SO THAT Missions Podcast | FBC Boerne
So that...God's ways may be known on Earth.
"So That" is an FBC Boerne podcast focused on what God is doing around the world with missions and through FBC Missions partners.
SO THAT Missions Podcast | FBC Boerne
Episode 64: Will Smith - Resources From The Harvest: Rethinking Church and Mission
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
What if everything we thought we knew about church and mission was backward? In this eye-opening conversation with veteran missionary Will Smith of E3 Partners, we explore a revolutionary perspective on discipleship that challenges conventional thinking about how churches function and grow.
Will shares powerful stories from his years in South Asia and his current work with migrant populations in Europe that illustrate a fundamental truth: "The client is the lost, not the church." This paradigm shift forces us to reconsider our priorities and methods. Are we building institutions or making disciples? Are we consumers of religious services or participants in God's mission?
The most compelling insight might be Will's assertion that "the resources are in the harvest." Rather than looking exclusively within established Christian communities for ministry partners, Will explains how new believers—those freshly harvested from fields white unto harvest—often become the most effective evangelists and disciple-makers. They haven't learned to compartmentalize their faith or delegate sharing the gospel to "professionals."
We also dive into an incredible case study from the Mexico-US border, where thousands of migrants in a temporary camp in Reynosa encountered the gospel. Within days, baptisms were happening in blue barrels, Bible studies were forming organically, and new believers were immediately sharing their faith. Though the transient nature of the population created unique challenges, the rapid multiplication of disciples demonstrated what's possible when we embrace biblical discipleship principles.
If you're tired of church-as-usual and long to see the kind of movement Jesus started, this conversation will both challenge and inspire you. Whether you're a pastor, missionary, or someone seeking to follow Jesus more authentically, Will's insights from decades on the mission field will equip you to think differently about discipleship in your context. Subscribe now and join the conversation about how we can effectively join God in all He's doing around the world!
Visit our website at www.fbcboerne.org for more stories, information, and service times.
Introducing Will Smith and His Ministry
Speaker 1Hey everybody, welcome to FBC's so that Missions podcast. So glad you could join us today. I have a really great guest in our studio and a friend as well Will Smith today, and our friend Chris Campbell, so I hope you enjoy. Welcome to FBC Missions so that podcast. This is an encouraging place to hear how God is working in and around us. We know that he blesses His people so that they can bless the world around them. Join us as we discuss how to join God in all that he is doing. Why is God working in our life, church and community? It's so that, through us, the world will know that he is near. Hey everybody, thank you so much for tuning in. This is Pastor Chad and I'm so glad that you guys have joined us today. I have a couple friends here in the studio with me. One of our instructors from Perspectives, Will Smith, Will welcome. How are you doing?
Speaker 2I'm doing great thanks.
Speaker 1This is the second time you've been here on the podcast with me, so excited to have you again. It's good to be back, great to have you. And then we have it's good to be back, uh, in missions and and uh as a follower of Jesus. So just for just in a couple of minutes, give us a quick overview of of uh, your family, who you are, and then we'd just kind of jump into to some some other topics there.
Speaker 2Yeah, thanks. So we've been back from South Asia for about five years now, and when we were there we just learned so many things that we've brought back to the US as a base. We've been in Atlanta for the last five years and since then we've been engaging in a lot of different realms. Most recently, we're re-engaging the networks of churches in Nepal to engage Tibetan Buddhists, but we're also working within global migration across Europe, so we're trying to catalyze church planning among people who are on the move that are normally inaccessible from the countries that they've fled. Basically, in addition to that, since we're in Atlanta, of course, atlanta is our home, so we're trying to reach Georgia with multiplying churches and disciples. So we've got our hands on a lot of things special projects with our organizations having to do with missionary care. We have a current cohort going on right now trying to be really, really good at caring for one another as missionaries and so involved in a lot of things. But all my kids are grown. I'm pretty much an empty nester at this point.
Speaker 1How many kids do you guys have? We've got four.
Speaker 2Four kids, yeah, two are married and two my two older daughters are having kids now and we've got two kids in college.
Speaker 1Okay, okay Great.
Speaker 2So Carol and I can travel a lot.
Speaker 1Okay, carol, how long have you guys been married? 30 years now.
Speaker 230 years you don't look old enough to be married for 30 years. Appreciate that.
