It’s hard to believe that we’re nearing the end of 2022. Over the last 12 months, we’ve appointed 37 new units to the Reaching & Teaching global team. These units will be heading to 22 different locations, some of which are completely new for Reaching & Teaching.
We’ve spent a lot of time this past year speaking and writing about our three core tasks: making mature disciples, establishing healthy churches, and training local leaders. This issue of our quarterly newsletter includes three different examples of what that actually looks like. You’ll also read a report from one of our team members who is currently in the midst of culture and language acquisition in Southeast Asia. With so many new appointments, a large percentage of Reaching & Teaching finds themselves at this stage. Hopefully, this will inform your prayers!
Also included in this issue is a review of my favorite missions book of 2022. There have been several great new books on missions, but Elliot Clark’s Mission Affirmed really encapsulates our perspective at Reaching & Teaching. I’m super thankful for the work he has done at Training Leaders International. If you haven’t read the book, you should.
We’ve also included a year-end report that highlights what the Lord has done this year. We’re thankful for the opportunity to reflect on God’s kindness. Each new team member represents a sending church who is willing to send some of their best people, a family willing to sacrifice time with loved ones. I know
that this time of year is one of the hardest as so many missionaries miss their loved ones across the world. Please know that we are praying for you and your families during this Christmas season. May such generosity bear much fruit for God’s glory to the ends of the earth.
Finally, I’m excited for all that the Lord will do for us in the year to come according to His plans and purposes. Please pray for us as we travel to meet with potential missionaries and their sending churches, and to assess new global ministry opportunities.
As you reflect on the glorious incarnation of our Savior this season, may you be filled with joy and hope. As my favorite Christmas puritan prayer remarks: “In Him you have given me so much that heaven can give us no more” (Valley of Vision, “The Gift of Gifts).
O Source of All Good, What shall I give to you for the gift of gifts, your own dear Son, begotten, not created, my Redeemer, surrogate, surety, substitute, his self-emptying incomprehensible, his infinity of love beyond the heart’s grasp.
Herein is wonder of wonders: he came below to raise me above, was born like me that I might become like him.
Herein is love; when I cannot rise to him he draws near on wings of grace, to raise me to himself.
Herein is power; when Deity and humanity were infinitely apart he united them with enduring unity, the uncreated and the created.
Herein is wisdom; when I was undone, with no will to return to him, no intellect to devise recovery, he came, God-incarnate, to save me to the utmost, as man to die my death, to shed satisfying blood on my behalf, to work out a perfect righteousness for me.
O God, take me in spirit to the watchful shepherds, and enlarge my mind; let me hear good tidings of great joy, and hearing, believe, rejoice, praise, adore, my conscience bathed in an ocean of tranquility, my eyes uplifted to a reconciled Father; place me with ox, ass, camel, goat, to look with them upon my Redeemer’s face, and in him account myself delivered from my sin; let me with Simeon clasp the new-born child to my heart, embrace him with undying faith, exulting that he is mine and I am his.
In him you have given me so much that heaven can give no more.
“The Gift of Gifts”
As Abraham Lincoln once said (maybe), “If I have one hour to chop down a tree, I will spend the first 45 minutes sharpening my axe.” Although we’ve had a burden for church planting amongst an unreached language group for a while, we spent seven years preparing to move overseas. We got a bachelor’s degree and developed marketable skills, we went to seminary, we then attended Radius International for specialized training, and—finally, we got professional work experience. After five months overseas, as we begin to learn the language, we’re starting to see our preparation bear fruit.
Friends sometimes ask us, “What’s new?” We struggle to find an interesting answer. At first, everything was new. But this initial excitement is wearing off as our days are mostly the same. We spend 40 hours a week learning the language—eight hours per day, five days a week. When we share this with friends and locals, we’re often met with surprise and curiosity. Most foreigners don’t even attempt to learn this difficult, Southeast Asian language. If they do, they rarely get further than basic conversational fluency.
So why spend so much time? Well, in order to plant a church among an unreached language group, our evangelism and discipleship depends (humanly speaking)
on our ability to communicate biblical truth as clearly as possible. We cannot risk being misunderstood because of our linguistic incompetence. If we rightly expect pastors to be master communicators of truth in the US, then we should expect missionaries to be just as competent, especially in unreached contexts where people lack even the slightest understanding of the biblical God. If we hadn’t received the proper training, then we’d have little hope of achieving the kind of linguistic and cultural fluency we need.
We’re still very much at the beginning of our ministry, but we look forward to seeing how the Lord will use our years of preparation to bear fruit for His glory.
“What does it look like to make mature disciples in our context?
