EFCA - The International Mission

EFCA ReachGlobal News

Updates for mission pastors and church leaders

In this issue

2008 National Leadership Conference

June 24-26, 2008 in St. Louis
Registration is now open for the 2008 EFCA Leadership Conference. Please visit the Web site at http://www.bthetree.org for more information and to register.

Conference prayer requests
Thank you for your willingness and partnership to pray, intercede and battle for the heart of God and His will and ways for this conference. We believe this will be an historic conference, and we cry out to God for His desires. Please begin your prayer focus by asking God to demonstrate His glory in all aspects of our conference and the time leading up to the conference. Habakkuk 2:14 says, "For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." Pray that this conference would be an opportunity where the knowledge of the glory of the Lord is poured forth as the waters cover the sea. Pray for the Holy Spirit to manifest God's presence and glory in all that we do.

Please pray for pastors and leaders across the country making plans to come to St. Louis.

For ReachGlobal area summits, please visit the conference Web site. Also, please check out this issue and future issues of ReachGlobal News for specific information about particular area summits.


Area summits at National Leadership Conference

The following are the summits hosted by ReachGlobal at this year's National Leadership Conference.  Please note the two new summits held this year:
  1. Papua New Guinea - New
  2. Bangladesh - New
  3. Africa
  4. Arab World
  5. China
  6. Congo
  7. Europe
  8. India
  9. Indonesia
  10. Latin America
  11. Mission Leaders Summit

You can register for the National Leadership Conference, and for these summits, by going to the conference Web site.


GlobalFingerprints - VBS and DVD

GlobalFingerprints is an orphan sponsorship program for Congolese children. Fifteen percent of the children in Congo are orphans mostly due to AIDs. Through GlobalFingerprints, these orphans will be able to attend school, be medically cared for, and be placed in the home of a Christian family from a local Evangelical Free Church of Congo. Just $25 per month provides food, clothing, medical care, schooling, and a backpack for an AIDS orphan. When you commit to a GlobalFingerprints sponsorship, you are linked with a child who will know your name and understand that there is someone praying and caring for them. Your sponsorship commitment will profoundly change a child's future and set them on a course of experiencing what God has intended for them. Visit www.globalfingerprints.org for more information about the program and to begin your sponsorship commitment today!

This year’s ReachGlobal VBS giving opportunity is to raise funds for the $25,000 purchase and shipping of five motorcycles to the Democratic Republic of Congo to help support GlobalFingerprints. Currently there are 360 sponsored orphans, and we are on our way toward the goal of 1,500 sponsored orphans in 2008. Having these five motorcycles on the field is crucial to caring for these orphans and meeting this goal. We currently support children in 12 different regions where our Congolese staff must travel hundreds of miles to care for the children in their homes.

If your church would like to participate, please contact Jenn Castro at globalfingerprints@efca.org. You can also contact Jenn to receive a copy of the new GlobalFingerprints DVD that is now available.


Partnership forum

Partnership Forum
May 31 - Elim EFC in Puyallup, WA
Be strategic in your missions ministry by helping people catch a contagious vision for missions. Attend the upcoming Partnership Forum endorsed by the Pacific Northwest District and hosted by EFCA CONNECT and Elim EFC in Puyallup, WA. You will learn how your church can engage in collaborative, cross-cultural ministry partnerships while hearing about current ReachGlobal partnerships in Congo, Indonesia/Pacific Asia, China, Europe and Middle East/North Africa, and the U.S. Join with other churches and experience the power of greater ministry impact! For more information, go to http://www.efca.org/connect or contact Andy Krause.


EFCA EQUIP courses

Do you want to be more effective in ministry? Do you want to expand your knowledge and skills? One great way to do that is through participating in an EFCA EQUIP course. There are three upcoming courses in which you can participate:
  1. Coaching for Fruitfulness: Learn why coaching is important, gain the skills to do coaching effectively and interact with others in ministry who are doing coaching. The course begins April 28, so sign up now if you are interested.
  2. Introduction to Adult Bible Fellowships: We are looking for beta testers to participate in the first offering of this course and give us feedback. This course is perfect for anyone who is considering the ABF model, who will be leading an ABF or who wants to improve the quality of their current ABF. The beta course starts May 21.
  3. Basic Evangelism: Learn to articulate your personal story of faith in Jesus in a way that will encourage others to seek a relationship with Jesus. This course is perfect for groups that are preparing for short-term missions.

If you are interested in any of these courses, please contact us at equip@efca.org.


Make a difference in Louisiana

EFCA TouchGlobal Crisis Response Ministry is looking for individuals to serve for 3 to 12 months or longer as part of our New Orleans based Crisis Response team. Some positions have immediate openings, and many are for summer/fall 2008 and winter/spring 2009. If you are interested in more information, contact Mark Lewis at mark.lewis@efca.org or (985) 893-0218. Positions include:
  • Administrative and Volunteer Team Assistants
  • Communication Assistant
  • Construction Project Managers
  • Construction Supervisors
  • Follow-up (Relational) Ministry
  • Food Service Manager
  • Food Service Assistants
  • Network Administrator/Web developer/manager/database
  • Skilled and Semi-Skilled Tradesmen
  • Tool and Equipment Managers
  • Tool and Supply Assistants
The mission of EFCA TouchGlobal Crisis Response Ministry is to show the love of Christ in times of need by developing, empowering and releasing the Body. These positions fulfill this mission by serving and ministering to volunteer teams and homeowners.