Speaker 1Will. We had a guest speaker today in Perspectives His name was Doug, who jokingly said that he retired from ministry after 40, but he started ministering when he was 43, or when he was three years old, so he also looks very young. But it's great to have you with us, will. There's a lot that you just in your little read up there. There's a lot that we could focus on. You and I have been friends for I don't know a long time now 10 years probably, since we met in the Valley. But let's talk a little bit about your ministry. You work with E3 Partners. Tell us a little bit about E3.
Speaker 2What is that organization focused on? Yeah, e3 provides organizational support for people called to reach the least reach and among the least reach. Multiply, catalyze the multiplication of disciples in churches, and really to the point where there is not the need for an outside mission influence but there's actually a local ownership, where people within that people group are sharing the gospel among themselves, continuing to make disciples, continuing to plant churches and actually reproducing leaders that become missionaries in other places of the world. And so that's what we saw in Nepal. We saw churches planted and multiply. Now we're going back there trying to convince them they're not just the place where missionaries go. They could be a place where missionaries are sent from.
Speaker 2So that really gives the bookends, doesn't it All the way from identifying the least reach to actually raising up those people as leaders to be missionaries, and so I know that's a lot, but E3 basically supports the SC paradigm, the strategy coordinator paradigm, where missionaries are learning to incorporate strategies that get from unengagement to actual movement.
Speaker 1Yeah, there's so much in that we could unpack multiple layers of it.
Speaker 2I'm setting you up, Jim.
Speaker 1I know you are, but I'm going to jump back in here. So E3, it's an organization based out of Texas. It's out of the Dallas area. It's been around for 20 plus years.
Speaker 2I think 87.
Speaker 187. So almost 40 years then A while. Yeah, that's been around for a bit. So a really neat organization.
Speaker 1I think it's probably most known for its I Am Second campaign. If you've watched sports in the last couple decades you've probably seen commercials with superstar athletes sitting in a white chair saying I am second and Christ is first, and they're talking about how their faith has moved. Well, that whole I Am Second campaign is an effort to try to bring Christ into really the modern media in some ways, engaging the world with some sort of testimonials that can drive people at least to ask questions about Jesus. And so people are very aware of I Am Second but maybe never knew about E3, who is the organization behind I Am Second and much less aware that behind that I Am Second campaign is really rich strategy to try to create.
The Client is the Lost, Not the Church
Speaker 1So if you have evangelistic or even effort to try to get people to ask questions, the follow-up is to teach them about Jesus and then teach them how to not only know about Christ and follow Christ but how to teach others to do the same. And so the E3 has been a very powerful organization, at least in my history as I've gotten to know the organization itself A lot of missionaries that were with other organizations join E3 because they find that freedom and they also find that capacity to really drive for multiplication and so that's really exciting. You've been a great part of it. I don't know what your title is if it's changed, but you at one point were like doing specifically diaspora focus, but maybe that's changed a little bit.
Speaker 2Really, there's just one title it's strategy coordinator. Strategy coordinator that's really what it is. Well.
Speaker 1I know a few years ago we were in a number of meetings specifically focused on how to engage migrant groups that were moving around the world and looking for strategic engagement points, whether that was places like Cyprus or Greece or some of these places that were kind of in between as they were fleeing northern Africa into Europe, or whether it was people coming from Latin America through the US border into the United States.
Speaker 1We were talking about these major migration routes, un studies, all this. It was actually an incredible summit that we had there talking about it, and I know that you were one of the leaders in trying to foster strategic engagement of that migration focus. So I want to ask you you mentioned a little while ago about the immigration issues in Europe and kind of looking at what it takes to really start this idea how do we evangelize them? How do we share the gospel with them? How do we train them, especially while they're in transit, so that they can be gospel sharers, even church planters, where they land? How do you even get the scope of that? Well, it's just such a monumental task. How do you even start?
Speaker 2Yeah, so I mean initially with E3, I was kind of initiating the conversation organizationally on how we catalyze church planning movements within diaspora movements, and it really seems like an opportunity to reach people we cannot ordinarily like I said already ordinarily reach in their home countries, so they're more accessible. But there are other challenges associated with that. I mean, by nature it's a moving target right.
Speaker 1Literally, people change overnight.
