Lausanne World Pulse – Transforming Partnership at the Coalition on the Support of Indigenous Ministries (COSIM) Conference
By John Lindner
“Partnerships That Transform—Here and There” was the theme of this year’s Coalition On the Support of Indigenous Ministries (COSIM) conference, held 12-14 June 2006 at the Billy Graham Center in Wheaton, Illinois, USA.
Seventy-three mission enthusiasts met to share experiences and to learn how to have more effective partnerships. At least twenty churches and one denominational mission board was represented.
About COSIM
COSIM is a fellowship of evangelical organizations with a common interest in supporting and building Developing World ministries. It has no central office and all work is done by volunteers from member agencies.
COSIM was formed in 1996 through the efforts of John Bennett of the Overseas Council; Chuck Bennett, then president of Partners International; Bernie May of The Seed Company, a branch of Wycliffe; Daniel Rickett, then of Salt and Light, now vice president of Sisters in Service; and Ken Gill, associate director of the Billy Graham Center. Some of the agencies represented have been pioneering partnerships with indigenous missions for over fifty years.
COSIM Conference
Key speakers at this year’s conference were Gary Edmonds, senior partner for Breakthrough Partners and former general secretary for the World Evangelical Alliance; Dick Robinson, senior associate pastor for outreach at Elmbrook Church in Brookfield, Wisconsin (USA); David Kasali, founder and president of the Christian Bilingual University of Congo; and an Indonesian brother known only as Faisal, who spoke about a village transformed after the 2004 tsunami which hit Southeast Asia.
Planners of the conference wanted to make sure participants heard from representatives of indigenous missions in the Majority World as well as from mission agency leaders in North America. According to Dr. David Kasali, even though the majority of sub-Sahara Africa is Christian—and evangelical in orientation—encroaching Western values are displacing much of what is uniquely African culture. Meanwhile, Dr. Kasali added, economic progress is passing it by while the media focuses on other parts of the world. He said the three biggest challenges facing the Church in Africa today are war, AIDS and Islam. He said the African Church must raise up its own sons and daughters to deal with these issues and affirmed that partnership with mission agencies and churches in the North will help make that happen. However, Dr. Kasali said, the African Church can teach Western churches contentment, dependence on God and humility.
Lessons from Leaders
Faisal shared how one American church got him treatment in America when he came down with leukemia and how this led to contact with Partners International, which took him on as a partner. That, in turn, led to the raising up of 120 incarnational workers in Malaysia and Indonesia. The secret to effective partnerships, according to Faisal, is taking time to build trust in relationships, jointly planning the agenda and not handing it to a national mission on a Western platter. He said in Aceh the emphasis is on three things (in this order): being, doing and saying. In the West it is often in the reverse order.
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John Lindner published Christian Mission magazine for Christian Aid for twenty-five years. He is founder of World Christian Ministries, which publishes World Christian magazine to tell the story of missions in the Two-thirds World. |