BURUNDI: How Faith Leaders Helped Bring Peace

Source: Tearfund, November 5, 2020

Faith leaders can play a crucial role before and after elections. As ambassadors for peace, they can heal the hurts that divide people and promote unity. In this year’s election in Burundi, faith leaders were a beacon of hope, showing communities what a peaceful election could look like.

“Earlier this year, before the 2020 Burundi elections, we organized different workshops with faith leaders to equip and engage them to advocate for free, fair, and peaceful elections,” shares Désiré Majambere, who leads Tearfund’s work in Burundi.

“Elections in Burundi have often been marred by violence. We wanted to show people there was another way.”

After the Tearfund-run workshops, faith leaders took the message of peace into their communities. A prayer event was organized for the leaders and candidates of the political parties. Sermons on electoral participation and unity were crafted and delivered. Faith leaders even took to the radio so they could reach even more people.

Whole communities were discipled in peace and reconciliation. And it didn’t stop there. After the election, faith leaders continued to hold people together, and communities remained largely calm and peaceful.

» Read full story.

The Expat Cookbook

Expat CookbookSource: Rachel Pieh Jones, via A Life Overseas

The Expat Cookbook: Travel, Cook, Eat, Love, by Rachel Pieh Jones. Independently published, 2020. 145 pages.

“The Expat Cookbook is more than a cookbook. It is 60+ recipes that can be adapted into dozens more. It is a guidebook for cooking, packing, transporting, even mailing food, all designed to contribute to a flourishing international life.”

» Learn more or purchase the Kindle edition for US$9.99 or US$15.99 for a paperback.

» Can’t live on bread alone. Another contributor to A Life Overseas, Amy Young, wrote Connected: Starting Your Life Overseas Spiritually Fed.

» William Carey Publishing has released a new, 30th anniversary edition of the practical book, Managing Conflict Creatively: A Guide for Missionaries & Christian Workers, by Donald C. Palmer. Includes case studies, discussion questions, and more.

Two New Titles from Pioneers

Source: BottomLine Media / Pioneers USA

Here are a couple of titles from our parent ministry, Pioneers. They may interest many of you. Both will be released next week (December 1) but can be pre-ordered now.

1. A Sequel to When Everything Is Missions

Convos cover 2

Conversations on When Everything Is Missions: Recovering the Mission of the Church, edited by Denny Spitters and Matthew Ellison. BottomLine Media, 2020. 146 pages.

In their previous book, When Everything Is Missions, Denny Spitters and Matthew Ellison raised seven questions that shape how we think about and carry out the global mission of the Church and called readers to refocus their gaze on the gospel and the Great Commission.

Conversations on When Everything Is Missions adds the voices of mission leaders J. D. Payne, Ted Esler, Jeff Jackson, Gary Corwin, Pam Arlund, James Mason, Jean Johnson, Jeff Lewis, Steve Beirn, David Platt, Mark Vowels, Dick Brogden, Ed Stetzer, and others. They write on the same theme but from different angles. Some chapters were previously published in the November/December 2019 edition of Mission Frontiers.

» Preorder the Kindle edition (available December 1) for US$4.99 or paperback for US$9.99 from Amazon or elsewhere. Missio Nexus member? You might want to catch a webinar with Spitters and Ellison on December 2 (see events calendar, below).

» For a different look at tensions between mission priorities and how to navigate them in a local church context, see Sharon Hoover’s excellent 2018 book Mapping Church Missions: A Compass for Ministry Strategy.

2. An Adaptation of Peace Child

Treachery cover 2Treachery on the Twisted River, by Don Richardson, adapted by Karen Robertson, BottomLine Media, 2020. 180 pages.

This book is a young-adult adaption of the late Don Richardson’s 1974 bestseller Peace Child. Both describe the early years of his family’s ministry among a tribe of headhunters and cannibals in New Guinea in the 1960s. After more than 50 years, perhaps it’s no spoiler to tell you many of them become followers of Jesus and saw their community transformed (a story revisited in the documentary Never the Same).

Treachery on the Twisted River was condensed and adapted by a teacher who wanted a version of the story to share with her students. It simplifies the language and removes some of the description and context for a younger and/or less patient audience. There’s too much violence and intensity for young/sensitive children; that’s intrinsic to the story. But this is certainly an easier read for today’s teens (and adults) than Peace Child.

» Preorder the Kindle edition (available December 1) for US$5.99 or the paperback for US$13.99 from Amazon or elsewhere. It might make a good Christmas gift for someone on your list.The Pioneers bookstore also has related titles.

