Wednesday, December 28, 2016

Three Days Left – Still in Need of Help from Michael Oh of The Lausanne Movement

Three Days Left – Still in Need of Help from Michael Oh of The Lausanne Movement
As you’ve probably read about in my previous emails, Lausanne was blindsided by a very unexpected, major financial hardship as we approached the end of the year.
This hit us very hard, particularly because Lausanne is largely a Movement of volunteers. Without Lausanne’s volunteer leaders and the ministries that offer us key services, our budget would easily be three times its size.
Therefore the small budget we do have is very necessary for Lausanne’s core work and individuals, and every dollar is stewarded with utmost care.
We thank God for the financial gifts that have already come in from places such as Iceland, Lebanon, India, Albania, and 41 other countries. So far by God’s grace, over half of the gap has been made up!
But we’re seeking to fill the gap in the next three days, which is one-third of our annual budget.
Would you prayerfully consider giving to Lausanne? As a global movement, we desire to have not only global leadership and participation, but also global giving.
To support Lausanne, you can give now online or schedule a recurring gift for 2017. You can also see other giving options here. Please don’t hesitate to send any questions to give@lausanne.org.
Please send or schedule your gifts by 31 December. This will allow us to know if the gap has been filled when we make critical budget decisions in early January.
Thank you for your prayerful consideration in this holiday season. May you and your loved ones be filled with hope and joy as we approach the new year!
With thanks in Christ,
Michael
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Michael Y. Oh, Ph.D.
Lausanne Movement
Global Executive Director / CEO
www.lausanne.org
Email: moh@lausanne.org
Twitter: @lcwe, @ohfamily
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‘The Gospel for Every Person’ Painting and Christmas Greetings from Michael Oh of The Lausanne Movement
'The result is my painted prayer that the gospel reach
every person on earth, and my hope is that the Holy Spirit
will stretch and inspire its viewers with an increased
passion to share the good news of Jesus Christ even
as I have been changed painting it.'-BRYN GILLETE
The Gospel for Every Person Painting by Michael Oh

This commissioned painting by Bryn Gillette beautifully shows the first part of Lausanne’s four-fold vision for global mission, which is ‘The Gospel for Every Person’.
Below is Bryn’s Artist Statement about the painting. You can also see a short video of the unveiling of this painting at the Younger Leaders Gathering in Indonesia.
Christmas is a special time of the year to remember the birth of Jesus Christ and the reason he came to earth. He is the good news for every person. May we rejoice in the privilege of being bearers of this good news to all the nations!
Merry Christmas from the Lausanne Movement and all God’s best for the new year.
Artist Statement by Bryn Gillette, 26 July 2016
I was so honored and so challenged by this opportunity to paint on the monumental subject of ‘The Gospel for Every Person’. What image could possibly capture the magnitude of God’s heart for the limitless diversity of humanity and culture?
The process of painting for me was the act of wrestling with this question, and I could feel myself stretching internally to try to embrace and internalize the scope of God’s Great Commission.
The result is my painted prayer that the gospel reach every person on earth, and my hope is that the Holy Spirit will stretch and inspire its viewers with an increased passion to share the good news of Jesus Christ even as I have been changed painting it.
I began the image with the outline of the world map, intentionally flipping it on its side and putting the Pacific in the center to challenge our assumed perceptions of the world.
As the multitude of figures were layered onto the image, I had to repaint the map several times, and each time I found myself meandering across the borderless continents with my paintbrush, or highlighting their edges with a golden orange, I sensed that this was my own prophetic act of intercession that the gospel be brought to every corner of the world.
I found myself praying for the nations as I passed over them with colors, thinking of the countless lives, stories, and value of people in each region. The cross of blue-white light in the center of the map is oriented through the equator and the international dateline, as the words ‘A New Day’ kept ringing in my ears while I worked.
The second layer of the image was the most time-consuming, containing vignettes of multiple figures from several major regions of the world. I strove to celebrate and honor various ages, genders, walks of life, customs, and cultures as a cross-section of all people, so that each person who sees the image might find a familiar and personal connection to it, even as we pray they would similarly receive the gospel. I tried to align the figure gatherings in proximity to the continents where they originate, and mirror the kaleidoscopic beauty of humanity.
The central figure was the last to arrive, and was not a part of my preliminary concepts. Before this fisherman casting his net was painted, the image felt like a handful of jigsaw puzzle pieces scattered across the surface of the world, largely lacking unity and harmony. As I prayed for a way to bring the painting into aesthetic harmony, I felt the Lord inspired this figure to bring it into spiritual harmony as well.
I could see the apostle Peter casting his net over the side of his boat, catching so many fish that he and his companions nearly sank two boats. That was the embryonic moment of the Great Commission born in Peter, a prophetic foreshadowing that he and those to come after him (us) would become bountiful ‘fishers of men’.
In the painting, the casted net surrounds the entire world, sparkling with the glowing light of the central cross, scattered across every part of the globe, reflecting the current population densities in bursts of blue and white, and groaning that the growing light would expand and spread into the remaining darkness beyond . . .Unveiling the Painting at YLG2016
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/NCMuBeRrujc" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Michael Oh serves as the Global Executive Director / CEO of the Lausanne Movement(Read the full artist statement and see a video of
its unveiling at the Younger Leaders Gathering.)
This commissioned painting by Bryn Gillette beautifully shows the first part of Lausanne's four-fold vision for global mission, which is The Gospel for Every Person.
Christmas is a special time of the year to remember the birth of Jesus Christ and the reason he came to earth. He is the good news for every person. May we rejoice in the privilege of being bearers of this good news to all the nations!
Merry Christmas from the Lausanne Movement and all God's best for the new year.
With joy,
Michael Oh
Global Executive Director/CEO
Lausanne Movement

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Movement Connection: A bare bones budget, State of the World, Brazilian Crisis, and more from The Lausanne Movement
Giving to a Movement of Volunteers by Michael Oh
In my last blog, I wrote about being blindsided by a major financial hardship. Two-thirds of Lausanne’s budget has been affected by the unexpected loss of a significant gift that was committed for 2016. Two-thirds of our budget means that this affects not the periphery of what we do as a Movement, but our core work and people.
As a movement rather than an organization, Lausanne’s work has expanded and contracted as God willed and supplied over these many years. I am so sure it is by God’s will and God’s supply because there is no humanly possible way that Lausanne would have survived otherwise.
Over the past 42 years, Lausanne’s core work has been carried out mainly by volunteers who are spread out across the world, working from their homes, raising their own support, or being seconded by gracious partnering ministries. It’s incredible then how Lausanne has been used for global congresses, game-changing ideas, and mission influence.
If it were not for volunteers who give their influence, excellence, energy, and countless hours to Lausanne, our budget would easily be three times its size. Therefore, every dollar we receive is stewarded with utmost care. (Read more)
SHARE:
Latest from the Lausanne Global Analysis
The LGA is also available in Spanish. Read in Spanish.
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Six Leadership Lessons from YLG2016
Sarah Breuel, Dave Benson
There is an African saying that goes like this: ‘If you want to go fast, you go alone. If you want to go far, you go together.’ This was very much the heartbeat of the Lausanne Younger Leaders Gathering 2016 (YLG2016).
More than three years ago, the Father had a vision of bringing together the next generation of evangelical leaders so that they could journey together. He raised up a team who shared the conviction that the rich heritage of the Lausanne Movement needed to be passed on to the next generation.
So it was that more than 1,000 younger leaders and mentors from over 140 countries gathered in Jakarta in August 2016. We were praying and hoping for a special time, but we had no idea what the Father had in store for us. It usually takes decades to see the fruit that emerges from this kind of gathering. However, by the grace of God, he has already allowed us to see overwhelming fruit in the form of kingdom connections.