Speaker 2That's exactly right and so, for example, like a typical scenario would be people from Middle East, even South Asia, traveling across land and making it all the ways it's like Turkey and they would travel across Turkey and really treacherous stories.
Speaker 1Sure.
Speaker 2Because they're not supposed to be there. Sure, and then they'll. They'll get on that coastline and then they'll make it to a Greek island where, once they're in Greece and a Greek island, they're somewhat responsible for them now and because it's part of the European union and there's a agreement across the European union where they're. You know, these people have certain rights at this point, so they set up camps where they house them and they try to figure out where to disperse them into the EU, and in that process, I've got dear friends that work in the island of Samos, that live there, and as these people come out, even though these camps look a little bit like a prison, they're actually allowed to step out and be in community and everything, and so they would disciple them, share the gospel with them while they were outside the camps, and so there was a lot of access to the gospel through that.
Speaker 2That isn't normally there. I will say we've not seen a church planning movement within a stream of global migration. We have not. Actually can't make that case. It is so transient, so many moving parts. However, there are cases where we followed people into the EU and continued a discipleship relationship and a few churches have been planted, so it's all about gospel access when it comes to diaspora and to see what happens next.
Speaker 1Well, even what we saw there at the border was really exciting for a very short window right.
Speaker 1So I'd love to tell a little bit about that story, one because it overlaps with my work here, and two, it's kind of how we got to know each other. So it's kind of fun, but I can't remember 2016, 2015?. We were aware of thousands of people living in this park in Reynosa and at some counts, when the camp first started, there was about 400, but it grew to almost 5,000 that were living in this one block camp in the middle of the city of Reynosa and we've been talking about how do we saturate this space with the gospel and is it possible to see even church planting movements emerge among them, and so a number of conversations led to kind of a pilot where we sent a couple guys that went in and shared the gospel faithfully for a few days, and they came out and said we think this is a really wide, open acceptance to this thing, so let's mobilize an entire team, which included Augie and some others. I think you were part of that first team with Augie and we went into that camp and it was unbelievable. Every time we would share the gospel, there'd be 50 to 100 people gather around us and almost all of them would raise their hands at the end to make Christ their Savior. It was actually so overwhelming that we had to figure out another way to filter that group, to find out who is it that God's called us here to train so they could do this without us.
Speaker 1So immediately Augie's asking people who would want to get baptized, and out of the hundreds that were raising their hands accepting Christ, there were some I think probably 12 or 15 in those first couple of days that were willing to get baptized. They got this blue barrel right, filled it up with water, right out in front of the casino that's owned by the drug cartel. And we're baptizing people in this blue bucket right out in front of the cartel-owned casino. And within a few hours of that we're training them on how to share their faith with non-believers. We're talking to them about what it means to follow Jesus. We do the first couple repent and believe kind of commands with them. So within a few hours they're already moving forward with their walk with Christ. They've already taken their first steps of obedience, already taking their first steps in understanding what a follower of Christ does.
Speaker 1And so the next morning we gather that group, those 12 or so and our group, and we go back into the camp and that day it just keeps going, it just rolls out. Now they bring people out, they baptize them and within a few short weeks I think that we were able to see I mean within a month, I'm sure of it that the entire camp was saturated with the gospel and then every new group that would arrive would hear the gospel and we identified leaders that were able to care for. They were sending us videos of prayer times at five o'clock hear the gospel. And we identified leaders that were able to care for. They were sending us videos of prayer times at five o'clock in the morning and the videos underneath the lights at 5 am there were hundreds of people singing praises to God in the darkness. At 5 am in Reynosa they were studying scripture together.
Speaker 1We were hearing of 10 or 12 different groups that were studying the Bible together and what was crazy is every time we would identify kind of a new key leader. Within a few days they would get their visa papers and move into the US. So, like you were saying, the transient piece is that every leader it was almost like the enemy was at work to get rid of them as soon as we got them empowered and mobilized. So it had a constant leadership train, constant turnover, and then, kind of, the nail in the coffin was probably about eight months later, the government bulldozed the camp and they moved them into these two more protected camps, uh, outside of town and and uh, since then there continues to be efforts to share the gospel, efforts at Bible studies.
Speaker 1We're finding that all again ongoing uh has been an effort to to make sure that those people are saturated with gospel presence, gospel tools, bible studies.
