Cutting Ribbons

July 21, 2010 By Greg Nemer 2 Comments

I like ribbons. Ribbons are commonly associated with girls but here in Chiapas we men also use ribbons. Recently, I had the honor of dedicating 2 new churches. Part of the new Church dedication ceremony included the official cutting of the ribbons…

Comitan, Chiapas

This New Plant is using a Purpose Driven Church roadmap and even kicked off the dedication using the 40 Days of Purpose campaign. Edwin, the Pastor of this Church is one of my personal disciples. He’s a young minister who is very creative.

Trinitaria, Chiapas

Cutting Ribbons in Chiapas

New Church in Comitan

We had an awesome time at this Church dedication and really saw the anointing of God as I prayed for the Pastor and Church leaders. This Church has a really talented Pastor (Juan) as the leader. Trinitaria is a very Idolatrous place so please pray for this new work.

New Services in English?

Why Not? In Tuxtla Gutierrez, the Capital of Chiapas, I’ve been practically begged to start services in English. That’s because the college students and businessmen are so eager to learn English here. Every Thursday night I’m conducting these services which are evangelistic in nature. I teach on such topics as success, finances and life purpose. Now you can come down to a Spanish speaking Country and preach in English.

Here’s some photos of our first service…

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June Missions Newsletter- Cutting Ribbons (100)

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Filed Under: Planting Churches Tagged With: christian missionary, christian missions, church planting

Holy Smokes

October 16, 2009 By Greg Nemer 4 Comments

Ever wonder where the term “Holy Smoke” comes from?

Some say it’s from the movie “Holy Smoke”. Some cigar fans like the term. Others say, It’s a religious term describing burnt sacrifices in the Old Testament. Still others say that it is sacrilegious and is mocking God. It’s closely related to “Holy Cow”, an expression of surprise or a slang term.
Being here in Chiapas and working with the Indians (mostly Christian) the term “Holy Smoke” forms a new meaning… at least for us.

Anyone that has been anywhere near one of the Indians knows something… They smell like smoke.
The Indians live in the mountains and cook with wood. However there are no chimneys.
The Indians usually have a fire right in the middle of their home to cook with. This also heats up their house when it’s cold. Even the Indians who are fortunate enough to have a kitchen don’t have gas stoves. They simply have another hut with a fire in the middle of it and call it a kitchen. Even if you were to give them an eclectic stove they wouldn’t use it. They prefer cooking with wood and they’re use to all the smoke.

The information contained in this article is available in pdf format from our July, 2009 Newsletter. You may download it here:

July 2009 Newsletter (106)

Speaking of Smoking…

Jude 1: 22-23 says, “And of some have compassion, making a difference: And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh.” That’s exactly what we’re doing.

During the month of July, 2009 we were privileged to start 3 new churches:

El Triunfo, Juarez Chiapas -Our new Pastor in Juarez caught the vision and just opened another mission in this town. Smoking!
Buena Vista, La Rainza- Located in Zapatista Territory- A beautiful view and a great new Church- That Smokes!
Motozintla, Chiapas- After very little persuading, Our Pastor located near the Guatemala border in Huitzla just started a new mission and already has 50 people attending- Holy Smokes!

Again they said, “Alleluia! Her smoke rises up forever and ever!” Rev 19:3

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Smoke rose from his nostrils; consuming fire came from his mouth, burning coals blazed out of it. Ps 18:7-9
But the wicked will perish: The LORD’s enemies will be like the beauty of the fields, they will vanish – vanish like smoke. Ps 37:20

Thank you for helping our ministry to “Smoke”!

Filed Under: New, Tzeltal Indians, Tzotzil indians Tagged With: christian missions, church planting, holy smoke, holy smokes, missions, Tzotzil indians

2 New Churches in 1 Week

May 2, 2009 By Greg Nemer Leave a Comment

This week we had the opportunity to work on 2 new church plants. These Churches are part of The PACE Plan.

To Download this Report in PDF Format click on the following link:

May 2009 Newsletter (83)

Juarez, Chiapas

We traveled to Juarez, Chiapas on Tuesday, April 28th. My family and I were accompanied by Pastor Jorge and his father, A Musician from Chile and his wife, and Antonio, our candidate to be the new Pastor in Juarez.

