Missions

AN INTRODUCTION TO MISSIONS

For over 50 years, AE has been committed to this mission:

“To evangelise the cities of Africa through Word and Deed in partnership with the Church”.

This vision given to AE founder Michael Cassidy has brought the Gospel to millions of Africans over the years. AE is unique for our focus on stratified evangelism – reaching people at whatever place they are in, be that a presidential office, business board room, slum, marketplace or many other locations. There is no one audience for a mission audience, AE evangelists have been able to share the Gospel with every strata of society in any given city selected for a mission. AE tries to run at least one large city mission in each of our 10 African Office countries, as well as a number of smaller outreaches and evangelistic events.

There are Three phases of a city-wide mission, as outlined below:

PREPARATION:

Over the course of a year, the church of the selected city will trained and prepare for the Proclamation week. Training will typically begin with church pastors, then lay leaders and local evangelists, and finally mission volunteers. Often counsellors are trained also, in order to help with the Preservation phase of mission. Training courses may include Preliminary Theological Certificate (PTC) training in core subjects such as New Testament or Biblical Theology, evangelism skills, caring for new believers and more.

During this time, AE National Team Leaders and Mission Directors are in communications with government and local authorities in order to secure large venues for use in the Proclamation phase. Missions are not a secret, and because teams are trying to reach every strata of society, having good relationships with local or national authorities is crucial to successful missions.

PROCLAMATION:

A typical mission lasts 7-10 days. It is a combination of word and deed events, to correlate with our overall mission statement. Every mission begins with a physical (and symbolic) city wide clean-up of the streets as we are anticipating that Jesus is going to sweep and clean the hearts of people.

A National Team will also run a Leadership Dinner, if possible, to share the Gospel with the political leaders of a city through speaking about what good Christ focussed governance looks like.

Then, hundreds of evangelists go out into the streets to engage with every strata of society: professionals, business people, school children, academics, factory workers and street dwellers. There may be as many as 2,000 separate meeting events in a single mission!

“What a joy it is to see people from all walks of life coming into the kingdom of God!” – Stephen Mbogo, AE CEO and International Team Leader

The expectation is that not only will many hear and respond to the message of salvation found in Jesus Christ alone, but also that Africans will reconnect with the Gospel if their hearts have grown cold, and become mature believers. The mission is also about rebuilding and encouraging the churches of Africa to press on in the faith as increasingly mature believers who can go forth to proclaim the Gospel further.

PRESERVATION:

The final stage of a mission is lifelong! As soon as a mission is concluded, mission volunteers follow up new believers through ensuring that these new believers get connected in to local church parishes. Prayer for these new believers is vital. Ensuring that local churches are ready to care for new disciples is critical, as we anticipate a great influx of new Christians after every mission. Sharing experiences and stories, especially testimonies, discipleship classes, forums and other events are all valuable ways to follow up and preserve the harvest of souls post mission.

Looking to the future, it is important to encourage believers to mature and grow in their faith through committing to lifelong, mature lives lived for Christ. Attending church every week, participating in Bible study groups and training events, and supporting subsequent missions in their cities and beyond are important. Theological training through AE funded courses such as Explore (through George Whitefield College), Preliminary Theological Certificate (through Moore College) and many other locally adapted evangelistic programs, help to strengthen and deepen the knowledge of the Church in Africa.

MISSIONS IN 2018

We are looking forward to seeing God at work in Africa in 2018. Please join us, as we commit the missions listed below to the Lord in prayer, eagerly anticipating that He will bring many people to know His son Jesus this year.

[Updated 23 January 2018]

GEORGE WHITEFIELD COLLEGE (GWC)

George Whitefield College (GWC) is an accredited theological college based in Cape Town, South Africa, with a mission to shape minds via a classical theological education, nurture hearts devoted to service and train voices to effectively communicate the word of Christ.

Their vision is “That Africa be filled with preachers and teachers who deeply love the Lord Jesus and who have a profound understanding of Scripture, in order that Africa may increase its share in the Kingdom of God.”

The church in Africa is growing and they need trained teachers of God’s Word. Teachers who are capable of understanding, preaching and teaching the Gospel. George Whitefield College exists to provide high quality tertiary level education and training for Christian life and ministry.

To this end, the GWC programme aims to deepen student understanding of the message of the Bible as a whole, to develop their capacity to relate to the many complex situations of modern life, and to minister the Biblical message to a needy world. This is accomplished by educating people in the principles of Christian knowledge and related fields and by training people for Christian life and ministry with an emphasis on teaching the Word of God.

GWC offers engaging programmes in Theology, the core subjects being Doctrine, Biblical Languages, Church History and Biblical Theology. One of the distinctive features of GWC is that students live in a diverse community of 15 African nationalities.

African Colleges Fund

(Not tax-deductible)

The church in Africa is growing and they need trained teachers who have a deep love for Jesus Christ, and who are capable of understanding, teaching and preaching God’s Word. By supporting the GWC African Colleges Fund, GWC can support other Theological Colleges in Kenya, Uganda, Malawi, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Zimbabwe and Egypt through offering bursaries to their students. In so doing GWC can partner with other African nations to pursue this vision:

‘That Africa be filled with preachers and teachers who deeply love the Lord Jesus and who have a profound understanding of Scripture, in order that Africa may increase her share in the Kingdom of God.’

To give to the GWC African Colleges Fund please click here.

PASTOR TRAINING COURSE

EQUIPPING A NEW GENERATION OF PASTORS: THE PASTOR TRAINING COURSE* (PTC) APPROACH

Africa’s greatest need is not only for more Christians, but particularly for more disciples. While people come to the Lord across the continent in the thousands each day, the church has often been described as “a mile wide but an inch deep”. This is because the growth of the church has outpaced the capacity to train church leadership. The prosperity gospel has also becoming a major challenge in many churches in the continent.

African Enterprise is committed to helping train Godly leadership, equipping church ministers to be faithful to the Gospel, and has been doing this for many years.

The depth of theological training in Africa is lacking. Many Christian leaders cannot afford the time and money for full time theological training or accessing theological modules. There is an absence of and a need for high quality, short term and low cost theological training.

Pastor Training Course is a Bible training initiative. It was developed by Moore College with the purpose of equipping men and women with the knowledge to be preachers and teachers in their local context. In Africa, providing effective, high quality, short term and low cost theological training is critical for the building up of the church. Through PTC, African Enterprise can work toward achieving our mission:

To evangelise the cities of Africa through word and deed in partnership with the Church.

In November 2016, 70 pastors graduated from the PTC course in Nairobi, Kenya. Through your support in prayer and finance, you are equipping many more to teach of the saving power of Jesus. In God’s strength, many will be able to do the same.

To give to the Pastor Training Course please click here.

*Formerly known as the Preliminary Theological Certificate Training in Africa

Annual Reports