TRAINING, SENDING, AND PARTNERING, WE TAKE THE CHURCH TO WHERE IT’S NOT —AND HELP OTHERS DO THE SAME.
FOR THE EARTH WILL BE FILLED WITH THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE GLORY OF THE LORD AS THE WATERS COVER THE SEA.
- HABAKKUK 2:14
Bethany International desires to see the name of Jesus known and exalted Pioneer Missions: among people from every tribe, nation, and language.
Focused on Finishing the Task
To accelerate the movement of the Gospel into unreached regions and peoples, 74 years ago, Bethany was born from the desire to see the evangelization of the exponential evangelism and disciple-making initiatives are necessary. We use world. It all began with 5 families who committed everything they had to train, reproducible toFrom accelerate disciples who make new disciples, and send and supportmethods 100 missionaries. this act of surrender, Bethany began a journey ofthat discovery to understand what this missionary task meant. churches plant other exactly churches. THE CHURCH TO W HER E IT IS NOT
Fall 2019
FEATURES Pioneer Mission Competencies for Engaging the Unreached A Cross Cultural Disciple Maker’s Story The Seven Stages of Engagement Engage500 World Map Bethany Global University: Innovatively Preparing the Next Generation How much is enough to be Happy?
Every time a new missionary was ready to be sent out from the Bethany family, all the staff and students would gather at our main “parking lot” to pray and Three convictions drive commission the new workers. It wasus: always a great time of celebration. The goal was steadily being fulfilled!
took more than 30on yearsunreached to complete the initial goal of as 100 missionaries. WeIt must focus peoples a matter of justice. Leading up to 1975, missionaries who were being sent out for “world evangelism” Nearly three billion people have no access to the Gospel and the good news that would go and reproduce what they had experienced on the Bethany campus Jesus died for publishing them. and/or distributing Christian books, sometimes training workers, developing local industries to support their efforts, and evangelism and
As these different ministries were transported around the world, Wediscipleship. must send missionaries to the nations. some missionaries did exceptionally well and saw many lives transformed. And, Obeying Great Commission means to train, send, and support all looked the for ways to support the work of missions in manycontinuing different countries, reach people in restricted access and look for ways to plant churches global missionaries andcountries, mission initiatives. and disciple new believers. After all, the goal to “send 100 missionaries” didn’t end with those parking lot celebrations. Once the missionary boarded the Weairplane, mustthepartner the Church around the world. task was justwith beginning.
The cannot be accomplished any one country. It demands Weremaining have prioritizedtask our mission to impact the most profoundly by unreached people in the hardest to reach places - reaching those with the least access that wegroups work together!
to the Good News of God’s Kingdom. This means equipping new generations of pioneer missionaries who are effectively prepared and committed to “take the With ourto collaborative model a network into the remote corners of Church where it’s not and help others doand the same.” A decade reaching ago we did fully grasp thelong way God usemajor this statement radically sharpen our the Great Commission and thenotglobe, we towould be a parttoof completing focus and reshape our understanding of the competencies needed to ensure hastening Christ’s return. that the Church grows, multiplies, and brings the Gospel of the Kingdom to the entire world.
Please join us! Until the whole world knows, Serving together,
Daniel H. Brokke
Dan Brokke President of Bethany International
CEO/PRESIDENT, BETHANY INTERNATIONAL
ent: Dan Brokke Holly Ward er: Dan Sanchez
Auto Club Road, Suite M ngton, MN 55438-2849 one: 952-944-2121 bethany@bethanyinternational.org e: bethanyinternational.org
Mission Statement Take the church to where it is not
WHO IS BETHANY INTERNATIONAL? TRAIN. SEND. PARTNER.
In 1945, five families pooled their resources to start Bethany Fellowship with one goal: send 100 missionaries to make Jesus known in the nations.
Bethany International partners with likeminded individuals, national churches, denominations, and international ministries.
Since then, Bethany International has become a leader in pioneering a Train-Send-Partner model for world missions.
As a catalyst for the Kingdom, our role is to research, plan, train, connect, facilitate, and build relationships.
Bethany is focused on training the next generation of Christian workers committed to proclaiming the Good News and sending them throughout the world as a testimony to all peoples.
We take the church to where it’s not and help others do the same.