Greg and Musician Marcelo Herrera From Chile

We had originally planned a big evangelistic out reach in the town square using the concert to draw in new believers. However, because of the swine flu epidemic we were prohibited from holding a mass public meeting.

We elected to have the meeting outside the home of one of the believers in Juarez. We were fortunate to have an attendance of over 50 people. Many of them were part of the family of believes that already existed in Juarez. Pastor Jorge is from Juarez and most of them were his family members.

That evening we saw new people come to the Lord and we also kicked off the first public meeting of our new Church which will have 4 or 5 families attending. This Sunday will be the first meeting where the new Pastor, Antonio will minister. I’ll be helping him with $100 monthly as part of our PACE plan for establishing new churches.

Tzomjok, Cancuc, Chiapas

On Thursday, April 30th of this week, I traveled deep into the mountains near Cancuc, Chiapas to help with a brand new church plant in a place called Tzomjok. There was previously no evangelical church in this tribal community.

The Tzeltal Indians welcomed me and the group of Indians that traveled with me from Cancuc Pozo by giving us a meal (cabbage and beef).

This was our 2nd visit to Tzomjok. The first time we held an evangelistic out reach in the town square. On the previous visit to this new work we also prayed for the land that the new Pastor, Juan Vasquez, had donated to the church. It was previously used for his coffee crop.

Click here to view previous photos

After clearing the land and adding cement posts, I was invited to raise funds for the new building project. Pastor Juan Perez, the overseer of the new project told me that there were only 9 families and that he expected them to raise up a couple of hundred dollars. I offered to match any amount that the church would donate since I knew that these are very poor families.

I preached on giving and even gave the Indians a rooster as an example of giving.

I gave the invitation- to place their offerings in the box located up front. One by one the members of the new congregation came up and deposited their offerings for the new church building.

How much did they give?

To everyone’s surprise, they placed $1200 dollars into the box for their new buiding project. I was caught by surprise also since I only had $500 dollars with me. It was unexpected, so I happily promised to give them the remaining $700 to match what they had given when I returned.

These Tzeltal Indians have been notorious for giving sacrificially. When I left they gave me coffee and 3 litters of honey from the first fruits of their harvests.

I am using everything that is given to us through Globe for these Church planting projects. If you would like to be a part of our church planting projects and the PACE plan you may visit our donations page to view the giving options.

Of course we also need your prayers as Satan hates it when we are planting new churches and making new disciples for Christ.

Filed Under: Planting Churches Tagged With: church planting, Tzeltal Indians, Tzomjoc

$19,520 Pesos and 3 Chickens

April 19, 2009 By Greg Nemer 2 Comments

This Tzotzil Indian Congregation Knows all about Giving out of Love

On April 12^th, Resurrection Sunday, I ministered in Tzenembolon, Chiapas with the Tzotzil Indians and witnessed a miracle.

The purpose of the visit was to work on stage 3 of our church planting program called the PACE Plan :

Outreach-Evangelism and the rental of a meeting place- We pay for this phase
The Assembly of New Believers into a meeting place- We help with the purchase of land
Transition of the work into an Indigenous Church- We help with the Church Building project by matching faith promises

The sermon topic was “giving by grace and not by law” We give because we love Christ, not out of obligation. I spoke on the Cross and the Resurrection as proof that Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law. In other words Grace, not works is the secret to Abundant Christian living.

This Tzotzil Indian Congregation Knows all about Giving out of Love

I saw this poverty stricken church of 200 Indians step out on faith this day. You see, besides the Celebration of New Life Sunday (Easter) I also went to this village with the purpose of raising funds for a new church building. This family of believers has grown out of the smaller building and termites have eaten the wood so they desperately need $9,600 dollars to provide a large building made out of block to meet in.

After encouraging the Indians to step out on faith in their giving we began to raise up faith promises to pay for their new building project. I offered to match whatever faith promise that each person committed too. I carried a whole bundle of cash with me. (the money you give to our ministry).

“Within the next 2 months, how many people will promise to give $1000 pesos (Approximately $100 )” I challenged them.

11 Indian men raised their hands making faith promises. Wow! That’s certainly more than I had expected.

I know that these Indians are the poorest of the poor and that most of them don’t have a monetary income. The average person that does have a job makes about $35 dollars a week. (most of them work the fields or farm)

I continued receiving faith promises in smaller increments. $500, $250, $100, $50, and even 10 pesos so that the children could get involved.

