The Great Commission occurs at the end of all four Gospels and at the start of Acts. Two of these texts (Matthew 28:19 and Luke 24:47) say we are to make disciples of all the ethnicities (panta ta ethne), and two (Luke 24:47 and Acts 1:8) say we are to do this starting where we are. As we reach the world – which has moved to our doorsteps – we are fulfilling three of the five texts of the Great Commission.
GoodroeThe most helpful resource I have found for doing this is Ethnic America Network (EAN), housed at the Billy Graham Center in Wheaton, Ill. We are bringing EAN’s North American Ethnic Ministries Summit to Spartanburg in 2012.
Although I have been doing ethnic ministry since becoming a director of missions more than 10 years ago, I had not heard of EAN or the summit until the church multiplication director for the South Carolina Baptist Convention took me to the 2005 summit in Dallas. (Cooperative Program dollars paid my conference fee.) We had ethnic ministries here in South Carolina, but this is where I first heard about multiethnic ministry. We had residents in Spartanburg from more than 70 countries, but most of these populations were too small for a congregation of just their own ethnicity. It was at the summit that the Lord gave me the vision for a multiethnic church here. That church exists today, and is called Kaleidoscope.
The 2005 summit stressed that a multiethnic church must have at least three ethnicities on its leadership team, and it was late 2008 before we had these. In 2009, CP funds paid the airfare for five leadership team members from Kaleidoscope to attend the March 2009 summit in Phoenix. Six months later, we launched Kaleidoscope Multiethnic Fellowship as a Sunday-evening congregation. Most weeks, Kaleidoscope has at least eight ethnicities in attendance. We are especially reaching international college students here. One from Rwanda was saved last spring. One from Taiwan has led a chronological Bible-storying group in her dorm room at Converse College this school year, and now they have begun a worship service on campus.
At the 2009 summit, the Lord opened the door for us to host the 2012 summit here in Spartanburg. South Carolina Baptists have been a vital part of that process. The two ministers in the SCBC multiethnic group have been in many of our summit planning meetings, as has their associate executive director and the interim director for missions mobilization. The multiethnic group director attended the 2010 summit with us in Boston and chairs the ethnic liaison task force for our summit.
The Lord has provided a 5,000-seat venue for our summit. We expect at least 3,000 in the three-night multiethnic worship services, which are free and open to the public. We expect the SCBC to be one of the corporate sponsors (at $5,000) which makes these free services (and nursery) possible. The daytime sessions are by paid registration, and include at least 15 seminars on 13 tracks.
Such a venture requires mammoth technical and administrative support, and CP funds are providing these services. SCBC website strategist Judy Ramsey has been building our website (www.interculturalnetworkcarolina.org). Roger Orman is publications task force chair for our summit, and the SCBC will provide our printing in-house at cost of materials. Orman said the SCBC is pleased to be a partner in providing services and materials to help promote the event.
Cooperative Program funds have also enabled The Baptist Courier to provide continuing coverage of the summit planning process since the first vision-casting meeting in July 2009. The SCBC multi-ethnic group was helpful in promoting this meeting to their Hispanic pastors around the state.
The summit is not just for Baptists, as EAN is an evangelical partnership. This is a win-win scenario, in that the Summit will reach many non-Baptists, but we as South Carolina Baptists are shaping it by filling many of its leadership roles. Thanks to South Carolina Baptists and their Cooperative Program dollars for helping to make this possible.
– Goodroe is director of missions for the Spartanburg County Baptist Network.