Here are six leadership development lessons God has taught us in this process:
1. Honor God with your whole heart and he will bless the work of your hands
YLG was organized by ‘jars of clay’. Humanly speaking, the odds were against us. The team was made up of younger leaders serving as volunteers with limited time to give and little experience of organizing a large gathering. We were supported by a very small staff and a modest budget as we faced the overwhelming challenges of putting together a global gathering.
However, we had one thing going for us. We knew deep down that this was God’s vision, God’s battle, and that he was with us. So we had no option but to put our full trust in him. We eagerly searched for him in each decision, had prayer at the forefront, pleaded for the Spirit’s guidance, fasted, kept short accounts with God about sin, and tried our very best to honor God in the battles that come with the territory.
God did not disappoint us. He heard our cry, placed his mighty hand over the gathering, fought the big battles for us, gave us favor with the authorities over visas, touched the hearts of donors, supernaturally called people to help in times of need, and released his Spirit powerfully to orchestrate divine connections. We believe that this was the ‘secret weapon’ of YLG: a loving Father, with an unstoppable mission, using a team who knew they could do nothing without him.
2. Choose the right people
The careful process of selecting the right people pays off. We received thousands of nominations for potential participants and conducted an extensive, prayerful, regionally based selection process. The selected participants also had to work on their personal fundraising and commit to a one-year preparation process. The result was not only a high caliber of participants, but also a group that was eager to come and contribute.
This was even more true for the organizing team. One of our most precious lessons was this: have the right people serving in the right place for the right reasons.
3. Leadership development is a communal process
The vision of YLG has always been something way beyond that of just a gathering; we foresaw a community which would journey together. Accordingly, the YLG2016 planning team was ambitious in its preparation. We imagined a year of monthly communications leading to the YLG, designed to facilitate ‘missional contacts’ becoming genuine friends. We progressed from Skype calls and face-to-face national/regional groups before YLG to forming tight-knit global connect groups overseen by well-trained mentors at the YLG.
Technology was leveraged to serve connection on every front. This comprised Skype calls, Facebook communities, a WhatsApp family, and—most crucially—a secure online platform and mobile app called the Connector which served as an intelligent directory for meaningful interaction. Before participants even arrived in Jakarta for the gathering, nine out of ten had already formed real connections and friendships with other participants. The result was a community that was traveling as one before we even met, with so much ownership and excitement over what God was going to do.
At the gathering itself, nearly 200,000 messages were exchanged between younger leaders using the Connector. Furthermore, each afternoon of the YLG programme was kept free so that deep and life-long relationships could be established through informal coffees, shared experiences, and strategic collaboration, such as the emerging China–Africa regional partnership.
This is just the start of the journey. We celebrated God’s goodness when we saw over 82% of YLG participants decided to continue on to what we have called the ‘Younger Leaders Generation’, a ten-year commitment by the Lausanne Movement to their development through mentoring, connections, and resources.1
4. One generation needs the other
It still amazes us to think that the Lausanne senior leadership team would entrust the planning of such a critical gathering to a group of younger leaders. They empowered and walked with us, modeling humility in a way that profoundly marked our team. We in turn made every effort to honor them, seek their wisdom, ask for guidance, and learn from their rich experience.
During the gathering, 170 carefully selected mentors led the small groups and were available to meet younger leaders one-on-one. To our delight, there were more than 1,400 of these one-on-one meetings during the week, and many participants have said that this was a highlight.
This model—of senior leaders trusting and empowering younger ones, and younger leaders honoring and learning from senior ones—could provide a precious lesson for the global church. It is an inter-generational dependence that we believe glorifies God and brings much fruit, since we are stronger together.
5. The best connection for global mission comes through sharing stories
YLG2016 was built on the conviction that our deepest identity is being ‘United in the Great Story’.2 The programme aimed to draw out our local tales of identity, purpose, tension, and resolution, and tie them into the master narrative of God redeeming the world through Christ.3
We immersed these young ‘actors’ in the story of God’s mission, to hear afresh his call to create, repent and bless, love, reconcile, and worship. We bent our ears to his voice, learning to improvise faithfully on our particular stage.4
These stages and stories were amazingly diverse. As our Egyptian sister Anne Zaki said so powerfully, ‘God’s beauty and God’s splendor cannot be contained in one language, or one people group, or one gender.’ This gathering reminded us that only together are we truly the global church.
One Middle Eastern participant shared how, through divine connections at this gathering, she will partner with an American Bluegrass band to travel through India sharing the gospel!
Ukrainians, Russians, and Europeans prayed with one heart for the flourishing of Eurasia.
North Koreans, South Koreans, and Americans shared their pain and celebrated the promise of cross-border initiatives.
Sri Lankans told of youth de-radicalization through the simple act of hospitality around a common meal.
These stories spanned the institutional church, academy, marketplace, and mission organizations. They reflected God’s image through the genuine partnership of men and women together proclaiming the gospel. They fused Spirit, Word, and World, uniting conservative Anglicans, reformed Presbyterians, sacramental traditionalists, Bible-based Baptists, and passionate Pentecostals as one evangelical family.
Through sharing stories, we can develop leaders who learn to love this diversity and celebrate the pluriform glory of God in the faces and practices of his global church. YLG2016 displayed the power of connecting through stories. This represents an indirect path to leadership development. However, it is also the most strategic way of forming wise guides for the task of ‘gospelling’: showing and telling the old story of God’s reign in fresh ways on unfamiliar soil for such a time as this.
6. Listen for the still, small voice
‘Telling stories’ requires a receptive audience eager to listen. Leadership development must cultivate attention to the still, small voice of God and our neighbour in the global village, growing ears to hear.
Throughout the planning process, God called us to wait, fast, pray, slow down. This worked its way into the gathering. Almost every session included minutes of total silence to listen to the God who speaks, and process all we heard in the presence of the Logos. The pivot for the whole gathering was a night of prayer, identifying with Israel on the edge of the promised land and longing for the Lord to guide us forward.
Global mission depends on discerning God’s leading; and the heart of God is best heard in the cries of the oppressed and those on history’s ‘under-side’.5 We need to train leaders to pay attention. Toward this end, YLG2016 was a potent experiment.
For example, we learned so much from:
ex-jihadists in Niger who converted after dreams of a man in white;
ordinary and yet incredibly courageous believers in Iran who faced solitary confinement for months and years after sharing openly about Jesus;
Chinese house church leaders heading a network of millions and planning to send 20,000 missionaries out globally by the year 2030;6
our many sisters in Christ, including a frail Brazilian politician standing up to corruption and environmental degradation, bringing her faith to bear in saving the Amazon; and
countless everyday saints sharing their life-stories in small groups.
This is God’s work, taking whispers from the margins and translating them for many to hear, speaking truth to power. We rejoiced as younger leaders learned to bend their ear to those who humbly occupy the least seat at our communion table. How great it was to amplify this kingdom voice, rather than simply privilege well-known names on the evangelical speaking circuit.
God is faithful!
Through YLG2016 we have journeyed together—together with God, together with one another, together as a global church, and together as generations.
We put our full trust in God and served him with all our hearts; and we now can testify to his faithfulness, for he indeed has done immeasurably more than we all had asked or imagined. Thanks be to God!
Endnotes1 Editor’s Note: See article entitled ‘Lausanne’s Renewed Engagement in Global Mission: The impact of Cape Town 2010’ by Michael Oh and Justin Schell in the November 2015 issue of Lausanne Global Analysis.
