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The last few posts have been more instructive about the process of what to do to begin partnering with a National Apostolic Visionary to pursue movements. We wanted to focus on the first few practical steps in partnering with NAVs, as we feel there is a lack of training around how to start. However, as you get into a ministry partnership, there are numerous movement resources to help you think through, plan, and implement movement practices in your field. You can see the Resources page for some of these movement resources.

We will probably have more posts about Being Barnabas in the future, but for now, we wanted to shift gears from practical instruction to illustrate the relational dynamic that we have with our partners and what we’ve heard from other CPM practitioners about their partnership with NAVs. Sometimes we can get caught up in “catalyzing things” and miss the people that we are supposed to be loving and serving. What could be a beautiful image of partnership in the gospel with a NAV quickly becomes something evil and prideful when we are manipulating people towards a ministry goal instead of loving them and authentically serving them towards a mutual vision from God.

One of the best descriptions we’ve heard of the relational dynamic between a movement practitioner outsider and a national partner insider was given by a national partner in South Asia. He broke down Paul’s relationship with the Thessalonians, and in particular focused on 1 Thessalonians 2:7-12.

But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children. So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us.

For you remember, brothers, our labor and toil: we worked night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you, while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God. You are witnesses, and God also, how holy and righteous and blameless was our conduct toward you believers. For you know how, like a father with his children, we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.

1 Thessalonians 2:7-12

He highlighted the metaphors Paul uses to reflect the depth of their love and care towards the Thessalonians, “like a nursing mother…” and “like a father with his children.” Ultimately, the relationship is summarized in the words, “we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves.” This is the level of depth and unity that a true partnership in the gospel can birth.

Instead of just telling you what aspects we think are important for you to have in a ministry partnership with a NAV, we wrote a few short stories from our experiences with our partners to illustrate what it could look like. We aspire to have the type of partnership that Paul had with the Thessalonians, likely reflected from his relationship with Barnabas. Despite differences in age, culture, experience, or language, we believe that we have oneness with Christ, which therefore means we have a oneness and unity with other brothers and sisters in Christ (John 17:21). We hope that Barnabas’ example, Jesus’ exhortation, and some illustrations from our relationship with our friends would encourage you to humbly serve, sacrifice, and invest your lives to see national brothers and sisters multiply the gospel to those who have never heard.

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Being Family Together
_Steven

After one very long ministry trip to a neighboring province, Mint, Jenn, and I arrived back late at her house where her Mom had cooked dinner. Everyone else had eaten a few hours ago, but the three of us ravenously devoured mom’s epic fried chicken and gaeng som, an insanely spicy and sour southern Thai curry. From the beginning, we had made a habit of going to Mint’s house and eating her mom’s food after every training.

When I asked for seconds of rice, Mint’s mom broke into a big smile and chuckled. I looked at Mint who was also smiling. I asked, “Why’s your mom smiling?” Mint said, “she’s smiling because you finally stopped being polite and asked for more food!” Whenever we see Mint’s mom, she greets us with “​​ลูก! เป็นยังไงบ้าง?” – which means, “my children! How are you?”

Later on, Mint’s brother-in-law told me, “we’ve had other people from churches or groups try to come and help us or run a training. But whenever the training was over, they would keep to themselves or go off and do their own thing. We knew that you cared about us and not just what we did because you guys always came over for dinner.” He always greets me with a big smile and a big hug, and asks me when I’m going to lose the 10 pounds I told him I would lose.

_______

Celebrating Fruitfulness Together
_Jenn

In 2019, Mint’s ministry began to bear fruit, and quickly. Our memories of that year are mostly a blur as we tried to keep up with all that God was doing. Most weeks, we traveled with Mint as she visited new believers and churches, energized by weekly reports of salvations, baptisms, and healings. Though we were so excited, we were also incredibly tired!

To take a breath, we planned a small prayer retreat at an airbnb in Bangkok. We asked Mint to take a pause for a couple of days so that we could pray together, listen for guidance from the Holy Spirit, and plan out our next goals.

On the first day, I handed Mint a sheet of paper and asked her to write what she had seen God do, what she was thankful for, and to draw a generation map of where the ministry was currently at. She prayed silently for a moment, listening to the Holy Spirit. And then she started to draw. New churches were represented by a circle, and a dotted circle delineated a Discovery Bible Study group. Circles began covering the first, then the second, and then the third page as she drew out how God had been moving. She shared with us story after story of people whose lives had turned from darkness to light. Tears of joy and gratitude fell freely from all of us as we realized how God had been working.

I asked Mint, “how do you feel about all of this?”

She replied, “I’m nothing special. I never thought God could use me like this.” 