Bethany Global University An accredited undergraduate and graduate missionary training institution. More than 3,000 graduates have served as missionaries, leaders, and Great Commission advocates in their communities.
Bethany Gateways A sending agency for missionaries to live and work in strategic locations with direct access to unreached people. Through the years, more than 450 missionaries have been fielded and we currently have a presence in 25 countries.
Gateway Partners A mission development team that helps indigenous ministries launch their own cross-cultural missionaries into unreached peoples. Through these partnerships, 303 mission training schools and organizations are impacting 71 countries.
BETHANY GLOBAL UNIVERSITY PREPARING A NEW GENERATION OF MISSIONARIES.
Bethany Global University (BGU) is a four-year, accredited missions college for men and women committed to full-time missionary service. Here, students become cross-cultural practitioners, doing cross-cultural missions while earning their degree. Our financial model removes barriers. With BGU’s practical training program and scholarships, students’ tuition is covered, so graduates can go right to the mission field without an excessive burden of debt. Within a supportive community of experienced missionaries, BGU prepares future missionaries through a three-fold educational philosophy: 1. Know biblical, theological and intercultural principles. 2. Be strong in Christ-like character and resolve. 3. Do missions competently in another culture. Students go abroad to serve alongside Bethany missionaries for their entire junior year and half of their senior year – a full 16 months of overseas service.
Along with online studies, they learn a language and study society and religion — skills they can take to any other culture after graduation from BGU. BGU provides a fast-growing pipeline of mission catalysts. Enrollment has grown from 111 to 350 in the past five years, stretching campus capacity. Using BGU as a model, Bethany has helped establish 303 other mission training schools internationally.
Bethany’s 3,000 alumni have served with Bethany Gateways and nearly 100 different missionary organizations including:
the Kenyan community, building a In my own life, see platform to share the Gospel. Kenya that have since t has many challenges to the Gospel. life into now servin There is great hostility and community lifelong missions.” pressure against Christianity. Coming For Jason and his to Christ in this Angie environment doesn’t Lucas, a 2019 graduate, is preparing to in Kenya is their life be a Bethany Gateways missionary. She will merely mean an ascent to beliefs, but DUCTION work among people displacedisbytheir conflicts in home. Jason risking everything including NY GLOBAL the Middle East andone’s northern Africa. the work that God h livelihood and family. TY (BGU) She chose BGU because it was both missiondo. He emphasizes, “ y filled with tables and Today, Jason centered and would help her grow in her works with three to 16-month be faithful to God relationship with Christ. For her senting Christian colleges unreached people internship, Angiein served France, groups hisin Marseilles, His kingdom whethe partnering with a church in a majority ms at a youth conference, village. He employs 14 Muslim great sequoia forest a Muslim neighborhood. BGU. He knew that this farmers, with whom he is blessed to “The internship gave me a better understanding His dream began to take have the opportunity to regularly of what it’s like to go through culture stress and rolled in August 2001 andto bring “It taught me how the adapt to other and traditions,” says— Angie. Jason Witt Regional share Gospel stories. In 2012,values he and love of Christ into a uretruth wife and freshman year. his team opened a clinic that operates Africa Gateways worldview that is not my own.”
the pit. As he pursued the call to missions kept to him. As much as he uldn’t shake it. “I knew I d to go. I had to go.”
Angie Lucas
Jason and Rebekah Witt As a young adult, Jason turned from a life of alcohol, fighting, and drugs to Jesus. Shortly after, he dedicated his life to missions, enrolled in BGU, and now serves as a Gateways missionary in Kenya with his family. Eight years ago, Jason started a small farm with the intent to train missionary church planters in sustainable farming skills. The first six evangelists to learn these skills, asked Jason, “While we learn how to grow crops, could we sow spiritual seeds?” He said, “Absolutely!” As they visited Muslim villages and families near the farm, people wanted to learn more about Jesus. When asked why they were so open the Muslim men said, “We know and trust Jason.” They had experienced his integrity for eight years. New spiritual seeds were sown.
“We are just beginning to see a glimpse of what God is working in many hearts.”
co
BETHANY GATEWAYS SENDING MISSIONARIES TO UNREACHED PEOPLES AND PLACES.
