CMS vision: Equip Christian leaders for church and society
How would you fare at a seminary where the graduation requirement was that people you discipled were clearly able to lead others to Christ? CMS Victoria State Director Wei-Han Kuan invites us to consider whether this would be a good way to test the CMS vision to equip Christian leaders for church and society.
Did you know that the Bible contains God’s strategy for growing his Church throughout the world and throughout all ages? Here it is in one verse:
“And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others.” (2 Timothy 2:2)
These words from Paul to Timothy are striking in their clarity. God’s gospel strategy for growing his kingdom is to have leaders and teachers multiplying leaders and teachers from one generation to the next to the next. Training and equipping leaders is the key task in God’s strategy. Observe the four generations of leaders in the one verse of Scripture: Paul and the many witnesses, Timothy, reliable people, and the others also.
For the Church to be firmly established, godly and able teachers of God’s word are needed (1 Timothy 3, Titus 1). And for the Church to grow, many more such leaders need to be trained and equipped for every generation.
I heard of a seminary in Asia where students could not graduate even after they had completed all their coursework. No, they could only graduate after they had converted three people, and trained and equipped them well enough that each had gone on to convert three more people each. That’s 2 Timothy 2:2 in action!
All around the world, CMS is working to train and equip gospel leaders. We do this with serving pastors, in Bible colleges, through university student ministry, through youth and children’s work, and in local churches. Our aim is to equip them to equip others also, following God’s plan for how his Church will grow by the power of his word and Spirit. We want to make sure that successive generations of able leaders are raised up and equipped all around the world.
Please keep praying that God’s gospel strategy will prosper all around the world.
Stories from CMS missionaries
Students sacrifice in order to learn
CMS missionaries Adrian & Anita Lovell equip local Bolivians to know and teach the Bible. In December, they travelled to Santa Cruz to teach a week-long Ephesians course with trainees from ECAMM, a Bolivian-run ministry program. Guadalupe (an ECAMM trainee) and Hugo (an ECAMM graduate) are two of the people who attended.
New Christian Guadalupe has suffered much for turning to Christ. She says: “Something new I learnt is how to divide the book of Ephesians [into parts], because it’s really important in order to be able to understand the theology and the practice.”
Hugo is pastoring a church in a remote area. He wanted to keep being well-equipped for ministry, so he travelled 18 hours by bus to be part of the course!
The whole counsel of God’s word
CMS missionaries Tony & Susie Wright have been training university students to read the Bible systematically. Their friend, Pio ‘Tuks’ Nakesu, describes this as “working to just keep the Bible on the program… we’ve taught through books of the Bible and hopefully, as we see Paul saying [in Acts 20], we give them the counsel, the whole counsel of God’s word.”
Their friend, Taniela ‘Dan’ Qeleni, said recently, “[After five years] we have gone back to what student ministry is known for… a Bible-driven ministry. I thank you for that. Your support is not in vain.”
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CMS missionaries are involved in MOCLAM, which provides Bible courses to the Spanish-speaking world. Do you have the theological skills to help with such teaching? To learn more, go to cms.org.au/opportunities.
