Global DAWN-Type Models

Ibero American DAWN Congress ’98 Section 3: National Models

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Global DAWN-Type Models Nations With National Church Planting Goals

Country Goal Notes Year Amazon Basin 100,000 2010 Argentina 27,000 2005 Belgium 4,250 Vlandern – 245; Wallonia – 234 2015 Brazil 150,000 2010 Canada 10,000 2015 China (house ch urches) 1,000,000 2000 Colombia 20,000 2003 Costa Rica 2,000 2000 Denmark 2,000 2000 Dominican Republic 12,000 2005 Egypt* 10,000 El Salvador 7,000 2000 England 20,000 2020 Fiji 1,400 2000 Finland 2,000 2000 France 35,000 Estimated Need Ghana 30,000 2000 Guatemala 13,000 2000 Hispanic USA 10,000 2000 Hong Kong 1,200 2000 India 1,000,000 2000 Indonesia 60,000 2015 Italy* 9,000 2010 Jordan 50 2000 Malaysia 4,000 2000 Mexico 50,000 2003 Nepal 8,000 2000 Netherlands 7,000 Estimated Need New Zealand 4,100 2000 Norway 500 2005 Panama 7,000 2005 Peru 40,000 2003 Philippines 50,000 2000 Sikkim (India) 750 2000 Slovakia 5,000 2005 Swaziland 3,200 2010 Taiwan 10,000 2000 Thailand* 80,000 2015 Ukraine 5,000 2005 Uruguay 2,000 2005 Venezuela 25,000 2005 Zaire 60,000 2000 Zimbabwe 10,000 2000 * Stated number is an agreed upon vision for the nation by the participating denominations. An official goal

will be set when a larger percentage of the denominations are represented at the congress.



Number of Churches Planted Since Implementing DAWN-Type Strategy (Through 1996 - not all nations reporting)

Country Churches Since When Botswana 30 Calcutta 40 Cameroon 100 Colombia 5,000 (since 1992) Cuba 5,000 (house churches since 1991) Denmark 100 (since 1995) Dominican Republic 2,500 (since 1992) El Salvador 4,500 (since 1987) England 1,600 (since 1993) Finland 100 (since 1995) Guatemala 9,000 (since 1984) India 85,000 (since 1990) Malawi 500 (since 1987) Mauritius 20 Mexico 8,000 (since 1995) Mozambique 80 Nambia 18 Nepal 3,000 (since 1993) Nicaragua 2,000 (since 1994) Peru 7,000 (since 1993) Philippines 33,000 (since 1975) South Africa 120 Thailand 512 (since 1995) Venezuela 10,000 (since 1993) Zambia 700 (since 1990) Zimbabwe 6,000 (since 1992)



Australia

By Gerald Rowlands

Sadly it must be admitted that Australia is not a nation renowned for Revival or for Church Planting. This is especially sad for a continent originally named “Terra Australis del Spiritos Santos”, the Southern land of the Holy Spirit.

The traditional church did not fulfil a happy role in the founding of modern Australia. Too frequently its leaders were linked with the governmental oppression of its convict settlers who constituted a large portion of its population.

Possibly the closest that modern Australia has come to revival has been through the recent Charismatic renewal that commenced in the 1960’s. From it has come music and worship that has circled the globe. A considerable growth, including church planting growth has also resulted. This is most conspicuous in the AOG denomination, which has been the fastest growing church group in Australia for the past twenty years. Its annual growth rate during that period has often exceeded 90%.

What are three most significant trends in the nation?

The diminishing effect of the traditional churches The declining attendance of institutional churches Reasonable growth of non-institutional, contemporary churches

What role does Church-Planting play?

Many churches are discussing it, few are actually doing it. It’s the “in thing” to talk about Church-Planting but again, few are actually doing it.

Links between prayer and Church-Planting

Obviously prayer is the only Biblical route to effective harvest. Again most Christians know this but don’t practice this too seriously. Prayer meetings are generally low on the agenda in the churches. There has been no real national expression of repentance from the churches.

Prophecies relative to harvest in Australia

There are several prophecies of revival and harvest in Australia. The best known was given by Smith Wigglesworth in the 1920’s. He said that Australia would be

the last continent to experience revival but intimated that it would be an extremely powerful one.

There are numerous lesser known prophecies. Prophecies generally only have credibility in Charismatic circles.

People movements most supportive

The most enthusiastic about Church-Planting are generally the charismatically oriented, contemporary, non-institutional churches.



People movements least supportive

Traditional, institutional churches are generally clinging to the past, endeavoring to “hold the fort”. Their attitudes are archaic. There are few indications of future growth.

What have we learned this year?

A far greater unity is needed across the National Body of the church in Australia. A national strategy for Church-Planting could help enormously. People are voting against traditional church by their absence from it.

Goals for 1999-2000

To see new, national unity and repentance from earlier attitudes To see churches truly embracing and activating Church-Planting To see leaders truly leading their constituencies towards harvest

Three items for prayer

To see God bring the church to a national repentance To see the national church brought to humility and repentance To see the church truly reaching out to its communities

Additional comments

True revival is not likely to happen whilst the people enjoy their independence from God. It may take real time of national calamity to bring the nation to its knees and to God. Such a situation is probably not very far ahead.

Many Christians are fervently believing for a great harvest in the nation. Also for a harvest in many parts of nearby Asia in which Australian ministries may participate. There is in many hearts a great longing that Australia might fulfill its name and finally be “The great Southern land of the Holy Spirit”.



Belgium / Flanders

Albert Walsweer, Patrick Scholman

Goal: 245 churches by 2015

The vision is called DAWN Vlaanderen, i.e. DAWN Flanders, and the first talks took place in January 1997. The first DAWN congress was on April 4, 1998, where a little over 100 leaders showed up. The project’s expressed duration is until 2015.

The goal that was set was to plant 245 churches by the year 2015. This would mean a doubling of the amount of churches as the research revealed the existence of 253 churches up to that point. Since then, churches have been planted, but not as a direct result of the congress (most were church planting projects that were already on their way). Denominations are making plans and strategies to plant churches, especially the Pentecostal denomination is making CP one of their top priorities.

Strategic prayer for DAWN is not in place. There will be an interdenominational afternoon of prayer focused on the DAWN project in November. Brian Mills’ DAWN prayer strategy book has been translated into Dutch and will hopefully be available soon.

Strength of the Movement

A little over 50% of the church is involved at the denominational level and some of the independent churches are as well. Many local churches have not assimilated the vision yet.

Impressions

The fact that DAWN is one of, if not the first, initiative that aims to bring together the whole body of Christ in a nation, to plan to reach that nation, makes my heart beat a lot faster. Only when the Church comes together with respect for each other will it be possible to reach the whole nation of Belgium with all its peculiarities. Our first conference in Flanders was therefore a milestone in the history of Flanders as never before had so many pastors of different denominations gathered together. The danger is now that it will collapse like a card house if we are not able to keep the vision alive. More than anything else, we do need to keep telling, sharing, encouraging leaders from grass root level to believe that they also can do it.

There is too much work done by too few people. The team is not yet finalized and much of the practical work falls on the shoulders of few people, as the others are too much occupied with their ‘regular’ work. The next challenge is to build a good team from all denominations consisting of people that believe the vision can be accomplished. We need a team that wholeheartedly ‘goes for it’.

House /cell churches are not discussed at a nationwide level, but is an issue in some individual churches.

Prayer

Pray that we would be able to keep informing and motivating people for DAWN. Pray that the denominational leaders will really catch the vision. Pray for enough finances to be released to accomplish what needs to be done.



Population in 1995: 5,459,060

Albert Walsweer: Kongoplein 3, 2300 Turnhout, Belgium, [email protected]

Belgium / Wallonia

Jean-Jacques Lovis

Goal: 234 churches planted by 2005

The vision is called DAWN Belgique (DAWN Belgium) and got started in June ’95 with an initial rally. The project’s expressed duration is until 2015. The goals are to see 234 new churches planted by 2005.

There are no specific goals yet for 2015, although they plan to reach one church for every 3000 people. At the time of the congress there were a little over 20,000 Christians in 418 churches. Since then, approximately 40 churches have been started (while ± 20 other churches died). One church has been planted in the largely unreached Arabic speaking community in Brussels (there was only one other one). I am currently learning sign language in order to start a pioneering work among the deaf.

As for strategic prayer for DAWN, we published a prayer booklet in 1997 containing specific prayer subjects for areas and people groups. This was very well received. 4000 booklets were distributed (20% of the Christians supposedly received one). Next year an updated version of the booklet will be published.

Strength

Approximately 50% of the Church is involved in the project. We specifically target the unreached regions of Wallonia and specific people groups like the Arab-speaking in Brussels.