That day a miracle took place- These people of Faith just kept on giving.

As they gave I matched the same amount by placing it in the offering plate.

To my surprise, this congregation raised up $19,520 pesos…. And 3 Indians also pledged to donate chickens. ($19,520 pesos is the equivalent of a little over $1,900 dollars).Talking about the widow’s mite and giving sacrificially.

View the video of me matching faith promises with the Indians:

How Your Donations To Our Ministry are Being Spent

That Sunday the total amount of funds raised was $39,040 pesos or approximately $3,900 dollars because I matched the same amount with the money that you’ve donated to this ministry. This $3,900 will easily pay for the foundation of the new church building.

If you’ve ever wondered how we spend the funds that you donate to Missions with Purpose now you have a prime example of your money being spent for a great cause….the building of a new church..

We use ALL of your donations for ministry (except for the tithe).

But that’s not all, with The P.ACE Plan, our new program for Planting New Churches, we promise to use methods of matching pesos for peso just like I’ve described above to actually multiply the offerings that you give.

Now I would like to challenge you- Would you make a faith promise today to support this ministry on a regular basis?

On Easter Sunday I was the one who received a blessing as I experienced the joy of giving. Not to mention that the Indians gave me a hen as my honorarium.

How much could you make a commitment to give today?

$1000, $500, $250, $100 dollars a month? Perhaps you could make a promise to give $20. The amount is between you and God .The important thing is that you give. When you do, we’ll wisely multiply your giving efforts and produce a greater harvest for God’s Kingdom by multiplying blessings just like God does.$20 dollars will purchase approximately 40 blocks. The members of the congregation will match the same amount. That equals 80 blocks using your $20 gift.

The economy is experiencing problems, but God is working just as He always had. He is blessing and he is supplying more than just our needs. Our family has increased our giving efforts. My 8 year old daughter even gave $5 to the Indians on Sunday. While others have suffered financially, we have seen more financial blessings as a result of sacrificial giving. I encourage you to make an eternal investment by donating or making a faith promise today.

This is our April 2009 Newsletter.Download this Article in pdf format:

April 2009 Newsletter (136)

For more information on how to donate to the ministry please visit our donations page.

We appreciate your comments in the form below

Greg, the Tzotzil Indian Pastors Family Cristi holding the honorarium

Serving Christ Together,

Greg

p.s. All your donations are likely tax deductible. Give to increase God’s kingdom while saving money on what the government sometimes wastes.”

Filed Under: New, Planting Churches, The PACE Plan Tagged With: chiapas, church planting, indigenous church, Matching faith promises, mission, missions, Missions With Purpose, new churches, outreach evangelism, Resurrection, The PACE Plan, Tzenembolon, Tzotzil indians

Plant New Churches.com

April 14, 2009 By Greg Nemer 1 Comment

The Goal of Missions is to Make Disciples and Establish Indigenous Churches

The following is our new church planting plan. We appreciate your involvement.

3 Phase Plan for Church Planting

Our 3 Phase plan for Church planting includes:

Outreach
The Assembly of New Believers into a meeting place
Transition for the work into an Indigenous Church

Phase 1- Outreach

Phase 1 of our church planting plan is Outreach- This involves evangelism and the Discipleship of New Believers.

Methods of Outreach include but are not limited to the following:

Campaigns
40 Days of Purpose
Social Outreaches

The outreaches usually end on Saturday night. On Sunday Morning the first “official” Church service is held.

We need finances to:

Pay for the actual campaign

Rent a building for a pastor for 6 months to a year – The New Pastor will stay in the building and services will also be held in the same building. In rural areas many times the Pastor will travel back and froth to a village. They will meet in the home of a new believer. In this case funds would be used to pay for his travel expenses.

Phase 2- The Assembly of New Believers into a Meeting Place

Phase 2 of our Church Planting plan is to aid the new believers in obtaining a permanent meeting place.

The Church should have a minimum membership of 50 new believers to enter into this phase.
We will strive to aid the new congregation in obtaining land through fund raising.
Many times a tent/tarp or temporary building can be constructed on the land to meet in

Phase 3- Transition for the Work into an Indigenous Church

Phase 3 is to finalize the Goal of Missions- Raising up an Indigenous Church

After obtaining a membership of at least 100 disciples we will aid the New Church in the construction of the building.

