Bethany Mission Church
Bethany Mission Church
Mission
- To Exalt the Lord – Worship
- To Equip the believer – Word
- To Encourage the community – Work
- To Evangelize the world- Witness
Vision Statement
As a multi-congregational church that exalts God and welcomes people from all walks of life, we are pursuing true discipleship and making a difference in our world by proclaiming the Gospel. We are pressing toward mobilizing 250 gifted ministers who will reach out from 250 Gospel centers across India to train 25,000 committed disciples of Jesus within 2,500 villages. As well, we are aiming to accommodate 1,200 children in a Christian education center and to found 12 worship centers, each with a minimum of 100 members within Vizianagaram, Andhra Pradesh, alone.
Values
- We value the Bible as God’s authoritative and accurate source for salvation and Christian living. Hence, we teach our people how the fundamental truths of the Bible impact our daily living and help them to live in the light of Scripture.
- We value worship that is both accurate and authentic. We believe that full devotion to God and His cause are normal for every believer. We seek to provide opportunities to authentically and accurately worship God in both personal and corporate settings. We seek to maximize participation in God centered worship in our Sunday services and also to instruct and encourage people in some of the basic forms of personal worship, such as prayer, Bible study, meditation, fasting, solitude, etc.
- We value fellowship that is relational, sacrificial and evangelistic. We seek to provide opportunities for people to meet in small group settings and minister to each other. We seek to split up our church into small groups of 10 to 12 people, and as the group grows, it is split into two groups. The policy is dividing and multiplying (growing).
- We believe in equipping the believers for ministry and life by helping them to operate in spiritual gifts.
- We value discipleship that is transformational and evangelistic: turning believers into disciples, getting involved in small groups, discovering spiritual gifts and beginning to function in those gifts, and sharing the gospel with others.
- We value ministry that is compatible with our people and effective for the Church. Our goal is to make every member a minister, as we believe the Church should function as an organism edifying each other. Team ministry is our model.
- We value prayer that is passionate and Spirit-led. Our church seeks to continue to be characterized by prayer by providing multiple venues for people in our church to engage in prayer: early morning prayer, prayer in small groups, praying in twos, prayer chains, all night prayer vigils, etc.
- We believe that an effective church serves its community and treats everyone with love, respect, and dignity.
Missionaries
We are challenged by the Words of Jesus Christ: “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into His harvest field.” Jesus knew that people had to hear, and for them to hear, someone had to go tell them. For them to go and tell, others had to be used by the Father to send them out.
Romans 10:13 says: “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” The verses that follow ask four very important questions:
- How then can they call on the One in whom they have not believed?
- How can they believe in the One of whom they have not heard?
- How can they hear without someone preaching to them?
- How can anyone preach unless they are sent?
“As it is written: ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who bring Good News.'”
Since the very beginning of this ministry of the Good News of Jesus Christ, salvation in Jesus Christ was preached, drawing many people to faith in Him. Many new churches were established, particularly in the remote tribal communities, fishing communities, and rural villages. These people had never before heard the Good News of Jesus. Each native missionary is taking the Good News to at least 6-10 villages by walking or riding a bicycle. Many times, these missionaries are persecuted, beaten, tortured, imprisoned and excommunicated from the villages.
Jesus died for the sins of all mankind – every man, woman and child on the face of the earth! However, they have to believe in Jesus to be saved. To believe in Jesus, they have to hear about Him. To hear about Him, someone has to go and tell them. For someone to go and tell them, others have to give to provide the needed funds to send them.
That is exactly what we are asking you to do. We and our missionaries are ready to GO so that others can be saved and experience the love of Christ, but we cannot go on our own. We need you to send us and our missionaries. We are co laborers with God.
Discipleship Development – Turning Members into Disciples
The fundamental principle to note is that biblical leadership has in view the challenging and equipping of the whole flock for ministry. In the early church, everyone evangelized everywhere. Thus, it is the intention of BMS to equip the lay leaders and ministers for the evangelistic task.
We regard evangelism as the most important ministry of the church. We aim to see people changed into disciples of Christ. For this purpose, we appoint in each center one pastor, one associate pastor, one children’s minister, one youth worker, six evangelists, and three core committee members.
We develop leadership at our church from the men, women, and youth in the centers who are faithful Christians. Our goal is to get every member involved in a church ministry. For this cause, in the beginning of each year, we take all lay leaders and other ministers and their spouses on a three-day leadership retreat.
At this retreat, I share my vision and the mission of BMS. We discuss the goals of our church for the upcoming years. Along with this, on the second Friday and Saturday of every month, all members are required to come together for learning and sharing the reports of the work accomplished for the previous month. Teaching will be on a biblical basis for every member’s ministry with principles like every believer is a minister, every ministry is important, we are dependent on each other, and knowing your spiritual gifts.