Katrina relief statistics

Current statistics
Teams to date: 948
Volunteers to date: 11,152
Volunteer hours to date: 432,313




New accepted ReachGlobal candidates

Praise God for the following people who have been accepted with ReachGlobal! Please pray for them as they begin raising prayer and financial support to serve for the purpose of glorifying God by multiplying healthy churches among all people:
  • Anna Swanson will serve as an MK (missionary kid) educator in Germany.
  • Ben Snyder will serve short-term in Tanzania.
  • Joseph Najem will serve long-term in the Middle East/North Africa.
  • Rachel Miedema will serve short-term in Tanzania.
  • Leah McCravey will serve short-term in Sudan.
  • Rebecca Hoke will serve short-term in Tanzania.
  • Mary Held will serve long-term in Louisiana with EFCA TouchGlobal.
  • Susan White will serve as an MK educator in Hungary.
To find out more about their ministries and how to support them, contact the ENGAGE team at (800) 745-2202 or engageteam@efca.org.

Opportunity with Uganda Harvest Project

Healthy partnerships that strategically utilize shared resources in order to demonstrate the gospel are key to the success of holistic ministry. A multifaceted effort that partners with Joni and Friends International and Africa Renewal Ministries in Uganda is one example of a healthy partnership. EFCA TouchGlobal, through the coordination of the church consortium focused on ministry in Congo, will be spearheading an effort to direct the ministry resources of Joni and Friends to be used as part of the Elikya Project in Congo. In preparation for that, we are asking both consortium members and others who are willing to join Joni and Friends in their Uganda Harvest Project on October 2-13, to see how a similar effort could most effectively serve the needs of the disabled in Congo.

At the same time, this interaction with indigenous ministry partners in Uganda will serve potential long-term interests for ReachGlobal Africa as we further explore the possibility of partnering with Africa Renewal Ministries, an indigenous church planting work.

For those interested in participating in the Uganda Harvest Project this fall, please contact Jim Snyder – jim.snyder@efca.org. Positions still needed for this team include: pastors, physical/occupational therapists, medical practitioners, and mechanics.


Ministry highlight: EFCA ENGAGE

EFCA ENGAGE is a ministry within ReachGlobal that assists and assesses missionary candidates who would like to serve in global ministry with ReachGlobal. ENGAGE helps candidates become self-aware regarding their unique wiring, their particular skill set and their spiritual gifts. The role of ENGAGE is to ensure missionaries sent out through ReachGlobal are spiritually, relationally and mentally healthy, as well as effective in a ministry team environment. If you have questions regarding the ministry of ENGAGE, please email engageteam@efca.org.


ReachGlobal apparel

If you would like ReachGlobal apparel, please email reachglobal@efca.org. There are multiple options to choose from at a variety of prices. The following options are available:

  • long sleeve button down (stone, kaki, white)
  • short sleeve polo (white, orange, black)
  • long sleeve t-shirt (white, orange, black)

ReachGlobal Africa (repeat)

God is doing something very significant in Africa in 2008! EFCA ReachGlobal is coming alongside our African national partners from Congo, Liberia, Rwanda, and Sudan as they seek to form an alliance of African Evangelical Free Churches called ReachGlobal Africa. The purpose of this alliance is to raise up, equip and send a generation of African indigenous church planting missionaries to reach Africa’s more than 260 million unreached people.

This idea was not one generated from America, but rather one that came out of the hearts of these African church leaders as they accepted the challenge for the African church to reach Africa with the gospel. Plans are being made to train hundreds of African church planting missionaries, to research locations for potential church planting locations, and to send multi-national African church planting teams to numerous countries like Togo, Niger, and Sudan in the next three years.

These African brothers have asked EFCA ReachGlobal leadership to come alongside them to help strategize, provide training and resource their dream of reaching Africa’s unreached. The EFCA has an unprecedented opportunity to come alongside its African brothers and sisters by providing financial resources to make this a reality. They need funding to send investigative teams into Togo, Niger, and Northern Sudan in the next two months. Could you help launch our African partners in this strategic church planting mission? Gifts for this project can be sent to EFCA ReachGlobal, 901 East 78th Street, Minneapolis, MN 55420-1300. Make your check payable to EFCA ReachGlobal and include “ReachGlobal Africa Account #2200-5430” on the memo line.

Europe news and opportunities (repeat)

In Europe we are forming new city teams for the following cities. We need U.S. local church partnerships and team members! Contacts may be made to the following city team leaders listed:
If your church is interested in short-term teams to Europe that might lead to partnerships, contact the following people about these areas, regions and cities in Europe:

EFCA
901 East 78th Street, Minneapolis, MN 55420-1300
(800) 745-2202 toll-free - (952) 854-1300 main - (952) 853-8488 fax - http://www.efca.org

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