CoCreate Curriculum
Overview
The Problem
Business is the tool of the “post-modern” missionary. Yet, many missionaries and mission sending organizations lack the knowledge or structure to support a business as mission, or marketplace mission initiative. Building on the content of his new book CoCreate: Harnessing the Redemptive Power of Business, Steve Forman of the Camino Foundation seeks to develop curriculum for three teaching seminars to support a redemptive business program for: English-speaking missionaries and mission sending agencies in the U.S.
The mission field of the 21st century is changing. The “modern” mission movement of the last 200 years was principally built on a traditional church planting program. Today, donor-based giving is drying up. Younger Americans seek more “participatory” forms of giving. They “vote” with their pocketbook through the products and services they consume. The “post-modern” missionary must respond to the changing landscape. Today, global business connects and intersects every culture, race, religious group, people group and age demographic. Business is where the people are, spending over two-thirds of their waking hours in the marketplace. By its nature, business generates relationships. Every day, business people interact with customers, employees, suppliers and vendors and investors. Businesses influence culture and communities, and can even provide the sustainable revenue to support a missions team.
English-speaking Christian business people, through local churches. Spanish-speaking Christian business people, through churches in Spanish-speaking countries served by Camino.
About Camino Camino Global (founded as the Central American Mission in 1890) is the largest and oldest mission organization focused on serving Spanish speakers globally. Based in Dallas, TX, Camino Global has grown from the work of two missionaries under the leadership of Dr. C. I. Scofield to serving Spanish-speaking believers in over 140 countries worldwide. Currently, Camino has 265 missionaries and over 30 staff.
Some 700 million people live enslaved in poverty, shackled by scarcity, exploitation and lack of training. The earth’s resources are being consumed faster than they are replenished. Water, food and access to jobs are held in scarcity. Government aid programs and humanistic economic systems have failed. In 2015, Fortune magazine wrote: “Business in pursuit of profit still offers the best hope of addressing many of mankind’s most deeply rooted problems.” But only if those businesses, business owners and profits are submitted to God and made part of his Redemptive Plan. Jesus is making all things new, including business. Redemptive business can be a powerful tool of the Holy Spirit – but only if education happens.
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