God’s Way to Transform

It is great to experience how God brings about transformation in individuals, families, communities and nations. Our role is to equip local church leaders to prepare members to carry out the transformational assignment God has given each of them.  God is indeed in the business of transformation. Throughout Scripture, God shows us his desire for healing and restoration in individuals, families and communities.

Making disciples is God’s way of transforming individuals, families and communities. God uses the process of personal discipleship to bring about spiritual transformation in individuals’ lives, and in turn, those transformed individuals influence their business, family, school and, in time, whole cities and nations.

 

Africa, our continent where we live, has been evangelized over and over again. But it has not been discipled.  Africa desperately needs a new kind of Christian and a new way of doing church. When we disciple people in small groups, we are doing church the way Jesus did it. He modeled a new concept of church by gathering a few men and women and teaching them to love and obey Him. The church is the only hope of the world that can bring a real transformation. 

Changed lives will automatically transform families. Transformed families will also change communities. When communities are restored this process will change the whole nation.

“Reflection on working through the Church”

                                                                 Dirakho UMC in Busia district after church service

The church is God’s design, a community of people unified with Jesus by faith. The church shows the love and reflects the glory of the resurrected Christ. According to the biblical pattern, the Great Commission can best be fulfilled by planting new churches. Ministry is unfruitful and superficial when it does not involve the Church. The Church is God’s instrument for the fulfillment of the Great Commission. God’s plan is to manifest His life and to minister to the physical and spiritual needs of the world through His Body's members. Each local church is a beachhead of God’s Kingdom. Priority should be given to planting and strengthening churches. As such, our work should be connected to an established church or a church planting effort whenever possible.

I believe that the effectiveness of my work as missionary is to help equip Christians to take the initiative in evangelizing their own people and in leading their own churches. To encourage them to take the leadership positions in ministry outreaches. When I take the lead, it should be always the purpose of training, teaching, and modeling how the nationals can grow in their leadership. 

                                                      

                                                              During a training of local pastors and church leaders in Busia

We should plant churches which are self-sufficient. This means that the churches are viable or not dependent on outsiders for their continuance as it is the cases in many places. Local churches are strong churches if they are self-governing, self-financing, and self-propagating. Many years Africans Christians were looking to the outsiders to hold the services, provide the funds, build the buildings, and make the decisions. This dependency robs native leaders of initiative and stifles all sense of responsibility and ownership for the work.

The most efficient use of resources is to target pastors and church leaders. As they grow in knowledge and maturity, they will preach it to their congregations. Then each member of the congregations will spread the Word to the general community and beyond. 

                                                          

                                                        Sharing time with church leaders in Busia district.

Our work should also help Christians to work through relationships. It is only through Interdependence with others and the synergy of different gifts working together that we can truly be effective in God’s work. Personal accountability is also strengthened when people know one another. Funds are often misused or spent unwisely when the character of the ones we are working with are unknown. Outward appearances and first impressions can often deceive. A priority should be placed on Christ-centered relationships over tasks. Ministry should first flow out of our relationship with God and secondly out of our relationships with one another.

                                          

                                                         Training of church leaders

Let us dream great dreams; see large visions in working through the church. "Where there is no vision," the Proverb says, "the people perish." (Proverbs 29: 18). When you dream great dreams and see large visions, you are driven to work persistently towards seeing them accomplished.