2 On the centrality of narrative for identity and action, see Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989), 15: ‘The way we understand human life depends on what conception we have of the human story. What [then] is the real story of which my life story is part?’ Similarly, Alasdair MacIntyre argues that humans are essentially ‘story-telling animals’: ‘I can only answer the question “What am I to do?” if I can answer the prior question “Of what story or stories do I find myself a part?”’ See his After Virtue, 2nd ed (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1984), 216.
3 Informing YLG2016’s process of combining deep questions and rich stories to call out the ‘brilliance’ of each participant for global mission, see Mark Strom, Lead with Wisdom: How Wisdom Transforms Good Leaders into Great Leaders (Milton, Qld: Wiley, 2014).
4 On a dramatic/narrative hermeneutic of Scripture engagement that mobilizes the church for mission, see Christopher Wright, The Mission of God: Unlocking the Bible’s Grand Narrative (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2006); Kevin Vanhoozer, The Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical-linguistic Approach to Christian Theology (Louisville, KT: Westminster John Knox, 2005); N T Wright, The Last Word: Beyond the Bible Wars to a New Understanding of the Authority of Scripture (New York: HarperCollins, 2005), 121-127. The programme structure developed out of the theology of education in David Benson, Schools, Scripture and Secularisation: A Christian Theological Argument for the Incorporation of Sacred Texts within Australian Public Education, unpublished doctoral dissertation, the University of Queensland, ch 5, available at http://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:384064.
5 Embodying this spirituality of humble listening, see the work of Graham Hill in the ‘Global Church’ project at https://theglobalchurchproject.com/. See also his book, Global Church Reshaping Our Conversations, Renewing Our Mission, Revitalizing Our Churches (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2016).
6 Editor’s Note: See article entitled ‘China’s Conflicting Signals’ by David Ro in the January 2016 issue of Lausanne Global Analysis.
Sarah Breuel (sarahbreuel@gbu.it) served as Director of the 2016 Lausanne Younger Leaders Gathering (YLG2016). From Brazil and currently in Rome, Sarah has been included in the ‘33 under 33’ Christianity Today’s list of leaders to watch. After a business career at Unilever and Nextel, she has been with IFES the past eleven years. Sarah is married to René, and they have planted a vibrant church in Rome as part of the Redeemer City to City network. They have two adorable boys, Pietro and Matteo.
Dave Benson (david.benson@malyon.edu.au) served as Programme Director for YLG2016. He is passionate about pluralistic dialogue and the public expression of Christian faith in a post-Christendom context, for the flourishing of all. Based in Brisbane, Australia, he teaches at Malyon College and the Millis Institute on evangelism, apologetics, worldviews, faith-work integration, practical theology, and philosophy. Dave directs Traverse, the Malyon centre for bridging church and culture, and with his wife, Nikki, leads the intentional Christian community, Christ’s Pieces.
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Global Leadership for Global Mission
Mary Ho
Forty years ago, a Taiwanese woman like me would not be leading an international mission organization. However, today, I mirror the globalization of missions. Forty years ago in the 1970s, non-Western missionaries totalled less than 1,000.1 Today, missionaries from non-Western countries outnumber missionaries from Western countries.
For decades after the Edinburgh 1910 conference, a dualistic mission worldview perpetuated the Western church self-identifying as the sending church and the non-Western church self-identifying as the receiving church.2 All this has changed. Mission is no longer a ‘one-way street’ from the West to the rest of the world.3
Mission shift
Mission is now a ‘traffic jam’, with workers coming from every country, going to every country, and converging in every country. The Christian church is increasingly a global church. Whereas only about 30% of Christians came from the non-Western world in 1960,4 about 80% of the global Protestant and Catholic population will be in Africa, Asia, and Latin America by 2050.5
The Christian church is a global phenomenon, and mission is a worldwide endeavor.
Global mission leaders will also be leading in an increasingly volatile world of dramatic shifts:
Economically, the majority world is already contributing 70% of global investment growth.6
Political power will shift from the Western-led G-7 countries to diverse players, including non-state actors empowered by the rise of technology.7
By 2050, most of the population will be living in non-Western countries, with only 12.6% of the world’s population in the West.8
By 2050, 71% of the world’s population will be living in cities, but only two of the ten largest cities will be in more developed regions.9 There will be nearly 2 billion slum dwellers, fueling potential outbreaks of pandemics.10
By 2050, another 170 million migrants will pour out of predominantly majority world countries.11
Missions today and tomorrow will be concentrated in the majority world where much of the world’s resources, jobs, and population are increasing, but also where confounding socioeconomic issues are intensifying. The mission workforce that will complete world evangelization in this generation is going to be a mosaic of global leaders, with diverse—even clashing—backgrounds, skills, and experience. In this increasingly complex world, every mission leader is going to have to be a global leader who masters key global leadership competencies.
Who is a global leader?
In their outstanding book Being Global, Angel Cabrera and Gregory Unruh paint the profile of true global leaders:12
Global leaders craft solutions by bringing together people and resources across national, cultural, even organizational boundaries. Global leaders are visionaries inspired by a worldwide challenge that remains unsolved, an ignored social injustice or a business opportunity that has gone unexploited.
Therefore, global leaders lead across great divides. They have the remarkable capacity to pool people and resources to make the impossible possible:13
They can identify and call on different individuals who together possess all the pieces necessary to make the vision a reality. . . . Global leaders understand the cultural, social, or political differences that keep contributors apart and find ways to build, cultivate, and connect them despite, and sometimes because of, those differences.
Global leaders therefore have developed the key competencies to connect, create, and contribute value across boundaries.14
Many have written about global leadership, and most of them have taken one of three approaches: the universal approach that focuses on leader as leader, the contingency approach on leader as local manager, and the normative approach on leader as global manager.15 None of the approaches are definitive, but as a global leader, I have found each to be invaluable.
Universal leadership
The universal approach considers leadership to be a generalized, universal behavior, regardless of culture.16 Many of the Western leadership theories, especially value-based charismatic leadership (also known as transformational leadership), have taken this approach.17 18
Therefore, although I adapt my demeanor as an Asian woman leader to the different cultures that I encounter, I enter most cultures confidently because I have fostered the charismatic leadership abilities of casting vision, inspiring others, leading a high-performance team, and exemplifying concern and integrity.19
Similarly, I conduct a regular self-check of the 22 leadership attributes identified by the GLOBE project—which surveyed more than 17,000 leaders in 62 national societies—as being universally desired in most cultures:20
  • Trustworthy
  • Just
  • Honest
  • Encouraging
  • Motive arouser
  • Dependable
  • Effective bargainer
  • Informed
  • Team builder
  • Plans ahead
  • Dynamic
  • Motivational
  • Decisive
  • Communicative
  • Coordinative
  • Has foresight
  • Positive
  • Confidence builder
  • Intelligent
  • Win-win problem solver
  • Administratively skilled
  • Excellence oriented
Similarly, especially in trying seasons, I self-evaluate how the eight universally undesirable leadership attributes may be undermining my ability to lead effectively across cultures:21
  • Loner
  • Irritable
  • Ruthless
  • Dictatorial
  • Asocial
  • Nonexplicit
  • Noncooperative
  • Egocentric
Knowing and developing these universal leadership attributes and eliminating undesirable attributes are vital for mission leaders as we lead across multiple national boundaries.