Bethany Gateways fields long-term missionaries to strategic regions of the world to proclaim and demonstrate the love of Jesus to those in darkness. Our workers live incarnationally among the people they serve, becoming fluent in the language to effectively communicate the Gospel. They are called to: • Pioneer evangelism, discipleship, and church planting • Train indigenous church leaders in Biblical and theological truth • Minister through compassion and kingdom justice ministries • Mentor global interns from Bethany Global University • Collaborate with local churches to reach new people groups together
Fourteen Gateways locations are focused on a special mission: to launch new evangelism efforts into unreached people groups. Through Gateway Access Platforms (GAP sites), Bethany missionaries collaborate with indigenous missionaries to strategically train, launch, and support workers into areas of the world that have limited access to the Gospel. In Kenya, for example, teams have reached remote communities in East Africa that are predominately Muslim. Bethany missionaries in Thailand are preparing to move into difficult Buddhist regions. Bethany missionaries become disciple-making catalysts, sparking new movements to Christ as disciples plant new churches that multiply.
Kerry and Jan Olson Kerry Olson’s mission calling started when he met a missionary family working among tribal peoples in the Amazon when he was 15 years old. That propelled him into sensing God’s call on his life for missions in the Spanish-speaking world. After graduation, Kerry and Jan joined Bethany Gateways and returned to Mexico as director of a Bible school in the town of Matehuala, which he transformed into a mission training school. “Bethany’s ethos has always been to train and send,” says Kerry. “We actually have a difficult time separating the two. Are we a training entity that sends? Or are we a sending agency that trains?” Kerry went on to establish a large mission school in Mexico’s largest church—the 9,000-member Amistad Cristiana in Mexico City. Graduates have become missionaries to indigenous people in 30 other countries including China, India, and North Africa.
“We go to the dark and difficult places in connection with nationals.”
Kerry now works for Bethany Partners to target unreached people groups where the church is just taking root. “Most Christian organizations are working where the church is very present,” says Kerry. “We go to the dark and difficult places in connection with nationals. One of the most important things an American Christian can do is come alongside the church throughout the world and help them become strategic.”
Sam and Jonhild Dunya At age 11, Sam Dunya came upon a village with no church, and resolved then and there to bring the Gospel into unreached areas. He trained at Bethany Global University and is now a Bethany Gateways missionary back in Ghana. For 23 years, Sam and Jonhild have focused on making and discipling converts, planting churches, and training missionaries. In new areas, he asks village chiefs to designate two men he can train for two years and send back to bless their villages. Thousands have come to Christ in this way and subsequently prepared to extend the Kingdom. Over 700 new churches have been planted, including a large number among Muslim people groups. “Today, the key to missionary enterprise is collaboration and partnership,” says Sam. “While the West has resources in finances and expertise, the rest of the world has human resources. Both are needed to complete the Great Commission.”
“Today, the key to missionary enterprise is collaboration and partnership.”
GATEWAY PARTNERS EQUIPPING NATIONALS FOR MISSION ADVANCE.
Many areas of the world are resistant to western mission efforts, especially in Asia and Africa. Courageous believers in these nations are eager to evangelize and disciple, but most need assistance to work effectively across cultural and religious boundaries. Gateway Partners fills this need, working with a network of frontline churches and ministries called GlobeServe that was organized in 1995 with Bethany’s assistance. Together, we effectively prepare and send workers to unreached and least-reached peoples, using a reproducible, seven-step engagement model: 1. Identify and adopt Pray, strategize, research, and prepare workers. 2. Field missionaries Go on-field, learn the language and culture, and build relationships. 3. Make early disciples First people are brought to Christ and discipled.
4. Plant first church Establish a congregation and train leaders. 5. Churches plant churches The first church plants at least one other church on its own. 6. Church-planting movement Emphasize exponential evangelism, discipleship, and church planting. 7. Send new missionaries The people group fields missionaries to other people groups. Today, it’s not unusual to find missionaries from China working in Kenya; or teams from Mexico church-planting in India — all facilitated by Bethany and its partners. The association continually pushes into new areas, determined to proclaim the Good News throughout the whole world.
Ethiopian Church For years, early Ethiopian missionaries with the Kale Heywet Church struggled to see results among Muslim tribes, due to language, cultural, and religious boundaries. But a transformation occurred in the early 2000’s, when Gateway Partners came alongside the church with an effective training program. “In the old approach, we confronted a lot,” says Wondimu Tirkaso, Dean of the Butajira Training Center. “It was very direct and confrontational. But in the new approach, we love and respect them with the love of Christ. We use wisdom in how to communicate the gospel.”