Three passages come to mind when answering this question; Ephesians 4:13-16, Matthew 28:18-20, and Mark 10:28-30. Making Mature Disciples in our context comes first by rooting and establishing Christ’s people in the Person and Work of Jesus Christ. Disciples in this context need this rooting and grounding for maturing to happen in opposition to their Islamic background of empty
works. The old foundation of five shaky pillars must be removed and this sure foundation must be laid well in order to build something that will last.
Secondly, making maturing disciples here comes through commitment as a family and laboring together in the body of Christ, the church. Disciples here need to belong to a community and find identity in relationship to a community that will stick by them. This means that disciples need to learn and experience how this Gospel impacts all of life in this community. They need to be washed with the gospel-word through preaching, singing, praying, visibly expressing the gospel in the ordinances, counseling and modeling.
Lastly, making mature disciples in this context means stewarding the gifts we have received in Christ for the Glory of Christ and the good of others. Stewarding the gospel, (proclaiming it and instructing others in Gospel living), inevitably means suffering for the Gospel, (persecutions in the form of loss of family, friends and possessions.) Maturity here means being willing to lose possessions so that others might inherit all things in Christ. Maturity here means being willing to lose family so that they can be part of the family of God. Maturity here means being willing to even lose one’s life so that others might inherit eternal life in the Son.
This is what it looks like to make mature disciples in this context.
Five years ago, after six years among the largest unreached people group in our city in Southeast Asia, we made the decision to focus our time and energy on planting an international church among the English-speaking community. But why?
If church health matters anywhere then it matters everywhere. Missionaries often face spiritual warfare and stressful situations, so we need to be ministered to as much as we to do ministry.
“English-speaking” doesn’t mean white and Western. At this point, our 50-member church is made up of roughly half expats and half nationals. Our goal for the near future is actually to replant a group of our national members as their own church, sharing our DNA but operating entirely in their native language. We believe that the very best way for someone to truly understand how to plant a church is by knowing what a biblical church is—and you can’t know what is church is without being a member of one.
To that end, we also started an internship for young national believers. Over the next year, they’ll be challenged to consider if they might serve in ministry down the road.
At this time, we have a new team in our city who plans to focus on one of our nation’s many unreached people groups in the countryside. We’re trying to help them think strategically about where and how to target one of these groups as they spend the next few years learning the language. We’ll continue to support them when they move on from here.
Our church has missionaries from at least five different agencies, not to mention Christian-run business owners, their employees, and various teachers.
Practically, this has led to a high degree of unity. We all long to pray for and reach the lost. This type of unity wouldn’t have been possible apart from an agreement in our church’s statement of faith and church covenant.
It’s rare in Southeast Asia to see unity between locals and expats, or even between expats who themselves are from different cultures and countries.
Thankfully, our church offers a platform for non-Christians to see something they likely won’t get elsewhere. As a small but diverse church, we strive to be what Paul describes in Ephesians 3:10 as the “manifold wisdom of God,” a picture of peace that can only be brought about by salvation in Christ.
For all of these reasons and more, this is why we’ve decided to focus our efforts on planting an English-speaking, international church while serving among Southeast Asia’s largest UPG.
I thank the Lord for the privilege of equipping leaders in Brazil. How do I do this? Two examples stand out: our training sites, in which I invest a little in many; and my local church, in which I invest a lot in a few. Let me explain.
I just returned from one of our training
sites. We spent some time with local pastors and church leaders. I taught church history, encouraged the attendees one-on-one, and preached in their churches. Lord willing, I’ll be back at that training site three more times next year. I’ll also check in at a training site deep in the interior of Brazil. To get there, we take a four-seater plane and then a boat across the river to teach an indigenous people group. These trips require lots of organization and study so I only travel five or six times per year.
The rest of my time is focused on my local church where I serve as one of the pastors. In addition to normal church life—preaching, counseling, discipling—I spend a lot of time managing our pastoral internship program. We’re raising up leaders from within our church who may become pastors at our church or other churches. During this year-long program, we meet weekly with these men to read books on ecclesiology and other practical church topics. We invest in their lives in a deep and personal way.
My days are full of studying the Word, training interns, and discipling men. My goal is to live a godly and transparent life. I want to share not only the gospel with them, but my own life also (1 Thess 2:8). What a joy and privilege to invest in the leaders God is raising up in Brazil!
Dylan and his wife, Celeste, currently reside in Louisville, KY with their children Noelle and Noah. Dylan graduated from Liberty University in 2015 with a B.S. in Pastoral Leadership, and from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2020 with an M.Div. in Christian Ministry. His recent vocational background includes working in arenas of development and event management for Southern, where he grew passionate about creating organizational infrastructure and fundraising to help send as many laborers into the harvest as the Lord will allow. Dylan and Celeste are joyful members of Hunsinger Lane Baptist Church in Louisville.