Contingent leadership
A second approach is the contingency approach which assumes that there are no leadership universals and asserts that leadership is a culturally embedded and contingent process. Key works include Geert Hofstede’s research and the GLOBE project on the varying dimensions of national cultures and local leadership styles.22
As mission leaders, we must learn from the contingency approach because research has shown that, firstly, ‘leaders behave in a manner consistent with the desired leadership found in that culture’ and secondly, ‘leaders who behave according to expectations are effective’.23
Before I visit a country I would, as a simple first step, thumb through Richard Lewis’ When Culture Collides: Leading across Cultures which profiles many national cultures.24 I assess the predominant style of leadership, communication, social interaction, and decision-making in that country.
Then, I look up Hofstede’s cultural index to gauge if it is a hierarchical culture, a collectivistic culture, or a time-oriented culture. Is it a masculine or feminine culture? Is it shame and honor-based, or is it guilt-based? I look up GLOBE articles to ascertain if the country prefers a participative or humane or autonomous style of leadership.
Of the various global leadership approaches, this contingency approach takes into account local leadership expectations and comes closest to seeing leadership as a cultural construct.
Normative leadership
The normative approach is the most practical for mission leaders and focuses on cultivating global leadership competencies, such as acquiring a global mindset or cultural intelligence.25 Leaders who possess global leadership skills are able to activate strategies, business plans, operational processes, and leadership styles that transcend multiple national boundaries and teams with diverse backgrounds and motivations.26
Among the most practical global competencies are the ten leadership behaviors that Ernest Gundling, Terry Hogan, and Karen Cvitkovich have identified. These fall into five successive stages—Seeing differences, Closing the gap, Opening the system, Preserving balance, and Establishing solutions (SCOPE).27
Seeing Differences in two ways:28
Cultural Self-Awareness is to realize that one’s leadership practices are preconditioned, and that there are alternative ways of seeing things and accomplishing the goal.
Invite the Unexpected is the global leader’s learning posture through asking good questions, immersing oneself in the culture, and acquiring knowledge about history, politics, values, language, cultural insights, and points of local pride.29
Closing the Cultural Gap in two ways:30
Results through Relationships is when global leaders understand that in most cultures getting things done comes through developing key relationships and social networks, not through formal channels.
Frame-Shifting involves leaders modifying their perspectives and behavior to fit the culture, including their communication style, leadership style, and leadership strategy.
Opening the System is vital after the cultural gap is closed:31
Expand Ownership is extending leadership to people normally excluded by social and organizational barriers, and crafting processes that are systematically inclusive so that more people can access information and engage in shared goals.
Develop Future Leaders is when global mission leaders proactively identify and develop high-potential leaders who can help a global organization grow in key ways.
Preserving Balance between local values and one’s own values:32
Adapt and Add Value is to balance adapting to local practices with asserting a different perspective without imposing one’s views.
Core Values and Flexibility is when global mission leaders authentically incorporate other values into their own belief systems, behavior, and leadership style, without compromising their core values.
Establishing Solutions by drawing contributions across multiple boundaries:33
Influence across Boundaries requires mission leaders to serve as ambassadors with political acumen and subject matter expertise across several functions, and to effectively facilitate cross-boundary collaboration.
Third-Way Solutions draw on all of the behaviors to create global solutions.
Conclusion
Global mission leaders must know when to exercise which cross-boundary skill at different times.34 Having times of cultural self-reflection is helpful for gauging each situation. I make cultural self-awareness my starting point to examine my own prepackaged ideas and practices, and then decide what to set aside for the situation.
Wherever I go, I try to bridge boundaries by putting relationship first—not tasks—and forging genuine connection and trust. I inquire by asking all kinds of questions and expecting to be surprised.
In leading global organizations, we as leaders must facilitate the creative tension between centralization and decentralization, sometimes standardizing a single policy or process uniformly worldwide, and other times selecting with local leaders to screen and apply outside information that is locally relevant.35 Sometimes, we adapt pre-packaged information to local conditions; other times, we adopt by applying an idea from a field location to other locations.
In the process, I have been astounded by the innovations produced by combining ideas from centralized and local sources or by integrating diverse contributions to create a new norm.
We mission leaders are called to be world-class global leaders. We must cultivate global leadership competencies in the greatest global endeavor—to complete the remaining task of world evangelization in this generation.
Endnotes 1 Cho D. ‘Kingdom mission: DNA of the missionary task’. Tokyo 2010 Global Mission Consultation Handbook. Pasadena: 2010. 27-34.
2 Cho D. op. cit.
3 Editor’s Note: See article entitled ‘Lausanne’s Renewed Engagement in Global Mission’ by Michael Oh and Justin Schell in the November 2015 issue of Lausanne Global Analysis.
4 Cho D. op. cit.
5 Johnstone P. The Future of the Global Church. Downers Grove: Intervarsity Press, 2011.
6 National Intelligence Council. Global Trends 2030: Alternative worlds. 2012. NIC 2012-001.
7 National Intelligence Council. op. cit.
8 Johnstone P. op. cit.
9 Editor’s Note: See article entitled ‘Movement Day and Lausanne’ by Mac Pier in the May 2016 issue of Lausanne Global Analysis.
10 Johnstone P. op. cit.
11 Johnstone P. op. cit.
12 Cabrera A, Unruh G. Being Global: How to think, act, and lead in a transformed world. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press, 2012. 12.
13 Cabrera and Unruh. op. cit.
14 Cabrera and Unruh. op. cit.
15 Steers RM, Sanchez-Runde C, Nardon L. ‘Leadership in a global context: New directions in research and theory development’. Journal of World Business. 2012. 47(4): 479-482.
16 Ibid.
17 Ibid.
18 Dorfman P, Javidan M, Hanges P, Dastmalchian A, House R. ‘GLOBE: A twenty year journey into the intriguing world of culture and leadership’. Journal of World Business. 2012. 47(4): 504-518.
19 Ibid.
20 Northouse P. Leadership: Theory and practice. Los Angeles: Sage Publications, 2013.
21 Ibid.
22 Steers, et al. op.cit.
23 Dorfman, et al. op. cit.
24 Lewis R. When cultures collide: Leading across cultures. Boston: Nicholas Brealey Publishing, 2006.
25 Steers, et al. op. cit.
26 Gundling E, Hogan T, Cvitkovich K. What is global leadership? Boston: Nicholas Brealey, 2011.
27 Ibid.
28 Ibid.
29 Ibid.
30 Ibid.
31 Ibid.
32 Ibid.
33 Ibid.
34 Ibid.
35 Ibid.
Mary Ho is currently the Executive Director of All Nations Family, a cross-cultural church planting and missions training and sending organization based out of Kansas City. She is also pursuing a Doctor of Strategic Leadership degree at Regent University, Virginia Beach. Born in Taiwan and raised on four continents, Mary has lived in Swaziland, Taiwan, Indonesia, New Zealand, Philippines, Hong Kong, and the US, and has traveled extensively. She is married to John Ho, a bi-vocational architect. They have two boys, ages 20 and 16.
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Engaging an Emerging Generation of Global Mission Leaders
Nana Yaw Offei Awuku
A new generation of African younger leaders is rising to the challenge of missions. Many young professionals and university students are responding to the call to serve in strategic areas of missional engagement.
Missions from Africa
It is common practice in Ghana now for thousands of Christian university students of diverse denominational affiliations to spend about three to four weeks of their summer vacations involved in Students-In-Church Evangelism (SICE) programmes. They are contributing in dynamic ways to indigenous church planting and foreign missions.