Building project methods:

Construction of the roof after the foundation and walls or built (or vice versa)
Raising up Faith Promises by matching the same amount of funds that are pledged for the new building
A ministry team will come and construct the new building after the church has raised up 1/2 of the funds necessary to complete the project.

Please email me at gregnemer@missionswithpurpose.com for more information or to become involved. I welcome you comments or suggestions in the form below.

Filed Under: New, Planting Churches Tagged With: church planting, plant indigenous churches, plant new churches

Equipping Leaders With Bible Schools

February 9, 2009 By Greg Nemer 2 Comments

One of the biggest challenges to starting new churches is to have leaders to Pastor them.

For that reason we are concentrating on Training Leaders.

This is the the 2nd purpose of our PEACE plan: [Read more...]

Filed Under: Equipping Servant Leaders, New, Tojolabal Indians, Tzeltal Indians, Tzotzil indians Tagged With: church planting, equipping leaders, leadership training, Missionary Bible schools

Missions is About Church Planting

January 8, 2009 By Greg Nemer Leave a Comment

Missions and missionaries are all about church planting.

There are many missions activities and many projects that a missionary is involved in but the greatest focus in missions should be that of world evangelization and church planting.

I really like this definition of “Christian mission” from wikipedia.com

A Christian mission has been widely defined, since the Lausanne Congress of 1974, as that which is designed “to form a viable indigenous church-planting movement.” This definition is motivated by a theologically imperative theme of the Bible to make God known, as outlined in the Great Commission. The definition is claimed to summarize the acts of Jesus‘ ministry, which is taken as a model motivation for all ministries.

$Tom Venuto\s Kitchen$

New Church plant

The Christian missionary movement seeks to implement churches after the pattern of the first century Apostles. The process of forming disciples is necessarily social. “Church” should be understood in the widest sense, as an organization of believers rather than simply a building. Many churches start by meeting in houses.

Church planting by cross-cultural missionaries leads to the establishment of self-governing, self-supporting and self-propagating assemblies of believers. This is the famous “three-self” formula invented by Henry Venn of the London Church Missionary Society in the 19th century. Cross-cultural missionaries are persons who accept church-planting duties go to people outside their culture, as Christ commanded in the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20).

However, Christian missions can more broadly mean any activity in which Christians are involved for world evangelization.

In addition to theological doctrine, many missionaries promote economic development, literacy, education, health care and orphanages, believing these causes advance the glory of God. Christian doctrines (such as the “Doctrine of Love” professed by many missions) may permit the provision of aid without requiring religious conversion.

read more or get further information: Evangelism and Christianization

The wikipedia is not a Bible so I cant really preach from it but it does cover 3 points that I always emphasis in Missions With Purpose ministry:

Making Disciples- I like the house meeting church plant idea
Establishing indigenous Churches- self-governing, self-supporting and self-propagating assemblies of believers
In addition to fullfilling the great Comission through world evangelization secondary activities and methods for ministry which our missions Ministry covers in the PEACE plan

I’ve told you all of that as a prerequisite to some great news.

On Saturday, January 3rd. We started the year off right by officially planting our first church of the New Year. That’s the goal of Missions.

We traveled to a remote Indian village near Cancuc Centro, Chiapas, Mexico with the Tzeltal Indians. We prayed for the leader of the new plant and even prayed over the place where we would like to build a new building for the church to occupy.

Here are some of the photos from our recent church plant celebration:

www.flickr.com

purposemission’s First Church plant for 2009 photoset

Filed Under: New Tagged With: Cancuc Centro, church planting, Greg Nemer, missionaries, missions, Missions With Purpose, Tzeltal

Planting Churches

June 4, 2008 By Greg Nemer Leave a Comment

Planting Churches (to attack spiritual lostness) is our number one priority

Filed Under: New, Planting Churches Tagged With: church planting

23 New Indian Churches

April 20, 2008 By Greg Nemer 3 Comments

Last month I told you about how I am continuing on my quest to make a million dollars this year. I also told you that I would use the money to start up new churches all over the world.

People laughed while I envisioned.

So how much money have I raised? A little.

How many new churches came under our ministry this year?

The answer: 23 Indian Churches so far. .