Arabic TV show teaches holiness
ARABIC TV PROGRAM TEACHES VIEWERS HOW TO FOLLOW JESUS
Arabic TV program teaches viewers how to follow Jesus
*Tahir and his wife, *Rima, from Syria, first came to know Christ a year ago. As they are learning and growing in their new faith, a key part of that support comes in the form of a Christian TV program.
The same is true for *Kamal, a Christian in Morocco who formerly belonged to another faith. He doesn’t have the freedom to ask Christians in his city about his faith questions, or to find strength in a local community of believers. Every week he watches the same TV program to hear worship songs and the testimonies of other Christians.The couple from Syria and the believer from Morocco both reach out to the show’s response team through social media to request prayer, ask questions, comment on the stories and music, or express gratitude for the show.
“Follow Me with Ayman Kafrouny” is the live, weekly Nazarene broadcast they are watching. Every Wednesday, the program airs globally on the Arabic-language Christian network, SAT-7. The network’s several channels broadcast in 25 Middle Eastern and North African countries, as well as 50 European countries. Wikipedia reports that as of 2017, the total viewing audience of SAT-7’s several channels was estimated at over 21 million.
“Follow Me” began as an hour-long series, but has recently expanded to episodes of 90 minutes. Kafrouny said the guests provided such rich content that the team realized 60 minutes wasn’t long enough cover all the desired material.
It is aired four times a week, with the first broadcast being live, and then repeating three more times.
“This means we have six hours of air time weekly,” Kafrouny said.
Viewers who contact the “Follow Me” team are watching in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iraq, Sudan and beyond. They reach out through the program’s Facebook page, calling or text, and send messages through other digital platforms, including WhatsApp.
One woman responded after a program featured a guest who ministers in Lebanese prisons. The viewer is also involved in prison ministry – to women in Sudan. She was encouraged by the guest’s stories.
Each episode features worship music led by Bouchrieh Church of the Nazarene’s worship team, as well as a guest, either a well-known public figure or someone “ordinary,” who shares a testimony and answers questions.
Program themes grapple with difficult issues and questions, such as, where is God when there is dislocation and war; whether and how Christians can engage politically; and how to reflect God’s character in the home.
“Follow Me” is the sixth television program produced by Nazarene Broadcast Communication Ministries.
“We noticed that almost all our previous productions so far were focusing on the Great Commission,” said Rev. Ayman Kafrouny, who directs and produces the programs with a team of Nazarenes, most of whom are members of Bouchrieh Church of the Nazarene, in Beirut, Lebanon, where he serves as lead pastor. “So it’s time for us now to put more emphasis on our doctrine (holiness) that distinguishes us from other denominations, and to give a simple and clear explanation on how we believe a Christian should live his or her life as a witness for Jesus Christ.”In preparing and developing the program, Kafrouny observed other Christian programs airing in Arabic, and noticed that few of them focused on holiness; those that did discuss it failed to do so in a clear, simple and practical way, he said.
“We hope this program will help our audience to know that holiness is not designated just for an elite group of Christians,” Kafrouny said. “Rather, it’s a command in the Scripture (Heb 12:14) (Rom 8:29), and it’s possible to every person, since God is the one who will accomplish it in the life of those who believe it.”
This is the first year for the team to develop a live show. Because SAT-7 producers believe so deeply in the value of “Follow Me,” they have provided studio space, equipment and part of the technical crew.
Through funding from World Mission Broadcast, a fund supported by local Nazarene churches around the world, the “Follow Me” team are able to hire additional freelancers to complete the crew.
While it’s not possible to measure exactly how many are watching “Follow Me” each week, the growing interactions with the Nazarene follow-up team through Facebook indicate the show is expanding its audience weekly. Since it launched in May 2018, its Facebook page has reported numbers of interactions as high as 46,000. Each episode is posted on the page for long-term availability after it airs.