The Church of Pentecost, originating in Ghana in 1962, today has a growing student movement and association of young professionals (Pensa ITI). It is reported to have established 2,681 international missions out of its 18,426 church congregations (called assemblies) by mid-2015.1 This is a contemporary example of African churches in mission to the rest of the world, and the story can be multiplied for many other denominations across many other African countries.2
Collaborative global missions
Any careful reflection on leadership for the twenty-first century church will involve, among many complex issues, significant consideration of the transitions and transformations taking place in the church in Africa and other global South continents. Samuel Escobar rightly observes that ‘Christian mission in the twenty-first century has become the responsibility of a global church. It is clear that the God who called Abraham to form a nation, and who revealed himself finally in Jesus Christ, intended his revelation to reach all humankind.’3
This reality strengthens our joy in sharing in collaborative global mission efforts as we earnestly continue to pray ‘your kingdom come’! The global diversity of the church as the community of God’s people presents the challenge of interdependence, relationships, and structures that need to be nurtured for effective partnerships for the mission of the church.
A global faith community with a common global mandate
Jesus tells the disciples: ‘And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come’ (Matt 24:14). The Great Commission is, ‘Go and make disciples of all nations’ (Matt 28:19). Our common mission arises out of our common identity in Christ. This must inform all reflection on a biblical paradigm for effective mentoring of emerging leaders and partnering for mission.
The experience of Peter recorded in Luke chapter 5 is insightful. It was evident that one of the essential lessons that Peter learnt in the quest to fish for people is the need for partnerships. After the miraculous catch of fish, Luke records: ‘So they signalled their partners in the other boat to come and help them’ (Luke 5:7). This priority for partnerships should be normative for the mission of fishing for people if the global church is to carry out effectively its God-given mission across cultures and regions in this century.
Five global mission partnership priorities for 21st century emerging leaders
Each generation will need to reflect afresh on the nature of the partnerships that emerging leaders will need in carrying out the Great Commission. Andrew Walls, reflecting on the work of David Barrett, observes:
Christian history has seen many changes in the centre of gravity of the Christian world. Three of these have been crucial, for each of them led to a transformation in Christian expression. The third has come to a climax in our own century; it has been the massive movement towards Christian faith in all the southern continents—sub Saharan Africa, Latin America, certain parts of Asia, the Pacific Islands—which means that Christian profession in the southern continents now outnumbers that in the northern.4
New effective models of geographical partnerships
First, this shift creates the need for new effective models of geographical partnerships between the church in the global North and the church in the global South. Paternal relationships must give way to a new paradigm of kingdom partnerships of trust, mutual respect, and sharing of resources and leadership, with a common commitment to the one mission of the gospel. Triumphalism must be buried in its various expressions in both the North and the South. Escobar remarks that ‘despite the shift of Christianity to the South, in the coming decades Christian mission to all parts of the globe will require resources from both the North and the South to be successful’.5 This calls for a renewed emphasis on intentional cross-cultural engagements in the humble spirit of the Christ.
New models of structural partnerships for global mission
Secondly, there is the need for reflection on new models of structural partnerships for global mission. Timothy Tennent touches on a significant structural issue when he observes, ‘Since the nineteenth century, protestant missions strategy has often been conceptualized around the priority of evangelizing individuals rather than planting churches, which brings together the nucleus of a new community of believers. On the sending side of missions, the role of the specialized parachurch missions grew more and more dominant.’6
In his careful biblical reflection on the two structures of God’s redemptive mission in relation to the church at Antioch and Paul’s missionary band, Tennent makes two vital observations: ‘Firstly, Paul’s missionary band was a distinct structure from the local church. Secondly, Paul’s missionary band was accountable to the church at Antioch and beyond that to the senior leaders based in Jerusalem.’7
Many emerging leaders in the global South church are directly impacted by the relationship between the local church and the mission agencies. There is a fresh opportunity to explore new structural partnerships with the current resurgence of church planting movements seeking to re-emphasize the role and involvement of the church at the cutting edge of mission, particularly in the global South regions.
Effective generational partnerships for mission
Thirdly, there is the need for reflection on effective generational partnerships for mission. When Jesus commissioned his first disciples with the promise, ‘And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age’ (Matt 28:20), there was in that promise an implicit commission to disciple the next generations also.
For the church to remain vibrant and faithful in its obedience to global mission through all generations till the ‘end of the age’, a key focus must be on leadership development and transitioning of kingdom leadership from one generation to another in stewarding the fulfilment of God’s promises in the global mission of the church. If the church has a unique mission, then it needs in each generation leaders of a certain kind. The Cape Town Commitment observes:
The rapid growth of the church in so many places remains shallow and vulnerable, partly because of the lack of discipled leaders, and partly because so many use their positions for worldly power, arrogant status or personal enrichment. As a result, God’s people suffer, Christ is dishonoured, and gospel mission is undermined.8
How does the global church adequately develop mature Christ-like next-generation leaders for its mission in an increasing diverse context? Faithful stewardship of inter-generational leadership transitions as an intentional partnership for the gospel and global mission will raise up new leaders at various levels across the global church.
Authentic cross-cultural friendships
Fourthly, effective partnerships for global mission will grow out of authentic cross-cultural friendships. These would be friendships that exemplify and strengthen our foundational relationship in Christ. On the final night, Jesus said to his disciples, ‘I have called you friends’, and gave them the affirmation, ‘I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last’, re-emphasizing, ‘This is my command: love each other’ (John 15:15-17).
Friendship has a very significant impact on partnerships for the gospel. Dana Roberts shares a concern: ‘Does anyone have time to make friends today, or is cross-cultural service a kind of global networking that looks good on a résumé? Is friendship now defined by Facebook rather than by walking in someone else’s shoes?’
She observes that ‘In today’s world of instant communication, short attention spans, and material development as mission, the sacrificial practices of friendship stand as evidence for the kingdom ethics of God’s love for all people.’9
The ultimate partnership with God in the missio Dei
I conclude with a challenge for the church to re-emphasize and re-engage the priority of the ultimate partnership with God in the missio Dei. As we celebrate the dynamic growth of the church in Africa and the global South, it is of utmost importance that we remind ourselves that ‘mission is first and foremost about God and his redemptive purposes and initiatives in the world, quite apart from any action or tasks or strategies or initiatives the church may undertake’.10
This relationship to God should be the foundation for all other partnerships in relation to the global mission of the church. Jesus emphasized this truth to the disciples by saying, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore, go and make disciples’ (Matt 28:19).
Conditioned through modernism, secularization, and postmodernism, the upcoming generations of mission leaders need to hear afresh Jesus’ instructive words to the disciples, ‘I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing’ (John 15:5). Tennent reminds us that theory and practice of missions can be summarized as, ‘The Father is the sender, the Lord of the harvest; the Son is the model embodiment of mission in the world; and the Holy Spirit is the divine empowering presence for all mission.’11
The kingdom of God is established only through the power of God. This ultimate dimension of partnership with God can accomplish the faithful finishing of the global mission (Rev 7:9-10). As we celebrate the dynamic growth of the church globally, it is time to engage the new generation of global mission leaders in embracing the challenge and beauty of kingdom partnerships for the gospel.
Endnotes1 The Church of Pentecost, 2015 Mid-Year Statistical Report (Updates can be accessed at http://thecophq.org/overview.php).
2 Editor’s Note: See article entitled ‘Engaging the Church in Africa in its Key Mission Issues to 2050’ by Rudolf Kabutz in the November 2015 issue of Lausanne Global Analysis.
3 Samuel Escobar, The New Global Mission: The Gospel from Everywhere to Everyone (Downers Grove, Ill: IVP Academic, 2003), 12.
4 Andrew F Walls, The Missionary Movement in Christian History: Studies in the Transmission of Faith, 1st ed (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1996), 68.
5 Escobar, The New Global Mission, 18.
6 Timothy Tennent, Invitation to World Missions: A Trinitarian Missiology for the Twenty-First Century, 2nd ed (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Academic & Professional, 2010), Kindle loc 4911.