Impressions

DAWN started strong in Wallonia but we need to be motivated by concrete actions/events. This fall (end of November) we have a congress with Christian Schwarz on Natural Church Development. We think this is going to be a very good means to help pastors on their way.

I try to have a realistic view on what DAWN is here.

The DAWN team members have excellent relationships with each other. I do most of the practical work. Some of the team members do try to make contact with other churches that are not yet involved in DAWN Belgium in order to have them participate as well. After the congress with C. Schwarz we will expand our team with some qualified lay-people, the Lord willing.

Several people do talk about cell- or house churches. The vast majority considers it as an attack to the (traditional) local churches.

Prayer

Pray for the congress with C. Schwarz: impact on pastors so that they can get a new perspective



on their work that many would come Pray for the forming of an extended DAWN team Pray for my (Jean Jacques’) pioneering ministry to the deaf community


Jean-Jacques Lovis: 62, Rue du Pont d’Arcole, 7340 Colfontaine, BELGIUM, [email protected]



Canada

Murray Moerman

Goal: 10,000 churches by 2015

The vision is called Church Planting Canada and the first congress was in October 1997. There was a preparatory meeting in 1996 that gave us the mandate. It was a gathering of about 25 denominational leaders and they asked us to organize the first DAWN congress, which took place the following October.

The goal we set was to plant 10,000 new churches by 2015. That involves the increasing the Church-Planting rate from 1,5% to 4,5% a year. Before the congress there were approximately 8,000 churches. Churches are being planted on an ongoing basis. We are in the process of entering all the denominational directories and than we will see what the gain is at the end of the year. At the end of this year the denominational directories will only be current to the end of 1997 and therefore the real effect of the congress will not been seen for another year.

The largest unreached people group is the French-speaking people. I am in the process of going to Quebec once in a while and attempting to put together a partnership of the French leaders to develop Church-Planting resources and training resources for planters. On a denominational level I am not sure if they are prioritizing and targeting Quebec and the same is true for the second largest unreached people group, the native Indians.

Strategic prayer for Church-Planting is related to the 2000 AD prayer track. The person who is the head of that, is on the Church-Planting Canada leadership team. We also have an e-mail prayer-network, where we publish monthly prayer request bulletins.

Strength

Most of the large Evangelical denominations are committed to the DAWN Vision and are at some stage of progress and process in promoting Church-Planting within their own movement. Some denominations did not set goals but are encouraging the leaders to set goals themselves. In the six major regions we are working at the district-superintendent level to establish partnerships between the various denominations working in that district to focus on the church planting systems.

Impressions

The impact DAWN has had is that people are talking about Church-Planting everywhere. Many of the Bible-schools are at least talking about adding Church-Planting courses, which they had not done before. They call for Church-Planting teachers. There are denominational, national conventions that are asking me to come and speak, they want their people exposed to the vision. The response to our research book is very positive. There are about 1,000 copies across the country now. It has only been published for 6 weeks but helps to put Church-Planting on the agenda.

Overall I am encouraged. On one hand the goal of 4,5% growth a year is not that high a goal compared to other parts of the world, but in the Western world it is more challenging than it looks. We have good momentum and moral. I have some concerns at the top level of denominational level; they may see church planting as one good thing among others to do. I don’t know how deeply



people have bought in. We are trying to do a church planting conference in each of the six regions. I am absolutely confident that it is making a significant difference. The denominations are making major changes at response at the vision.

There is a national leadership team and there are six regional teams. The relationship between the team members is excellent. I have not felt any conflict or tension, either on the regional teams or the national. I am very encouraged by those relationships. The teams are composed of different denominations.

Cell church is very much an issue. The house church is not so much discussed. Denominations can produce new churches but will produce institutional churches and not house churches. Local pastors will also plant more institutional or program-based churches rather than house churches. When you work with parachurch- and mission organizations that are willing to plant churches in Canada than you have a higher possibility there that house church/cell church movements emerge.

Prayer

Pray for the unreached people groups: a) French speaking Quebec. It has been very hard ground. b) The native Indian and the Sikh and Muslim people who have been immigrating into Canada

in great number. Pray for the top denominational leadership level, that they would move from seeing church

planting as another program to making it their primary passion. Pray for pastors to be released from their sense of territoriality and ownership and to become

desirous to move from addition and church growth to multiplication and mothering new congregations.



China

Goal: 1,000,000 house churches by 2000

The DAWN project has been initiated in a unique way through the radio network “FEBC.”

Through the programs the goal of one million house churches is being communicated. Programs also include leadership training and worship services which have been adapted for house churches.



Denmark

Svend Lobner

Goal: 2000 Churches planted by 2000

The project is called DAWN Danmark and started in 1987. We aimed at the year 2000 but are now shifting to a more practical role.

Our goal was to plant 2000 churches by the year 2000. At that time approx. 2.8 % of the population went to church once a month, that is 140.000 people. But probably only 40.000 are committed Christians, coming to church once a week. This research was made in 1992. Since then there has not been made such research.

Approximately 90 churches have been planted and survived. In 1995 we counted 150, but many have closed because of lack of support from the mother church, or simply because the ground is so hard.

The Copenhagen area has got many new churches (26). Unfortunately very few ethnic churches have been planted even though Denmark has quite a number of immigrants (Turks) and refugees (Tamils, Kurds and people from former Yugoslavia

Strength

To be honest, during the last three years, we have lost touch with the denominations. Their emphasis has been on strengthening the church that is there and on several renewal movements. The committee is just a committee, and therefore, we have decided to open an office, release a consultant half time (me) and support the church planters practically and directly.

Impressions

The DAWN project has been very valuable because it:

1. Put church planting on the agenda in the whole church 2. Started congresses, conferences and seminars addressing that issue. 3. Helped church leaders remove barriers among themselves and made them talk to each

other and even cooperate with each other. 4. Publishes relevant literature Things are progressing slowly, DAWN has a changed role now, and has become a practical

support to church planters. We are at the disposal of mother churches and denominations. We would like to see things move faster, but we also have to support those who we inspired to start. Danish Christian leaders need to see that it CAN happen in Denmark, then they will dare to go on with church planting on a much larger scale.

The leadership team is functioning well, there is a friendship and brotherhood among us. There is the general committee, and then a small executive committee. The general committee meets 3 times a year the executive one 6 times.

House and cell churches are an issue in Denmark. House churches exist that found their origin in the charismatic movement. Also people in the state church have started cells and house churches



both within the state church and as independent Lutheran churches. And lastly, the other denominations are looking at the concept with great curiosity, and a few are trying to make the transition.

Prayer

Pray for more spiritual fathers and consultants. Pray that denominations would see their responsibility to plant new churches and would be

willing to give people and resources. Pray for finances to release people to do the work of an apostle. Pray for wisdom to use the openness in the New Age movement so we can introduce them to

true spirituality. Pray for wisdom to plant churches among the ethnic groups.



Egypt

1. What are the three most significant spiritual trends in your nation?

Greater concern for evangelism, working together, and prayer

2. What role does Church Planting play in the minds of the various church streams in your country?

It is still in the early stages - many seeds have been sown, but it is like trying to change the direction of the Titanic - many people, especially official pastors still understand church planting in terms of buildings, ordained people, and amongst Christian communities - not Muslim.

3. Describe the links you have seen between Church Planting and prayer

There has been progress in the area of prayer and many groups now have monthly overnight prayer, calendars etc. There have been good conferences on prayer, some bringing different groups and churches together, BUT not much of this has been directly focussed on church planting.

4. What specific prophecies have been given which might be relevant for Church Planting in your nation?

Some people emphasise Isaiah 19 although others take Egypt symbolically as representing the Gentiles. There have been other prophecies suggesting a wave from the south - possibly Sudan?

5. Who are the people/movements that are most supportive?

The Christian Practical Service Society is the movement which has been encouraging church planting more than any other. Within the 16 Protestant denominations there are individuals who are encouraging CP and doing it, although no denomination has a concerted denomination-wide strategy for Church Planting. AWEMA has a small committee also supporting church planting. There has also been the beginning of a church planting network. A cell church movement exists in the country which has about 100 cells although these are not well accepted by the registered churches. The Evangelical Catholic movement is ‘planting’ within the Catholic church by reviving dead churches. They now have about 1000 people attending (700 committed) in 5 different churches.

6. Who are the people/movements who are least supportive?

Opposition from the Orthodox Church is probably a greater threat than from Muslims. Within the Protestant church there are many who re not really interested in church planting. The Government and the Orthodox church are preventing the establishing of new churches in the new cities.

7. What have you learned this past year?

We need accurate figures to see what is really happening. We need to design training models that are flexible and meet the need of locals. We need to identify and promote models which have already worked in the country. There needs to be a greater link between prayer and CP.



Local planters need good support and follow up.

8. What are your goals for your nation for 1999 - 2000?

Continue to plant and develop the vision of CP amongst lay people and pastors. Continue lay training. Encourage CP movements within the denominations. Identify models that have worked. Translate/produce materials to help with CP. Work with individual churches to train their pastors and lay people.