“We love and respect them with the love of Christ.”
There is specific training for Muslim converts in how to effectively share the Gospel, including teaching on safety in the midst of continued boldness, and wisdom in interacting with Muslim communities around them. The change has triggered large numbers of Muslims coming to Christ — 43,000 in a seven-year period. “Because of Bethany International, we’ve trained almost 200 new workers, including 49 sheiks and imams,” says Wondimu. “Though many still experience heavy persecution and resistance, even the persecutors are being won to Christ by the love of God.”
India Mission
An Indian by birth, Nicolas Das became a pastor in Nepal and trained 110 other pastors to plant churches. But he was discouraged when those congregations failed to have further impact. “We have to develop something different,” Das thought. “We have to multiply.” God opened a door for Nicolas to study at Bethany International University in Singapore, where his paradigm for missions radically changed. He decided to return to India and use Bethany’s model to cross the boundaries that hinder access to the Gospel. Nicolas joined Bethany’s alliance of mission partners, GlobeServe, and embraced its most recent five-year plan, Engage500, to place workers in 500 profoundly unreached people groups worldwide. “Engage500 is a roadmap for us to reach our target,” says Nicolas. “India is vast and, although we were working in many people groups, we didn’t know strategically where we were, and who were not yet reached.” Today Nicolas has trained 80 new missionaries, with 70 deployed to unreached peoples in India. His ministry has engaged 41 of the unreached groups identified in the Engage500 plan and adopted another 16 for future contact. “I credit Engage500 with providing a strategy,” says Nicolas. “We’re seeing more and more of India’s unreached peoples reached with the Good News of Jesus.”
“I credit Engage500 with providing a strategy to unreached peoples.”
BETHANY’S REACH PRESSING ON TOWARD THE GOAL.
BETHANY’S IMPACT 71 Nations impacted with well-equipped missionaries
GOALS SET, MET, EXCEEDED IN 75 YEARS 1945:
Send 100 Founding vision: Train, send and support 100 missionaries to the field. Achieved in 1974.
75 Indigenous mission partnerships supported
2002:
GO100 Open 100 new mission training schools globally in 10 years.
103 Bethany Gateways missionaries in 25 countries
Exceeded in six years with 122 schools begun.
2008:
Field5000 303 International missionary training schools launched
Field 5,000 workers in five years. Exceeded in three years with 8,600.
2015:
10,500 Active missionaries from all mission schools
Engage500 Place missionaries among 500 unreached people groups with little or no Christian witness. Exceeded 500 UPGs by mid-2020.
FINANCIAL HIGHLIGHTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED JUNE 30, 2020
Contributions
REVENUE AND SUPPORT
Total (in 000s)
Ministry Contributions Tuition and Student Revenue Rental Revenue Other Income
$ $ $ $
Total Operating Revenue
Contributions Student Revenues
Tuition and Contributions
8,878 3,421 1,024 1,838
Tuition and Student Contributions Tuition and Student RevenuesRevenues Rental Revenues Tuition and Student Revenues Rental Revenues Rental Revenues
Other Income
Rental Revenues Other Income
Other Income
Other Income
$15,161
ANALYSIS OF OPERATING EXPENSES
Bethany Gateways
Bethany Gateways
Gateway Gateways Partners Bethany
Bethany Gateways (International) Gateway Partners (International) Training Ministry (USA) Ministry Community, Rental & Other Fundraising General & Administrative
$ $ $ $ $ $
Total Operating Expenses
$14,250
Bethany Gateways Gateway Partners
4,355 3,033 3,794 1,461 649 958
Training Ministry Gateway Partners
GatewayMinistry Partners Training
Ministry Community/Rental Training Ministry
Training Community/Rental Ministry Ministry
Ministry Community/Rental Fundraising
Ministry Community/Rental General & Administration Fundraising Fundraising General & Administration Fundraising
General & Administration General & Administration
UNREACHED PEOPLE GROUPS ADOPTED & ENGAGED (2015–2020)
FIELD MISSIONARIES & GLOBAL INTERNS (2015–2020)
TOTAL ENROLLMENT (2015–2020) Graduate Enrollment
Field Missionaries
Undergraduate Enrollment
Global Interns
Engaged Adopted
'15-'16
2016
2016
'16-'17
2017
2017
'17-'18
2018
2018
'18-'19
2019
2019
'19-'20
2020
2020
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
50
100
150
200
100
200
300
400
500
OUR ENVISIONED FUTURE EXPONENTIAL EVANGELISM, DISCIPLE-MAKING, AND CHURCH PLANTING.
