For the past year and a half, I (Jeremy) have been ministering at a half-way house for substance abusers called The Lighthouse. Every Thursday night me and my team of fellow Missionary Training Center students go out to teach God’s Word and spend time one on one with guys in discipleship. Here is how this experience is preparing me for church planting among unreached tribal people:
I am having to communicate with people who are different from me and essentially a different culture.
I am getting to communicate God’s Word to them foundationally. We are able to start with these guys in Genesis and progressively lay a foundation of the character of God, man’s lostness, and God’s faithfulness to send the Savior that he promised in Genesis 3:15. It has been incredible to see the clear understanding of the gospel that these guys walk away with and what a foundation they have for living the Christian Life after they have been taught God’s Word this way. This is exactly how we will be teaching the people that the Lord will send us to.
I have the opportunity to work with our ministry team to develop the lessons that we are going to teach and map out where we want to take these guys and why, and also to co-teach the lessons. This has been a great experience and something that will be of value when we form a team of Church Planters to do the job the Lord Jesus has sent us to do.
If you think about us, please pray for our Lighthouse ministry team on Thursday nights. Pray that we could connect on a deep level with all of those guys and that we could communicate God’s Word clearly with them