I AM SECOND - San Antonio

This month we held three "I AM SECOND" training events on college campuses around San Antonio. Over a hundred college students, high school students and men and women attended and learned how to launch an outreach ministry in their sphere of influence, using the free I AM SECOND resources. If you haven't seen the 60+ testimonial videos that we have, go to www.iamsecond.com. If that is not enough, there are 44 FREE bible studies that tie to those quality testimonial videos. We are praying for dozens of outreach ministries to crop up all around San Antonio in the next weeks and months. You can learn about how to use the materials yourself through an "online" training, if you go to https://e3partners.org/SSLPage.aspx?pid=4463.

Argentina 2012

Come join us as we plan to minister in Argentina in 2012. We are putting together two church planting campaigns for 2012. The first will be March 9-18 (during most U.S. spring breaks). We will be working with Pastor Beto Chambi and the Evangelical Church. We will primarily be working with Bolovian immigrants, who now live in Argentina. We will be sharing the gospel, discipling through small groups (I am Second groups), and helping to establish several churches in the Pilar/ Escobar area of the Buenos Aires Province. Our Second trip will be October 5-15 to the Sante Fe province. We will be working with pastor and church planter, David Ibarra. We will be sharing the good news of Christ, discipling new believers using "I am Second" reproducible discipleship groups, and helping start new churches. Our strong emphasis in the Sante Fe area is to plant 3rd generation (grand daughter) churches. These are churches that we were priviledged to see birth in previous years. Both of these trips are "family friendly" and are on the e3 website now for churches and individuals to sign up to go. It is always good to plan early! Sign up today at www.e3partners.org/apply We would love to have you on the team as we impact Argentina with the gospel.

July Church Planting Mission to Central Uganda

From July 14 -24 a Texas team headed to Central Uganda to work with two different denominations, whose prayerful vision was to each plant a new church. We thank the Baptist churches in central Uganda and Ggaba Community church for their partnership together in planting the two new mission churches in Mutungo (in the Kanjansi area) and Gangu. God did amazing things during the week in our team and through our team. I want to thank all the team members that came and gave of their hearts and souls in sharing the good news of our Savior, Jesus Christ. The American team was made up of 16 members from six different churches. We especially appreciate our partnership with Austin Ridge Community Church in Austin, Texas for their key role in the campaign. It was a pleasure to work alongside each and every one of them, and their worship pastor, Don Ellsworth. God stretched us all. Because of the great leadership on the team, I was able to spend several days on both sites with the total team. The week started as soon as we arrived on Saturday and never seemed to slow down until we left. On Saturday, we met our translators and Ugandan team members and caught the “overall” vision for the week. Sunday was packed with two church services, leading 10 different Sunday classes, and training 80 Life Group leaders from Ggaba Community church with the “Evangecube” and the “I Am Second” discipleship materials. Our special thanks to the Ggaba discipleship pastor, Eric Byamugisha, for his work (among many others) that put framework to the week. I also want to thank Ggaba pastor and evangelist, Jonathan Kabanda, for his fine work in coordinating the Ggaba evangelism team. It was wonderful to see the partnership in the gospel between the host churches in spreading the gospel.
The week had several highlights for me. Let me share just one that impacted me from each of the sites. At Mutungo, we were working to plant “Rivers of Joy” Baptist Church. Amazing to me was that my translator, Stephen, came from the local Pentecostal church. There was a partnership in the area, with a desire that each and every person in the area would hear the good news of Christ. During the week I saw Stephen grow greatly as we witnessed dozens of individuals trust Christ as Savior. By day two, we picked up a “disciple” (whose name was also Stephen), who learned rapidly to share his faith and to disciple others. We were blessed to have dozens of discipleship visits and to personally launch three discipleship groups in homes using the “I am Second” materials. In fact, the Mutongo team saw 19 such groups start in that community during the 153 discipleship visits with the new believers, helping to give ongoing growth to the 163 new believers in that community. Some of those groups started in homes, in schools, and even in a bar named “Hell”. The next few days I worked with my translator, Prossy, and evangelist Jonathan on the Gangu site. One highlight was meeting five boys walking home from school, the first day. After sharing Christ with them, they all trusted Christ as Savior. One of them, named Alex, spent the rest of the day with us, learning how to share his new faith with many in the community. On the Gangu site we witnessed to 317 in their homes and on the street, just like Alex. We also were blessed to have the openness to share with 450 in schools and over 200 through Jonathan’s film evangelism at night. (We showed the “Jesus film for children” one night and “The Passion of Christ” the other.) Through the week we witnessed 139 in Gangu place their faith in Jesus. It was a joy to see the gospel spread through these two communities during the week and to see two new churches rise up in those communities.