Sign up here to schedule a meeting with Dylan and learn how you can support the work of RTIM
Dylan will be joining the rest of the executive team:
Ryan Robertson PRESIDENT
Chad Ireland DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS
Scott Mescher DIRECTOR OF GLOBAL TRAINING
Rachel Ware DIRECTOR OF MOBILIZATION
Louisville, KY (Third Avenue Baptist Church) Austin, TX (High Pointe Baptist Church) Atlanta, GA (Mount Vernon Baptist Church) Washington, D.C. (Capitol Hill Baptist Church)
Reaching & Teaching (RTIM) has been involved in short-term ministry partnership with the Baptist Association of Belize (BAB) since 2018. It’s encouraging to reflect on how the relationships have developed over the years. Initially, we followed the traditional model of training pastors and church leaders who serve in Belize City. The pandemic caused us to pause and then forced us to be creative. At the request of Ashley Rocke, the President of the Baptist Association of Belize, we resumed our training through Zoom meetings in May 2021, and even celebrated our graduation through Zoom as well. This effort re-established the partnership and opened other doors of opportunity.
We took a preview trip in 2021 to Belize City, which resulted in a Women’s Institute site in Belize City at Lake Independence Baptist Church. Our pastor recently expressed his appreciation for this particular training. He said, “I know we can trust Reaching & Teaching will provide the biblical teaching our churches need. We trust you to bring us sound doctrine and healthy teaching.”
Pastor Rocke loves Belize and has two distinct goals for its struggling Baptist churches. First, these churches need more young leaders and young men who aspire for ministry. Rocke started meeting with several men for informal encouragement but these relationships have grown into formal equipping sessions with RTIM staff. It’s possible in God’s timing that this could develop into an ongoing training site.
Second, church leaders from the south of the country need encouragement.
The Mopan people are the descendants of the Ancient Mayan empire. Their first language is Mopan; English is their second language. Some speak some Spanish but most prefer English. There are only about 14,000 Mopan and more than 10,000 are in southern Belize.
Due to a lack of geographic proximity and various cultural differences, the BAB has struggled to serve these pastors and churches well. However, Pastor Rocke has asked RTIM to provide biblical and theological training to the Mopan church leaders. He shared that when another group offered to provide training he even turned them down. “No, thank you! We’ve already hitched our wagon to Reaching & Teaching.”
Early in 2023, RTIM will partner with the BAB to equip and encourage key church leaders among the Mopan. Miguel Tush (pictured with gray shirt) serves as the pastor of San Roman Baptist Church. He regularly uses his own resources to travel south and west to visit other churches in the network. He discipled and served with a second key pastor, David Cal (pictured with purple shirt). David is the pastor of Santa Rosa Baptist Church and has been very helpful in identifying possible dates and locations for local trainings. These men will equip church leaders from nine different churches in the Baptist Association and three other like minded evangelical churches.
We’re thankful for the network of churches who will provide the training for these pastors in 2023. It’s a joy to see God at work at the intersection of these relationships.
Scott has more than 25 years of experience in missions and lo cal church ministry. Scott and his wife Corey live in Salado, TX, and have 3 children (Corban, Noah, and Ellie). He is a graduate of Oklahoma Baptist University, Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (MDivBL) and earned a PhD in Christian Apologetics and Worldview at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is fluent in Spanish and has a strong call to develop church leaders in their lo cal context. Scott leads the Global Training Team of RTIM to provide biblical and theological educa tion to church leaders around the world and equip domestic church partners to teach in cross-cultural context. He is a member of the Executive Team.
Discover more about our Global Training ministry at rtim.org
In an age of innovation and shortcuts in mission strategy, veteran missionary Elliot Clark provides the church with an opportunity to reflect on its approach to missions and, if necessary, to consider an alternative approach shaped by the Apostle Paul.
With Ryan Robertson & Mack Stiles
God’s people have always been opposed—opposed by earthly enemies, by spiritual foes, by worldly governments, and even at times by supposed friends. And yet, God’s people press on in hope. We can be assured that God will prove victorious in the end, having already triumphed over his foes on the cross.
Join us as we exult in the God who brings life out of death and joy out of sorrow. Together we are called to worship and to bear witness, that our coming and conquering King might be known and adored by the nations.
Reaching & Teaching is excited to partner with 9Marks on the production of Missions Talk. Missions Talk is a regular conversation about biblical and practical elements of missiology.
Subscribe to Missions Talk wherever you listen to podcasts.
Would you prayerfully consider partnering financially with Reaching & Teaching this year-end as we look to the year ahead?
Your year-end gift goes directly to help make mature disciples, establish healthy churches, and train local leaders through the efforts of RTIM global workers around the world.
Visit rtim.org/give or scan the QR code above to make a year-end donation or find more information on how to support Reaching & Teaching.