Visual broadcasts are the most popular forms of media in the Arabic world, Kafrouny said. Previous Nazarene TV programs, some of which aired as long ago as 2009, remain in syndication on various Christian TV stations around the world or are still being watched on the Internet. Kafrouny said regularly people approach him to thank him for an episode of a now-ended TV program that they have just seen in a re-run or on a website, such as YouTube.
That means all the previous Nazarene Arabic-language TV programs continue to have an indefinite lifespan to impact viewers, even beyond their original airdate. It’s natural to expect that “Follow Me” will, as well.
“Our hope or our prayer is to reach out to people who we cannot see face to face,” Kafrouny said. “The results, the fruits, we may not see them all. We believe the people we are reaching, that many are becoming members in the Kingdom of God. (By Gina Grate Pottenger)
*Names changed for privacy
“Follow Me” is partially funded through World Mission Broadcast (WMB), a fund to which local Nazarene churches around the world contribute offerings.
WMB provides grants to local churches and districts to create and develop evangelistic and discipling broadcasts that may air on radio and television stations, and the Internet.
Find out more, or give now at:http://nazarene.org/wmb
Read the full story.
From YouTube to church plant |
An unusual approach to seeking the lost takes the form of an Internet TV show about current events, history, travel and exploration.
Adventure. History. Tourism. Exploration. Spirituality.
These are the themes of a Russian-language YouTube channel called Alfa-News.TV, led and produced by Pastor Yuri, a Nazarene leader in Russia.
Several years ago, restrictive legislation and increasing government pressure in Russia were making it more difficult to rely on traditional methods for evangelism and church planting. Yuri turned to the greater religious freedom of the Internet, and of Russia’s neighboring country of Finland.
In response, Yuri developed an innovative strategy to reach Russian people with the gospel through an online travel and exploration show with spiritual content. Once the programming draws at least 1,000 regular followers, the YouTube channel will begin broadcasting informal worship services. Yuri believes they’ll start this autumn. The program has about 300 followers on YouTube, 300 more on its Facebook page, and an additional 300 on VK, a popular Russian social media platform.
As the online services begin to draw a consistent following of viewers, Yuri plans to eventually organize those viewers who are interested into real-world house churches or small groups. Nazarene congregations and pastors on the district are ready to provide support, especially the congregation and pastor in Volgograd, where Yuri previously was a pastor. He considers this will be the mother church of any new groups that are planted.
Such an approach will not violate Russia’s recently enacted laws limiting evangelism and where Christians can meet for worship.
“If they like an adventure program, when we start to talk about spiritual things they already like and trust us, and they start to hear from us the message about God and the gospel. They give us trust in that area.”
Yuri is making his vision a reality through creative partnerships.
He turned to a Christian TV station in Finland to partner with him in developing, filming and producing Alfa-News.TV. The station donates studio space, and one week of time every month from one of their salaried employees. A Christian marketing firm in Siberia donated a drone so the team could shoot high quality aerial video footage. Several of Yuri’s Russian friends in the film profession volunteer their time and expertise, as well.
Why partner with a station in Finland? Finland shares an extensive border with Russia, and has a significant Russian-speaking population; many Russian people are interested in Finland, or travel there on vacation. Yuri moved to St. Petersburg, close to Finland’s border, making it easier and more affordable to travel there regularly for planning and filming episodes of the show.
With high-end camera work, editing and graphic animations, the show is competitive with other secular programming in the genre.
In one episode, the team of geolocators visit a medieval castle where they reveal interesting aspects of the fortress’s architecture and history, as well as provide travel tips for tourists. Yuri shares religious or spiritual history of the site, connecting it to topics of spirituality.
Episodes often feature the team praying together for viewers or future visitors to the site.
Another 12-episode series follows Yuri and a group of Nazarene Eurasia Region leaders on a TransSiberian Railway trip from Moscow, in the west of Russia, to Voldovostock on the far east border with China and North Korea. The group learn about the cultures of cities along the way, while stopping to pray for God’s Spirit to be present and active in each city.