7 Ibid, Kindle loc 4981.
8 Chris Wright, ed, The Cape Town Commitment: A Confession of Faith and a Call to Action (South Hamilton, Mass: Hendrickson Publishers, 2011), II-1-C.
9 Dana Roberts, ‘Cross-Cultural Friendship in the Creation of Twentieth-Century World Christianity’, International Bulletin of Missionary Research, http://www.internationalbulletin.org/issues/2011-02/2011-02-100-robert.html, accessed 25 April 2016.
10 Tennent, Invitation to World Missions, Kindle loc 492.
11 Tennent, Invitation to World Missions, Kindle loc 718.
Nana Yaw Offei Awuku was the Lausanne Regional Director for English, Portuguese, and Spanish speaking countries in Africa (EPSA) until September 2016. Nana Yaw has been on staff with Scripture Union Ghana for over 20 years and currently serves on the Senior Management Team as the Director for Field Ministries. Nana is married to Beth and they live in Ghana with their three children. He is currently on a two-year study break at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (Boston). Nana has been invited by Lausanne to serve as Director for the Younger Leaders Generation initiative (YLGen).
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The Brazilian Crisis
Paul Freston, Raphael Freston
Shortly after the end of the Rio Olympic games, Brazil impeached its second president in 24 years, in controversial circumstances and amid profound political divisions in the country. Brazilian Christians have not escaped this polarization, affecting relationships within families, not to mention churches and denominations.
By all indications, this is not the end of the political crisis in Brazil, but merely one more stage in a battle that is far from ending. Furthermore such Christian polarization in divisive political contexts is not confined to Brazil.
Therefore, it is important to continue to articulate principles which can guide Christians in how to respond in such polarized and divisive contexts.
First Principle: Knowing how to behave is more important than knowing what position to adopt
At a time when politics threatens to tear the Brazilian Christian community apart (perhaps even more than society as a whole), we want to suggest some principles for the political debate. These take into account that this moment will pass and that in a few years’ time Christians will no longer need to have an opinion regarding current politicians, but they will still have to live together as brothers and sisters in the faith and give an example of seriousness and wisdom to society as a whole.
Hence the importance of cultivating the natural political pluralism of the Christian community, of knowing how to debate and disagree without excommunicating each other or twisting each other’s motivations. We need to remember that politics, although very serious, belongs to the realm of the relative and not the absolute, to the sphere of convictions but not (with rare exceptions) to the sphere of the basic doctrines of the faith.
Second Principle: Cultivate Christian political reticence
In politics, Christianity is characterized by a certain reticence, a hesitation, a non-dogmatism, a broad space of freedom for legitimate disagreement between believers.
This reticence comes partly from the historical origins of the faith.
Some comparisons with Islam help us to understand what this means:
The founder of Islam governed a state; the founder of Christianity was put to death by the state.
The followers of the former enjoyed political power from the start; the followers of the latter spent 300 years without political power, as a voluntary, transnational, and trans-ethnic community. It is during that period that its normative Scriptures were written.
That is why Christianity usually has less political ‘self-confidence’ than Islam, why it feels less free to exercise power in the name of God or create political ‘recipes’ in the name of the faith.
In addition, the Christian concept of revelation is that God revealed himself over time, in various ways and in very diverse circumstances, culminating in the incarnation of the Son of God. There were in fact several biblical worlds:
The New Testament was written for the early Christian community, which was a small transnational group with no control over territory, no access to political power and no possibility of formulating legislation. Whoever tries to formulate a ‘Christian politics’ only from the New Testament soon runs into the problem of a political vacuum, above all in a democratic context where citizens are called upon to participate in constituting the authorities. That is why the default position of primitive Christianity is distance from politics.
The Old Testament, written for a national community that actually did have to deal with questions of territory, law, power, and force, has to be read in the light of the final revelation of God in Christ. No modern country, however many Christians it contains, is in the same situation as Old Testament Israel. That is why Christian politics is always less sure of itself than (for example) most Islamic approaches.
Another factor is that, as is often said, politics is the art of the possible and the political phenomena of a modern society are extremely complex. As a result, two people who deduce the same political principles from the Bible may still disagree radically about what is possible and advisable to do now, in our country.
Jesus warned us to ‘beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees’ (Matt 16:6). Although very different from each other, both these groups absolutized what should be relativized in the light of Christ. Today, one example of such leaven is to place the Christian faith at the service of a particular political position. This politicization of Christian identity is disastrous for the church, and is idolatrous, because it absolutizes our relative opinions and puts them on the same level as the central doctrines of the faith.
Third Principle: Distinguish the different debates
Today, in Brazil, at least four questions get intertwined, and failure to separate them makes debate very difficult:
whether President Dilma Rousseff deserved to be impeached;
corruption as a generalized problem in Brazilian politics;
party preferences and who we would like to see in power; and
larger ideological questions (neoliberalism, neo-conservatism, social-democracy, socialism, etc).
Fourth Principle: Avoid dichotomous thinking and recognize the many possible positions
There are not only two possible positions (for or against impeachment). Being worried about procedural failings (in Congress and in the investigations) is not the same as defending this or that person. It is dangerous to accept a highly fallible procedure just because the people affected are politically on the other side from us.
In part, the problems stem from a mismatch between presidentialism and parliamentarianism. In a parliamentary system, a prime minister Rousseff would fall through a simple vote of no-confidence, without the need for impeachment. Since that is impossible in our presidential system, the constitutional mechanism of impeachment is being used. Nevertheless, this opens up a dangerous precedent, being a mechanism that is meant only for exceptional situations, and not as a convenient way of removing an unpopular head of government.
Given the complexities, we should recognize the multiple stances that might be adopted within the Christian community and seek to understand the best arguments on the other side, instead of believing the caricatures disseminated by much of the media.
Fifth Principle: Go beyond simplistic moralism in the Christian perspective on corruption
For Christians who understand little about politics, corruption seems to be a political issue that is easy to comprehend simply by transferring personal moral values to the public sphere. Crafty politicians, including Christian ones, take advantage of this to try and mobilize their grassroots and justify their own presence in parliaments. However, the Christian view of corruption is much more sophisticated than this:1
Christians view the radical nature of sin as affecting not only all individuals but also all groups and institutions, including churches and political parties, without exception. Christians ought to be less susceptible than most to any messianic feeling around any person or party—and less surprised at the inevitable disappointments.
Christianity offers a balanced view between individual and institutional renewal. Corruption is related both to institutions and to cultural factors, and both these renewals are mutually reinforcing in combating corruption. Substantial reduction in corruption takes a long time and involves work on various fronts.
Universal human ‘communion’ in sin is one of the great justifications for democracy; nobody deserves unlimited and unsupervised powers over their fellows. It is also one of the main arguments for political concern over social inequality. Christianity is realistic: wherever there is inequality, there will be oppressors and oppressed. For that reason, loving one’s neighbour includes efforts to weaken the unequal structures that engender oppression.
The Christian view of the world also helps us to remember that Brazil has already been here before (in 1992, with the impeachment of President Fernando Collor). The anti-corruption campaign is extremely necessary, but will not solve the problem once and for all, and will certainly be taken advantage of for other political and economic ends.
Any improvement will be merely temporary if there are no political reforms, especially in the electoral and party systems. The electoral system of proportional representation with open lists is responsible for a considerable part of Brazilian political corruption. (It is also responsible for the large ‘evangelical caucuses’ in the federal, state, and municipal parliaments, which means the evangelical politicians are unlikely to have a constructive role in combating corruption.)