Resources Are in the Harvest
Speaker 1I don't know that they ever self-identified as church, you know. So like there was so much turnover in the leadership that trying to establish what we would call a stable church was was, I think, kind of what you're talking about Really hard to get to that within the diaspora streams the people are moving so often so quickly. But it was incredible Within a few months I'm positive that we could say that all of the 5,000 people that lived in that one block heard the gospel, had access to the gospel at many ways. There was Bible studies happening throughout the camp regularly and it was really almost a microcosm of a really quick movement that kind of came and went right, it was there and then it was gone, and so then trying to track those thousands of people who eventually came into the United States and encouraged them to remain faithful as they got established in the United States was a whole nother challenge that continues to be hit or miss, whether or not you get any responses.
Speaker 2I mean seriously, virtually impossible. Actually, it's really difficult. These people were definitely affected by the gospel, there's no question about it, and we just have to trust the Lord with the outcome of that, Sure. You know, and envisioning them with the purpose of sharing the gospel with others wherever they go. There was some follow-up.
Speaker 1But you know, we we understand like a lot of times when they they're in that stage, they have nothing but time and there and there's some accessibility and when they land, well, they're like working seven days a week in a chicken plant, you know, with seven people that live in a house they don't ever see. Yeah, barely enough to send a text saying, hey, I'm still doing well, brother, thanks for praying for me, and that's all you hear for a few weeks. So it really is amazing one to see how the gospel took light in their hearts and it really eased their suffering. I don't know if you like, it's one thing to think about the church potential, but the other thing to see how God filled their hearts and lives, even when they were in this in-between space where they felt like they had nothing. They had nobody that cared for them. They were second-class citizens or third-class in Mexico and trying to figure out how to get into the United States where there would be no class at all. They're under the radar as asylum seekers and immigrants and so unbelievable to see how the gospel gave them hope and life.
Speaker 1And obviously our hope and prayer is that they continue to be fruitful and faithful in their days today. But that's not what you're doing as much. So we put a lot of effort into that for some years to see if we could establish those streams, but you said that's been a challenge. So what are you doing now? Like especially, you mentioned it today in Europe You're talking about doing something similar.
Speaker 2Well, we have our hands in a number of different large categories. I think we're well. We are going back to South Asia to try to mobilize Nepalese to reach Tibetan Buddhists, but when we're in Georgia, we're trying to multiply disciples in churches in Georgia.
Speaker 2And in between. You know we're working with the global migration phenomena happening across the EU and then I think the thing, one of the things, I'm most passionate about is just all the coaching opportunities I have with upcoming missionaries that are newer in their journey than I am, that I can coach and encourage and support and really set up fruitful conversations for them to be strengthened and encouraged.
Speaker 1That sounds great. There's so much there. You mentioned a little while ago, during the perspective class, we were talking to someone in the break. One of the things that you mentioned was were talking to someone in the break. One of the things that you mentioned was that the resources come from the harvest, and so you're talking to young missionaries, you're training, you're coaching, you're caring for them. When you use a term like that that the resources are in the harvest what do you mean? That feels like a great thing to say, but unpack that for me.
Speaker 2Well, it's common, when we get a vision to be used by God to catalyze a movement, let's say something like that that we immediately go to the existing body of Christ. Let's say and we try to get all of the resources from that environment when the reality is, if we want someone to team with, if we want someone to co-labor with, a lot of times some of the best people to do that with now hang with me here are not even believers yet. You've got to find this person that has not even accepted Christ yet and then disciple them and they can become your best team member. And one of the things that's really healthy about that way of thinking about it is they don't have to have their DNA readjusted. They've never been told they can't do anything, or it's not outside of their paradigm to immediately turn around and share the gospel with their friends and family, or to disciple a new believer the way they've been discipled, or to even lead into a simple church, because maybe they're falling in love with Jesus or have accepted Jesus but still have some apprehension about going to the church down the street. So it's not trying to unlearn anything. It's not trying to get them to step away from anything they've already done.
Speaker 2And, by the way, that's not the mission. If someone's happy in their church, by all means continue in your church. That's fantastic if you're getting what you need. But the reality is the client is the lost, it's not us. And so the reason we do what we do is not because we have an agenda for a certain kind of church. The reason we do what we do is not because we have an agenda for a certain kind of church.