Additionally, the team record occasional programs in which they simply sit and discuss a complex topic that is relevant to both Finland and Russia.
Join us in prayer for the team and the ministry they are doing. Also, please pray for the people who will see the show, for God to speak to them through it. (By Gina Grate Pottenger)
The Eurasia Region Church of the Nazarene is one of six regions in the Church of the Nazarene global denomination. The Eurasia Region is home to about 8,000 churches in Europe, the Middle East and South Asia. Learn more about us at www.eurasiaregion.org.
Founded in 1908, the global Church of the Nazarene denomination is the largest in the classical Wesleyan-Holiness tradition, with 2.3 million members, in 29,000 churches, sharing Christ’s love with their communities in 162 world areas.
Learn more at www.nazarene.org.
Did you read our September issue? Don't miss a single story!
Operation Dynamo The mission cannot be fulfilled only by the few missionaries that we have. Everyone must be involved in God’s rescue operation of the world. subscribe www.eurasiaregion.org
SEPTEMBER 2018 / ISSUE 8 WHERE WORLDS MEET Miracle in the Red Light District Mobile medical workers in Moldova help a distraught new mother find her way home. Forced to choose Nirmala was looking for unconditional, all-knowing love in relationships that failed her. Then, she found Jesus. 3 2 5
Leadership letter Operation Dynamo b Annemarie Snijders Eurasia Region Mobilization Coordinator
I love reading novels, or watching movies about the Second World war, and how the resistance in different countries tried to organise itself in an effective way. I’m intrigued by the fact that the church in general was so silent when Hitler came to power, and that someone like Bonhoeffer (a German theologian) was so much the exception. Recently Arthur and I watched the movies, Dunkirk and Darkest Hour. Both depict how the British army was trapped in France in May 1940. Large numbers of British and French troops were cut off, and surrounded by Nazi soldiers. It seemed as if the whole British army was going to be destroyed. Members of the British staff thought that only 25 percent of the British soldiers could be evacuated. There simply weren’t enough navy vessels to pick up people. And then, on May 26, Winston Churchill, the new British prime minister, made an unprecedented move: he made an appeal to all the owners of small boats to sail to Dunkirk and participate in what was called “Operation Dynamo.” About 850 little boats and ships answered the call. Between May 26 and June 4, 338,226 soldiers were evacuated from the beaches of Dunkirk. There were 43 formal navy ships involved, but the majority of those rescued were carried by hundreds of private fishing boats, yachts, pleasure craft and life boats from Britain. I feel emotional when I see these “ordinary” people involved in a rescue effort like Operation Dynamo, which helped to determine the outcome of the Second World War. I see a parallel with the relationship between the church and the mission. People in Eurasia are trapped because of the power of sin, or because there are systems that keep people in poverty and situations of abuse. Jesus has come to this world so that people can be saved, and that transformation can happen. But people need to hear, they need to see, they have to feel and experience that accepting Jesus is Good News. The mission cannot be fulfilled only by the few missionaries that we have. We need the principle of Operation Dynamo – that everyone must be involved – for God’s rescue operation of the world. We must appeal for people to step into their boats, take the risk, and sail out to where God wants them to be. It is the ordinary people that made the difference with Operation Dynamo; the same will happen when lay people will answer the call that God has made upon their lives. Christine Cleveland writes: “People can meet God in their own cultural context, but in order to follow God, they must cross into other cultures, because that is what Jesus did in the incarnation and on the cross. Discipleship is cross-cultural.” (Quoted in Canoeing the Mountains by Ted Bolsinger) Will you become part of God’s rescue operation? q “The mission cannot be fulfilled only by the few missionaries that we have. We need the principle of Operation Dynamo – that everyone must be involved – for God’s rescue operation of the world.” (Annemarie Snijders)