Pastoral Leadership during Missional Church Planting

Whenever I share about the great work that is done by a team on the mission trip, a question normally comes up. It is usually phrased something like this, “What happens to the churches that are planted on the trip?” That is a great question, understanding the call is not to simply “evangelize the lost”, but to make disciples of all the nations. Pictured above is team member and pastor Mark Piland, from Oakhills Community Church (an Evangelical Free Church in Argyle, Texas). Standing next to him is pastor Doe from Mutongo and pastor Moses from Gangu. Just as Mark is commissioned to focus his discipleship ministry in his community in northern Texas, pastors Moses and Doe are left in their communities to help disciple the new believers and equip their churches for the work of the ministry. Every time an E3 trip ministers in an area, we do so by the invitation of a host church, whose goal it is to plant a growing, healthy church in the new community. Come join us on our next trip to either Uganda or Argentina, and see it in progress.

"I am Second" training in Central Uganda

This month on our trip to Uganda, we had the opportunity to see the “I am Second” materials utilized while planting two new churches. We used them in personal discipleship, starting small groups throughout the two communities with new believers, and at the “evening” groups that gathered at the designated church site. These groups will greatly enhance the ability of the pastor in each of the areas to “follow up” the new believers scattered across their communities. Well over 20 groups were started in the communities.
We also took time to also equip our host partner church, Ggaba Community Church. At the invitation of their discipleship pastor, we trained their 80 Life Group leaders in both the Evangecube and the “I am Second” materials. It was well received and we look forward to hearing how it will be used to equip new believers to the 3rd and 4th generations. I also spent time at Ggaba’s Bible Institute in Buloba, training Alumni pastors in the discipleship materials. After the training, they headed back to the dozens of cities across Uganda to put the materials in practice. T
These very practical materials have been a great new resource to our international church planting ministry. They are having a phenomenal impact at home as well. I would be very happy to come to share at your church to assist as you equip your church in evangelism and discipleship. Cell—210-843-9532

Pictured above is my wife Janelle, with a few of the ten family members that live in Gringa's home, where a new church began this week. Here are some of the comments Janelle heard from new believers. When new believer “Anna” was asked why she attended three groups a day, she said, “I haven’t been to church in a long time, so I have to catch up”. When Janelle asked one group what she could do for them, one woman answered. “What you could really do for me is to teach me to share my faith with this ‘evangecube’, so that I can share with my two sons and my ex-husband.” After a small group meeting, one mother gave this prayer request: “Please pray that I can remember everything I’ve been taught, so I can share it with others.”Her daughter, the next day asked this prayer request: “Please pray that I can have more faith, because I know it can only come from God and please pray that I can remember what I have learned so that I can share it with others”.

On June 3-12, we took an eleven member team from San Antonio to the province of Santiago del Estero, Argentina.  This was my 13th mission team to Argentina, and my fifth in the Santiago del Estero province.  We count it an honor to work with pastor, Gabriel Cejas, our regional leader in the province.  He was worked for years with country leader, Eduardo Buldain, and the E3 country leadership in setting a long term "church planting" vision for his province.  This year we assisted two churches of which we had previously been privileged to help establish.  It was a great joy to work with pastors David Navarro and Fabian Santillan.  It has been a joy working alongside both of them in past years, planting churches in Santiago del Estero and Clodimira.  This year was the first "granddaughter" church plants with Fabian and David.  Our team started the week by participating on Sunday in three services.  Firstly, we went to participate in a house church dedication with Pastor David and gathered in groups to pray over the barrio we were to work in during the week.  That evening we drove out to Clodimira to join pastor Fabian.  During the evening we prayerwalked the downtown Clodimira area (where a new church was being planted), worshipped with the church, and trained the workers in how to lead an "I am Second" small group discipleship meeting.  
   During the week our team would sub-divide into two groups for the day of ministry.  Teams went door to door, to businesses and to schools, sharing the good news of Christ and discipling the new believers.  We saw two new churches begin that week; one in the downtown area of Clodimira and one in the home of Gringa in Villa Borges.  It was a joy to work alongside the 55 nationals who participated in church planting on the two sites.  It also was wonderful to see churches from Tucaman send a team to partipate in the church planting campaign.  We also were thrilled to work with several Baptist missionaries, who participated in the church planting campaign.  During the week the team personally shared the gospel with 340 men, women, and children.  It was a joy to see 265 place their faith in Jesus Christ as their savior.  During the week we also went back and discipled 85 of the new believers, through one on one and small group discipleship meetings.  Many church members grew in leadership and by the end of the week many of the church members (and even a few new believers) were leading others in discipleship.  Janelle, told me that when Gringa was asked to lead her first small group discipleship study, she replied, "Why not, there is a first time for everything!".