Speaker 1We're basically fitting the needs of the needs of the very people we're trying to serve. So there's so much reorientation in what you just said. So let's just pin down for a second this idea of the client is the loss, not the church. So you might ask yourself, if you're listening today, like, why does the church exist? And you might think about our church like First Baptist Church. Right, we have music, we have an incredible choir, we have an incredible building that God's provided for us over the 130 years that God has had us here.
Speaker 1We have an incredible preacher, we have a great staff, all these resources but what do those resources do for us? Well, really, they care for the community of faith, right, they provide counseling services. We do weddings, funerals, quinceañeras Actually, we haven't done a lot of those here, but you do a lot of things that the church expects for us and, honestly, sometimes you do things that you're not even sure. But the needs are so evident and overwhelming that most of the time, I feel like our staff feels like we have plenty going on, maybe more than we can handle. But you're saying that the client, that the church exists for the lost, that's a completely different picture than what I just described. So tell me why you would say that. What does that mean? How would a church orient itself to engage the lost if it's not here just to engage and care for the community of faith?
Speaker 2Well, I think it all starts with what vision are you leaning into? What's your vision? If it's from God's word? We recognize that in a timeline, we're in an age called in redemptive history and that this life of faith that we're all experiencing will culminate with Jesus's return. Jesus says when this gospel of the kingdom has been proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, then the end will come. So we have the conditions for his return.
Speaker 2So our greatest desire of any Christian, any church, should be to see the face of Jesus. So, if we know the conditions for his return, we have a clear direction on the activities we should be involved in and as the body of Christ, as the bride of Christ, the bride should want more than anything else than to be with the group to see Jesus return. And so I think the question is you know what is the function of the church? I think it is to come together as disciples pursuing Jesus and his mission for his glory and the joy of the nations, and that's the purpose of the church. Now, as churches grow and expand and are able to provide more services, we can celebrate that. That's great, it's a great support system. But we always have to ask our question. To what end?
Speaker 1All right, so that that's the name of our podcast today. Like why does he bless us? Why do we have all these things? There's a, so that there is a. To what end? Like there's a purpose that goes beyond receiving the blessing.
Speaker 2Right. So we have a lot of Christians who are exceptionally well-fed spiritually, but we're not marrying a process with the content of learning more about Jesus. We're not actually encouraging, as intentionally as we might, to actually the application to be doers of the word you know. In James it says you know, do not, do not be foolish and forget what your image looks like in a mirror, but be doers of the word you know and not just hearers of the word.
Speaker 1Right, it's so powerful. So I love, I love the idea I'm going to try to, I'm going to start adopting that language that the client is the lost. You know this whole concept that Paul writes that we are ambassadors, as though God was writing a letter to the hearts of men, on our hearts, right? So when they see you, chris, when they see you, they read about God and our actions and then they find the opportunity, at the very least, to deal with God in some personal way. And there's so much there, like, if that's what the church is created for, then our services, our goals, are really to equip the church for the works of the body, right, the body being the full collective of all those who will come to Christ, historically, now and in the future, as we engage with the lost, the harvest this is where the first question is the resources are in the harvest? I think of the story of Nicodemus, or even who's the guy that climbed up the tree, zacchaeus, right, you got this guy who is clearly not a God follower, at the beginning of the story. And by the end of the story, he's not only following God, but it says those who are with him are following Christ, and he says everything I've ever stolen, I'm going to give back double fourfold. And you see, what happened is in his heart changed from someone who was spectating, watching God, watching Jesus walk the streets, now he's a friend of Jesus. Then his resources became available for the ministry that Jesus pursued later on, and my clear thing is that those resources.
Discipleship Process and Yellow Lights
Speaker 1I've talked to so many leaders today. Fbc is not one, by the way. Fbc is a thriving church. It's incredible to be a part of this staff and a part of what God's doing here. There are many churches that are in decline and they're struggling. They just don't know how to get back to the glory days when everything was thriving and you just want to yell at them. Go out to the lost. Get your eyes up. Look to those fields that are white right, the workers are. The harvest is plentiful and the workers are few. Go, do the work of the gospel and see if God doesn't fill your coffers right Like the resources are outside your walls. Go and find those new believers.
Speaker 2We're really following Jesus in that. Let's not forget that.