9. Share three specific items for prayer

For people to catch a vision for CP amongst Muslims as well as nominal Christians and for new appropriate models of church to be developed.

For CP to become a movement in all the Arab countries. For many of the ministries (evangelism, mercy etc) to direct their work towards CP.

10. Specific obstacles hindering you to reach your goals.

Ghetto mentality/protectionism where people can only see as far as maintaining what they have, rather than expansion.

11. Additional comments

We are keen to learn from our Latin brothers and sisters and catch some of their fire that the Lord has given them!!



England

Kevin Popley

Goal: 20,000 new churches planted by 2000

The vision is called Challenge 2000 and started in 1992. At the first congress we agreed on a goal of 20,000 new churches by the year 2000. In 1995 there were 39,000 churches and probably around 6,500,000 church attendees. Approximately 3,500 churches have been planted since the project started. So far we have probably not really targeted any unreached people group.

As far as strategic prayer for DAWN is concerned, the main pioneer is Bryan Mills. He wrote “DAWN Prayer Strategy” which was distributed and used internationally. The prayer chains over the country were kind of disconnected from the mission of the church. We are now trying to integrate prayer in the life of the church rather than have a prayer network separate from it.

Strength

At the congress most of the denominations were represented (except the Catholics).

Impressions

DAWN has brought Church Planting to the front in the nation. It has stimulated some denominations to elect a person responsible for Church-Planting, It has created a national vision in which each denomination recognizes they are not big enough by themselves, but that it takes a much bigger focus.

We’ve been encouraged in the last year as we have done some foundational work. We’re trying to get every denomination and region to have a team of people that will be working part time or full time. We’ve got good contact with most of the Protestant Churches.

We have three levels of leadership:

The coordinating group which is the representative from denominations, agencies, Bible Colleges etc. They are the practitioners. Through them we try to reach the denominations to reach the goal.

A working group that consists of 10 persons. We are looking at courses to refocus the church back to its mission. We try to put leadership training in place, so that local church leadership can actually mobilize the church into mission.

The third group is the executive group, which is the leader of the working group. This group consists of the leaders of the working group and coordinating group, so that decisions can be made quickly.

The subject house/cell churches it is very fashionable to talk about. Cell Church is more popular than house Church. There are some churches that are converting to a cell-church setting, but it is still in an early stage.



Prayer

The center of all we are doing needs to be intimacy with God. Pray that we would seek this intimacy.

We need to look at the next generation, so we have a plan to try to impact Bible Colleges. We need Bible Colleges that see the vision and be radical in their ability to change the college. Pray that we would find favor and that God may work in these schools.

We need models of churches that will multiply themselves. In January we have a meeting with the heads of the mission agencies. We want to integrate

them in the vision. Pray that this will be a fruitful meeting.




Ethiopia

Assayehegn Berhe

Significant spiritual trends

Deeply rooted revival resulting in church planting Challenging situations against leadership resulting in severe persecution by religious groups New vision of sending Ethiopian Missionaries to neighboring countries and other nations

Church planting

Church planting has been the heartbeat of church growth in Ethiopia. From 1996 to 1998, ECFE has planted 175 churches in more than 45 ethnic groups, with more than 30,000 people converted.

Church planting and prayer

The priesthood ministry of prayer and intercession in Ethiopia is dynamic and alive. We strongly believe prauer is the back bone of church planting.

Specific prophecies

The Lord has been speaking clearly that the God is raising the Ethiopian church to reach the globe.

Movements that are supportive

Calvary Temple (Denver) & Pastor Charles Blair, Barnabas Trust (London), Billy Graham Association, Worldwide Leadership Council.

Lessons from last year

Living the Christian life, not just being busy with Christian activities. God loves obedience more than offering.

Goals for 1999-2001

To reach seven Arab countries and Israel, planting at least one church in each nation by sending 50 Ethiopian missionaries.

Prayer items

Pray for the 338 Ethiopian missionaries as they do church planting in 60 ethnic groups Pray for the training and support of 50 Ethiopian missionaries who will be sent to seven Arab

nations and Israel Pray for the ECFE leadership to experience God’s wisdom and power

Specific obstacles and needs

Financial support for missionaries, training centers, School of Missions within ECFE.



Finland

Kari Torma

Goal: 2000 churches by 2000

We adopted the name: Association for Church Growth. In 1988 we had the first pre-congress with Jim Montgomery and Wolfgang Fernández. The official DAWN congress was held in 1994. There were 220 participants at that time. They were pastors and leaders from denominations.

The specific goal was 2,000 churches by the year 2000. We would need to have 4,000 churches to cover all of Finland. Before the congress there were approximately 1,000 churches in Finland and approximately 100 churches have been planted at this time. The European Prayer Link has DAWN and church planting on their prayer agenda and some other people are praying for church growth but that is more on a personal level.

Strength

On the denominational level, only the Free Evangelical church is involved with the vision and some independent and Pentecostal churches.

Impression

DAWN put church planting on the agenda of many churches. This, however, is not seen as an interdenominational and national strategy. Most of the churches or denominations do not see the value of new churches and generally speaking not even the value of church growth in quality and quantity. The progress is very slow, but we have started a Saturation Church Planting movement.

The DAWN leadership team is functioning fine. We have good relationships.

We have started to speak on cell/house-churches. I have made a booklet about the subject based on Bob Hopkins papers and Wolfgang Simson’s and William Beckham’s books. I am very enthused by and interested in this subject. But people do not really understand the issue yet.

Prayer

Pray that we will find the key people at the leadership level. The 9th of November we will have had a conference with the DAWN leaders where we will share, plan and pray. There will be another leadership and church planting conference in the first weekend of February 1999 and 500 people have signed up to come there. This needs a lot of prayer.

Pray that more churches will become interested in church planting and will do church planting.

Pray that Hope for Europe will have a good impact and good teaching for church workers about church planting.

We need secretarial help, people who can come to the office who can take the burden away. We have helpers all over Finland, but they can’t come to my office.


Kari Torma: Keinutie 8 I 54, 00940 Helsinki, FINLAND, [email protected]



Ghana

Ross Campbell

The Ghana Evangelism Committee was formed in 1971 and has the same goals of a DAWN project. The project was to ‘finish’ in AD 2000.

Goals in three areas are being pursed:

To mobilize the Church to identify and reach out to its least evangelized, linguistic peoples, geographical areas and particular classes and religious blocks. In other words, to focus on pioneer church planting to see initial penetration of every area, every ethnic group, every class and kind of people. This is very critical to the ultimate objective of this national initiative, which is saturation church planting. In the end of the 80’s we were looking at some 40 different groups that we could call unreached.

To see national churches playing a significant role in world-evangelization, particularly with view to targeting the peoples of the 10/40 window.

Saturation Church-Planting: to see a church for every town, village, ethnic community, and neighborhood.

Prayer happens right at the grass root level. Private prayer, prayer cells and prayer events (like prayer nights) are part of the life of the African churches. We often call national weeks of prayer and national days of prayer. These have had spectacular results.

Strength and Impressions

To some degree every denomination is impacted by the vision. The research project included every major denomination, Catholics included. The Ghana Evangelism Committee has had a very marked impact. It resulted in the restructuring of denominations, creation of evangelism departments, mission boards, opening of mission fields. It comes down to the level of the local church members. They are the harvest force, winning people for Christ and planting the churches.

I moved away in 1993. We held our second consultation, had our survey updated and the churches and leadership in Ghana released me to a wider ministry in Africa. I see significant developments across Africa now in terms of ongoing national initiatives: Sudan, Malawi, Central Africa countries. This flows out of the vision of mobilizing national churches.

This subject of house- and cell-churches is talked about a little. We don’t have many megachurch structures in Africa, except in Nigeria, where they do operate the cell system. In South-Africa you’ll also find some, but generally speaking, most of the churches in Africa are small.

Prayer

Praise for the significant developments in terms of national projects. Pray for the role of Africa in the next millenium, especially in sending missionaries to the

countries of the 10/40 window. Population in 1995: 17,543,000

Ross Campbell: [email protected]



India

Goal: 1,000,000 churches planted by 2000

Several movements exist in India that have a strategic vision for Saturation Church-Planting. The two largest are:

Cons (Committee On National Strategy) mainly concentrates on South-India and The North India Harvest Network mainly concentrates on Northern-India. In 1986 /87 people invited Jim Montgomery to come and speak about Saturation Church-

Planting. A first All India Congress on Church Development took place in 1990 and a goal of 25,000 churches by AD 2000 was set. Between this congress and the second one in January 1995, the vision was caught by many churches and parachurch organizations and they committed to plant 500,000 churches by AD 2000. At the second congress all agreed on setting the goal at 1,000,000 new churches!