Sixth Principle: Distinguish between an ideal and the carrier of that ideal
All human projects end up disappointing us. However, disillusionment with the carrier of an ideal does not have to lead to abandoning the ideal itself (just as disillusionment with a particular church does not have to lead to abandoning the Christian faith). We need to know how to criticize and, if necessary, abandon a particular carrier, without necessarily rejecting the ideal the carrier claimed to represent.
In Christian circles, the task of distinguishing between ideal and carrier is made harder by a tendentious use of the word ‘ideology’ as a swear word to criticize our political adversaries. They are ‘ideological’; we are not. It is better to say that we all have our ideologies, merely by virtue of being human beings in a particular social location, with our limitations and interests. None of us has a ‘God’s-eye’ view.
Today, we confront two temptations: of rejecting an ideal because the carrier of it has let us down; or of clinging on to the carrier because we feel that the survival of the ideal demands it.
It is important not to give up on political ideals that are compatible with the Bible and in fact recommended by it, such as justice and solidarity; prioritizing the weakest and most needy to reduce inequality; the fundamental value of democracy as a reflection of the character of God expressed in the way he has treated humanity since the beginning and the way he treats humanity reconstituted in Christ (Gal 3:28); and the rejection of idolatry both of the state and of the market (paraphrasing Mark 2:27).2
Being a Christian means not bowing to fashions. History springs many surprises, and the person who subordinates their reading of the faith to a passing social consensus, to supposed ‘obvious lessons of history’, will discover one day that their reading has become strangely dated. That is why we must affirm the importance of Christian political pluralism, in which some will be more to the right, others more to the left, never despising or excommunicating those with whom we disagree politically.
Endnotes1 Editor’s Note: See article entitled ‘The Earth is the Lord’s! How taking a stand against corruption can be gospel work’ by Dion Forster in the July 2015 issue of Lausanne Global Analysis.
2 Editor’s Note: See article entitled ‘The Restorative Economy: poverty, the future of the earth, and the role of the Christian’ by Richard Gower in the March 2016 issue of Lausanne Global Analysis.
Paul Freston is the CIGI Chair in Religion and Politics in Global Context at the Balsillie School of International Affairs and Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada. He is also professor colaborador on the post-graduate programme in sociology at the Universidade Federal de São Carlos, Brazil. His books include Evangelicals and Politics in Asia, Africa and Latin America (Cambridge University Press, 2001); Protestant Political Parties: a Global Survey (Ashgate, 2004); (ed) Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in Latin America (Oxford University Press, 2008); and (co-edited) The Cambridge History of Religions in Latin America (Cambridge University Press, 2016).
Raphael Freston is a Masters student in sociology at the Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil. He has a degree in social science from the same university.
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November 2016 - Volume 5 / Issue 6
View Online Download Full Issue Download Executive Summary
View all issuesMore from the Younger Leaders Gathering
Stories and highlights from the 2016 Lausanne Younger Leaders Gathering in Indonesia
State of the World—YLG2016 Presentation
Jason Mandryk and Molly Wall, editors of Operation World, give insight to key issues in the church, Great Commission, and the world based on their extensive research and encounters around the world in this YLG2016 presentation.
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(Watch now)
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Mentored and Now Mentoring—A YLG story
‘Talking to this woman of God was the highlight of the whole gathering for me’, says Lilian Gitonga, one of the participants of the 2016 Lausanne Younger Leaders Gathering. She left Jakarta with the conviction that mentoring for the next generation of leaders should be encouraged all over the world.
Talking to this woman of God was the highlight of the whole gathering for me’, says Lilian Gitonga, one of the participants of the 2016 Lausanne Younger Leaders Gathering. She left Jakarta with the conviction that mentoring for the next generation of leaders should be encouraged all over the world.
Arriving to Indonesia a few days before the gathering, Lilian felt that she was at a crossroads. Her work contract back in Kenya would end the next month, and she was trying to decide whether or not to accept another offer that would have her traveling 70 percent of the time. How could she possibly balance that with being a new mother and a young wife? Was she to sacrifice her ministry or her family?
So when she learned that younger leaders could book one-on-one meetings with senior leaders at the YLG, she knew it was her chance. She booked a meeting with Narni Wang, who leads an IT (Information Technology) as mission ministry in Indonesia.
‘To my great surprise, a day before our meeting, Narni reached out to me by email to confirm that we were meeting. This was so meaningful for me’, says Lilian. When they sat down together, she wasn’t sure where to start. But Narni helped by sharing her story first, making herself vulnerable. God was already speaking to Lilian as Narni opened up, and this set the stage for many more questions.
The two soon realized how much their life stories have in common, and how juggling family and ministry is a struggle that Narni has also had to grapple with. ‘Although we only booked one time together, we ended up meeting four times, and on the day off, I went to Narni’s church and spent time with her family’, shares Lilian.
Lilian returned to Nairobi with a newfound clarity. After talking to her husband Jack, they decided that she wouldn’t take a job that would tear her away from her young family. Instead, they would trust the Father to provide another opportunity. No sooner was this decision made than her boss called Lilian to ask her to stay at her current position for another year.
Lilian’s story echoes that of so many testimonies from the YLG, showing a deep hunger among younger leaders for mentoring—rather than something the older generation wants to impose on the next. ‘When you look at younger leaders, you might get the impression that we know what we’re doing, but we often don’t. And we don’t look for someone who will tell us what to do, but someone who can come alongside us and ask the right questions that reveal our blind spots’, says Lilian.Lilian and Narni are still in touch via Skype and exchange regular emails. But this is not the end of the story. The generational impact has continued even further. After realizing the value of mentoring through her YLG experience, Lilian also started to mentor younger people in her own church.
Mentoring was central to the YLG in Jakarta, and it’s one of the main aspects of the Lausanne Younger Leaders Generation (YLGen), a ten-year commitment launched at the YLG to further connect leaders for missional impact. YLGen is not just a commitment to younger leaders, but to building connections across generations.
Lilian’s story exemplifies the ripple effect we were so fervently praying for and working towards—we praise God for this early fruit from the YLG!
Attila Nyári is the Chair of Communications for the 2016 Lausanne Younger Leaders Gathering. He also serves as the Media Relations & Online Engagement Manager for the Lausanne Movement and as a church-planting pastor in the greater Budapest area in Hungary, Europe.
(Read more)
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Connections at YLG2016—Video
A short video highlighting connections made in Jakarta. YLG2016 participants with a passionate commitment to North Korea; mobilization for refugee ministry in Jordan; younger leaders from China and from India and Africa in some strategic brainstorming sessions. (Watch now)
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/P1vhD8YuocQ" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Video available in English with subtitles in French, Korean, Portuguese, and Spanish.
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Updates from the Issue Networks
Movement Day 2016
In October, Lausanne co-sponsored New York City Leadership Center's Movement Day Global Cities where thousands gathered from 95 nations to unite the church for gospel movement in the great cities of the world. Watch a video summary 
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<p><a href="https://vimeo.com/194579722">Movement Day 2016 Highlights</a> from <a href="https://vimeo.com/movementday">Movement Day</a> on <a href="https://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>
Did You Know?
This past October, leaders from across the globe gathered for three powerful days of connection, celebration, education, and inspiration in the Jacob Javits Convention Center right here in New York City. Day after day powerful stories of God’s faithfulness and His people’s commitment to spreading the gospel were shared. Our team watched you pray, cry, laugh, and challenge one another. We came away humbled, energized, and inspired.