Third Generation Church Planting

In 2007, we had the privilege to work with Pastor Fabian Santillan, planting a church in his back yard. (Pictured with Sandy Marek, Church Plant Coordinator with E3). During the years the church has matured to the point of planting a new church this year in the downtown area of Clodimira. This was not the first year we had worked with Fabian. He had participated with us six years in both the Santiago del Estero province and the Sante Fe province. Iglesia Jesucristo me Esperanza of Clodomira, the church that was planted in his backyard in 2007, now has caught the vision for the church planting movement. Clodomira has 22 barrios and Pastor Fabian's plan is to establish 10 churches in barrios surrounding the downtown. A church member, Dora, has already donated some of her land and opened her home for the next church plant in Barrio Mendilarzu. In Barrio Fatima, Lorena Gauna's home is used for children's ministry every Saturday. In Barrio Ramon Carrillo, there are weekly meetings with youth, adolescents and women. In Barrio Juan Domingo Peron, there is also an ongoing children's ministry. We are excited to work with pastors, like Fabian, who have a vision for their towns, cities and beyond. This year Fabian involved the local Baptist missionaries, as well as churches in Tucaman province that sent a team to participate in the church planting campaign. We are excited to see what God does in the future through leaders like Fabian. This year the church in Clodimira received some special training on how to start “I am second” groups in their community. Pictured above is the small group discipleship training for the church members on the Sunday before the campaign. This small group discipleship training equipped the church members to follow up new believers through natural "home discipleship" studies.

This March's trip to Santiago del Estero, Argentina, was a special mission trip for me, because it involved my wife, Janelle, and daughter, Beka.  This is the sixth year that my daughter, Rebekah, has gone on mission with me.  During the week we ministered to many individuals in both Clodimira and in Villa Borges in Santiago del Estero. Pictured below with my daughter, Beka, are two "sisters in law", Estella and Vanessa, and Vanessa's niece, Clara.  Estella and Vanessa came to Christ outside the home of their mother in law, Blanca, on Monday.  They attended the small group study at Gringa's home every evening and grew in love for each other and for the Lord.  Each night Estella would go home and share the Bible story with her sister late into the evening. On Wednesday, I visited both ladies in their homes and taught them how to share their new faith with family and friends.  Estella went right away and shared her faith with her neighbor!  When Vanessa was taught, she shared with her niece, Clara, who trusted Christ right in Vanessa’s own home.  Vanessa brought Clara that evening to the new church gathering that was meeting in the house of Gringa. Clara and Rebekah, both fourteen, enjoyed getting to know each other that evening.

Training Leaders in Uganda

After the first week of ministry in Uganda, the team departed for the States. I remained for the next several days to train Christian leaders in the central Ugandan area.For three days I was blessed to teach at the Gaba Bible Institute in Buloba, Uganda. The Bible Institute has over 100 men and women who have come from 4 countries to be prepared for ministry. I enjoyed greatly teaching classes for three days on Evangelism, Discipleship, Christian Ethics, and Spiritual Leadership. On Wednesday I was enjoyed being able to address the whole student body at chapel

Later in the week I was able to focus a full day of training for the leaders of 30 Baptist churches in the central Ugandan area. We thank the leaders at Kampala First Baptist for hosting the Leadership Development training, focusing on church planting movements. When we talked on evangelism, we took an hour “practicum” as we went to the streets of downtown Kampala at midday to share the gospel. I was just as surprised as the church leaders, when we saw 41 trust Christ during the lunch hour in downtown Kampala.On Saturday, before departure for home, I spent the day with members of Gaba Community Church and Bethany Community church in training for the upcoming July campaign

Ugandan Police Force Comes to Christ

A surprising event happened while we were ministering in Naluwondwa. One day while I was discipling a couple in their place of business, the local police chief stopped by. He was excited to hear that we were sharing “good news” from God about his son, Jesus Christ. He invited us to visit and share with the police at the police “station”.