Before we shifted toward setting goals, we had a time of listening prayer, asking God to speak into our plans. As I listened, the Holy Spirit put a Thai worship song on my mind that I had only heard once or twice. Unsure with what to do with this word, I asked Mint, “do you know this song? Maybe we can sing it?”

A huge smile came across her face. “This is the song God used to call me to be a church planter!” In God’s kindness and wisdom, He brought to my mind a song that was significant in reminding Mint of His faithfulness when she first started this new ministry. As Mint’s ministry began to multiply, the song took on new meaning as our celebration of God’s fulfillment of His promises!

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Suffering Together
_Steven

After the first 5 house churches were planted, Mint’s ministry took off. Before we met her, she spent 2 years of difficult laboring to get to her first house church of about 15 people. 7 months after our first training with her team, there were 70 new believers and 5 house churches. 3 months later, 120 new believers and 12 house churches. We were traveling constantly with her throughout her region to train new church planters and follow up with new believers.

But with the highs of fruitfulness also came the lows of resistance and trial. During one coaching meeting, she shared with us that some new believers had gotten into a dispute about money with another believer in the church. Even though Mint tried to resolve the conflict, the new believers decided to leave the church without a word. Instead, they simply left their Bibles on Mint’s doorstep and disappeared.

Mint was devastated.

She said, “it wasn’t just that they rejected us, but that they rejected Jesus too.”

She also told us that this same month, her dad had decided to leave them in the northeast and move back down south to his second wife. Mint’s mom had just baptized him a few months before.

We sat in silence and mourned together with her. And with as much feeling and intention as we could convey in our limited Thai, we prayed for Mint and asked God to be her comfort.

________

The first time I hugged Mint after three years of working together was in the hospital. We were in a province I had never been before to help train some new church planters that Mint had raised up. Upon arriving to the hotel after a 6 hour drive, Jenn had multiple seizures and was taken to the hospital in an ambulance.

After texting my teammates to pray, the first person I called was Mint, searching for the Thai words to explain “faint, unconscious, seizure.” She told me to tell the hotel to call an ambulance and was there in 10 minutes next to me as Jenn started her 3rd seizure.

We rode in the front of the ambulance together; I remember that Mint was carrying Jenn’s shoes for her. When we were getting ready to move from the government hospital to the international hospital, Mint disappeared for 10 minutes and came back with the bill paid. She wouldn’t let me pay her back.

Around midnight as the hospital was closing, I went to the lobby where Mint and some of her teammates had been waiting for almost 6 hours. With tears in my eyes, I told them thank you for being with me that day, and I gave Mint a hug. For context, Thai culture isn’t very touchy as they ‘wai’ each other instead of hugging or handshaking, and Mint in particular isn’t a touch person. Jenn and I aren’t sure if we’ve even seen Mint hug her own family. But it felt like we had been through something significant and intense together and a ‘wai’ just wouldn’t suffice; she was there with us through one of the worst days of our lives.

The next day, she ran the training for the new church planters by herself and was back at the hospital to see Jenn. 

After we were gone from Thailand for almost 2 years for Jenn’s treatment in the States, we came back to see her and it was like things just picked up right where they left off. Mint gives Jenn a hug now almost every time we see her.

________

Encouraging Towards Jesus Together
_Jenn

Two days after my seizure, Talia sent a text to me and Steven.

“Last night, I had a dream about Jenn. I was really worried and woke up early to pray for her. Jenn, please don’t work too hard!” 

To that point, we hadn’t updated most of our Thai friends about what had happened, and I was recovering in a hospital ICU. It still blows our minds that the Holy Spirit had alerted her of my situation from hundreds of miles away.

After Steven told her the news, Talia responded immediately:

“Jenn, I thank God that we are going through these situations. Everything that happens is in God’s control and in his care. I believe we will see and understand His promises much more, together.”

At the time Talia texted this to me, she was incredibly sick herself. For months, she had been fighting constant weakness and nausea, eventually ending up bedridden from hyperthyroidism, with doctors unable to figure out a medical plan. For the next two years the Lord knit our hearts to each other for a season of suffering and sickness that we would weather together. 

While we fought our respective battles, Talia and I texted constantly. One of the terrible effects of sickness is isolation and loneliness. With brain cancer, no one else was able to experience what my body was going through the way I did. I didn’t have the energy to explain my experiences and the storm of emotions in my heart. But Talia and I had each other – no explanations needed.

We shared with each other verses about God’s promises in suffering, frustrations with sickness, the painful words of people around us, and pictures of new clothes we needed for our changing bodies.

