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We Share The GospelDiscipleship occurs through the long-term relationships that are formed as the Floresta staff works with community leaders. The good news of Jesus is woven into much of what we do, but through the process of discipleship, people grow in their faith, and become servant leaders in their communities.
Floresta emphasizes discipleship rather than simply evangelism. We do this for several reasons. For one, we have seen far too many cases of agencies doing crusades or outreaches with no follow-up. Dozens of decisions for Christ are recorded, but no one stays around to explain or model the radical, life-changing implications of the gospel. A grim reminder of this comes in considering that Rwanda had the highest percentage of Christians in Africa, before the genocide
We also emphasize discipleship because the nature of our work permits us to have a long-term relationship with people. We are likely to be working with the people of a particular village for ten to twelve years. This provides the perfect opportunity to assist in the spiritual growth of both community and church leaders. Finally, we partner with local churches, and through discipleship we are able to empower the body of believers and assist church members to reach out to their neighbors in new and vital ways.
Of course, we are very clear that participation in the spiritual activities of Floresta is not a requirement to receive our services. The love and the opportunities and we are sharing are unconditional. We do not want anyone to feel coerced by their poverty to accept something that is not in their heart. At the same time we make it easy for people to seek out the gospel and understand the source of our love.
Each local team (Haiti, Mexico and the Dominican Republic) has a field chaplain who coordinates our outreach, but one of the primary roles of the field chaplain is equipping the staff itself so that each one can effectively communicate the gospel. Our methods of outreach include the following:
We weave spiritual truth into our regular teaching on agriculture, on business, on leadership and on land stewardship. For example, Col. 3:23 (Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men,) might be used introduce a topic on business.
In each country we are developing a Bible study, which is available for those who want to go deeper. Ideally volunteers who receive their training from the field chaplain will lead this.
We have an ongoing discipleship program for our staff, to nurture them spiritually, so that they are better prepared to minister to those around them.
We make an effort to reach out to the local churches, to strengthen, serve and partner with them.
We disciple promising leaders through seminars and one-on-one meetings, so that they can be truly Christ-like in their leadership.
We are starting to see results from this program, manifested in changed lives, and we look forward to seeing more.