Speaker 1Jesus said obviously.
Speaker 2Jesus said I did not come to be served, but to serve and to give my life as a ransom for many. He tells us to take up our cross and you know we have to ask ourselves what gospel are we following? Are we following a gospel that serves all my needs or are we blessed to be a blessing?
Speaker 2And I think there's a great marriage between a church like Bernie and also the people that you could send out into the nations across the world or the people across the street, and so you get the full benefit of the support that comes from a wonderful church like this, with also the support to say, hey, we exist for this ultimate end, which is Jesus the lost, or engaged to the healthy believers in this church.
Speaker 1We've had a number of instructors come through this semester, of course, some of them like Jeff Lewis. I remember he specifically said that when you read the Great Commission, you should read it more like as you go and make disciples, baptize them and teach them right. But the assumption is that you're going and making disciples. It's not a if you decide to, just in case you. It's like as you go and make disciples, baptize them and teach them to obey all that Jesus commanded them Like it's. The assumption is that you're disciple making and really that's where we'll finish today, like when it comes down to the core.
Speaker 1Jesus called us to make disciples. He didn't call us to make church members. I know we say church members are disciples. That's fantastic, but there are definitely places in the world where church members look very different than disciples look like in the New Testament. But let's just think through what is a disciple and maybe you've done this for some time your missionary history in Southeast Asia, the work that you've done. When you first engage someone who's far from God and they're responsive, let's just say they're interested how do you go from someone who's pre-Christian right they haven't yet become a Christian to someone who's walking with God, who's able to share with someone else the hope of the gospel. Like what? What does that process look like? And maybe, chris, you could speak. I know you've. You've thought about this, you've prayed about this a lot too no-transcript.
Speaker 2Well, Chris, do you have an answer to that question?
Speaker 3I'd be, happy to hear you jump in.
Speaker 3Well, as I think about what Chad just said, it's so easy to you know, in America you think of a disciple as somebody who has been a church member, has studied the Word, has gone to growth group, has done all these things after things, after things. But what I'm hearing you say, will, is that you and Chad like what happened in Reynosa, that very quickly a person comes to faith and is very quickly out sharing the gospel, very quickly out helping others to be discipled. It's almost like a foreign language to most people and to me. I mean it's just amazing to think that something like that could happen. If you could go back and kind of help me understand what you said about, as you're ministering to the lost, you're looking at someone to lead before they're a Christian for their believer.
Speaker 2Looking to lead before they're a Christian.
Speaker 1It's. The resources are in the harvest.
Speaker 2The resources are in the okay. What I'm saying is when we, when we look at even someone who is pre-believer, okay, they're just interested to already be anticipating what you're going to do the moment they believe, and this idea of immediate obedience to the basic commands of Christ, and so just being prepared for that. And sometimes there's a stage when and this happened in Nepal, where I was sharing with a Buddhist family meeting in their home, week after week after week, and at the end of every time I would clearly show the gospel and they'd say, no, we're not ready to do that, we're not interested. Are you interested in having another Bible story? And they say, yeah, come on, do another Bible story. Well, what I was doing, I was doing you might call it pre-discipleship All of the lessons I was doing were the basic commands of Jesus and so what they were counting, the cost, they, they and I.
Speaker 2I find integrity in that quite honestly you know, as I was doing that, so, so I was actually preparing them for what their life would look like, uh, after they made Jesus the Lord of their life. And so, um, man, as soon as they, uh, profess faith in Christ which they did after eight visits, I mean our whole family, packed in their home, and we did that week after week after week, um, they came, they, I mean our whole family, packed in their home, and we did that week after week after week. They came to know Christ and they followed Christ with obedience. Now, a funny story came out of that.
Speaker 2They resisted baptism for week after week after week, and finally the head of the household said you know, will, let me just be honest with you. I've never seen a baptism. And you talk about how it points to the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus. I just have one question how long do you hold me under the water until you die, sir? And he was really like he trusted jesus. He wasn't right, quite ready to trust me, to bring him back from the dead after you drowned him.
Speaker 2He was really concerned about this and so and I explained it was a symbol and everything. And that evening my wife baptized his wife and I baptized him in our, in our bathtub awesome that's wonderful so but but you have to understand all that, the all that we call that a yellow light you know, some people are red light you stop. Yellow light, just keep going, you know.
