Cebu City, Philippines

1. Preaching the Gospel

The Philippines is a Catholic nation of 115 million people. This simultaneously makes it a lost country, yet filled with people who are familiar with Jesus and want to serve God. There is still a great need for the Gospel to be preached here, and the Philippines has incredible, untapped potential to be the next “missionary nation” to the world, especially to the unreached people living within the “10-40 Window” in Asia.

We regularly visit the Cebu City jail to preach to inmates there, who have not yet obeyed the Gospel. We have also partnered with local churches of Christ to help them conduct church planting campaigns in other parts of the Philippines, and with newly planted churches who are trying to serve their surrounding communities.

Each month, we also preach in an especially low-income area of the city. Many there are affected by gangs, drugs and illicit money. The small house church there has a strong desire to bring the light of the Gospel to this very dark place, and we are blessed to be working with them to do that.

2. Making Disciples Who Are Disciple Makers

Much of the work we do is with local churches and local Christians. Taking to heart Paul’s admonition that we are all ambassadors for Christ, our strategy for church planting involves all the members of the churches we work with. Thus, one of our primary goals is to help the local body see what it looks like to follow Jesus through what we read in the Bible, and how to apply that in our everyday lives. Doing so transforms each person, not only into obedient disciples of Jesus, but also the Church that preaches the word wherever they go (Acts 8:1-4).

We preach the Gospel to the lost to make new disciples. We continue to teach and walk alongside them and the churches God has partnered us with, to make disciple makers (2 Tim. 2:1-2).

3. Local Church Leader Maturation

Paul gives us inspiring words in Ephesians 4, which are foundational to the purpose and work of leaders within a body, even a small group or house church.

Outside of normal gatherings, we spend time meeting and talking with the house church leaders, to help develop them as Christian leaders. These meetings include time in God’s word and in prayer, reading Scripture that addresses leadership and stewardship. We often talk about what it means to be a man of God, and what that in turn means for the different leadership roles men take on.

We understand it to be critically important for the growth of God’s Kingdom that local leaders desire the goal of “attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.” When the church is led by such men, then the body will be both Christlike and missional in nature.

In our time here we have planted house churches and baptized many. We are thankful to be a part of God’s work here among the non-believers and with local churches and church leaders. We are blessed to be part of the great and wonderful purpose to preach the Gospel, make new disciples and plant new churches being taken on, not only by us, but also by the Christians we work with.