Thailand
Population: 62.8 million
Life Expectancy: 70.6 years
GDP: US$2990 per capita
Unemployed: 2.1%
25.2% earn less than US$2 per day
Thai Buddhists are very unreached! The percentage of Christians among them is less than 1% and there are still 215 large towns and districts with no church. In addition there are 3,830 villages and communities that still do not have a single Christian believer. This means that millions of Thais still have no access to the gospel. They have no chance to hear about Jesus because there is very little chance they will ever meet a Christian believer.
Muang Thong church is having an effective harvest in church-planting movements among Buddhist people groups in Thailand and Laos. In this past year, they have baptized 1000 people and begun 75 churches (many of which include 2-3 house churches).
It is a strategy development, equipping, resource and deployment centre for evangelism, church-planting and discipling the least-reached Buddhist people groups in Thailand and its neighbouring countries.
One aspect of the work the church planting does is ongoing training and encouragement for church planters. They have started running monthly training events where they bring these church planters together for two days every month. Most Thai church planters have come out of Buddhism and have no Bible knowledge so are unable to teach the Bible well in the churches they are planting. During this short two day training course they are taught some Bible lessons which they can then go and share with the people they are working with. The idea is that those people then teach others and so the training multiplies. Their aim is to continue to build and develop Thai trainers to train church planters, to help Thai Christians evangelise their relatives and start house churches, and to support and train those who successfully plant house churches.
Beneficiaries
Our involvement would involve covering the costs of transportation, materials and trainer expenses. Usually between 25-40 church planters come to each training event. However, the number of people who benefit from these church planters being trained is unknown as when they go back to their community the Bible knowledge they've learnt keeps spreading and lives are changed.
What We Like About The Partnership
1) Our exploration team benefited greatly by hearing the stories and observing the enthusiasm within this team. They have a contribution to make to us from their spirituality and enthusiasm.
2) This church has seen the huge spiritual need in Thailand and is doing something positive to equip people to reach out to others with the good news of Christ. The ongoing training for church planters and children's workers is not only beneficial but essential and it is great to see them strengthening and encouraging new believers.
3) The church planters themselves are Thai people.
Vision And Annual Strategy
The mission of the Muang Thong church is to make a significant contribution to the fulfillment of the Great Commission by facilitating church planting movements among specific least-reached Buddhist people groups in Thailand and its neighbouring countries.
Their strategy involves:
1) Integration - evangelism, discipleship and mercy that lifts communities
2) Partnership - with the whole Body of Christ in Thailand and beyond
3) Mobilisation - helping Thai partners take responsibility for their own people
4) Training - equipping Thai partners to do the work of the ministry
5) Movements - reaching whole families rather than extracting individual believers
Annual Budget
The amount required for 2010/11 to fund the monthly training events for church planters is USD $2,100.
Our Potential Commitment
• Have John/Nok at Mt Albert Baptist for two Sundays at the end of 2011/beginning of 2012 for others to hear their stories (obviously this will depend on their availability and Brighthope’s perspective of what is most helpful for the mission)
• Provide financial support of a 2 year period, followed by a review of this commitment for the future.
Wow, that's all? That's pretty cheap to train people every month for a year. I'm in - go the global church!
ReplyDelete