Speaker 2And green light is it's full on, they're a believer and they were yellow lights and so we, we were patient with them and I think one thing, what this reminds us of and we experienced this, this in Renosa is you have to pivot, Like when you're, when you're doing gospel, sharing you. Sometimes we start to even some people can't believe this, but you can get to the point where it's fun and that's all you want to do and you're not willing to slow down and do the hard, slow work with a few people.
Speaker 2You're just kind of used to widely broadcasting the word and that's great, but that is a step. And when I say the quiet is the loss, it means we have to give them what they need at that stage, and that are development. So if I've got two hours a week to share the gospel, someone comes to faith.
Speaker 1Now that two hours is going to be dedicated to discipling them and this is extremely close to Jesus' model, like we see over and over again Jesus drawing crowds, healings, the feeding of the 5,000. There's huge stories. He's surrounded by mobs. He has to disappear into the crowd. There's all these places where we see Jesus have this extremely large public ministry, but he reserves himself and almost all of your teachings are with the 12 or with the gathered. It might have the 72, you know, and it even gets smaller than that. Like there's the inner core of the disciples are Peter, james and John, the three of them right, and so like if you were to try to track and we've got a cool little graphic for this where you kind of see like Jesus spent the most time with the three and then a little bit less, but a lot of time with the 12, and a little bit less, but some time with the 72. And Corinthians tells us that there was as many as 500 believers at the ascension, right, so there was a larger group, but the 5,000, they got just next to nothing. They got a day or two with Jesus and they didn't follow him the way the disciples did. Right, they sought after something. I mean, if there was a consumer class of the New Testament, it was the people who wanted the food and the healing and all the things that Jesus gave them by hanging out near him, but they didn't follow him right. It's a different thing entirely. Them by hanging out near him but they didn't follow him right. It's a different thing entirely.
The Challenge of Tibetan Buddhism
Speaker 1And so when we think about how we spend our time right, I would say, oftentimes our public ministry to the church is broad. We have a lot of people coming. This weekend we're expecting probably between 2,000 and 2,500 people on campus. It's double our normal Sunday on Easter and because of that we're going to have very strong evangelistic messages. We're going to have every way that we can be friendly to them and include them and give them information about Vacation, bible School and everything they can possibly do here, and all of that, we hope, draws some to come in faith with Christ. But the people that are coming to our church, they're fringe Christians already. They might all be Christians, but at least fringe right. But there's another step outside of them, people that would never come to a church that Jesus loves. And we hope that our people, as they go out these doors, as they walk off this campus, they become the salt and light that draws the world to Christ. Obviously any legacy church like ours is hoping they'll eventually come to our church as well, but the hope is that they find Christ.
Speaker 1And so I love this whole picture, this idea of some people really struggle with the pre-evangelism kind of concept as well. They're like how can they understand the Spirit of God before they've made a confession of faith? Well, actually I think the Spirit of God is drawing them before I ever see them Like they're already. There's something that happens in someone's heart that when you speak the gospel message and it's interesting to them, but they respond Like I think that shows us the spirit of God is already working inside of them before I've ever heard a word Again scripturally I think of the Corn.
Speaker 1Right, peter has this vision. You know he is almost adamant, I'm not going to do that. And God tells him if it's, if I call it clean, how can you call it unclean? Right? And he goes into Cornelius' house anyway. He gets there and Cornelius is gathered. It says at the introduction of Cornelius that he's a follower of God, like what is a Roman follower of God. Who's he worshiping? Does that mean he's converted to Judaism? I don't know, but it says that he already has a reputation as a God follower, and yet, as they share and preach the gospel to him, the whole community is filled with the Spirit.
Speaker 1And then you obviously see a movement of God that is unique and powerful and it surprises the disciples. It surprises all of them, even the ones in Jerusalem You'll hear about it later and they're almost like what are you thinking, peter? Like I can't believe you'd go to those people. Well, god was already among them. Like how could I argue with what God was doing? And that almost becomes Peter's defense. But God is at work before we ever arrive, and he's the one drawing people's hearts, and so if we get to share the message of the gospel, it opens their hearts to surrender themselves to Christ. Praise God, somebody else was watering. We just got to be there for the day that it was ready.
