Global Partners – February 2015
This year we celebrate 65 years of missionary endeavors of the Baptist Bible Fellowship International. From the beginning, BBFI churches have been sending workers into the world, often into hostile and difficult places. In this edition of Global Partners, we want to explore some of the intricacies of what we call Creative Access Missions — those places where traditional missionary access is not possible.
Our world is becoming increasingly hostile toward the Good News of Jesus Christ and it’s messengers. In a world of constant turmoil, we want to help BBFI missionaries establish a long-term presence so they can build the relationships necessary to evangelize, make disciples, and establish churches.
The 10/40 window across North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia encompasses a majority of the unreached people in our world today. The BBFI has been actively helping missionaries go to these countries since the Fellowship’s beginnings. However, the China of Fred Donnelson’s day has long since become an industrial and military giant under Communist leadership — persecuting Christians who endeavor to freely worship within its borders. Similar restrictions and persecutions occur in neighboring countries like North Korea and Mongolia.
Muslim countries throughout the 10/40 window have seen a revolution of extremism and instability since the 1970s. Islamic countries known for having cordial to cold relations with the West, have rapidly become more aggressive and even hostile toward Western influence. That makes them resistant to the infiltration of missionaries and a renewal of the Christian faith and practice. The growth of Islam into Europe and the West presents a changing and challenging environment for the expansion of the Gospel. However, with these challenges, we continue to accept the responsibility of delivering the message of Jesus Christ.
In the September 2014 National BBFI meeting, the mission committee approved policies designed to help our missionaries working in these difficult parts of the world. We identify the countries as Creative Access Nations (CAN). We serve a God who is creative and has given us the ability to be creative and to evaluate, reason, and problem solve. Therefore, each missionary endeavors to enter his or her field through creative means to obtain visas. Some go and teach, others establish legitimate business platforms, and others enter working through localized non-governmental organizations (NGOs). One thing is certain, their purpose for going is still the same — to reach the lost with the Good News of Jesus Christ and see Baptist churches established in those communities. The mission of God the Father, and the directive of His only to go into the entire world with the empowerment of the Holy Spirit remains, the same regardless of how hostile or unwelcoming the world becomes.
Within this Global Partners, you will hear from some of the BBFI’s missionaries working in Creative Access Nations. We are honored to have men and women of this caliber serving the Lord and the churches of the BBFI. We have purposefully endeavored to keep their specific countries and personal identities hidden. We desire to help, not hinder, the ministries they are doing in their countries. Please accept this information in the form of a prayer request. Pray for these missionaries and the people with whom they are sharing the Good News!
To read the entire February 2015 Global Partners, click here.