When we arrived at the police station, the police chief gathered the whole police force and their families to hear the gospel. After hearing the gospel, ten prayed and placed their faith in Christ as Savior. They invited us to return “as often as we could” to share more about Christ and how to follow him in discipleship.

One of our team members returned the next day and found an eager police chief awaiting our time of sharing the Scriptures. Over 15 gathered for a time of looking into the Scriptures and asking “lots of questions”. Seven more policemen took the step of faith to trust Christ as Savior. The study will continue led by James, the new pastor at Naluwondwa. It was so encouraging to see the whole police force of the village open to the things of the Lord.

March 2011: Mubende, Uganda

During this month we saw an eight person US team head to the Mubende Province of Mid-Western Uganda to share Christ and assist in the planting of two new churches. We partnered with Ggaba Community Church from Kampala and Kyengeza Community Church from Mubende, with the focus of planting two new churches in the villages of Kanseera and Naluwondwa. Our host pastor from Mubende was Pastor John Magaba from Kyengeza Community Church, whose vision was to plant two new churches; one in Naluwondwa and one in Kanseera. We praise the Lord for the work that was done in presenting the gospel to so many men, women, and children in the villages, with such a great number placing their faith in Christ. We were also blessed to return for follow up discipleship gatherings with over a hundred men and women.

I had a few experiences that really touched me and I wanted to pass them along to you. Here are the “shortened versions”:

1. On Tuesday I met Jilbert Kayitesi, a boda-boda motorcycle “taxi” driver in Naluwondwa. After hearing the gospel, he and seven other boda-boda drivers placed their faith in Christ. The next day I met with Jilbert and a couple others for a discipleship study. During that time, Jilbert showed great interest in learning how to share Christ with others. For the next few hours Jilbert led me to his family and friends and shared with them (with a little assistance) that he had trusted Christ as his Savior. He was encouraged when his wife, Juliet, and another of his fellow boda-boda drivers prayed and placed their faith in Christ. That evening at the “church” meeting at the local secondary school, Jilbert brought 7 of his friends to “church” and even helped to lead the small group Bible study with his friends at the evening’s gathering.

2. On Monday we met Peter Zwiwe, a businessman from the local village of Ngabano. He was weighing “ground nuts” (peanuts) to take to market. We started to share the gospel with him and he stopped us and said that he preferred that we waited and told the story to him and his business associates at the same time later in the week. I thought that he was simply putting us off and didn’t want to hear, since he told us that he would not be able to meet with us until Thursday afternoon (three days later). When we tried to contact him by phone on Thursday to drive over to his nearby village, we found his phone was turned off. So, my translator, Innocent, and I prayed and decided to take transportation over to the Ngabano village, with only the slight hope that we would find Peter there. Upon arriving at the village, we found a local man that was able to direct us to Peter’s place of business. Peter greeted us warmly and told us that the power had gone out in the village and that his phone was not able to be charged. He gathered his workers, the local taxi drivers, and several other businessmen from the local stores (a total of 32). He said, “share with us the story from God”. After sharing the gospel, we saw 22 of those gathered placed their faith in Christ. My translator, Innocent, said he would come and help Peter start a “church” in Peter’s place of business. Praise the Lord.

Uganda Elections: Reposted from Pastor Peter Kasirivu (Africa Renewal Ministries)

PRAYING FOR OUR NATION
This week Uganda is going into elections and these have been the mostly hotly contested elections in the recent past history of Uganda.
In the next few days we will know who our new leaders are but before then we as Christians who have been called by God to pray for our nation and our leaders, have got to pray.
i) Why pray?
Because prayer is the greatest weapon that God gave us to fight the Devil and his forces and it is the most assured way of getting God’s will for any situation.

2 Chronicles 7:14-16
• “14 if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. 15 Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayers offered in this place.”