The proposed goal is to plant 1,000,000 churches by the year AD 2000. They also want to see one Christian worker for 5 villages in the country. This means that 200,000 Christian workers need to be found and trained. There are between 45,000 and 50,000 Christian workers. They specifically target those areas where no Christian workers are active.

It is not easy to know the exact size of the church in India. According to government census in 1991, the actual size of the church was 2.5% of the total population. In 1990 a person started to develop a church directory, denominational directory, of the whole country. In 1994 he let out the figure that there would be approximately 200,000 churches in India. There is no reliable figure today to say what the total church membership attendance is. Part of the issue is the definition of church. Some entities want to consider prayer cells as churches and are saying that India has close to 800,000 churches. If you discount those or consider them as churches in formation then we are looking at between 300,000 and 500,000 churches. This is no verifiable information.

We do not exactly know how many churches have been planted in India since the congress. But we do know that in the state of Punjab for example, a slow growth was seen in the first years following the congress and this has increased exponentially in the last years!

Strategic prayer for Church-Planting is a specific goal that North India Harvest Network has. Their desire is to have 100,000 intercessors within India and 100,000 outside of India. They invite people with a background of intercession, such as teaching, writing etc., to come into the country and give a five year commitment to the North India Harvest Network. That commitment implies that they would come once a year for two to three weeks, spend time in North India at the disposal of North India Harvest Network to teach intercession and hold intercession and prayer walks. This has gone on for 3 years and they covered some very significant territories.

Mission 21 India is a mission organization that resides abroad and tries to find churches that are willing to adopt a district of India to specifically pray for.

There are several examples of cities or regions that spontaneously formed a prayer group for the city or area.

YWAM, together with other entities, had different prayer walks at strategic events.



Strength

A large percentage of the church is involved, although they may not be aware of it because of the influence of the relationship of big organizations as North India Network and Evangelical Fellowship India. At a more practical level, it varies on a state by state basis. But even in the state of Punjab, 50% of the church is actively involved.

Cons said they are trying to target the whole country, but is more focussed on the South and North India Harvest Network works in the North. They mutually respect each other, but are not working together. The vast majority of India at the geographical level is being targeted by one of those movements.

Impressions

There is a very clear impact on the country. Many organizations and churches speak about church planting so that there is no question that this vision has penetrated the thinking of key church leaders. It is reflected in their newsletters, magazines, and pastor-training events.

I am tremendously encouraged. Over the last five years there is a noticeable ownership and acceptance of the vision in that country.

There is no single DAWN team. There are teams, like the North India Harvest Network, that are really functioning in a DAWN-type setting. In the 10 states where the project is going, they have committees that are really functioning as a DAWN ad hoc committee. The degree of understanding about the vision and the commitment to the vision is growing.

House- and Cell-Churches are a tremendous issue. There are a number of people that are saying to forget anything else and go on only with house churches, then you’ll reach India. Others are saying that it can be one among other strategies. Every state is talking about house churches, Cell-Churches, small groups etc.

Prayer

Pray for the relationships between church leaders, that the Lord will continue to draw people together in a love relationship.

Pray for the government. It is a strong Hindu leadership that is against Christianity and any other religion. Open-air meetings are more and more forbidden.

People going out teaching intercession, doing research or involved in church planting training are under a lot of attack in various ways, whether it is in marital relationships, health issues, or even the loss of life. Pray for protection and boldness to do God’s will.

Population in 1995: 904,800,000

Roy Wingerd: 5775 Union Blvd, 80918 Colorado Springs, CO, USA, [email protected]



Italy

Anneli Portman

Goal: 9,000 churches planted by 2010

The project is called Vision 2010 and is mainly supported by the Pentecostal and Charismatic denominations and churches. The first contacts were made in the early 90’s.

The goals we have are to get people acquainted with DAWN and see revival in Italy. The specific goal has been to see one church per 5,000 people by the year 2010, which would mean approx. 9,000 new churches in 12 years.

At the time of the congress in 1997, there were approximately 2000 churches. A number of churches have been planted since then. We put a lot of emphasis on prayer. We set up a national network of intercessors. Approx. 400 people signed up for the network. We send a letter every three months, not specific for church-planting, but more general prayer-requests. One effect of the conference in 1997 is that there is a greater awareness of prayer and that prayer is necessary. Another thing DAWN brought up was a higher awareness of the need to have unity and networking. That is a very big and positive step for Italy.

Strength

As the team consists only of Pentecostals and Charismatics, it was hard to get doors opened to other denominations.

Impressions

We have an excellent team, but we are limited geographically and church politically. We have met very heavy criticism form non-charismatic sources. DAWN has been associated with being more charismatic in part because Yong-gi Cho was invited as the main speaker at the conference. Unless we reinvent ourselves, we don’t know what the future will be for DAWN. We will continue to pray and organize the prayer, but apart from that we need to reevaluate the whole DAWN vision in the Italian context.

We feel partially discouraged, because we want to see a church planting movement happening. We don’t know how to get from where we are now to church planting being an actively embraced practice of evangelizing. On the other hand, we are encouraged because we believe that intercessory prayer is the key to break all the things mentioned.

Yong-gi Cho gave a prophecy at the conference: there will not be a revival that will be a big bang, but there will be a lot of small fires breaking out all over Italy that will result in churches being planted. However, that prophecy, at that time received with great enthusiasm, is now being criticized. People who had been previously sustainers of DAWN now say that this prophecy was given on the spur of the moment, because the context was a DAWN conference. I don’t think that this is true because other prophets who had similar kind of visions have confirmed it and they didn’t know anything about DAWN. In the conference, Bryan Mills also had a similar vision.

House- and cell-churches are mentioned but seen as another new American idea. It is not perceived as being relevant, because people want a centrally-controlled church.



Prayer

Italy is in a little crisis situation concerning DAWN. We made DAWN in a vehicle of revival. It has not been going forward as we expected it to. Only the prayer network is moving on. DAWN was not perceived from the beginning as a vision but was much more perceived as an organization and trying to link people together. Difficulties with the research. Nobody could do it full-time, and not exhaustive. We need someone who is set free to do the job. Italians dislike statistics. There are still obstacles for leadership training. It would be premature to expect that the outcome of the conference would be new churches planted.

Pray for the rekindling of a truly DAWN vision. We need to hear from God what He wants us to do.

Pray for people who could do some of the work and finances to do so. Great obstacle we are facing is lack of time and lack of money.

Pray for a broader involvement of non-charismatic denominations.


Anneli Portman: Via Colleoni, 97, Robbiate (LC), ITALY, [email protected]



Japan

Rob Gill

Significant spiritual trends

Secularization

Resurgence of spiritual hunger, including emergence of cults and new religions

Revivalism (focus on outward, human events and activities), not necessarily revival (what God is doing inwardly)

The role of church planting

Church planting is often mentioned as desirable by most churches but is seldom actually done. When it is done it is usually conducted in very traditional ways and methods.

Total of protestant churches

In 1988 In 1997

Increase of # of churches

Average annual increase

Average annual growth

Japan 6,629 7,755 1,126 125 1.76%

Okinawa 167 208 41 5 2.5%

Church planting and prayer

There have been some efforts to mobilize prayer but so far, the results seem to be minimal.

Prophecies concerning church planting

I’m sure there have been many prophecies. At the Asian Cell Church Summit which was held in Hong Kong in November 1997, for instance, there was a prophecy from Luke 5 about the need to strengthen ( and enlarge) the nets for the coming harvest.

Most supportive movements

White Fields Evangelism Committee, Japan Cell Church Mission Network, Japan Evangelical Missionary Association which also sponsors the Church Planting Institute, and two groups significantly influenced by Bob Logan, the layman training center in Okinawa and the Parent Church Network in northeastern Honshu.

Least supportive movements

More than people, the least supportive tend to be traditional church and denominational structures, which tend to support maintaining the status quo.

Lessons learned in the past year

The limitation of programs and events as seminars, congresses, crusades, etc. What seems to be



vitally needed are:

deeper, inner-life spiritual formation coaching or mentoring networks training methods that include on the job training short term cross-cultural church planting missions may also be a key

Goals for 1999-2000

As far as I know, there are no church planting goals for the nation nor for Okinawa. However some groups are beginning to set goals in the area of leadership development, cell church multiplication, coaching/mentoring, and cross-cultural missions.

Three items for prayer

Pray for ministry focus (prioritization of time and resources) Pray for unity (not necessarily harmony) among the various church groups Pray for bold and visionary leaders who can raise up and empower others for a church

multiplication movement in Japan and from Japan to the rest of the world.

Specific obstacles

Lack of focus in strategic thinking that could result in a church multiplication movement, inadequate leadership development, ineffective church structures and programs, resistance to receptivity in society.

Additional comments

As a part of the 10-40 window itself, Japan may be key to reaching many others within this area who are currently unreachable through the current, existing mission groups and structures.



