Success with our church plant model in Mexico.
Since our ministry in Mexico has primarily been concentrated on reaching youth between the ages of 15 and 25, we had to come up with a church planting strategy based on that people group. Without taking up too much space in this update with the nuts & bolts and philosophy of our Latin American church plant model, suffice it to say that it is built around relational discipleship on a biblical foundation.
Here is an example how this OSY (Out of School Youth) ministry has grown from Evangelism only, into a church planting movement. A small church plant just outside of Mexico City wanted to participate in one of our Evangelism camps in southern Mexico. This new church plant had 3 youth attending, and the pastor had been exposed to our discipleship ministry model and teaching.
For 2 months a member of our International Training Team (ITT) spent time with the 3 youth to help them understand the DNA and vision of this ministry focused on youth. We want to evangelize, edify and expand the Kingdom of God. When the 3 youth were ready they were assigned a camp date and a bus to be filled with youth that does not know Christ as their Savior.
The 3 youth filled the bus with 42 peers that did not have a profession of faith or much interest in spiritual things. 45 young people packed the bus to full capacity and enjoyed a great camp experience with our OSY ministry team in Morelos, Mexico.
After the camp experience, the bus returned the youth to their home (sometimes that is simply a street corner for many of these youth). The following Sunday, this new church plant with only 3 youth attending saw 33 of the 42 youth come through the door for Sunday services, as they all had given their lives to Christ and received Him as their Lord and Savior.
The pastor, upon seeing the youth enter stood almost catatonic as tears of joy flooded his eyes. He told us that he has changed the way they are doing service in order to reflect the relational and intentional model of ministry that he has received from us. God is good. May these stories continue to be written for God’s honor and glory and because of your continued prayer and financial support of this ministry.