The Trumpet Call For The 11th Hour Laborers - 2024 Kenya Vision Trip
By Pastor Gary Ham
Two weeks ago, I completed a vision trip to Kenya in East Africa. A vision trip accomplishes important purposes for future mission trips. First, as a representative of Elim Bible Institute and College and Elim Fellowship, my primary reason for going to Kenya was to support the Manna Bible Institute and College Graduation ceremony in Nairobi and to participate in the celebration of the school’s 40 th Anniversary.
I had the distinct privilege of serving as the graduation speaker for over 300 Manna Bible school graduates. What a delight to see so many students successfully complete their education and training, many of them are already serving full time in gospel ministry. Furthermore, and quite unexpectedly, I was honored to have received from Manna Bible Institute and College an Honorary Doctorate Degree.​​
“the gospel of the kingdom being preached in the whole
world as a testimony to all the nations……”
(Matthew 24:14)
The second purpose of a vision trip is to enable one to see and learn what God is doing in a different part of the world to advance His Kingdom in the earth. The Pentecostal Evangelistic Fellowship of Africa, PEFA, is one of the largest Pentecostal church organizations in Kenya, and Manna Bible Institute and College is one of the schools which PEFA oversees.
Since its creation in 1962, PEFA has been steadily growing. Remarkably, PEFA Kenya has grown to over 2 million church members, 6 thousand pastors, serving in 74 regions throughout Kenya, and which is presided over by 60 bishops. Such numbers are a testament to what Philip Jenkins said in his book, the Coming of Global Christianity, 2002, “the center of gravity in the Christian world has shifted inexorably southward, to Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Already today, the largest Christian communities on the planet are to be found in Africa and Latin America. “
With the rapid growth of the PEFA Church has come a greater apostolic burden to reach the unreached and unevangelized beyond their regions and national boundaries. The leadership of PEFA strongly feels the tug of the Holy Spirit to reach out to other countries within the African continent, spreading the gospel to the lost and unreached.
So, what does this mean for the missionaries from the United States? Is there a role that we are to play in this global shift of Christianity? Should the unfinished task of world missions be left to what a leading missiologist refers to as the “Two-Thirds World Churches?” These are the kinds of questions which come to mind on a vision trip to Kenya.
Indeed, the role of the western missionary has changed within Kenya, from a lead role to more of a supportive role. However, on a global scale, there is an opportunity, which never has existed before, for global collaboration and partnership in missions.
With remarkable advances in technology and communications, more diverse and more qualified church leadership, the effectiveness of nontraditional approaches to evangelism and missions, and deeper sensitivity to cultural issues in missions, it makes partnerships and collaboration a better way to do missions.
It’s time for the Northern Hemisphere Church to link arms with the Southern Hemisphere Church to fulfill what Jesus said would be the essential mission of the Church that precedes His second coming, which is “the gospel of the kingdom being preached in the whole world as a testimony to all the nations…… (Matthew 24:14).”
According to the Joshua Project, there are 375 unreached people groups which total over 120 million people, residing on the continent of Africa. Somalia and Sudan, two countries neighboring Kenya, have populations that are over ninety percent unreached with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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Global partnerships will complete the unfinished task of world missions. God is bringing together His body, the Church, on a higher and greater scale of global unity and oneness so that we can produce a global harvest of souls before the coming of the Lord. As Church leaders have said, it will take “the Whole Church taking the Whole Gospel to Reach the Whole World.”
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This leads us to the final purpose of the vision trip to Kenya which is to build relationships. On various occasions as we met and discussed the future of PEFA and its vision for the future, two phrases were stated that summarized what was needed: to rebuild the bridges of relationship and re-dig the wells of evangelism and missions. I have learned over many years that unity, functional unity, requires work, commitment, and sacrifice. No matter how dynamic the vision is, without personal and committed relationships, partnerships will not work. A good and functional relationship, especially if it involves intercultural understanding, is not an end, but a journey. Overtime and as new generational leadership emerge, we must continue to cultivate and grow the common ground—mutual trust, shared vision and values, open communications, sacrificial love—and not merely assume that we have it.
Although, the road ahead seems daunting, it’s worth the sacrifice, the work and effort, to win for Jesus Christ the souls which He has died and ever lives for.​​​​​​