As Talia’s condition worsened, she expressed to me that I had become one of the few people who she felt understood by and who encouraged her. I felt exactly the same. The lessons that she was receiving from the Lord mirrored the things that I was learning. I once asked her, has God given you any promises during this season of suffering?

She said, “God has given me a vision that he will heal me and that I’ll return to my former strength! And that many people will believe in him through my testimony. I want to spend the time I have left to serve him and share the gospel and my story to as many people as I can!” 

625 days after my seizure, we reunited with Talia in Thailand. Although our bodies were exhausted and changed from 2 years of disease and treatment, we were overjoyed to be on the other side of a season of sickness and to meet face to face again. Meeting together also gave us renewed focus and resolve to take the lessons that God had been teaching us through sickness and move forward with His work in Thailand.

When we first launched to Thailand, we knew that our role was to partner with Thai leaders to help them complete the vision God had given them. What I didn’t expect was that God would give me someone that would understand what I was going through better than almost anyone in my most difficult season, despite being across an ocean and a language barrier. I had in mind to have a close relationship with a partner in the ministry, but my good Father knew that what I needed was a dear sister and friend to encourage me in Christ.

I’m confident that God had me and Talia go through our treatment seasons together to reflect to each other what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 1: 

Blessed be the… God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God… Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again.

2 Corinthians 1:3-4, 9-10

As we head into 2024, here are our top 5 most read posts of 2023!

1. Why Be Barnabas?
2. 625 Days and Talia’s Story
3. Lessons from Cancer: Suffering Leads to Surrender
4. Team Conflict
5. Lessons from Cancer: Surrender the Self to the Point of Death

We have a lot on deck for next year, including the last few posts for the Be Barnabas series, as well as other posts about personal and team thriving. In 2024, we hope to connect with even more missions leaders to learn from and share lessons with; we’d love to connect with you personally! Please reach out at contact@missionsleaders.com. We hope you have a great Christmas / New Year’s season!

We hope this poem from Amy Carmichael will encourage you to continue in the way of Jesus, even through all of the ups and downs.

Thy Way is Perfect by Amy Carmichael

Long is the way, and very steep the slope;
Strengthen me once again, O God of Hope.

Far, very far, the summit doth appear;
But Thou art near, my God, but Thou art near.

And Thou wilt give me with my daily food,
Powers of endurance, courage, fortitude.

Thy way is perfect; only let that way
Be clear before my feet from day to day.

Thou art my Portion, saith my soul to Thee,
Oh, what a portion is my God to me!

From time to time, we’ll update some about our personal lives and ministry here in Thailand. This past weekend, we had the opportunity to travel through the mountains to meet up with one of our closest Thai partners, Talia (name changed for security purposes).

We’re planning to post about our past season of cancer treatment, how we experienced Jesus in that, and the difficult lessons God was giving throughout all of it. Just 12 months ago, while Jenn was in the middle of cancer treatment, I wasn’t sure if we’d be able to continue in the ministry, return to Thailand, or what in the world God had in store for us. We were burnt out, battered, discouraged, lost at sea with no port to return to.

As we were taking the 3-hour drive through the mountains, it hit me that the last time I was taking this kind of drive was the day of Jenn’s seizures that revealed her brain tumor – March 19, 2021.

625 days.

625 days after the scariest day of our lives, He allowed us another opportunity to continue in what He has called us to.

625 days might not seem like a long time for some people, as it’s about 3 months shy of 2 years. And I’m sure it has been a long 2 years for many others. But it was the longest and most difficult 625 days that we’ve ever experienced, and we’re immensely grateful and humbled to be able to continue serving in the ministry we love, in the country we love, with the people we love.

We had such a great two days catching up with Talia! After 1.5 years apart, we got to share in beautiful mountain views, good coffee, and delicious Thai food. But more importantly, we shared with each other similar lessons that God had been teaching all of us through the past season of sickness and suffering.

Talia has an amazing story: after coming to faith, she was passionate about serving God and immediately participated in a church plant. After she got married to her husband John, they moved and eventually joined a church that ended up being a Christian cult. The pastor told them that they could not teach from the Bible, serve in the church, or generally do anything other than show up on Sundays if they were not ‘anointed,’ and the only people who were anointed were those that he picked who had given enough money to the ‘church’ (meaning: to him directly). After a few years trying to endure and acquiesce with the leader’s demands, Talia and her husband realized that what the pastor was saying didn’t line up with what the Bible was saying, and decided to leave that church. They left discouraged and worn out after struggling in that church for 3-4 years.

As they looked around online for another church, they got connected with one of the church planting leaders from the church network that we partner with, who invited Talia and John to one of our quarterly CPM trainings.