Perspectives Virtual Class to Start in January

Source: Perspectives Study Program

Due to COVID-19, the folks who organize Perspectives on the World Christian Movement courses are conducting a National Virtual Class in English this spring via Zoom. Anyone in the US is welcome, but the goal is to provide a class for people who don’t have one in their area or don’t feel safe attending a class in person.

The class starts Sunday, January 17 with registration and orientation and concludes May 23. Will you help spread the word? They would love to have 200-300 people in the class. Alumni get a discount. They’re also looking for some alums to volunteer as mentors and graders.

Perspectives also offers the class in a flexible, pre-recorded online format which may work better for some. New classes start about once a month. In 2021, a number of groups plan to host traditional 15-week, in-person Perspectives classes for their cities, while others will take to the internet.

» Learn about or register for the National Virtual Perspectives Class. Perspectives Canada is also offering a virtual course for Canadians. Don’t forget to download activity sheets to include your kiddos!

» You should also check out Pathways to Global Understanding and the Kairos course, independent incarnations of much the same sort. Need something shorter? Consider the six-week class MomentumYes.

Mission Events Online in December

Source: Missions Catalyst Events Calendar

See our online calendar for a handful of in-person events as well as some events planned for 2021. Got submissions? Send them my way!

December 2, Conversations on When Everything Is Missions: Rediscovering the Mission of the Church. Webinar from Missio Nexus.

December 3, Counting the Cost of Movements. Part of a training series from Beyond, but each can stand alone.

December 3, Fertilizing the Soil: Define Missions. Part of The Greenhouse, a free series for church mission leaders from Pioneers USA.

December 8, Mission Trips, COVID, and 2021. Webinar from Standards of Excellence in Short-Term Mission.

December 8-10, Support Raising Bootcamp. Provided by Support Raising Solutions. Similar events offered throughout the year (live or virtual).

December 10, The Five Directions to Guide Investing Your Leadership. Webinar from Missio Nexus.

December 28-30, CMC Global 2020. Chinese Mission Convention, organized by Ambassadors for Christ. Completely new format with multiple events.

December 29-30, Cross Conference. Student missions conference. Previously scheduled for Louisville, KY; now moved online.

» View complete calendar. Corrections and submissions welcome.

WORLD: Discovering a Country’s Digital and Spiritual Landscape

Source: Mobile Ministry Forum, November 10, 2020

Mobile Ministry Forum has published a Digital Atlas for several years, providing a detailed overview of the digital landscape for the 40 least-reached countries [and have now] launched the new Digital World Atlas at digitalworldatlas.com. On this website, you can search for a specific country and view its spiritual and digital data. For example, you can view India’s rich religious make up or the total number of mobile subscriptions in Malaysia.

» Read more or contribute data.

» WorldVenture is publishing a series of blogs and videos to help your ministry or church thrive in the digital age and make disciples locally and internationally. Here’s part 1. See also Digital Media to Launch Movements (Pioneers).

MEXICO: The Cult of Santa Muerte

Source: International Mission Board, October 29, 2020

Casting a long shadow across one of Mexico City’s poorest and most crime-ridden neighborhoods stands a seven-story tall image of Santa Muerte—the Saint of Death. She takes the form of a human skeleton clad in black plastic sheeting with arms outstretched, inviting residents in from the streets to make offerings of flowers, fruit, burned cigarettes, and alcoholic drinks.

Even in a country known for its fascination with death (which is celebrated every November during the Day of the Dead festivities), Santa Muerte seems macabre and gruesome.

The cult of Santa Muerte was popularized by Jonathan Legaría, the ambitious son of a middle-class family in Mexico City, his father a politician and his mother a karaoke bar owner. He had always been fascinated by magic and the occult and convinced many that he had healing powers.

After his violent death in a hail of bullets in 2008, at just 26 years of age, the cult grew rapidly under the organization of his now-deceased mother, Enriqueta Vargas. Indeed, there are now estimated to be more than 10 million followers, not just in Mexico, but across the Americas, with altars to the saint in various cities in the US.

IMB Mexico City missionary, Carlos Llambes, explains the mindset behind the worship of death.

“They think that the only thing in life that is sure is death, so we better be on good terms with her,” Llambe says.

» Read full story with pictures and prayer points.You might also be interested in another article from the IMB, Refugees in Southeast Asia Find Home in Christian Community.