Malaysia

Goal: 4000 new churches by 2000

200 Bahasa Malaysia-language congregations by 2000 100,000 prayer partners (1000 churches w/ 100 prayer partners) mobilized by 2000 2000 intercessors mobilized by 2000

Recently the national government is trying to change the law in order to impose a $5,000 fine

and up to 3 years of prison for those who request a change of religion on their identification papers. This implies that the number of converts who are requesting the change is growing currently.



New Zealand

Nick Klinkenberg

Goal: 4,100 churches total; 500,000 in attendance by 2000

Vision 2000. It is not really a DAWN or Saturation Church Planting project anymore. It really turned into an evangelical conference to discuss the need for evangelization. It started as a DAWN project 1986 but it has turned around. The research was done in 1988.

The specific goals at the time were to have 4,100 churches and 500,000 people in attendance in the Protestant churches by the year 2000. At the beginning of the project, there were 2,870 Protestant churches, 208,663 regular Protestant church attendants. In 1990 research showed 2,962 churches and 240,412 regular attendance: 1.1% growth in new churches and 4.8% in attendance.

There have been new churches planted. We are about to have a survey at the end of the year. Different denominations have planted new churches such as the Assemblies of God, the Apostolic churches, the New Life Centers, the Pentecostal Movement. The Salvation Army also planted a few. The church planting vision carries on within different denominations, but not in a unified way.

Strength

On a denominational level, the Pentecostal churches are most involved in the project. There are 45,000 Pentecostal people. There are 360,000 believers in total including the Catholics, Baptists, Pentecostals and all the denominations.

Impressions

The project is not having the impact it should have. A number of key leaders in New Zealand are saying that we don’t need more churches, and that we need to help the churches that are already planted instead. I don’t think it is only a dilemma in New Zealand but all over the western world. The Apostolic churches are leading the way as we were a few years ago in planting churches, but we have also slowed down on the project. This is a leadership issue and not a church planting issue. We need leaders. We have been restructuring and we are working on the training at the moment. In another year or two we will see another rise again. I am very confident in that. We need to keep Church-Planting in the hearts of leaders.

The subject of house churches or cell-churches is not an issue in New Zealand. There are a number of cell churches that are popping up, though.

Prayer

We need leaders to plant churches. In the Bible school, Vision Leadership College, we are aiming to train people to plant and pastor churches. Pray for church planters and leaders.

Pray that churches would be planted, that people would catch the dream to plant churches. Pray for leadership at a national level. We need the national leaders to be convinced of the need

for a true Saturation Church Planting project. Population in 1995: 3,507,000

Nick Klinkenberg: [email protected]



North Africa & Middle East

What are the three most significant spiritual trends in your nation?

Vision for Mission, among the churches, which includes sending of missionaries to other Arab Countries

Openness for the house church movement in closed areas Hunger among the majority (Muslims) in the Arab World

What role does Church Planting play in the minds of the various church streams in your country?

Church Planting is becoming a more and more important issue. As media ministries we see the important need of using the media (radio and TV) for Church-Planting. I think about 1000 house churches have been planted in the Arab World since 1990. It will accelerate during 1999 and we expect 5000 before year 2000.

Describe the links you have seen between Church Planting and prayer

In very sensitive and difficult areas as the Muslim world we depend for 100% on prayer and prayer support. We have seen amazing results, as open doors and new contacts, as a result of prayer. The Lord brings people together who are praying for the same thing.

What specific prophecies have been given which might be relevant for Church Planting in your nation?

We have the prophecies in Isaiah 19 about God´s blessing over the people of Egypt. We see a move in Egypt for Church Planting in Egypt and towards other Arab countries. There is a flow of God-inspired dreams, visions and prophecies in the same direction. "The Glory of the Lord will cover the Arab Land as the waters cover the sea".

Who are the people/movements that are most supportive?

Underground house church movements in the area.

Who are the people/movements who are least supportive?

N/a

What have you learned this past year?

"Nothing is impossible for Him".

That the Lord will use two different ways for church planting in connection with each other:

One is the media, TV and radio.

The other is people on the ground like apostles with a specific calling for church planting.

What are your goals for your nation for 1999 - 2000?

For the Arab World we want to see 5000 house churches before 2000.



Share three specific items for prayer

Specific obstacles hindering you to reach your goals.

We have people - we have the instruments (radio/TV) to reach the Arab world. The only thing that hinders us is the lack of financial resources.

Additional comments

IBRA Radio in cooperation with other organizations in -Scandinavia and worldwide-reaching the Arab World with media, bible/literature and social projects.



Norway

Jan Inge Jensen, Ommund Rolfsen

Goal: 500 churches planted by 2005

We simply called the vision DAWN and it started in the early 90’s. At the last congress we set goals for 500 new churches by the year 2005. At that time there were 2,600 local churches, catholic churches included..

We are now doing the 2nd research to find out how many churches have been planted. From 1993 until 1996, 128 new churches had been planted.

We have a relationship with several prayer networks outside DAWN that are praying for the process. In January we will have a DAWN conference and a parallel Prayer congress where people will be praying for the first conference. Strategic prayer for DAWN is not implemented. There was prayer conference at the same time as the first congress.

Strength

In Norway we have a State Church (Lutheran). Some Bishops are supportive, others not. All free churches are supporting DAWN.

Impressions

When the first research was done, the leaders were very skeptical about church planting. We got questions like: are these people in these new churches really new converts or do they come from existing churches? But now the vision of Church-Planting is more or less accepted and people are talking about it. They have articles about Church-Planting etc. Denominations that did not plant any churches for many years do plant churches now. At the last congress leaders from very different denominations met together and there was a kind of reconciliation. It helped to create a greater unity among them. First the denominations thought about church planting as competition but that has been resolved. The congress in 1996 had a great impact on the change of mentality.

It is a slow process. To plant churches is a difficult job. It is difficult to establish churches. And some of the churches that are planted are lacking support of the leadership and others are very traditional. But things are happening. We might not reach the goal, but we are developing more churches now than we have in the past.

The leadership team is functioning well. The working part of the leadership team here in the South of Norway is working very well. The board of DAWN in Norway consists of leaders of big organizations in Norway; they are making DAWN a big priority. There are no conflicts. The big challenge for the team is to work also between the congresses.

House- and cell-churches start to be an issue, especially the cell church idea. Conferences are being held. It is received in a positive way. It might be related to the culture here. Small groups worshipping and praying together is well accepted, though it is hard doing it in an average church. You have to make a lot of effort and fight for it. It is easier to think about changing than really doing it.



Prayer

Pray for the research process leading up to the conferences in January 1999. We want to find out how many churches have been planted. It is very difficult to get the data. The research needs to be finished in December.

Pray for the organization of the congress in January 1999 and that many people may come.

Pray for the parallel prayer conference. We are struggling to make this a big and strong event. Only 100 people signed up for the prayer conference until now.

Pray for the young church planters that are struggling. They need God’s wisdom, strength and encouragement.


Jan Inge Jensen: [email protected]



Philippines

Jun Balayo

GOAL: 50,000 churches by 2000

The vision is called DAWN 2000 and the beginning of it could be traced back to the later sixties. There were two main streams, which eventually converged into a mighty flow of evangelistic and church planting movement in the Philippines. But in November 1980, the first congress that introduced the concept of DAWN was held. The stated duration of the project is 2000.

The specific goal of the project is to establish 50,000 churches by the year 2000. This figure corresponded with the number of Barangays, which was projected to increase from 40,000 in 1980 to 50,000 at the close of the century. The main strategy to accomplish the goal is to “establish a church in every Barangay.”

In 1980 there were 10,500 churches and since the project began, 21,500 churches have been planted as of 1997.

Strength

The vision is supported by a broad spectrum of the evangelical community.

Impressions

We did not have a massive evangelistic movement yet. Every leader says that DAWN is the most effective missionary momentum –and the longest –we ever had. I really trust the Lord that our goals will be achieved. In 1970, we had 3000 churches in the country; today there are 32,000. Isn't that marvelous?

We have a national leadership team, the DAWN coordinating committee. Chairman is Jun Vencer, and Bishop Ephraim Tindero is the national coordinator. We have very good relationships with each other in this team. Most churches in the Philippines started as house churches, and this structure is predominant and popular. We encourage all sorts of structures, whether they be house churches, cell churches or large churches - whatever is best for the specific situation.

Prayer

Pray that the spirit of unity and cooperation continues during the last two years of the project Pray that we can keep up the vision like in a "homestretch challenge" in basketball where often

the last 2 minutes are the most important. Pray that the Lord continues to work mightily—we can do nothing from ourselves.


