathen cults were the town's major characteristics," says pastor Schenjazarapenko.
A small group of Christians did not accept the town's silent collapse. "We started to pray for three or four months, repenting for the sins of the past (civil war, Gulags, rebellions) and the present, including the Satanic rituals in cemeteries and the so-called 'altars of death' where abortions were performed. We walked around the town for months, performed every conceivable symbolic act, including praying on Nawarna-Rodne, a mountain nearby with statues of Lenin and the so-called 'Queen of Heaven' whose birthday is celebrated on 21 September. Reconciliation services with Christians from Germany, Switzerland and other nations in May 2001 literally brought a new spirit into the town."
"Unfinished buildings were completed, houses repainted, drugs have almost completely vanished, and the Police and Mafia are equally confused. The wages have risen, children's playgrounds cleaned up, the birth rate is again higher than the death rate, and crime has sunk by 60%. There is no more unemployment - quite the opposite, people from the region travel to work here. The average wage of 10,000 roubles is the highest in Komy. 'Life has returned to Ussinsk,' the people say, whether they know Jesus or not," says Schenjazarapenko, "and we know that Jesus came to our town and has revived it."
Source: Friday Fax
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JN399-4. Church in Argentina ministers to whole city
Ted Hahs of Harvest Ministries reports that in Adrogue in Argentina the church is actually pastoring the entire city. Every block has a pastor, every business an intercessor, every branch of government a chaplain. No one is left unattended.
The felt needs of the lost are met on a daily basis. Miracles occur regularly in answer to prayers. And the best is that thousands have come to the Lord. "Just the week we were there another 800 did so," Hahs reports. "When we visited the Mayor she expressed gratitude that every week 'her pastor' (an intercessor) comes to minister to her and to collect city prayer requests. Intercessors are also assigned to the chief of police and to his officers. Each business in town is ministered to regularly and owners often invite customers to be prayed for."
According to Hahs Adrogue is the first known model of a city being completely pastored a-la prayer evangelism.
Also in Mar del Plata significant things happened. After years of division 30 pastors made a covenant to work as ONE church. The pastors meet twice a week for prayer and every Wednesday they bring their congregations together to intercede for the city. 1500 intercessors gather weekly from different congregations across the city to storm heaven.
There has been an extraordinary outpouring of miracles and demonstrations of the power of God all across the city. Every participating congregation has experienced extraordinary conversion growth. No congregation has grown less than 200%. Some grew more than 300%, a few over 400% and one grew 1,000% from 13 to 130 members in less than a year.
Source: http://www.harvestevan.org
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JN399-5. Revival in the Himalayas
A few years ago in the Christmastime snow, Caleb (name changed) wanted to go shopping. He was new in the Himalayas and wanted to stop in a town before traveling on. He noticed a group of passers-by gathered around a girl who was obviously demon-possessed, screaming and breaking the chains with which people had tried to keep it under control. A witch doctor was trying to drive the spirits out, but with no apparent success.
Caleb was unsure of himself, so walked past to carry on with his shopping. "But within me, I was sure that Jesus could help the girl, so I eventually went back and offered to pray for her," he says. "The witch doctor simply smiled, and showed me the long list of sacrifices which he claimed the girl's family would have to make in order to appease the gods, telling me that I obviously did not realize the power of the spirits here. I remained steadfast, and was finally allowed to pray in Jesus' name. In my uncertainty, I prayed in tongues for the girl, and within a few moments, she calmed down and was completely freed. That caused some excitement, and the bystanders started asking where I lived and who I was."
"DOES JESUS LIVE HERE?"
"At 5am the next morning, we were all awoken by loud knocking: some 70 locals stood in front of the house, torches in hand, asking if Jesus lived here. Somewhat cautiously, we answered that he did, because he lives in us. At first we thought that the girl had relapsed, and the people had come to kill us. That was not the case! They had brought a number of sick people, and wanted us to pray for them before we moved on. It was amazing: every time I laid hands on someone, I knew exactly what to pray, and every person for whom we prayed was healed or set free. A steady stream of locals prevented us from continuing our journey that day as planned; we prayed with them until 8pm. There must have been 3,000 in total. We told them about Jesus as well as we could, and remained in the town.
In a short time, so many people came to faith in Jesus that we could hardly keep count of how many we baptized. We began to organize them into house churches; the movement has become so strong that I estimate that already 10% of the population in the region follow Jesus," Caleb told us recently. "I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I had simply ignored Jesus' voice telling me to pray for the girl on the street that day."
Source: Name and address withheld for security reasons |