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Ethnic summit seeks to reach diverse population
K. Faith Morgan, NAMB
May 21, 2015
5 MIN READ TIME

Ethnic summit seeks to reach diverse population

Ethnic summit seeks to reach diverse population
K. Faith Morgan, NAMB
May 21, 2015

People-group ministry is often viewed as an international concern, but the executive leadership at the North American Mission Board (NAMB) is seeking to highlight this ministry’s importance and develop the scope of Southern Baptist people-group efforts in North America.

“The ethnic population is growing faster than the Anglo population in the United States,” said NAMB senior assistant to the president, Kim Robinson. About 58 percent of the new churches added to the Southern Baptist Convention in 2013 and 2014 are reported to be minority congregations, he noted.

Robinson and NAMB president, Kevin Ezell, hosted a two-day summit at NAMB’s Alpharetta, Ga., building to address this growing need. More than 20 Southern Baptist leaders representing several different ethnic groups sat down to discuss current outreach efforts and explore how NAMB could effectively help plant churches for diverse populations in cooperation with ethnic Southern Baptist groups like the National African American Fellowship, the Vietnamese Baptist Fellowship of North America, the Native Fellowship of Christians, the Chinese Baptist Fellowship of the U.S. and Canada, and others.

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Photo by John Swain/NAMB

The North American Mission Board (NAMB) hosted a two-day summit to address collaboration and partnership to strength ethnic church planting and people group focus in North America. Participants included NAMB president Kevin Ezell, K. Marshall Williams, Byron Day, A.B. Vines, Dennis Manpoong Kim, Christian Phan, Abraham Chiu, Ted Lam, Jeremiah Lepasana, Bobby Sena, Rolando Castro Salas, Erick Zaldana, Emerson Falls, Santosh Ramdam, Mokhles Bekhet and NAMB staff Carlos Ferrer, Gary Frost, Jeff Christopherson, Kim Robinson, Jason Kim, Jeremy Sin, Ramon Osario, Gary Hawkins, Aslam Masih, Dhati Lewis, Neal Hughes, Clark Logan, Jerry Daniel, Greg Murphree, Chad Childress, Shane Critser, and Mike Ebert.

“We did not invite you here just to get to know you. We didn’t invite you here just to come and share the particular needs of each area. We’re really ready to stand with you. To speak up at the appropriate time, and to sacrificially, come together to have a shared goal of how we’re going to get this done,” Ezell said during the April 23-24 meeting.

Robinson told the group in his opening remarks, “We have a very strong desire to accelerate ethnic church planting, but we know we can’t do that by ourselves.”

He said, “That comes from pastor-led churches leading their congregations into church planting. So we want to partner with you to help plant more than we could if we tried to do it alone. It’s not that you need to join forces with us, and we are your leaders. We want to join forces with you.”

Throughout the two days, participants spent time in both large group sessions and small-group meetings where they explored ways that their respective fellowships could work symbiotically.

“We would like to advocate the potential of partnership with other ethnic groups, so that we could add value to the kingdom work here in the U.S.,” said Filipino leader Jerry Lepasana.

Dennis Manpoong Kim, pastor of Global Mission Church in Silver Springs, Md., agreed. “It is encouraging for me and for my congregation to cross over the ethnic boundaries to help other people start new churches,” he said. “I have a clearer understanding of what we are trying to do together, and I give thanks to God.”

One of the major organizational instruments introduced at the summit was the NAMB Church Plant Map at namb.net/map. This interactive online tool allows pastors, planters and church members to see both current church plants and potential plants by ethnic group alongside census statistics. The data presented is the result of research and on-the-ground expertise from missionaries and pastors living in the area.

“We constantly update these maps,” Ezell said. “We don’t just come up with these numbers arbitrarily. We meet with people locally who have investment and expertise there, and we put the information on the map for everybody to see.”

Many leaders echoed a desire for increased collaboration and communication between their organizations and NAMB, too. The tools and initiatives presented by NAMB’s mobilization team sparked enthusiasm for the potential to partner in ministry and magnify the groups’ respective strengths – especially as it relates to the specific cultural context of each ethnic group.

“You’ve got dots on the map, and so do we,” said Emmerson Falls, chairman of the Native Fellowship of Christians, in reference to NAMB’s extensive map of target church plants. “Where they overlap, let’s partner together – it just makes sense.”

The meeting also stressed the bond of fellowship forged through prayer. K. Marshall Williams, Sr., president of the National African American Fellowship, said “If we don’t dialogue with the divine – if dust doesn’t talk to deity – nothing is going to happen.”

Ezell said, “I really believe that God has brought us together for such a time as this. God has brought us together for a purpose, and it’s not just to grow in fellowship with one another but to leave here with some action points. What are we going to do, and what are we going to do together?”

(EDITOR’S NOTE – K. Faith Morgan writes for the North American Mission Board.)