Nurture Program: Training Effective Goers & Senders

At Bethlehem Baptist Church we realize that it is the church's responsibility to recruit, equip, confirm, and affirm some of our best people in order to send them out as cross-cultural missionaries. We want to do what we can as a local church to equip them to effectively communicate the gospel of Jesus Christ in cultures where

1. there is no indigenous evangelizing church yet planted, or
2. the indigenous church does not yet have sufficient resources and personnel to evangelize their own people in an effective way, or
3. the indigenous church has not yet matured to the point of sending and supporting their own missionaries to other unreached people groups.

Bethlehem's Nurture Program for Missionary Candidates
In regard to preparation for cross-cultural ministry, we have the benefit of learning from both missions history and recent studies on the successes and failures of missionaries. Based upon these, and the mandates of God's Word, we perceive there to be three key dimensions in which the missionary candidate needs to develop with the help of the local church. Each dimension has Action Points (e.g., readings, courses, and practicums) that correspond to it. These Action Points are the minimum of what Bethlehem's Foreign Missions Committee (FMC) requires before they will consider a candidate's application and recommend a candidate to the church for financial support and commissioning.

Read more about the Nurture Program.