Did you know that Movement Day Global Cities…
Hosted over 3,000 attendees
Saw over 750 cities represented
Had 95 countries represented
Hosted over 300 millennial leaders
Saw over 1,000 marketplace leaders represented
Had 1,300 international leaders present
Hosted 164 plenary and track speakers
Had 21 different tracks
Movement Day Global Cities 2016 was a team effort!
Some attendees travelled over 17,000 km to attend.
Over 795 days were spent planning this historic gathering.
27 regions discussed having a Movement Day expression in their city in the future.
What some leaders are saying:
“Sensed that the destiny of cities will be changed.”
“Really exciting work happening in London. We’re excited for Movement Day London” next year!
“I am encouraged to be more intentional in Biblical spiritual warfare, healthy leadership and learning more about my city.”
“The speakers showed so much intellect through education, dreaming, talking and risking. Very encouraged to take things to a bigger level.”
Mark your calendars and be sure to look for the next Movement Day expression coming to a city near you!
Movement Day Greater Dallas
Mar 4, 2017
Movement Day Haiti
May 2017
Movement Day Australia
May 2017
Movement Day Athens
May 2017
Movement Day Chennai
August 2017
Movement Day Arizona
September 15-16, 2017
Movement Day London
October 6-7, 2017
Movement Day NYC
October 20-21, 2017
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Global Diaspora Network series on Christianity Today
Scholars and practitioners from Lausanne’s Global Diaspora Network were highlighted in a special series of five posts on Christianity Today on diaspora missions:
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Creation Care in the Age of Trump
‘It is already clear that the one of the Trump administration’s priorities will be to try to reverse many of the environmental protections that already exist within the United States. More ominously for those outside of this country, he intends to back out of the United States' international obligations with regard to climate change. Will this happen? If it does, will other countries stay the course or choose to back out as well? What does it all mean for God's creation? So we are asking ourselves: What does Creation Care look like in the Age of Trump?’ writes Ed Brown, Lausanne Catalyst for Creation Care. (Read more)
Dear Friend,
Immediately after the US election, I wrote the following to friends and colleagues in the US. I thought it might be helpful for you as well:
This has been quite a week. Here in the US, we have been rocked by news of Donald Trump’s election to presidency of the United States. Many of you were also surprised and shocked - I've heard from some of you. We’re all wondering what this means for the US and for the world.
We are also wondering what it means for the Lausanne/WEA Creation Care Network. It is already clear that the one of the Trump administration’s priorities will be to try to reverse many of the environmental protections that already exist within the United States. More ominously for those outside of this country (which is most of you who are reading this) he intends to back out of the United States' international obligations with regard to climate change. Will this happen? If it does, will other countries stay the course or choose to back out as well? What does it all mean for God's creation? So we are asking ourselves: What does Creation Care look like in the Age of Trump?
As a former pastor, my first response in any crisis – and make no mistake, this is a crisis – is to look to the Bible. On this occasion, I find myself meditating on the experience of one of Israel’s greatest prophets, Isaiah. Isaiah’s account of his call to service begins like this (chapter 6):
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the LORD…
This is more than a calendar notation: King Uzziah (probably one of Isaiah’s relatives) had been a fixture in the political scene of Jerusalem, reigning for more than 52 years. He was a strong, powerful and stable ruler (see II Chronicles 26 for his story), and his death almost certainly brought uncertainty and fear. Isaiah’s response to this event contains some useful lessons for all of us in our time of uncertainty:
Isaiah saw the Lord because he sought the Lord. The great event here, of course, is Isaiah finding himself face to face with the Lord of the Universe, but what interests me is where this happens. We find Isaiah in the temple. Perhaps this was a regular visit for worship, perhaps a special time of quiet devotion because he needed comfort, assurance, certainty, answers. This is where we need to start as we process recent and ongoing political events in our own day. There will be a need for planning, for strategic regrouping, perhaps for marching and protesting. But first, before anything else, go look for God. Find your temple, wait for him to appear. Feel free to interpret ‘temple’ loosely. My favorite spot to seek the LORD is on a bike and hiking trail…
Isaiah’s encounter with God drives him to humility… “Woe to me! …I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips.” (v. 5) Few of us came out of this election with much to be proud of, and with Isaiah, humility and confession is necessary before we can move on. This process can take many forms: personal confession of sin or rebellion, examination of motives, asking forgiveness of those we might have treated harshly in the heat of passion. But it springs naturally from our time spent with God. If we’re going to move on, and we must, we dare not skip this important step.
…and results in a commission, a call to ministry. “Whom shall I send? …here am I. Send me!” (v. 8) These are familiar words and standard missionary fare. I could not count the number of sermons I’ve heard (and quite a few that I’ve preached) on these words. In this context, a crisis that drives us to God will also push us toward action, and this is good and natural. For us at Care of Creation, this means doubling down on our commitment to our mission of calling the church to respond to environmental crises everywhere.
Notice, though, that Isaiah is being called to obedience, but not to results or success. He is to preach to a people who will not listen, offering healing that will not be accepted, and he is to carry on “until the cities lie ruined and without inhabitant, until the houses are left deserted and the fields ruined and ravaged.” (v. 11) Does this sound familiar? Who wants a ministry like that? Not I. But that is exactly what we’ve been called to. Whether the occupant of the White House is sympathetic or not, whether the church at large understands or not, our task is to continue to proclaim this truth: God loves his creation, and he has given us the task of taking care of it.
In the end, Isaiah’s message was one of hope, not despair. If you are familiar with Isaiah’s entire body of work, you know that gloom and doom was not his entire message. He gives us many beautiful predictions about the coming Messiah (Jesus), as well as glorious portraits of a new earth and new heaven:
See, I will create
new heavens and a new earth.
The former things will not be remembered,
nor will they come to mind.
But be glad and rejoice forever
in what I will create,
for I will create Jerusalem to be a delight
and its people a joy.
I will rejoice over Jerusalem
and take delight in my people;
the sound of weeping and of crying
will be heard in it no more… (Isaiah 65:17-19)
This, then, is the tension we face as we work to care for God’s creation in the Trump age, or in any age for that matter. We know that things are falling apart around us. We know that there is very little that we can do to stop the destruction. But we will do what we can now, and persuade as many people as we can now, and weep over the tragedy now, while always keeping our eyes on that final hope that Jesus will return with final and complete and glorious healing, restoration and reconciliation.
One of my friends and colleagues, Lowell Bliss, reminded several of us in an email this week of a quote from one of his favorite authors, Walter Brueggemann:
Jesus’ concern was, finally, for the joy of the kingdom. That is what he promised and to that he invited people. But he was clear that the rejoicing in that future required a grieving about the present order. Jesus takes a quite dialectical two-age view of things. He will not be like one-world liberals who view the present world as the only one, nor will he be like the unworldly who yearn for the future with an unconcern about the present. There is work to be done in the present. There is grief work to be done in the present so that the future may come. . . (1)
So I invite you to join with us in this uncomfortable place – caring for the Garden, weeping for the parts destroyed (Brueggemann’s “grief work”), healing what we can, while keeping our eyes on Jesus and his promises of a final, complete and glorious future, the whole growing out of an ongoing, genuine encounter with God himself. Did I say “uncomfortable”? Yes, but what an exciting adventure, as well!
Thank you for your part in caring for God's creation in your own place and as part of this wonderful world-wide network. Always remember, Presidents come and go - and in the final scheme of things matter not at all (Isaiah 40:23-24); we, on the other hand, we are serving the King of Kings. And he will be victorious!
Blessings,
Ed Brown
Lausanne/WEA Creation Care Network
Would you like to send an encouraging word to Christians in the US during this time? Use this link to send a message (written or video) that we can share with the church in the US during this time of uncertainty.
(1) Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1978), 112-113.
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