Nirmala’s life had become one of tears. It seemed she did nothing but cry. The young woman had returned to the home of her parents after a disastrous six-month marriage, one she had eloped into, against the wishes of her family and everyone who knew her. Nirmala had fallen in love with a boy who drank and smoked and did many other things she didn’t like. Optimstic, she thought she would be able to change him after they were married. “It didn’t work,” she recalls. And yet, despite all his faults and destructive habits, she still, desperately, loved him. Now, confronted with her disgrace and failure, she felt that no one understood the deepest feelings of her heart. “I never used to share with anyone. But I expected that somebody should know, even if I didn’t say anything to them.” One night, around 11 p.m., as she sat weeping in the rain outside her parents’ home, she remembered her sister talking about Jesus. As a daughter with seven other siblings, Nirmala had grown up caring for her younger brothers and sisters. One of her sisters had been very ill and in great pain, but none of the treatments she was given had worked. When a neighbor urged the family to take the girl to a nearby church for healing prayer, they agreed, considering it to be their last viable option. The girl fully and miraculously recovered, and began attending church regularly. She soon gave her life to Jesus and talked about Him to her family. Her parents were unhappy with her new spiritual path, which contradicted the religious views of the family and community. They were even more unhappy when she began bringing other family members to the church. Taking the side of her parents, Nirmala had see “LOVE” • page 4 Nirmala’s husband insisted that she choose between marriage to him and following Jesus Christ. She would have to give up one of them.
Forced to choose: marriage or Jesus Testimony by Gina Grate Pottenger
been angry as well. “I used to beat or kick them, and kick them out of our home. I burned their Bible also,” she recalls. When her sisters brought their pastor to visit, Nirmala scolded him, too. But now, broken and alone, Nirmala cried out to Jesus. “Then I called, ‘Jesus, if really you are my savior, if really you are my creator, please help me and show me the way, which way I have to go. Because people are saying you are the wrong way.” God answered by reminding her of a story in which two men were clinging to a mountain, about to fall to their deaths. One called out to several gods and goddesses, but none of them answered, and he died. The other called out to Jesus, who rescued him. Nirmala recalls sensing that Jesus was telling her He is her savior. “I feel like I got peace in my heart. What I was expecting from my husband, I found that love in Jesus Christ.” Filled with a new joy and purpose, Nirmala carried evangelistic tracts and Bibles with her to the tailoring business where she worked; if anyone shared a problem with her, she told them about Jesus and gave the items to those who were interested in learning more. Four months later, her husband showed up, asking her to return to him. “It’s OK that you came back,” she told him, “but now I am a Christian. What do you say?” He replied that they could not remain married if she was a Christian. He gave her an ultimatum: choose him, or Jesus. “I said, ‘I want both.’ He said, ‘It’s not possible.’” Nirmala realized that her husband had left her once; he might leave her again. But she knew without a doubt that Jesus would never leave her. “So that’s why I don’t want to lose [Jesus],” she recalls. She told her husband, “I choose Jesus Christ.” Her husband left again, but Nirmala held out hope that Jesus might change his heart, too, and bring them back together once and for all. While she waited, she focused her life on discerning God’s purpose for her and growing closer to Him. She prayed for direction, and believes God gave her the verse, Isaiah 49:6, in which it says, “I will make you a light to the Gentiles, and you will bring my salvation to the ends of the earth.” Nirmala took a year of training from Operation Mobilization (OM), a Christian mission agency. Her passion for serving God only deepened. OM sent her out to other areas of Nepal where she visited villages and shared the gospel with many. Around that time, her husband remarried. Although she was heartbroken, and asked God why He had not brought her husband back, she read 1 Thessalonians 5:17, which urges all believers to praise God no matter their circumstances. So she made that choice and continued moving forward. Nirmala studied theology at South India Biblical Seminary, which Continued from page 3 LOVE: Nirmala answers call to mission has a partnership with South Asia Nazarene Bible College, and afterward she went on to teach theology. Yet, she had a growing sense of calling to missions, and often remembered Isaiah 49:6. When she returned to Nepal from India, she spoke