When Jenn and I met them, we didn’t know their backstory at all. They actually seemed quite skeptical, asking a lot of questions about obedience to the Word and who has authority in the church. Eventually, they invited me and Jenn to train them and a few other believers in their province, so we went to visit and train them about a month later.

Their demeanor towards us was totally different than the first time – and Talia especially seemed filled with passion and excitement. Our very first vision casting and training is from the Great Commission – that there are 4 commands (go, make disciples, baptize, teach them to obey), and 2 promises (Jesus has all authority, and he will be with us always). For me, I tend to receive the promise that Jesus will be with me as an encouragement. But with our Thai church planters, the promise they cling to is that Jesus has all authority. For Talia, hearing that Jesus has all authority and gives her the command to make disciples was like releasing a river that had been stopped up by a dam for 4 years. She was ready to GO.

Reports began coming in from their area of healings, demons being cast out, new believers coming to faith, new groups of believers formed. Talia was texting us with ministry reports from different areas all around her province and beyond. The next quarterly training we had, she brought along a team of 6 other people to join along.

At one point, Talia and John and their disciples were baptizing several new believers, and some of the members from the previous cult came to harass them. They said, ‘You’re not anointed! You’re not a pastor! Who says that you have the authority to baptize? This isn’t a real baptism.’

And Talia, who I imagine and believe was filled by the Holy Spirit with boldness, replied: ‘The Bible says that Jesus has all authority and that he has given us authority to make disciples and to baptize them in his name!’ And they continued with the baptism.

All seemed to be going well, but we weren’t able to visit Talia’s province for several months as it was one of the hardest hit by Covid restrictions in Thailand. When we reconnected with her at the end of 2020, we heard about multiple areas and multiple generations of churches being planted! But we also heard why we weren’t able to get in touch with her.

5 months before, she was diagnosed with cancer. She was given months to live by the doctor. She said she couldn’t even look at her two young children without breaking down, overwhelmed by the thought of leaving them without a mother and her husband without a wife. At one point, she told us that she had thought, “It’d be better for everyone if I just died. Then my family will get the life insurance money and I won’t have to deal with the suffering.” She said the only thing that kept her going during this time was that there were new believers coming to faith every week through her disciples.

As she hit her breaking point, she asked John to take care of the kids for a few days and locked herself in her office. And she described the experience of that 3 days as ‘the closest to heaven that I’ve ever been.’ She simply worshipped, read the Word, and prayed with Jesus – and surrendered the outcome of her health, life, family, and ministry to him.

3 weeks later, Talia’s sister, who is a nurse in Bangkok, asked her to come get checked up at one of the best hospitals in the country. And when they did the scans – the cancer was gone.

God had healed her.

As we listened to her story in that coffee shop, we rejoiced with her over the new brothers and sisters that had come to faith, cried together over the suffering she had been through, and planned together towards how to help the new streams of churches continue in health and fruitfulness.

But we didn’t get to follow through with any of those plans. A few months later in April 2021, we were being repatriated on a plane back to the States for surgery, radiation, and chemo. And Talia continued to struggle with debilitating health issues over the next year as the hardest spike of Covid closed down any ability to do ministry in person in Thailand for over a year. But as Talia and Jenn went through over a year of medical treatments, they were both texting and praying for each other and mutually encouraging through the lessons God was teaching them about surrendering in suffering.

None of us can guess at the timing of significant health problems hitting at the same time as Covid lockdown, effectively stunting an emerging work of multiplication. To be honest, the person I was 625 days ago might have worried about that. But experiencing a new freedom, a new humility, a newness of resurrection life from the breaking down of this past season has just given me gratitude that we get to be back in Thailand, serving God and pursuing the Great Commission with our Thai friends. And seeing Talia renewed with passion, faith, vision makes me confident that a powerful work of God is around the corner for Thailand.

When we saw Talia this past weekend, she said this: ‘Jenn – I believe that we were sick together, to encourage each other and understand each other, and now to be healed together. But now is a time for us to เริ่มต้นใหม่ – a time to start anew.’

625 days is just shy of two years for most people. But for Talia, Jenn, and myself, it’s a new start; God giving back to us our lives and the opportunity to do ministry.

Please continue to pray for Talia as she has lingering effects from the medical issues of the past season and will need to get a corrective surgery in about 3 months. Pray also for her disciples and churches in 5 different areas as they continue to move forward in a vision for multiplication!

For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me. Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell. I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account. Convinced of this, I know that I will remain and continue with you all, for your progress and joy in the faith, so that in me you may have ample cause to glory in Christ Jesus, because of my coming to you again.

Philippians 1:21-26