The entire context of the New Testament is one of multiplication. All healthy believers and churches will multiply. The multiplication of disciples is crucial in the formula for multiplication and that places the onus on the leader to be making disciples. If pastors and leaders are not spiritually healthy than unhealthy, with no multiplication, is what will be normal in churches as well.

As I share about the ministry of Missionary Care, I often talk about how our care team is helping serve our missionary families. But who exactly is our care team? Well, all of us at BMA Global. Every individual serving through our missions ministry is on the care team.

In April 2024, a BMMI medical team traveled to Colombia where the group served alongside local pastors and church planters, hosting clinics in the port city of Puerto Inirida and in remote villages along the Orinoco River. The main goal of BMMI is to connect people in the community to the local church, introducing people to Christ while assisting with their health.

Short-term trips are intentional journeys to serve with a missionary and provide assistance in a project or ministry, serve the local church, share the gospel, build relationships, and foster cross-cultural understanding. More often than not, the person taking the trip is much more impacted than the ones they go to serve.

The Christian journey was never intended to be an isolated one. The call to make disciples gives clarity to our need for one another. In a similar fashion, scripture tells us the church is one body made up of many parts. One body represents the unity of MISSION. Many parts represent the MEANS.  God’s plan and design is that we work together, using our God given gifts, talents, and ability to further his mission.

Imagine believing in God, but not actually trusting that what he says is true. Instead, you proclaim to believe in God, but when something bad happens, you wonder what you did wrong. Maybe you start to doubt God’s goodness and faithfulness. Maybe you start to doubt that God is sovereign over all. Maybe you start to let the doubt take over and before you know it, God is not Lord of your life. 

In this region, people are consumed with the prospect that their gods can give them something; perhaps money and wealth, good health or healing, a better job, or a visa to a western country. They believe that if they please their gods enough, perhaps they will be blessed with these various things. 

Have you ever considered the challenge of spreading the gospel across Europe? It's an incredibly diverse continent with 44 unique countries, each with its own language, cuisine, music, literature, and culture. It's easy to overlook the importance of understanding and respecting each country's culture when we're trying to reach out to them.

There certainly are several cultural barriers here in the United States, and the trends we are observing right now point towards the reality of spiritual darkness increasing and progressively getting worse, not better. That is not intended to cause us to wave a white flag of surrender but instead to understand the depth of the conflict and the need for prayer in the midst of spiritual warfare.

When you think of church planters serving in the hardest-to-reach places, are you imagining Americans moving to those places, learning the local language, building relationships and planting a church? Unfortunately, in most cases that’s not a real possibility. Let’s first consider the realities of those hardest-to-reach places and how those realities affect our strategy as Americans to reach the people living there.

My daughter had fallen in love with this little girl that we took in, along with her mother, here in Thailand. At that time Ava’s dad had left them, but later the mom left little Ava as well. It was heartbreaking. 

Our view of culture many times is the same. We really do not understand culture, even our own culture . . . we just swim in it. For this reason, often we are unknowingly dominated by our culture. The greater culture infiltrates our churches in ways contrary to scripture. We do not know how to speak the gospel into current culture, and we are imprisoned in antiquated methods that reflect a culture from times gone by.

Since 1950, BMA missionaries have been sent to foreign fields, leaving a legacy of faith, perseverance, and obedience to the call to serve. Sometimes those fields are fraught with danger, but the men and women of the BMA are more likely to run into the fire rather than away from it. Why? Because that’s where the lost souls are.

Honoring our legacy missionaries is a priority for BMA Global, and whether deceased or alive, learning from their lives and ministries is important to their incredible legacies. Through family testimonies, archived articles, and ministry partner stories, understanding the ongoing work in their former fields impacts future generations.

In 1973, a visionary leader named Prakash Guruputra and his wife Susheela embarked on a journey as a missionary to India, armed with deep faith and burning desire to serve his community. Hailing from a small village in India he established a church planting ministry, children’s home for the needy, and Christian school, all of which had a profoundimpact on the community.