• In prayer we do business with God and in prayer we can decide the destiny of our nation and our continent.

ii) Why pray for the Nation?
• Because God requires us to pray for the nation. The nation where God has put us is our home, when it is peaceful, we are peaceful and when it is not , we will not have a better future.
• The Bible teaches that God blesses those nations that keep His standards of justice and righteousness.
• Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people. (Proverbs 15:34 NIV)
• A nation is its people and each nation has got a place to play in God’s economy.
• We have the opportunity as a nation to thrive, prosper and be God’s channel of blessing to other nations and this all comes when God becomes the King and the affairs of God are held in high esteem, when that happens a nation will change but its people will be a source of influence to the rest of the world. That has happened in the United Kingdom 200 years ago, in United States of America in the last 100 years and we see it happening in South Korea today.
Deuteronomy 28 1 If you fully obey the LORD your God and carefully follow all his commands I give you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations on earth. 2 All these blessings will come on you and accompany you if you obey the LORD your God:


iii) Why pray for our Leaders?
• The Bible commands us to pray for our civil leaders therefore we have to pray.
• I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone-- for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. (1 Tim 2:1-4 NIV)
• When we get godly leaders those leaders will influence godly character and behavior in our nation.
• When we have leaders of vision, the Bible says the leader leads people to inherit God’s promises.
• Joshua 1:6 Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to their ancestors to give them.
•
• If you have an evil leader, that leader will destroy that nation. For us in Uganda we experienced that during Idi Amin’s time.
• Leaders can lead a nation to revival but leaders can also mis-direct a nation.
Uganda is going through a season of elections and some of us will be excited and others disappointed with the results.
But we have got two responsibilities
1. We have to go for elections
2. We have a responsibility to pray for the nation and our leaders even those we may not have supported, we still have to pray for them.

There is a wave of violence, riots, demonstration around the world, we have experienced this recently in Egypt, Tunisia and a few other countries. Let us pray that these nations will not fall into anarchy and let us pray that this wave does not spread to other countries.
We encourage you to pray for your nation specifically for Uganda as we go through elections this weekend.

Freedom in Christ (via evangelism.net)

Unfortunately, many new believers understand that they are reconciled with God, but seldom are taught what that also means for their life right now.

God has a great freedom in mind for every person on earth – that’s the freedom to know as we get up every morning that we have a relationship with Him. That relationship makes heaven our home forever, and gives us power to live in freedom here on earth, no matter what our circumstances may be.

The Bible says that when we trusted Christ for our salvation some amazing things happened – immediately – and simultaneously. Here are a few of the results of salvation that relate to living a life full of freedom. Over 33 categories are identified by Lewis Sperry Chafer in his book Salvation: God’s Marvelous Work of Grace.

1. You were reconciled to God so you could have a relationship with Him: “He has delivered us form the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.” (Colossians 1: 13,14)

2. You are a new creation and can live differently than you lived before your salvation: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold all things have become new.” (2 Corinthians 5:17)

3. You can walk by a new life principle from now on: “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving. ” (Colossians 2: 6-7)

4. The Holy Spirit comes into relationship with you and helps you to live a life that is increasingly Christlike. These characteristics of Christlikeness are called “fruit”. As you learn more about how to live through studying the Bible, praying, and worshiping in a Bible-believing church, walking with mature believers, this fruit will be more and more evident in your life. Of course, that is only if you want to be more like Christ and want to be obedient to what God wants, trying to do what is pleasing to God.

The list is found in Galatians 5:22-23: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control…”. What a great way to live! People will happily notice the new you, believe me!

5. God makes a way for you to escape from the temptation to sin. We still sin after we become a Christ-follower. Most of us have habitual sins or maybe we are just beginning to recognize some sins that we do that hurt others and ourselves. Sin wrecks our relationships, our sense of identity, our ability to tell right from wrong, and results in very negative consequences.

While God makes a way for us to be forgiven if we sin after we have been saved (1 John 1:9), He desires that we not sin and has given us this promise, “…God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.” (1 Corinthians: 10:13)

Most Christ-followers are growing in freedom bit by bit. If you read the Gospels in the New Testament you will learn about Jesus, who He is, what He did and why it matters. But if you read the book of Acts and the Epistles, you’ll see how new Christ-followers struggled, and tried, and tried again to shake off old habits, ways of thinking, and harmful personal traits. The apostle Peter, after all, denied that he even knew Christ three times! The apostle Paul, had persecuted Christ-followers before he was saved! Some of the other disciples argued over and over about how to be the most important in the Lord’s kingdom. But God changed them when they came to Him.

By their desire to be obedient to God, through the grace of God, and the work of the Holy Spirit, they, and the Christ-followers who came after them, grew closer and closer to God. So they grew spiritually…and so can we. As we do, we are more and more free to love Him and others, and to be someone that the Lord will use to serve others. That is true freedom.