Jun Balayo: 168 Pearl Street, SM Village – Bangkal, 8000 Davao City (Mindanao), PHILIPPINES



Singapore

Ed and Lai Kheng Pousson

The project was first known under the name Vision 2001 but is now called Love Singapore. It is not really a Saturation Church Planting initiative but it is a national initiative for Singapore. It sprang up in a very indigenous way. It actually started with a prayer movement five years ago. And about two/three years ago it developed into a vision for the nation.

Initially there were four goals and a fifth one was added later:

1. Unite the Body

2. Serve the community

3. A cell in every block by the Year 2000

4. A saturation evangelism campaign through the year 2001

5. Every church in Singapore to adopt at least one unreached people group outside of Singapore in missions.

This vision is quite well received and embraced by a number of churches and a number of denominations over the last three years.

The project is really not based on research. There were several attempts to do research, but we were not able to gain enough support for a nation-wide DAWN type research. However, goal number 3 (a cell in every block) means that research should be conducted at some point. Some attempts were made but not very systematically.

The cells are multiplying all the time in Singapore because of the international cell-seminar that is organized every year by the State Community Baptist Church. A lot of the Singapore pastors are taking the seminars and the methodology and they are multiplying cell groups. So with or without Love Singapore there is an increase in the number of cells and churches forming cells throughout the city.

The foundation for everything is the prayer movement. In 1993/2 a small group of pastors were meeting on the last Friday of every month and that group kept growing. Some participated in Peter Wagner’s Gideon’s Army conference in 1994. So the prayer movement created the whole vision. It was certainly not that the vision created the prayer movement. This prayer movement is still very active, intensifying and accelerating week by week. The whole thing is built around prayer initiatives.

Strength

Almost every domination has embraced the vision to one degree or another. Most come to the annual prayer summits or some of the meetings where the vision was presented. So every denomination has at least heard of it; most of them are favorable to it and quite a large number are involved in it. Much happens at the grass roots level as many intercessors, whose pastors may never have heard about the vision Love Singapore, are praying for it.

We are not targeting at this point the unreached people groups in Singapore.



Impressions

We are very much encouraged by the developments. In a sense, we are simply trying to put a structure around what God is doing already. This is really a refreshing way to approach things. In this case, the spiritual movement emerged first. The leadership team from Love Singapore is a very spontaneous network of leaders. Most of them are senior pastors of large churches: one is a denominational leader, another is a head of a missions agency. So there is a good mix of people. They meet whenever they need to meet.

Prayer

Pray for the continued outpouring of the Spirit. We don’t want to over-institutionalize or over-structure God’s movement! So pray for a continual softening of the heart of the people, a genuine touch of Jesus in the heart of the leaders.

Pray that the work of the Lord’s Spirit will really result in evangelism, missions and changes of hearts in society and inside the church

Pray that we would see a great missionary movement to the unreached peoples of Asia come into being.


Fam. Pouson: [email protected]



Slovakia

Don Crane

Goal: one fellowship in every town or neighborhood in one generation

This Saturation Church-Planting project has no specific name yet, because it is just beginning to take shape. There are a number of different parts to it. The Association of Evangelical Churches is sponsoring this initiative. The Apostolic Church, Baptist Church, Free Church and the Methodist Church are in it.

They held several gatherings in which they talked about the vision of Saturation Church Planting in the country. The denominational leaders set a goal of seeing a witnessing fellowship of believers in every town in Slovakia or neighborhood within one generation (approximately 35 years). Their first goal in order to reach this is to have a new church or church in every town over 10,000 people in three or four years. Right now there is a population of 5,000,000 and there are only a little over 200 churches in the country. In order to pursue that they have sponsored a research project and the first phase of that project has been finished, which is primarily the missions force part. So they have been able to track the location and size and growth patterns of all evangelical churches in the country. They know where the churches are, what is happening with each one and what the growth rates are. They have several new churches created this year and they are showing a growth rate about 6%.

We have an interdenominational team of 5 Slovak Church-Planting teachers and they have finished their second cycle of training now. During the second cycle they had 20 new fellowships created, some of which are already churches. They had 35 students. They anticipate their next cycle of training next March.

Another area which we are working on is to move the growing prayer movement in the country towards engagement and outreach and church planting and not just prayer meeting in general. Until now the prayer initiatives have primarily been for revival and unity of the churches. Lately we have been networking the prayer intercessors and the leaders to the subject of Church-Planting. Now they are focusing prayer much more on new towns and new areas.

We are moving towards creating a commission of the Association of the Evangelical churches devoted to Church-Planting and are hoping that eventually it becomes something like a DAWN committee.

Strength

Slovakia is primarily Catholic. The Evangelicals among the protestants in Slovakia would be certainly less than 50%. The Lutherans did not want to be included in the research in terms of the harvest force because they are not interested in evangelism and church planting.

There are groups of largely unreached Ukrainians in the country and they form an orthodox community. There is also a sizable community of Hungarians in lower Slovakia with some believing communities among them. The gypsies are the other larger community that really is unreached. There are some groups working among them, but they are rare and generally speaking Eastern Europeans have a very hostile attitude towards the gypsy communities Even the churches find it



difficult to focus on them.

Impressions

I would not say yet that there is any real impact on the country. There are 5 million people and only 200 and some churches. I think the impact will come. There are new churches being established, but at a slow pace. There is unity among the churches and a growing vision .We also have helped an interdenominational seminary being established. We have all the ingredients necessary for the church to begin to grow rapidly.

The subject of house-/cell churches is a real issue. The Apostolic church is the fastest growing church in the country and their primary Church-Planting strategy is the cell church approach. They are talking about it with others and people observe what they do.

Prayer

Pray for the continued unity of the church. I never want to take that for granted. They have developed a wonderful unity among the denominational leaders and Satan certainly does not like that.

Pray that the denominational leaders will start owning the Church-Planting vision themselves. They have committed themselves to this but they have not yet put real resources into it.

Pray that God will raise many laborers to do the work. We need a revival in terms of mass mobilization of lay people.


Don Crane: [email protected]



Sri Lanka

Rohan De S. Ekanayake, General Secretary of Evangelical Alliance

Christianity in Sri Lanka is believed to have arrived in 1505 with the arrival of the Portuguese in the country. Although the country has been under missionary influence for over 450 years a major break through has not been made by the church, with the Protestant community being less than 1%.

There has not been any national plan or strategy for church planting. Some of the charismatic / Pentecostal churches have been engaged actively in church planting. A survey conducted this year, reveals that 517 congregations have been planted since the independence from the British in 1948. Out of this number 486 or 94% has been planted since 1980 onwards. 298 congregations have been planted by one denomination.

Out of the 1259 congregations of the Protestant community 301 a re independent congregations. A high percentage of these would be those who have broken away from a larger Pentecostal/charismatic churches. Therefore although the annual average church planting growth rate has been 2.9 during the last 2 decades, this has not contributed to the growth of the church in real terms. It is in this context that the following questions have been addressed.

The most significant spiritual trends

a) Emphasis on prosperity gospel- since lately the health and wealth gospel teaching is creeping to the church very subtlety. Due to this the principle of the cross, the cost of discipleship and such basic and fundamental teachings have been neglected. This also has affected many that have come to Christ with the expectation of instant solutions to problems. The inability of the church to retain new converts has a direct consequence to this emphasis on health and wealth gospel.

b) Persecution - The nation is going through a phase of Buddhist revival. Persecution has been sparked off due to sociological and mysiological reasons. The ethnic conflict between the majority Sinhala Buddhist and the minority Tamil Hindu communities have provoked the Sinhala Buddhist against the Christians as well. They believe that Sri Lanka is for Sinhala Buddhist and since almost 40% of the church is Tamil by ethnicity they view all Christians to be sympathetic to the guerrilla movement and therefore consider Christian as traitors. Further having been under foreign domination for over 450 years Christianity is identified with the west as well as the colonial rulers. The sudden surge of church planting in the last 2 decades has also no doubt being viewed as a threat by the Buddhist.

c) Power encounter- inability to penetrate to the Buddhist world has made some leaders to evaluate as well as to seek new revelations. The nation is under bondage. This has obviously made the church to think in terms of the power encounter and spiritual warfare. In fact the principles of warfare, which has been spreading during the last 10 years, had been thought and emphasized much earlier in Sri Lanka. This as well as a desire to work together, in the body of Christ due to persecution could be considered as a spiritual trend in the church of Sri Lanka.

Church planting role in the minds of various churches strands

The Charismatic/Pentecostal churches are in the forefront of church planting during the last 50 years. According to a survey conducting recently 517 churches had been planted since



independence out of which these churches have plated 95%. As there is no DAWN type vision yet; it is difficult to attribute this growth to a particular strategy or vision. Although the traditional churches (NCC Affiliated) have had no emphasize on church planting, there are encouraging signs of things to come in the future.