about her call with Rev. Dilli, the Nepal District superintendent. He told her that the Church of the Nazarene Eurasia Region was planning a cross-cultural volunteer training in Kathmandu in May 2017. Called M+Power, the regional program is designed to identify Nazarenes across the region who have sensed a calling to cross-cultural service, train them for ministry and deploy them to mission. Nirmala attended the training, which confirmed her calling. Today, she has served as a cross- cultural volunteer in the western part of Nepal for the past year, and plans to continue for a second year. She has been leading a child development center, established by Nazarene Compassionate Ministries, and also leads a literacy program that helps children, youth and elderly people learn English. Every day, she teaches an English class to housewives in the community. After her second year, Nirmala may be able to serve cross-culturally outside of Nepal. q
To learn more about M+Power, visit www.eurasiaregion.org/volunteers
As we went out to the red- light district in Moldova in the Mobile Medical Intervention Clinic, we approached a young woman dressed in a silver dress. She was very young, nervous, and visibly upset. She did not want to talk to us. We approached her with a gift pack and told her who we were. She recognized us from our previous visit. That is when she opened up to our volunteers and translator. Sobbing, she said she had given birth only four days before, through a C-section. Even as we spoke, she began lactating, marking her dress with the signs of new motherhood. Though she had given birth in our city, it wasn’t her home and she couldn’t afford to return there. She told us that she did not have money to go home. Each night she Miracle in the red-light district
see “MIRACLE” • page 7 By Becky Sukanen Photo illustration of street oureach. Photo courtesy Mobile Medical Intervention Clinic. Learn more or give: https://ps.ncm.org/ project/125404 Compassionate ministry
5 and beyond what is expected, without allowing the job to consume the worker or dominate his or her life. A “hungry” team member will work hard and go the extra mile, while also taking sensible amounts of time for personal rest and recovery, and observe Sabbath. Smart Lencioni is not talking about IQ or braininess when he uses the word “smart.” What he’s describing is what some now call “emotional intelligence.” Smart people, in this sense, know how to relate to others and communicate in healthy and productive ways. They are consistently appropriate, respectful, kind and sensitive in their behaviors, conversations and relationships. They listen well, and take an interest in the thoughts, ideas and well-being of others. Basically, they exhibit common sense about people and themselves. While there may be many other qualities that team leaders look for in potential team members, Lencioni distilled such longer lists of qualities into these three core competencies as the most needed for success of a team. In ministry, the ‘ideal team player’ may be humble, hungry and smart Book review “Humble,” “hungry” and “smart” are the three virtues that Patrick Lencioni, author of The Ideal Team Player, argues are the core character traits needed to make someone an ideal part of a team. After reading more about these three characteristics in his New York Times-bestselling book, it’s easy to see how these virtues, as he sketches them, are supremely desirable for team members in a mission team context. I recommend that anyone planning to become part of a mission team, or who is leading and developing a team in a missional context, read this book and seek to embody these characteristics, as well as recruit others who exhibit these virtues. Characteristics of an ideal team player Over years of helping workplace teams within churches, universities and businesses to become functional and healthy, business consultant Lencioni developed his theory that the ideal team player is humble, hungry and smart. He defines the three virtues in the following ways: Humble Starting with “humble,” an inarguably Christlike quality, Lencioni writes, “Great team players lack excessive by Gina Grate Pottenger ego or concerns about status…. They share credit, emphasize team over self, and define success collaboratively rather than individually. It is no great surprise, then, that humility is the single greatest and most indispensable attribute of being a team player.” Conversely, when adding someone to the team who is arrogant, the leader risks “fostering resentment, division, and politics” within the team. Insecurity is another opposite of humility. Lencioni claims that someone with low self-worth hurts the team just as much as someone whose ego is inflated. He quotes C. S. Lewis: “Humility isn’t thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less.” Hungry Lencioni describes “hungry” people as those who “almost never have to be pushed by a manager to work harder because they are self- motivated and diligent. They are constantly thinking about the next step and the next opportunity.” He qualifies the kind of hunger he is talking about as a commitment to doing a job well, and going above
