Author: Steinar Opheim

First ever GO Equipped! course in Sweden

/ Steinar Opheim

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For the first time ever the GO Equipped Tentmaking course will be run in Sweden later this month. Swedish leaders believe this can be the starting point of a Swedish tentmaking movement.

“Several churches and organizations are speaking about tentmaking, and some of the leaders will attend the course to learn more. Afterwards we will sit down and discuss how we can work together to promote tentmaking in Sweden,” says Stefan Rizell. He is the mission leader at Smyrnakyrkan, in downtown Göteborg, and the primus motor behind the tentmaking course that will run from October 30th through November 3rd.

“I attended the GO Equipped course in Bergen in May this year and the teaching went beyond my expectations. Now I am looking forward to seeing many people from Sweden experience the same teaching,” Rizell says.

He is sure that the course can benefit all Christians, whether they are thinking of going to another culture or planning to stay at home.

“The central part of the course deals with how we can, in a natural and loving way, make Jesus known to the people around us in our everyday lives. It is very important that we help everyone in our congregations see themselves as God’s representatives where they are.  At the same time, the course focuses on cross-cultural ministry. In our globalized world, tentmakers can bring the gospel to places where traditional missionaries usually do not have access,” says Rizell.

2 Hour FREE Info Seminar
before the course

If you are undecided on whether you should attend the full course, there is a free 2 hour information seminar on Wednesday 30 October at 18:30 at Smyrna Church in Göteborg. at Tentmaking Sweden

30 people signed their own ”death sentence”

/ Steinar Opheim

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30 Nigerian Christians answered yes when they were asked to go as tentmakers into an area where their lives will be constantly at risk.

Nigeria Evangelical Mission Association (NEMA) aims to recruit, train and send out 15,000 tentmakers by 2020. Most of them will go to what can spiritually be regarded as the toughest places on the planet.

In August, tentmaking was the main subject when NEMA arranged its annual conference in Lagos. For everyone attending it became perfectly clear that many of the Nigerian Christians will hold nothing back as they live and work to expand God’s kingdom. One incident at the conference showed to the full extent the total commitment many of the believers have to Jesus.

Difficulties

It all started when one of the speakers invited people from the audience to join him in his work. He had come from a highly sensitive, far away nation and from the podium he shared openly about the suffering and persecution he and his co-workers were facing.

“Many people have died around me – expatriate workers as well as local believers. In many ways I feel like the last man standing,” he said. He shared that the kingdom results are scarce, but things are happening on a small scale. ”Even if this is a dangerous ministry, I believe that God may call one or two of you here today to come and join us. Are you willing to come?” the tentmaker asked.

When the person leading the meeting took over, he repeated the invitation. “Will those of you who feel that this can be a calling for you please come forward,” he said.

Death sentence

It was quiet for a little while. Then one person stood up and walked forward. Then another one. And another one. In the end, around thirty people were on the move towards the podium.

“I hope you are aware that you are in many ways signing your own death sentence by accepting this invitation. Are you really willing to do this?” the leader asked.

Some of the people in front of the podium were crying. Others were kneeling on the floor in praise and prayer.  After a while, they were all led to the side of the conference room where they received the first instructions for what was ahead of them.

“It is amazing to meet this kind of commitment for the Lord,” commented one Western leader who was present at the conference.

Several Nigerian mission leaders have said that they sense that Christians from their own nation have a special call to take the Gospel to the toughest places in the world. “We experience persecution here in our own nation. Through this, God has prepared us for the tough treatment and persecution we may meet elsewhere,” one of the leaders said.

Global network puts tentmaking high on its agenda

/ Steinar Opheim

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One of the world´s largest evangelical networks puts tentmaking in focus when it gathers 300 leaders for a worldwide consultation in India next week. One whole day of the four-day conference program will center on tentmaking and marketplace ministry.

“Tentmaking has not been given so much space since the Lausanne Conference in Manila in 1989,” rejoices Berit Helgoy Kloster. She is the senior associate for tentmaking in the worldwide Lausanne Movement that hosts the leadership consultation in India. For four decades she has worked to promote tentmaking both in her home nation, Norway, and through various international networks. Many times she has felt that she has been working against strong headwinds.  Now she senses that something new is happening.

Waking up

“The emphasis given to tentmaking and marketplace ministry at the conference in India shows that people are beginning to wake up and see the strategic importance of tentmakers in the worldwide mission force. Tentmakers can go everywhere, including to nations and places where traditional missionaries do not have access,” says Kloster to TMBrief.

The leaders attending next week’s conference in India will work on following up the Cape Town Commitment that was made by the Lausanne movement at a worldwide conference in South Africa in the fall of 2010. At that conference more than 4000 Christians from all over the world came together to form a document that could give direction to the global mission work. Tentmaking is mentioned in several paragraphs in the text. 

Focus on tentmaking

“Christians in many skills, trades, businesses and professions can often go to places where traditional church planters and evangelists may not. What these ‘tentmakers’ and business people do in the workplace must be valued as an aspect of the ministry of local churches,” states the Cape Town Commitment before it goes on to urge church and mission leaders to focus on tentmaking through the following paragraphs:

“We urge church leaders to understand the strategic impact of ministry in the workplace and to mobilize, equip and send out their church members as missionaries into the workplace, both in their own local communities and in countries that are closed to traditional forms of gospel witness. We urge mission leaders to integrate ‘tentmakers’ fully into the global missional strategy.”

The forgotten illness in development work

/ Steinar Opheim

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They are viewed as crazy and are often kept chained in cages. Many times they have to live as outcasts or they are kept hidden in order not to bring shame to their families. Still, the mentally ill have been forgotten in international development work. Medical doctors who go as tentmakers may make a difference.

Manmaya Taman in Nepal is one of these mentally ill people. 18 years ago she was locked up in a small room. Since then she has been treated like an animal. She has been allowed to leave her little shack only two times a day in order to go to the toilet.

“I was forced to lock her up. Even after spending a great deal of money on medicine she did not get better. She was creating a lot of trouble in our village,” says Manmaya´s former husband, Til Bahadur Tamang, to the Nepali newspaper Kantipur Daily.

Forgotten victims

Manmaya Tamang is not unique. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), most people with mental illnesses do not receive proper treatment. The treatment available is worst in poor nations. WHO indicates that depression will be the most common disease worldwide in a few years.

Coordinator Michelle Funk in WHO Mind says that the development organizations have let down the mentally ill.

“People with mental illnesses are often victims of violence and abuse because no one is protecting them. They also have no political or civil rights. When they are not included in our fight for human rights, they will lose the chance of getting an education and work,” says the WHO Mind-coordinator.

Total change

Matrika Devkota in Nepal is one of the lucky ones who did receive help. When he was 15, he got the first signals that he was depressed. The illness got worse, and from age 19 he lived in total isolation inside his high caste family.

“People around me thought I was tormented by evil spirits. Even today people with mental illnesses are often seen as possessed,” he says.

One day Matrika Devkota got in touch with a development worker who made the correct diagnosis and gave him the right medication. His situation changed totally and today he is running an organization focusing on helping people with mental illnesses.