Link between church planting and prayer

The charismatic / Pentecostal churches are committed to fasting and prayer on a regular basis. Most of these churches have a weekly fasting and prayer, monthly all night prayer meetings etc. Some churches though minute in number conduct early morning prayers on a regular basis. It is these churches that have been engaged in pioneering church planting ministry.

Prophecies relevant for church planting

There have been no specific prophecies to the nation or in a particular denomination. However some of the charismatic leaders of denominations have a vision and a call from God for church planting ministry. Awakening of the Sri Lankan church is a recent phenomenal and prophetic ministry is minimal.

Most supportive people / movements

As already stated charismatic / Pentecostal movements are actively engaged in church planting. The Evangelical Alliance, which is the umbrella organization for these denominations and churches, is actively supportive while this cannot be said of the NCC. However since lately within the denominations of the NCC, some groups though small in number have been supportive and also engaged in the church planting movement.

Lease supportive movements

The NCC churches could be considered as lease supportive. In fact statement made by some of the leaders have been detrimental for the cause of church planting. It is much worse with the Roman Catholic Church.

Lessons from the past year

a) Although the number of churches planted in the recent past has been on the increase this cannot be said of the membership. In the circumstances the church cannot be happy about ‘kingdom growth’.

b) The size of the Sri Lankan church is small according to a survey. The average size being less than 100. Therefore there is a necessity to increase the number of churches to be planted if the nation is to be reached

Goals for the nation for 1999 -2000

a) Personally my denomination has set a goal to plant a church in every electorate by the year 2001. This five-year plan commenced in 1997. The next two years would be crucial, as new areas have been targeted.

b) The fact that the Protestant community is less than 1% after almost 500 years of Christianity is an indication of the church’s inability to make a break through in to Buddhism. Many leaders appear to be indifferent to this. I wish to highlight this issue through writings and



addressing this matter in appropriate forums, national level Leadership

Prayer Items

a) For a spirit filled godly visionary leadership in the church, who are committed to unitedly working in reaching the unreached.

b) For those under threats / attack, and that persecution would lead to a cleansing and revival in the body of Christ, which would enable her to be the salt and the light of the nation.

c) That God’s will be done in the ethnic conflict and there would be peace with justice.

Obstacles hindering to reach the goals

a) Resources b) General opposition to the gospel in the country Luke-warmness and disunity in the body of Christ



Swaziland

Ted Olsen, Dean Carlson, Xolisani Dlamini

The vision is called the Swaziland Evangelism Task. It started in 1992. At that time we invited 13 representatives from 10 different denominations. In 1994 the research project was launched. In 1995 a national congress was held.

We had to face a problem, because the leader was taken out of the project to become a minister. This ripped the heart out of the project. We lost a lot of momentum after the congress. We have planned a series of regional consultations in the last week of November to try to revitalize the vision for the nation. A lot of things are happening spontaneously, but at this point there is no identifiable national executive team.

We have no clear measure on the amount of churches planted at this point as we need to do a follow-up research to find out.

In Swaziland there are really no unreached people groups. The primary need, we found through the research, is urban Church-Planting. That is where most of the unreached regions are. The churches are not keeping up with the rapid urbanization. We might consider the Asian people as unreached people group, but they are very few.

There are various prayer networks. One of them is really involved in strategic spiritual warfare. These things need to be more developed. There are very powerful strongholds in the nation. There is a lot of syncretism, regular communication with spirits. 150 years ago, before they had even seen white people, the king of Swaziland had a vision of a pale-skinned man holding shiny disks in one hand and a book in the other. He then heard a voice telling him to look for the people with ‘the book’. So he did, and he found the white missionaries. Based on this vision of 150 years ago, some groups are now rallying the country in prayer festivals for the Swaziland.

Strength

At a denominational level, every denomination was represented at the congress and has accepted the vision; in the local churches, however, the project is hard to implement.

Impressions

At a denominational level a kind of unity is coming about. After 150 years, the church has refocused its attention on the primary task of advancing the gospel. We are aware that it is a vision from God and that He needs to do it.

There is so much unrealized potential. God has worked despite the disunity. The unity is not so strong anymore these last few years. If the believers would come together in greater unity, then we will see much more happening for the glory to God.

As the majority of churches are churches without building, the subject of house- cell-churches is quite relevant. This is especially true when one looks at the independent churches. So it is not so much an issue because they meet in houses, open air or other places than church buildings.



Prayer

Pray for a continuous unity in the church, that the Lord would enable leaders to boldly stand up for unity. We need a leader who can help to gather the nation again for a national strategy.

Pray that God would raise people with a vision at the grassroots: people who are active, do their own research etc.

Pray that there will be an environment where leaders can learn from one another, methodologies, mentoring, church planting techniques etc.

Population in 1995: 938,000

Ted Olsen: Box 21535, Helderkruin 1733, SOUTH AFRICA, [email protected]



Switzerland

Reinhold Scharnowski

Need for: 5,000 churches planted

The vision is called ‘Focusuisse’, standing for ‘focus on Switzerland,’ and started in 1988 when Wolfgang Fernandez came to Switzerland to present the DAWN vision to about 40 leaders. There is no specific duration of the project.

We do not yet have any specific goal agreed on by all. However, we do need 5,000 more churches to get Switzerland discipled. We do not know the size of the church exactly. In 1992 we found out that only 2.1% of the population was churched.

Since 1990, we estimate that around 150 churches have been started and around 25 have died. One third of the new plants are ethnic churches. They have been planted among Tamils, Africans, Koreans, Portuguese, Filipinos etc. Presently there are very few churches being planted, probably around 10 per year.

We brought the Church planters and prayer networks together which had not been connected until then. Through our publications we feed information to those prayer networks. A concrete outcome of all this is the national prayer day for leaders in Zurich which has been initiated by Focussuisse in 1996 and which is now being organized by the Evangelical Alliance.

Strength

It is hard to say what percentage of the church is involved in the project. It maybe only a quarter of all the denominations, but it's growing slowly as we are working towards more trust and cooperation.

Currently the target seems to be the youth as there is a trend to plant youth churches. We have not targeted any specific group of people or area.

Impressions

We still need to do a lot of sowing. We are not yet working together towards a commonly accepted goal but are preparing the ground for it:

by creating an atmosphere of expectation through the Friday Fax by giving encouraging in-depth-information on missionary models through the REPORT, the

bi-monthly FOCUSUISSE-magazine by providing information for church planters and praying partners through the Swiss Prayer

Map on which every town is visible with the number of churches and which will be updated and put on the internet soon

by encouraging churches to network on a local basis

We are strongly expecting that the Lord will bring up a national vision soon, which is carried by some acknowledged leaders.

We have a small FOCUSUISSE-leadership team consisting of 5 young leaders. Most of them



lead a task force: prayer, church planting, communication and research.

House- and cell-churches are definitely an issue. We strongly believe that alongside with the traditional churches we need new (old!), flexible, cheap and multipliable models of churches among which the cell and house churches are the most promising. Neighbour’s books had a great influence on young leaders.

Prayer

Pray that the spirit of individualism and pessimism is broken Pray that denominational and other leaders come together and start thinking aggressively and

evangelistically instead of peacefully and denominationally. Pray that we can build 5 evangelistic model city networks by the year 2000.

Reinhold Scharnowski: 8130 Tulip Tree Ct., 80920 Colorado Springs, CO, USA,

[email protected]



Taiwan

Rahn Strickler

Goal: 10% of the population in 10,000 churches by 2000

The project in Taiwan is called Year 2000 Gospel Movement and started in 1989.The CCOWE (Chinese Counsel of World Evangelism) was formed after Lausanne. They have plenary meetings every three years. They had one of those here in Taiwan and afterwards some of the denominations and their church leaders got together. They were really moved by the Lord and so 50 leaders came together for three days of prayer and fasting, asking the Lord how they were supposed to respond. This project was the answer.

In the year 2000 they would like to see 10% of Taiwan’s population in 10,000churches. They also have a goal to see 200 cross-cultural missionaries sent out from Taiwan. When we started the project we had 24 cross-cultural missionaries and now we just surpassed our goal! We are really excited about that. There are now 206 missionaries.

At the start of the project there were 2,500 churches and 350,000 believers. Now we have approximately 3,500 evangelical churches and 535,000 adult believers. So the adult church member population is now at 2.5%. Some groups want to include children and if we do that we come about 4.8% of the population right now.

The Hakka people is one of the least reached groups. One of the groups in the Year 2000 Gospel Movement is the Hakka Evangelistic Association and they are a coalition of denominations and other organizations that have targeted the Hakka people.

They have successfully launched a prayer movement and a renewal movement along with the numerical goals.

They started all night prayer meetings on new year’s eve and in May and June they had an Island wide prayer meeting. 20,000 people receive a prayer dispatch every week.