see “TEAM” • page 7
Dangers of lacking one or more Many people possess one or two of these traits, but Lencioni argues that cultivating all three in oneself makes one the most effective team player. People who possess just one of the traits could fall into certain undesirable roles. For instance, someone who is humble, but not hungry or smart, may end up being used and manipulated by others on the team, or simply left out. Someone who is hungry – a high achiever or ambitious – but not humble or smart risks being seen as a bulldozer, “determined to get things done, but with a focus on their own interests and with no understanding or concern for how their actions impact others. Bulldozers are quick destroyers of teams.” If someone is only “people smart,” but lacks humility or ambition, the team member may be charming and likable, but quickly becomes a drag on the team’s productivity and morale. Lencioni spends a few more pages describing further dangers to people who possess a combination of just two of the qualities, before moving on to some tips for leaders seeking to identify those people for their teams who possess all three characteristics, making them the Ideal Team Player. Self-evaluation One of the best uses of the book may be for personal evaluation and assessment. The “fable,” or story, which launches the book, concerns a young man who steps into leadership of an American- based construction company after its previous leader retires. His journey of learning about the company and some of its problems and dysfunctions illustrates what happens to organizations when their employees lack the three virtues. The story also depicts possible ways to help team members cultivate the traits, as well as how to identify and add members who already have them. While some of the characters’ language in the story could be mildly offensive to some readers, the value of the narrative is that the author’s theory is demonstrated in practice, TEAM: Cultivate the three virtues to be effective stayed at the hospital she incurred a 200 lei ($12) charge, plus the cost of her C-section, and cost to purchase a ticket home to her area, over two hours away. In this work, we must be wary; we wondered whether she was telling the truth. She said she wanted to leave the street; she didn’t want to be there, doing what she thought she had to do to get her child out of the hospital, and go back home to where her mom was waiting for her. We needed to confirm her story. Our team made a plan: first, we would go to the hospital with the woman; second, we would have a conference call with her mother. In the call we hoped to confirm if their home was where she said it was, if it was a safe situation, and if her mother was truly ready to receive her daughter and new grandchild into her care. As we pulled into the hospital parking lot, the call patched through. The woman’s phone screen said “Mommy” in Russian. Everything she had told us checked out to be true. We got to work checking out the woman and her 4-day-old baby, “Christian,” from the hospital. MIRACLE: Ministry workers earned woman’s trust Continued from page 5 Continued from page 6 The young mother cried and cried and cried. She said that over the past four days she had been praying for a miracle. Moldovans and people from Eastern Europe are slow to trust, but because she had been praying, she believed God sent us in answer to her prayers. We took the new mother and her baby to the church office. Our local church had just taken a generous love offering for another of our beneficiaries, and there was much left over. There were things for this new mom, too. We enjoyed spending time with her and the baby while we waited to take her to the bus station. q albeit a fictional scenario. Reading the book with an eye to self-development will enable people already on mission teams, or those preparing to deploy, to cultivate attributes that will make them valuable members of a mission team. Humility, healthy approaches to interpersonal relationships, and ambition to do one’s best in the service of Christ and others, can only give one an extra edge for positive experience, and for bringing value to a team and its mission. Perhaps, after reading the book, find a mature, wise, spiritual mentor (who is willing to speak the truth in love) to help you evaluate where you measure up on the three virtues, and to help you as you work to cultivate these virtues in your own life and character. The tips for sniffing out the three virtues – or their lack – in job candidates, and the list of hiring questions given at the end, are an added bonus for those interviewing candidates to join a mission team. q