Speaker 3Chris, I can tell you something You're like ready to go. There's a verse that's really blessed me recently 2 Corinthians 2.14,. Paul says that in Christ, he leads us triumphantly everywhere we go. So he was thinking of you know, do I go to Corinth or do I go to Macedonia? But he says regardless where I go, christ is going to lead me triumphantly. So we have that promise of victory, no matter where we are.
Speaker 1Well, we are so blessed to have so many incredible people as a part of our church and then, of course, having guys like Will come and speak into our perspectives, class and encourage so many people as you come. We're so thankful for your ministry. Brother, Thank you for taking time out of your Atlanta Georgia world and the rest. We know that you have some travel coming up and I'll encourage everyone listening to be praying for Will and his family as they make some excursions into Asia and into Europe to try to figure out how to serve these communities where we see God awakening hearts to respond to him and it's so exciting. As we close, is there anything we can pray for, Will?
Speaker 2Wow, I think at the top of my mind right now would be just praying fervently for these Tibetan Buddhist people that are. It's really like nothing I've ever seen. I've been fortunate to step into context If you've ever read Henry Blackaby where he says join God where he's working Of course, experiencing God Shout out right there.
Speaker 2There you go, man. And so I've been fortunate to go to places where there's been decades and many, many years of prayer that led to breakthroughs in terms of access and receptivity, and so I've kind of ridden the wave of that receptivity, and so I've kind of ridden the wave of that With Tibetan Buddhists I get to join the company of those who were in those previous stages where we're praying fervently for open ears and access, and this is like no other challenge I've ever seen in the Great Commission, and most people will agree with that who are knowledgeable about people groups and difficulties in reaching people groups and what we put our hands to.
Speaker 2I've actually wanted to backtrack a couple times and my wife's like no, we're going to keep pressing on on this Because it's so unclear what to do next, but it's worth pursuing. It is a major gap between us and the fulfillment of the Great Commission, and so just pray fervently that Tibetan Buddhists will come to Christ mission.
Speaker 1And so just pray fervently that Tibetan Buddhists will come to Christ. Yeah, tibetan Buddhism remains one of the least reached um. I don't know populations, I don't know if it's a specific people group. It may encompass multiple people groups within that, within that religious sphere. But, uh, one of my professors in college had been a missionary working among Tibetan Buddhists. This was 20 years ago and the stories that he told of working among that population and the the um, what he would call like the manifest manifestations of darkness that they saw physically represented were, were shocking to him and to a 19 year old kid in college Like, whoa, that kind of stuff. You actually saw that kind of stuff.
Final Thoughts and Prayer Requests
Speaker 2In the West we have a very romantic view of Buddhism. Yeah, and it's kind of a novelty when you get close to it. It's super, super dark, it's super dark and it's all-encompassing.
Speaker 1It entraps people at every area of their life. There are others, but this one is especially permeating. So, anyway, we'll definitely be praying for that, praying that God would give us breakthrough, chris. Anything we can pray for you, brother. No, I'm good, he's good, he's good. Well, if you're listening today, I hope this has been encouraging to you. Definitely, take a few minutes and pray for Will and his family, his wife Carol, their kids and the ministries that God gives them around the world, and I know that he'd appreciate that. As you know, like I said, they're working with E3 Partners. They're fundraising for their livelihood. If you're interested in that, send us an email. We'd love to connect you directly to Will. He's always interested in talking to people about what God's doing there and around him. If you want to even ask him questions about disciple making, he's been coaching people around the world for I don't know a couple decades doing this kind of work, so he'd love to hear from you as well. Thank you for listening, chris. Thank you for joining us today.
Speaker 3Sure Glad to be here.
Speaker 1Listen, guys. The whole point of this podcast is to talk about. Why does God do all these things? He blesses us, he makes his face shine on us, but the scriptures say it's so that his name will be known among the nations, his salvation among all the peoples. So whoever you are and whoever you see today, be a blessing to them and make sure that what you understand and who you are in Christ overflows into the world around you. Thank you for all that you do. God bless you all. Have a wonderful day. We are so thankful that you joined our podcast today. We would love to hear any feedback you may have for us. Remember Psalm 67 says May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face shine on us, so that your ways may be known on earth and your salvation among all nations. Don't forget why the Lord blesses us. It's so that we can be a blessing to those around us. Until next time, god bless.