Through the prayer movement of AD 2000, prayer for Taipei was emphasized in 1995, and not long after that the Year 2000 Movement was able to start evangelistic bible studies in many high risers in the city of Taipei. So during lunch breaks, Christians gather together to pray, disciple one another and reach out. They were able to start over 300 of these prayer groups in the last 2 years. They were able to reach a lot of government people and professionals. It is a very exciting development. I think it is God’s direct response to this worldwide prayer effort.

Strength

We estimate that 85% of the evangelical churches at the denominational level are involved in this to some degree or another

The Hakka people are one of the least reached groups; they are about 13% of the population in Taiwan. One of the groups in the Year 2000 Gospel Movement is the Hakka Evangelistic Association and they are a coalition of denominations and other organizations that have targeted the Hakka people.

The Year 2000 Movement tithes its income and supports grassroots Church-Planting with that



money. In this way they have provided the money for the staff to get churches planted. There are still 3 counties that don’t have churches which they are targeting. Actually, the rural areas are largely unreached as well.

Impressions

The greatest impact this project has had is that it brought unity among the churches. I think that the churches are the most unified in the world. We have a great desire to see God work. We have a kind of leaders retreat every year. Last time there were about 90 denominational leaders and church leaders. They refocused their goals and they still believe that God can finish their goals.

We are very encouraged about the developments. We realize that is has to be God to really pull this off, as far as the 2,000,000 people in the 10,000 churches are concerned. We want to be ready when God breaks out.

We have a well functioning staff. The representatives of the denominations take their task seriously.

The cell church is a big issue. Singapore’s cell churches have a great influence here.

Prayer

Pray for the development at the grassroots level; that’s where lay leaders need to stand up! Pray against materialism and the expansion of Buddhism. Pray for the rise of an indigenous, contextualized approach in evangelism, Church-Planting and

Christian music.


(see http://new.ccea.org.tw/english/)



The Alliance for Saturation Church Planting

What is the Alliance for Saturation Church-Planting?

It is a coalition of 53 North American churches and mission agencies devoted to facilitating saturation church planting movements in the 27 countries of the former Soviet Union and Central/Eastern Europe.

Alliance Missions Statement

The Alliance exists to facilitate planting evangelical congregations in every community of Central-Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.

Alliance objectives

Facilitate widespread cooperation among the body of Christ in each nation around common goal ownership

Continuously recruit, involve and cast vision among active partners Establish national research functions Promote strategic prayer movements Establish resident facilitation teams Facilitate church planter training Help identify reproducible church planting models and encourage the sharing of these models Facilitate national cross-cultural missionaries Prepare nationals to take full responsibility for on-going training and the planting of churches Foster national ownership and resource national Progress during the year 1998

Churches planted by trainees: 634

New Teams

New Alliance Facilitation Teams have been established in Hungary, Slovakia, and Poland. The Albania team is being reformulated. We now have facilitation teams in 12 of the 27 countries of the region and itinerant teams functioning in 4 others.

New Church Planter Training Sites

Church planter training was initiated this year in Hungary, Serbia, Poland, Tajikistan, and Albania.

Romania Facilitation Team

The Facilitation Team in Romania is now led and staffed primarily by Romanians.

Central Asian Republics

Regional Resource Team members attended partnership consultations for the Central Asian Republics and now have much stronger contacts with the major players. Already asking for our



training materials, we believe that we will be making a significant contribution to that region in the next few years. With its training base in Tajikistan the Bible League is already training church planters for the region and is seeing new churches established in Muslim areas.

Internationalization

The Regional Resource Team is studying the possible forms that could facilitate inter-country saturation church planting facilitation within the region of Central/Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. We are already providing opportunities for the Facilitation Team comprised of Romanians to promote the saturation church planting vision in Hungary, Bulgaria and Slovakia.

Our long term vision is for an international fellowship of people from the region vision casting, sharing effective church planting models and facilitating toward saturation church planting goals.

Coalition for the Evangelization for Central/Eastern Europe

Don Crane participated with Pavle Cekov of New Eastern Europe for Christ, Larry Thompson of Campus Crusade, and Stuart McAllister of the European Evangelical Alliance in sponsoring a consultation for national and mission leaders from the region under the Hope for Europe Banner. The purpose was to promote the forming of partnerships for national initiatives aimed at the evangelization of each of the 12 countries of Central/Eastern Europe. The first consultation went well. A steering committee of three national leaders and three missionaries was established to carry on the work and prepare for next year’s consultation.

Church Planter Training Curriculum

The Curriculum Committee continues to make good progress in cooperation with Project 250. Manuals 1 to 5 are almost complete. The Committee still expects to complete the project by the end of 1998. Good reports are coming back from the areas where the curriculum is already being used.

The new manuals are already being used in Russia, Czech Republic, Serbia, Albania, and Hungary. They are currently being translated into Polish.

Plans for the coming year

Publish • A Saturation Church Planting Concept Book • The five manual Church Planter Training Curriculum • The prayer resource guide • Mentoring guidelines

Expand Into New Countries • Southern Baltics • Former Yugoslavia • Central Asian Republics • Southern Caucasus

Strengthen the Alliance Partnership (Of the 53 current partners fewer than 40% of them have an active role.)

Study DAWN movements in Africa and Latin America to learn transferable principles



Prayer Items

Pray for unity among the church leaders and missionaries. The divisions sap energy and vision from the church.

Pray for continued freedom to evangelize and plant churches. The established religions are opposed to the growth of evangelicals and are pressing their governments to pass restrictive laws.

Pray for a revival in the churches and a great mobilization of the laity. Without it we will not see significant growth.

Specific Obstacles

Disunity in the churches Non-reproducible models of church planting. Heavy dependence on western funds. Fortress mentality among many Christians Opposition from governments and established religions Little concept of stewardship among believers



Turkey In 1994 national leaders adopted the vision to plant a church in each of the country’s 75

districts. At that time only 12 of the districts had churches. By the end of last year churches had been planted in 20 of the districts and there are now believers in 6 more.



Zimbabwe

Xolisani Dlamini

Goal: 10,000 churches planted and 10,000 leaders trained by 2000

We called the vision Target 2000 and it all started in 1984/1985 when Jim Montgomery and Ted Olson came to Zimbabwe. The people themselves, however, caught the vision in 1986. In 1989 we started the research project, which we finished in 1991. In 1992 we had a great congress and more than 500 leaders came together from different churches. It was a historical conference, because there had been no unity among the leaders.

The goals are to see 10,000 churches planted and 10,000 leaders raised and trained by the year 2000. Through the research we discovered that there were already 10,000 fellowships or churches.

Since the congress, approximately 5,500 churches have been planted. 50% are planted in the urban regions and 50% are planted in the rural areas. People who plant churches in the rural areas face more problems than the people who plant churches in the urban regions.

The largest groups of unreached people are the Tonga people and the bushmen: 50% of them have now been reached. We need to look for partnerships with people who work already with the Muslims, Indians and Chinese people.

At the time I was doing the research I discovered that there was a real spiritual warfare going on, so I started to gather a group of prayer partners. They are individuals and churches that pray for the whole project and for me personally. We still need more people around the world to pray for us.

Strength

65% of the churches are behind the project of Target 2000. These churches are very active. We experience some opposition by the Catholics and the 7th Day Adventist churches and a little percentage in the Pentecostal churches.

Impressions

God has taken us so far and He has been faithful to this project. The church has grown tremendously. No one can write the history of the church in Zimbabwe and leave Target 2000 aside. It set a tremendous landmark in Zimbabwe and not only in Zimbabwe. The nearby countries in Southern Africa now come and ask us to help them. Zambia, Angola, South-Africa, Mozambique, and other countries want to implement this vision. A few weeks ago we had a meeting where we discussed this, because we want to be ready to go into these nearby countries, although we are short of financial resources. With the little that we have we want to go in partnership with those countries.

The project had a big impact because it was not only oriented to church planting but also biblically oriented. Discipling a whole nation involves not only preaching, it involves discipleship, not just soul winning but to disciple biblically. In church planting, discipleship and leadership, Target 2000 had a great impact.

I am the only one who works full time, but I have a team of 10 persons with whom I am



working. Five of them are very involved and faithful to the vision. In general, we have a good relationship with each other. Of course, there are some individuals who want to have their own agendas.

House- and cell-churches are spoken about. In May next year I am planning to hold a conference on cell-churches. Some churches don’t call themselves cell-churches but the idea is there. It needs to be motivated and cultivated.

Prayer

January 18-20, 1999, my whole team will have a retreat where we want to strategize for the final years for the Target 2000 project. Pray that God would provide the finances we need.

Pray for my personal physical recovering from the attack I suffered.

Next year we will really focus on 6 or 7 neighboring countries. Pray that God will raise up people there, that will catch the vision and be faithful to it.


Xolisani Dlamini: c/o Alan Avery, 3 Greendale Road Fortunes Gate, Bulawayo, ZIMBABWE



Documents

Global DAWN-Type Models