WWW.EURASIAREGION.ORG SEPTEMBER 2018 | ISSUE 8
Facebook: Facebook.com/eurasiaregion Twitter: Twitter.com/eurasiaregion
Vimeo: Vimeo.com/eurasia Website: www.eurasiaregion.org
Where Worlds Meet Our Team is the monthly newsletter for the Eurasia Region of the Church of the Nazarene. To suscribe, email to: communications@ eurasiaregion.org or visit our website: eurasiaregion.org
GINA POTTENGER Communications Coordinator gpottenger@eurasiaregion.org
TEANNA SUNBERG Central Europe Communications Coordinator tsunberg@eurasiaregion.org
ERIN KETCHUM W. Mediterranean Communications Coordinator eketchum@eurasiaregion.org
ZEE GIMON CIS Field Communications Coordinator zgimon@eurasiaregion.org
AYMAN KAFROUNY Eastern Mediterranean Comm Coordinator aymankafrouny@ajwiba.org
RAJIV YANGAD India Field Communications Coordinator yangadrajiv@cmnaz.org
RANDOLF WOLST Website Designer rwolst@eurasiaregion.org
ARTHUR SNIJDERS Regional Director awsnijders@eurasiaregion.org
Eurasia Regional Office Junkerstrasse
60 Buesingen Am Hochrhein Switzerland 8238 phone: (+49) 7734 93050 email: communications@eurasiaregion.org www.eurasiaregion.org
Follow Us “Love prospers when a fault is forgiven, but dwelling on it separates close friends.” (Proverbs 17:9)
Prayer requests Please pray for Nirmala as she carries out her ministry work in Nepal through M+Power. Ask God to strengthen her, give her wisdom and courage, and love for others. Pray the Spirit brings her into relationships where she can share His love with people who are open to knowing Him. Pray for Nazarenes across Eurasia to recognize the calling of the Holy Spirit to unite in God’s mission to the world. Ask God to raise up believers, local churches and districts to be senders and supporters, as well as new cross-cultural workers for the harvest. Pray for the women of Moldova who are living and working on the streets. Ask the Lord to rescue them from the destructiveness of this life, to experience deep healing from trauma through the tender love of God, and to take opportunities to rebuild new, whole lives. Pray for those in ministry to these women to be protected and anointed by the Holy Spirit, to be given patience, compassion and wisdom. We are a Christian people As members of the Church Universal, we join with all true believers in proclaiming the Lordship of Jesus Christ and in affirming the historic Trinitarian creeds and beliefs of the Christian faith. We value our Wesleyan-Holiness heritage and believe it to be a way of understanding the faith that is true to Scripture, reason, tradition, and experience. We are a holiness people God, who is holy, calls us to a life of holiness. We believe that the Holy Spirit seeks to do in us a second work of grace, called by various terms including “entire sanctification” and “baptism with the Holy Spirit”-cleansing us from all sin, renewing us in the image of God, empowering us to love God with our whole heart, soul, mind, and strength, and our neighbors as ourselves, and producing in us the character of Christ. Holiness in the life of believers is most clearly understood as Christlikeness. We are a missional people We are a sent people, responding to the call of Christ and empowered by the Holy Spirit to go into all the world, witnessing to the Lordship of Christ and participating with God in the building of the Church and the extension of His kingdom (Matthew 28:19-20; 2 Corinthians 6:1). Our mission (a) begins in worship, (b) ministers to the world in evangelism and compassion, (c) encourages believers toward Christian maturity through discipleship, and (d) prepares women and men for Christian service through Christian higher education. Learn more at: www.nazarene.org/articles-faith Who are Nazarenes? 8 SEPTEMBER 2018 | ISSUE 8 WWW.4.ORG
Have you sensed God might be calling you to serve as a cross-cultural volunteer? The Eurasia Region's M+Power initiative exists to recruit, train and mobilize Eurasia Nazarenes into mission. Learn more and sign up to attend a Mission Orientation:
© 2018 Eurasia Region, All rights reserved.
Our mailing address is:
Eurasia Regional Office
Junkerstrasse 60
Buesingen Am Hochrhein
Switzerland 8238, Europe
***
No comments:
Post a Comment