I knew the "what", but now the "how" is getting clearer

I went to Thailand feeling good about what God had done through us in the Philippines over the last couple of years. While studying Tagalog fulltime, we were still able to lead a bible study at our house and start another one among the poor living under Manalo bridge. Having just finished the classroom part of my Tagalog learning, (with the exception of an optional course) Jessica and I found ourselves at a crossroad. What next? Actually we knew the 'what', we have known for years, even before we arrived here we knew that God called us to train and send men and women from the Philippines to reach the Philippines and everywhere else Filipino's are scattered abroad to work. The question we are looking at now is "How?" Do we plant a church first and from there, some time in the future start the training center? Do we work in and with an established local church and start the training center through it? We could also just go straight to work on establishing a training center.

I felt excited about all those options and was open to others, but seeing positives and negatives in each kept me from rushing into a decision. I decided to wait on the Lord for an answer as we prayed about it, sought counsel, and learned more about the different ways to do the 'what' that God has called us to. It was in Thailand that I believe God put me on the path to the next step. After talking with the leader of our mission and the South East Asian overseer of the Evangelical Free Church Mission, God began to work in my heart. I told them the three options that I mentioned earlier and they encouraged me to pursue what they called the 'big rock', the vision that God gave me before coming out here. They said that training and sending nationals to plant churches is much more strategic than Jessica and I planting them ourselves.

We were planning to plant a church over the next five years or so to get more experience in that area. We thought that was the "how" in begging a training center. However, my boss pointed out that I can still help in church planting with the people under the bridge, (and even other church plants that the church we are working with is doing) but, I will multiply ministry if I focus on training nationals to be pastors, church planters, disiplers and missionaries. He said that once the training center is established I can always bring in seasoned church planters to teach modules to train the men that I work with if they need more teaching than I have to offer. This all made a lot of sense, but Jessica I have to admit that it is taking a little while to get used to since we had thought for so long that we would be leading a new church plant to start off.

As I was processing this path to the "what" I starting thinking about how I should proceed. The leader of my mission suggested that I talk with another man who was attending the conference. The next day I met him for breakfast and shared my vision with him. He is currently training men to plant churches in Indonesia. I talked with him about partnering to train and send people from the Philippines to reach the world for Christ. It turns out that it part of his vision as well. He suggested that I start trying to train and send 10 people to Indonesia. As I go through that process, he said, I will be able to develop a working model that I could expand. From there I can seek partnerships with other Evangelical Free Churches and groups to train and send more men throughout Asian and Arab countries. In his case, he would take the men that we train in the Philippines and place them on church planting teams in Indonesia. It seems that the "how" is getting clearer now. Pray for us as week seek to train and send more workers into the harvest.