There is a grave spiritual injustice – so many live with no access to the Gospel. To address this injustice of access, we each have a role to play. Where spiritual darkness has covered peoples and places, we push forward into new territory with the love of Christ, in bold yet culturally respectful and impactful ways. In the 5 years leading up to May 7, 2020, God enabled us, along with our partners, to place church planting teams among 503 unreached people groups (UPGs) leading to 172,000 new believers and 5,900 new churches. Almost half of the UPGs we have sent teams to are less than 1/10th of 1% Christian and many are at 0.0% Christian. But this is just the beginning. “Addition-based” efforts will not fulfill the Great Commission. Only multiplication strategies empowered by
the Holy Spirit can produce the level of fruitfulness needed to truly impact these profoundly unreached people groups. Our Goal: Catalyze Movements Where the Church is Not We are laying a foundation to train leaders for an exponential increase of evangelism, disciple-making, and church planting. These leaders will multiply movements to Christ. By God’s grace, these unreached people groups will progress to see new believers brought to Christ, churches established, and multiplication underway. Many will see an accelerating expansion of new disciples and churches. These are church planting movements. The following exponential goals and strategies will catalyze movements among the unreached:
EQUIP
DISCIPLE
400 mission training schools with the resources to prepare 15,000 new pioneer church planters and leaders for exponential effectiveness
235,000 new disciples who will then make other disciples
MENTOR
PLANT
Coach workers who apply movement principles and practices, and train others to do the same
17,000 total new churches
CATALYZE 100 new church planting movements among UPGs
By engaging exponentially, we are trusting God to see 100 new movements in the next 6 years. These 100 new church planting movements among profoundly unreached people groups will each see at least 1,000 disciples come to Christ, and 100 churches planted. We call this God-sized goal MOVE100. Researchers are presently tracking more than 1,000 movements – some just in the beginning stages, others in the growth stage, and still others that are mature and sustaining. Our own research assesses the competencies of the most effective catalytic leaders of disciplemaking and church planting movements to train others to do the same. Foundations being laid now have staggering growth implications. God’s mandate is to bring the Gospel to the most spiritually impoverished peoples.
This work is only possible through the power of the Holy Spirit to transform lives and multiply impact. We are committed to see the growth of disciples and movements to places where the church is not today. God has entrusted Bethany with mission training and sending experience and competence over these past 75 years. Our commitment is to faithfully bring the Gospel to unreached peoples and places. Help us accelerate this significant work. This task is too important to be done alone. Will you partner with us? It needs all of us. As we work together, God will turn the desert into a garden! Daniel H. Brokke President/CEO Bethany International 952-918-1899 Dan.Brokke@bethfel.org
“No matter who we are, we are called to be workers together with God in His great program of rescue and recovery — the evangelization of the whole world.” T.A. Hegre Founder Bethany International
“Bethany has a rich heritage, a spiritual
DNA of faith, international fruitfulness, and a great future ahead.”
“[Bethany does] a very effective job
of training workers for the harvest. They have been great partners in the Finishing the Task Network, and have helped to motivate indigenous workers in scores of countries to set up local missions’ base camps and equip them for ministry among unengaged people groups.” Paul Eshleman Founder of the Jesus Film & Finishing the Task
Loren Cunningham Founder Youth With A Mission
“I am just thanking the Lord for BGU’s impact around the world.”
“Bethany Global University has been blazing recently.” Andrew Scott President/CEO Operation Mobilization USA
George Verwer Founder Operation Mobilization USA
“Bethany Global University puts first
things first—The Word and the world.”
“Bethany Global University has a tried and true approach to equipping men and women for missionary service.” Doug McConnell, PhD Provost and Professor Fuller Theological Seminary
BethanyInternational.org Bethany International 6820 Auto Club Road Bloomington, MN 55438 952-944-2121 © 2020 Bethany International
Marvin J. Newell Senior Vice President Missio Nexus